Dark and tasty

At some point in November, Kep came to visit me, which was an excellent choice on his part, because we both had fun during his stay. And in case you're wondering, the title does not refer to Kep, because that would be really weird and kind of queer; see below for details...The initial plan was to go and do something cultural every day, but of course that plan went to pieces after his first evening here, which also was the first night we went out, being a Friday night and all.

The night had begun with take-away Indian food that was extremely tasty, after which we headed out so we could explore the legendary night life. Unfortunately, I am a poor guide in that respect as about the only place I could give a reasonable tour of is the library. However, we started out by going through Temple Bar, the central nightlife district of Dublin, and grabbing a couple Guinness in a small pub. Next stop was a place called Cafe En Seine, named after the French river that runs through Paris. The Irish however, cannot pronounce that name, so it comes out as "Cafe Insane," and it's a reasonably known nightlife spot I was introduced to by my god father. The place has incredible decor though, and that's why I actually took Keo there, for what I expected to be one drink, but we ended up there for most the night. Kep was quite popular with the Irish and foreign ladies, and eventually I lost him because he'd been dragged to nearby bar by a bunch of Spanish women, and we spent the rest of the night alternating between the two localities.
Saturday we nursed our hangovers (I also went to the library, I think) until evening time when we had a couple cans at my flat and hung with my comic flat mate, Barry. Upon heading out, Barry recommended a place called Hogan's, which since has become my favorite weekend night spot. There, we chilled out the evening grooving to the mellow old school hip hop sounds the resident DJ infuses with soul, funk and Motown samples, as well as the occasional guitar riff. A less eventful, but more relaxing night that was equally enjoyed.

Sunday we finally got out and did our cultural event: The Guinness Factory tour! (Funny how our cultural event also included alcohol. Find the link here.) Unfortunately, the tour doesn't actually allow you to see where the beer - sorry stout - is brewed, but you do learn a fair amount about brewing in general and the Guinness brand in particular. You also got to try things like roasted barley, an important ingredient in stout and what gives it the distinctive coloring. In fact, the barley roasting could be smelled from my flat the day before we went on the tour, as the wind often carries the smell from the St. James brewery into the city centre. It was always a pleasure to get outside and on my bike in the morning to be greeted by the sweet and wholesome smell of this process, a gentle - and necessary - reminder that there is more to life in Dublin than just endless mind-numbing, painful, depression-inducing study. There also is Guinness (and someday I hope to take advantage of that).That's a lot or barley!

The coolest part of the tour is probably the building itself: they have converted one of the old storehouses for the grain, which sits atop the hill of the brewery and overlooks the city, into the museum, so there is a huge atrium, which is probably about 14 stories high, with various exhibition halls going off it. While we were there, there also was a special temporary exhibition on John Gilroy, the guy who created all the iconic Guinness ads with the animals and so forth, which was pretty cool. In fact, the St. James' Brewery, where Guinness is still brewed today originally didn't belong to Arthur Guinness. Instead, he leased the land for the brewery for a couple hundred pounds - and 7000 years. Now considered the most astute real estate deal in the history of the British Isles, this means that Guinness now sits on some of the most valuable land in Europe, at the heart of one of Europe's most expensive real estate markets. In fact, the company is thinking of moving to a different location and selling the land, which is valued above a billion Euros! They had an original copy of the lease recessed in the ground of the entry hall, which you can see to the left.

One thing I didn't realize about the Guinness drought we drink today is that that particular beverage wasn't created - or at least, released onto the public - until 1959. Previously, there had been various forms of Guinness, predominantly bottled for export, such as "Foreign Extra" and "Extra Stout." Sometimes you can still ind these in pubs here in Dublin, although it is rather rare. Moreover, Guinness runs a continuous Brewhouse Series of slightly altered brews - currently the "Northhouse," of which we received a sample - and also some crazy new stuff in the works like Guinness Red (my pub in London actually turned down an offer as a sampling point for that new one last year, and I have yet to try it).
The final part of the tour is a complimentary pint of Guinness on top of the factory in a round glass bar, with views over all of Dublin.
Bottoms up! Too bad we didn't have the views.

Unfortunately for us, it was both dark and raining, so we couldn't see anything. But on the upside, some English girls next to us didn't want their pints, so we had a couple pints each. We then purchased some Guinnes Foreign Extra bottles - at a whoping 9% alcohol - for our walk back into town. At that point Kep and I split ways, as I had to go to the library to write a paper critique avec buzz while he found himself a sports bar and watched the NFL.

Every few hours Kep would call me, and each time he would sound a little more drunk, until eventually he called in order to tell me that he had a bunch of girls and I should join them. I finally left the library at 1.30 in the morning and went to find Kep, who immediately infused me with a Vodka Red Bull. Unfortunately, I think the bartender had cut him off at this point, so I drank a pure Red Bull, which meant that I ended up sleeping quite poorly. that was the first time I was happy there there is a closing hour to the nightlife here, because if there weren't, I don't think God himself could have moved Kep out of the bar. Then he and the girls unsuccessfully attempted to convince me to join them at the girls' hotel, and I was glad to see Kep a few hours later, still in one piece after he returned to m.y place after having been at theirs. I should add that most of them were quite attractive, despite their North English accents.

Eye of the Storm

Where have I been, where have I been, you ask yourself in vain as you pick up the broken pieces of your once promising life and academic career.....

As for myself, I have been engulfed in a storm the size of which is hard to imagine. Think of the movie The Day After Tomorrow and that huge storm - and we all know how awesome that movie was, what with its predictable story lines and marvelously lousy acting - well, I just passed through the eye of that storm (the storm total seemed to cover the entire northern hemisphere). Except where the storm in the movie is a snowstorm, mine is a shitstorm. This was driven home to me Tuesday when I entered the fecal smelling graduate reading room, where apparently the toilets that haven't been renovated since 1937 and have plywood floors had flooded the basement of the building. True shitstorm.

Anyway, since I last posted here, I had a ton of projects due before the end of the term on December 14. I had hoped to relax at that point, but it turns out the end of the term is not actually the end of our work, since I had to hand things in the following week, so I stuck around Dublin and completed the work, and ended up moving houses again the day before i left for London - stress stress stress. Then I went to London for my break .... no, wait, I didn't! Because our course, in the words of the head of our department, "is about breaking your balls" so we have our ridiculously long and difficult exams after the "vacation" that is not a vacation.

To add to the stress of these exams, my youngest sister decided to get married over this winter break. So I'm now coming to you live and direct and with a brother in law. Anyway, the stress of the exams really made it hard to enjoy the wedding and all the visitors that came to town - most of my family, and the lady friend (for whom we still need a good blog-alias, please feel free to post suggestions) - stress stress stress and more stress. But at the end of the day it all went off well.

Then came the exams themselves, which were last week- stress stress stress stress. 3 classes - 3 exams - each 3 hours long. 3 unmitigated disasters, in which I managed to stress myself out and get so nervous I couldn't even do the simplest of tasks, and failed to answer a single question correctly on any of the three exams. This despite the fact that we had been given some of the questions beforehand. In retrospect, the days and nights I put in in the library weren't nearly enough, nor do I feel I would have done any better had I spent more time. When you can't even answer the questions that you knew beforehand would be on the test.... it says a lot about you.

The eye of the shitstorm was this past weekend. After the final exam, we went out for drinks, then home for a belated birthday dinner, followed by more going out at Hogan's and the excellent late-night DJ there, not to mention Jacobo the Italian Principella's dance performance, an experience I cannot even begin to describe. Let me just say it was good enough for me to commit to some kind of concert this weekend, type of music unknown, in hopes of seeing that again. It was awesome.
The following morning, I was woken by some kind of loud noise, which turned out to be my alarm. I had set the alarm because I had an 11 am flight to Germany with one of my classmates from the course in Dublin, which was going to be my little mini-vacation. I was psyched for this trip because i hadn't been to Frankfurt for 2 years. 90 minutes later, I was once again awoken by some kind of loud noise, again coming from my phone, but this time it was actually ringing. Since I was too gone to understand the person on the other end of the line, I asked him to repeat everything slowly. It turned out to be Ollie, who had forgotten his passport for the flight, and wanted to know if I was at the airport yet. I asked him what time it was, and freaked out when he told me 9.30. Somehow, both of us still managed to catch the flight.
By that night we were in Frankfurt, and after chilling with my cousin for a bit, I headed out towards the Taunus, where I grew up. First I missed the train, so I spent 30 minutes at the main train station (Hbf). I always forget how much English is spoken in Frankfurt, it's really incredible. Even the doener (shwarma/kebab) salesman earlier that day switched to English when he realized Ollie couldn't speak German - and the dude's English was better than his German. I then picked up Moritz, whom I hadn't seen in 5 or 6 years, on the platform at FFM West by yelling for him to jump on the train, and we began reminiscing and catching up as we headed out to Bad Soden to meet Steph, who met us at the station. We decided to skip food (I was still pretty full from the doener) we headed over to my hometown Oberursel and went to Chris' house. This entire evening was a huge throwback to when I still lived in Oberursel. Not only is Chris' room still the same, but we just talked about all the old people, caught up on each other's travels and looked at pictures, both new and old. Obviously, Lena's wedding was the really big story. But really, it was all like back in the day: Chris and his room, Mo had stuff from his father's stash, and we just kicked it real laid back.
We had arrived around 10 pm, and aside from a walk out to a field know as the Stierstaedter Heide up the road, just been talking when I asked what time it was. It turned out to be 3.30 in the morning, meaning I couldn't get back into Frankfurt, and despite constantly saying "we should go home" we weren't out the door for almost another hour. Overall, it was one of the most pleasant evenings I've had in a very, very long time, despite the fact we still had to walk Steph's dog when we got home after 5.
The next day included oversleeping. Instead of being up at 10 or 11, it wasn't until 12.30 that I awoke, and only with help. After a nice breakfast, we went to Stuff and Axel's place in Frankfurt for a few hours, then back to Oberursel to have tea with my relatives. Of course I was a) late and b) baked from Stuff's homegrown, so that was somewhat awkward, but nonetheless nice. Then one of my cousins and I went to a theater performance, and I headed back to Stuff's since it happened to be in the same neighborhood as the theater. After several more hours, a paper and doener run, and the introduction to a computer program that allows you to design ultimate plays, I headed for my cousin's to crash. (I think I'll have to do a separate post on this program, and of course Bert will be addicted immediately.)
The next morning I rose early enough to catch the 7 am bus from the city center to Hahn airport, 2 hours away. Shockingly, Olli made it also, and by midday we were back on Irish soil. Much to my disappointment, i may add.

That was my "eye of the storm" as now the fury of the second semester is upon me.

Basically, I now have a 6 week sleep deficit that I'll have to try and make up somehow, because the term can't continue how it began, with me sleeping through my 4 pm lecture Monday, and a constant threat for zzzzzs during class Tuesday. Moreover, I now have to do more than just the standard workload, as I need to begin preparing to re-sit the exams, provided they even permit me to do so. Oh, and I've been sick since Thursday, something I've seen coming for weeks, and finally my body gave in to it.

Hope everyone is having a good alumni weekend, wish I could be there.