Dublin Excursion

Last weekend I went to Dublin with my group and the first thing we did when we got there was tour the Rotunda hospital, the oldest maternity hospital in Europe where about 10,000 babies are still born there each year. It related to our study abroad seminar class because in that class, we are learning about Ireland's healthcare system. We are looking at how healthcare has changed and developed throughout Ireland's history as well as comparing their system to ours at home in the US. 

Inside the chapel at Rotunda Hospital

After the tour we got to go shopping for the first time since we’ve been here! It was fun to hang out and shop in a bigger city. For supper we went to the Brazen Head, the oldest bar in Dublin. Kate and I shared our meals, she had beef Guinness stew and I had fish and chips, it was excellent.

That night, we went out in Dublin and four of us ended up at the crowded Temple Bar where there were a lot of people and live music! We went there almost every night of our trip and Friday night they had an amazing band. We also went to a pub called The Porterhouse where they have hundreds of beer from all around the world.

Christ Church Cathedral

Friday during the day we toured the city of Dublin with our Theology professor, Brother Colman. He showed us the remnants of the Viking city there and pointed out other landmarks. We went to Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells, which reminded me of the Saint John’s Bible. It is a handwritten book of the four gospels in Latin. We spent the entire day walking and were pretty tired by the end of the night but we got to see a lot of things relating to what we’ve been talking about in theology. We went to a museum where the have an exhibit on bog bodies. They are bodies that were thrown into bogs and well preserved because of the environment, some of them still had hair; it was a little creepy but probably the coolest thing at the museum as well.

Passage Tomb

The next day we went to Knowth, which is a huge megalithic passage tomb. There is one huge tomb in the middle and several satellite tombs around it. The tombs are older than the pyramids in Egypt and they are evidence that these people believed in an afterlife. It also showed that they had knowledge of the solar system and the sun because the two tombs face each other and have places above the doors where the sun shines in on the solstice and illuminates the tomb. The people buried there would have been important and it would have reminded those who saw if of their status as well as the fact that life will end and they too will die and go on to an afterlife.

View from the top of Knowth

Sunday was a lot of fun because we went horseback riding. My horse was named Jack and he was really cute! We rode for an hour and it was a great stress reliever and an enjoyable thing to do with our group.  

Jack and Me!

I liked Dublin a lot and there is so much to do there, I wouldn’t mind returning later this semester or later in life! Tomorrow I start my ten day break where I will be traveling to Brussels, Amsterdam, Munich and Salzburg!