The Beginning of the Beginning of the End

Well with the exception of final exams, my third year of college has come to an end.  This was the last week of classes here at UCD.  Next week is a "reading week" (aka a week for most people to travel) and then exams start up.

On Wednesday for my Irish History Class we had a "gallery" of the posters we individually made about a symbol we thought best represented Ireland's history.  The business school provided us with free food and wine for just standing around for forty minutes so it was worth it.  I got back the essay I neglected to write until the last minute around Spring Break and got an A on it...pretty happy about that seeing as we were told at the beginning of the semester that it's pretty much impossible to get an A on an assignment here.

Saturday was our final API event.  I headed into town early because it was such a nice day and wanted to walk around a little to see some places I hadn't been yet.  I walked along the Liffey to my favorite bridge in Dublin, the Samuel Beckett Bridge, and snapped some pictures.  Although kind of hard to tell in the picture, the bridge looks like a harp turned on its side.

Samuel Beckett Bridge

On my way back to meet up with my friend Tory to finally go see the Book of Kells, I happened to come across the famine memorial right by the river.  The sculptures were fairly disturbing and the expressions on their faces were quite sad.

Famine Memorial

I met up with Tory at Trinity College and we waited in the queue to see the old book.  The Book of Kells was written by Celtic monks and is one of the oldest books in the world.  It contains the four gospels of the New Testament, all in Latin, and is housed in the Old Trinity Library.

Because Tory goes to school at Trinity, I was able to get in for free rather than paying the ridiculous price of admission for something that takes about five minutes to see.  I would have been rather upset if I had paid.

After the book, we walked up some stairs into the Long Room, which is exactly what the name suggests.  It's a long room of the library with bookshelves on the sides holding very old books.  This was honestly more impressive than the Book of Kells.

The Long Room

Books in the Long Room

It was now time to join up with the API group to start our last get together.  We met at the Abbey Theatre, a place I had learned about in my Irish history class.  The Abbey Theatre held the opening production of The Playboy of the Western World in 1907 which caused rioting in the streets.

The play we saw was called Drum Belly and was absolutely fantastic!  It was a modern play set in the 1960s about a gang of second generation Irish men who have come to an agreement with the Italian mafia until a large sum of money goes missing.  The show was very dirty, gritty, and bloody.  Some of my favorite parts were the scene changes.  The actors came out with blaring rock music from the 60's and would throw the props on and off the stage.  Throughout the play, they made an absolute mess of the stage and nothing was ever cleaned up.  By the end, there was blood, vomit, food, spit, cigarettes, rain water, and so much more just sitting around on the stage floor.  It was also fun to hear the Irish actors do Brooklyn accents.  They all did a pretty good job.  I imagine it was like if an Irish person heard an American attempting an Irish accent.                        

All photos of the play courtesy of:   http://www.abbeytheatre.ie/whats_on/event/drum-belly/

After the show, we got a short talk about the play and the history of the theatre.  We then headed to a place called The Church which is a bar/restaurant inside of an old renovated church.  The organ and stained glass windows are still there.  We had dinner here and partook in the first annual API Awards which Eimear had made for us.  I won the "Carpe Diem Award" for my "ability to make the most of every day."  I was quite pleased with this.

The Church

 A group of us then went to a pub where we partook in some fizzy drinks and then I caught the bus home and went to bed.

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-I leave for Nice, France tomorrow morning to meet up with Megan!  This will be my last trip in Europe so it's incredibly bittersweet!

-Only 3 weeks left :(

***A couple of days early but happy birthday to both Grandmas!!***