I had a visit from a lovely young French girl last weekend. She arrived on Saturday morning and left on Sunday evening. I very much wanted to sleep with her.
Instead I gave her an express tour of Dublin's major cultural landmarks. Giving it some thought I decided Dublin had the following number of attractions worth visiting:
That number is one.
The Book of Kells
And even the Book of Kells is a fucking joke. 9 euro past the door (French girl was inexplicably given a free ticket by some old American woman on the way in) and you are in an asinine tourist shop. Make your way through that and you enter a rather nice exhibition on ancient Irish texts. Not a bad primer for the main event and the room has a gravitas that implies one must speak in whispered tones. And rightly so.
Sadly this atmosphere of scholarly appreciation disappears the moment one enters the main exhibition room. It reminded me of trying to order a pint in the College Bar during Ragweek in Galway . From here on out it is a vicious contest of elbows and shoulders each man trying to wedge their torso between some group of morons who seems to have taken up permanent residence around the Book of Kells display. I am sure that a large part of this unsavory behaviour can be attributed to the high proportion of perfectly sociopathic Spanish Students in the room. So we saw the book and legged it. A few more minutes in the shop and we were back out on the street.
The rest of the day involved walking around the city centre with no real destination in mind(?), visiting St. Stephen's Green (??), a sneaky pint in the Palace bar and then... the inevitable trip to the Guinness Store house.
The Guinness Store House
I had up to that point, been rather proud of myself for having never gone to the Storehouse. It was a tourist magnet, no place for a true Irishman and disciple of the black stuff. Yet there I was, walking around the various multimedia displays explaining how Guinness is made for no other reason than I simply couldn't think of anything else to do. I got the feeling neither of us were getting very much from it; she doesn't drink Guinness and I drink enough to not have to pretend I give a shit how it's made.
One interactive display measured how much drink you consume. Frenchy scored 6 out of 10 which is probably bad. I entered a conservative estimate of how much I drank and got a big red 10/10 resulting in a few worried looks from out fellow visitors. It didn't bother French Girl. I have yet to encounter a foreign girl who has been disappointed to find she is in the company of a a drinking Irishman. I regret if I sound like a prick for saying that but It's true.
The rest of the day was dedicated to eating (Dinner in Juice on Georges St, avoid) and then I was able to bring her to a birthday party so it ended well.
Still though, I would love to know what exactly Dublin has to offer someone who doesn't really get exited about the Irish love affair with booze, and more importantly, boozing.
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