In my effort to make the last post a nice, concise, and unboring rundown of the events I totally forgot ALL the stuff I wanted to say about the things that happened there and all the things I have been excited to share since I got back. Man, am I a fool. So now that you have that handy little overview of events, you can place these thoughts in with that timeline. :-)
The whole day of leaving Greystones was rather sad- I love that town and had been delighted to return (fulfilling a vow I made in the early hours of November 21, 2005). I was also sad because I was leaving my friends with whom I had been through this whole adventure. I was excited to see Devon, but I wish I had known I wasn't gonna see Ben again when I left the room that morning because we never said a proper goodbye, but it was nice of Kelsie to walk me to the DART station.
I was terrified of trying to find my way places using the French language. Sure I can memorize the Beatitudes in French and rattle them off with a nice accent, but landing at some airport in the middle of the night, finding a bus to one of the biggest cities on the continent, then spending the night who knows where? From leaving the DART station in Greystones at 3PM on Friday to finding Devon in Gare Montparnasse at noon the next day, I was mostly lonely and afraid.
But! God was watching over me in a way that was so profoundly evident I would have had to have been in an unconscious state to not recognize it. First, I got straight from Greystones to Pizza Pino in random street number 80 billion in Paris without a single hitch. I wanted to take credit as an expert traveler and decipherer of foreign language signs, but I knew I was too tired and confused for that to be true. Not only that, but God gave me the grace to sleep at time in places I shouldn't have without getting caught. I was given a nice little seat in the pizza place facing away from everyone so I could pull out a book and studiously lean over it which so happened to be a mildly comfortable sleeping position. Random times, I felt the need to open my eyes, smile and look around. Every one of those "random" times, my waiter was just on his way over to check on me. The same thing happened with the police when I was napping in the bus stop: I got up and was rummaging through my suitcase rather than huddled in a corner with a blanket an pillow looking like quite the vagrant. And of course again in the cafe the next morning, I was woken by an unexplainable thing during my little naps to grin up at the barrista who had just then decided to glance at me.
If God's hand wasn't evident enough in the amazing and unexpected hospitality of my new friends Melissa and Philippe, you might have to check your level of awareness and see if you're conscious!
And finally, the grace to have such and amazing, accommodating, wise, understanding, fun, and amusing friend as Devon Graves studying in France, to come to Paris to visit with me and show me around, introduce me to our hosts, not to mention give me the infallible directions that got me to Pizza Pino the night before as well as plan out our French adventure in Caen and Angers for the next few days... this sentence has become too long and I don't know how to end it. But God is amazing to give me a friend like Devon and put us both in that situation!
All in all, I did a terrible job planning this excursion and it should have been the biggest disaster of my life- I mean like dead in a gutter disaster.* But God through Devon, our hosts, and His hand working in so many ways turned it not only into a survival in a big city, but a fantastic touristy trek though Paris!
* Call this poetic license of exagerration: I remind you, I was never in any real danger of my life- pickpockets maybe, but nothing life or death!
Monday, April 7, 2008
Paris
Traveling alone is rough. I understood a surprising amount of French as we got off the plane and fought like mad for a spot on a bus into the city. I got it so late that I never really booked a place to stay and just planned to meet Devon in the morning. She had told me of this pizza place that was open late, so I found my way there fairly easily and spent the wee hours of the morning slowly devouring a pizza with an egg on it. They kicked me out at 5AM when the closed and I napped in a bus stop until the metro opened and rode it around for a couple hours until a little cafe was open where I spent the rest of the morning. So yes, I didn't tell my parents or anyone else who would worry that I spent a night on the streets of Paris. Kind of. No, for you worrisome types out there, I'm sure I was never in any danger, it was just uncomfortable.
After some confusion in the train station, Devon and I finally met up, stowed out luggage, then headed out to see the city! Devon was such an amazing tour guide and I saw all the good stuff and none of the lame stuff in like five hours. It was exhausting, but I had some amazing gellato, got my picture taken in front of like forty thousand famous places, listened to her play the piano for a crowd in a bookshop, and realized I was incredibly tired and kinda smelly.
We had plans for dinner with some of Devo's friends in Paris: Melissa and Philippe. They had met in America while Philippe was studying abroad there and Melissa had come to France and they were now engaged and it was also Philippe's birthday! This meant a phenomenal meal in which I actually ate asparagus and enjoyed is (don't tell anyone, they might get ideas). Philippe also happens to be a high class French wine connoisseur, so being his birthday, he broke out some of the really nice stuff and tried to teach us a lot about fine wine tasting. It was a phenomenal experience. They ended up very generously offering to let us stay the night, so Devon canceled our other lodging plans and we settled down in their little Parisian flat. I was amazed by how much I had seen and done in one day, how much sleep I was lacking, and how incredibly wonderful our hosts were, though I had just met them.
Easter morning dawned in Paris and Melissa gave us American candy (Reese's Cups to be precise) for our Easter baskets! By this point my thankfulness for their hospitality was almost overflowing until they gave us bus tickets to get to the train station so we could make it to Caen that day. Paris and the sights were nice, but I will never forget such amazing and unexpected friends as Melissa and Philippe.
On our train ride to Caen, Devon and I got to do a bit of an Easter Sunday Bible study (since we hadn't had time to go to Easter Mass at Notre Dame like we wanted to), and we arrived in Caen sometime after lunch.
That story will wait for another time of me procrastinating from my homework, but for now, here are the pictures of Paris:
After some confusion in the train station, Devon and I finally met up, stowed out luggage, then headed out to see the city! Devon was such an amazing tour guide and I saw all the good stuff and none of the lame stuff in like five hours. It was exhausting, but I had some amazing gellato, got my picture taken in front of like forty thousand famous places, listened to her play the piano for a crowd in a bookshop, and realized I was incredibly tired and kinda smelly.
We had plans for dinner with some of Devo's friends in Paris: Melissa and Philippe. They had met in America while Philippe was studying abroad there and Melissa had come to France and they were now engaged and it was also Philippe's birthday! This meant a phenomenal meal in which I actually ate asparagus and enjoyed is (don't tell anyone, they might get ideas). Philippe also happens to be a high class French wine connoisseur, so being his birthday, he broke out some of the really nice stuff and tried to teach us a lot about fine wine tasting. It was a phenomenal experience. They ended up very generously offering to let us stay the night, so Devon canceled our other lodging plans and we settled down in their little Parisian flat. I was amazed by how much I had seen and done in one day, how much sleep I was lacking, and how incredibly wonderful our hosts were, though I had just met them.
Easter morning dawned in Paris and Melissa gave us American candy (Reese's Cups to be precise) for our Easter baskets! By this point my thankfulness for their hospitality was almost overflowing until they gave us bus tickets to get to the train station so we could make it to Caen that day. Paris and the sights were nice, but I will never forget such amazing and unexpected friends as Melissa and Philippe.
On our train ride to Caen, Devon and I got to do a bit of an Easter Sunday Bible study (since we hadn't had time to go to Easter Mass at Notre Dame like we wanted to), and we arrived in Caen sometime after lunch.
That story will wait for another time of me procrastinating from my homework, but for now, here are the pictures of Paris:
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
The first week- The Dublin Experience
Even though I still have lots to do I need some way to procrastinate, so you're getting the first installment of the spring break updates.
Our first week (March 16-21) was spent living in Greystones near the rest of the TU students. We nearly missed the bus from Galway, got stuck in the Bray DART station like usual, but Ben and I were too elated to return to our old home to care much. We were staying not at the YWCA with the rest of the group, but at a small theological college called Carraig Eden. It was really rather like a hostel situation and Ben and I shared a room that had four beds, community showers down the hall. It was so great to sit on the rocks above the waves again and climb down to the beach like I always used to. That night Kelsie and her roommate went out to dinner, so Ben and I headed to the Y to introduce ourselves to the TU crowd and have dinner with them. We got to chat with a number of people we had kind of known from back on campus and it was really nice to chat with other people from our school. Ben and I went out later that night and even bought Tesco 2 litre colas for defenestration, but the guys didn't seem too into it. The Man House had been all refurbished and lacked it's wonderful smell and character, but it was still my old home. The rock doorstops that we named two years ago were still there!
Monday was St. Patrick's Day and so we accompanied the group into Dublin for Mass at the Dublin Pro-Cathedral and the parade, but not before I accidentally got drenched by a wave that literally rose more than fifteen feet from the sea to hit me. I think God was messing with me or something because it was totally impossible for any wave in those conditions to reach me as near to the road as I was. Aaanyway... Dublin was SO jam packed for the parade. As Megan told me later "I wouldn't wish Dublin on Paddy's Day on anyone"... yet we went by choice. The parade was so weird and fantastical with loads of awkward costumes. I didn't even upload most of the pictures; it just wasn't worth it. But! Afterwards, we had a choice of going to a Gaelic Athletic games day in Croke Park or dancing. Kelsie went off with some girls for dancing while Ben and I headed off for some hurling and Gaelic football. Some sweet games and solid pics. Being a separate group from the ISP, we took the liberty of leaving early to go to dinner in Temple Bar, but we had to meet up with Kelsie who by this point was all alone and trying to find us in an unfamiliar city. Poor kid, she did well finding the Millennium Spire, but we're probably not gonna leave her alone much more. We had dinner with a couple girls who had a mutual friend with Ben, then headed back to Bray to explore to Promenade, then back to Greystones to chill at the Y.
Tuesday, we spent the morning hanging out with people at the Y and then in the afternoon, headed off with the group to Glendalough. It was great to return there also, but it's so much prettier in August when I first saw it. Again we split off from the group and did our own little hike, meeting up at the picturesque tree with the huge swooping branch so Kelsie and her roommate could take pictures of each other in front of the lake.
On Wednesday, the ISPers had to go to Irish Lit class with Beulah Baker... not wanting any part of that we fulfilled our duty to Vance and pretty much finished off Kelsie's Irish history class by giving her the grand tour of historical sites in Dublin. We took the Hop on/Hop off bus and saw Trinity College, the Book of Kells, Dublin Castle (which I had never been to before), Christ Church and St. Patrick's Cathedral, as well as Kilmainham Gaol (where we had the same fantastic tour guide I had had two years ago. We had dinner at Flanagan's on O'Connell street which shows up in the Tom Clancy book and movie Patriot Games... this wa sonly after our attempt to eat at the pub in which Patrick Pearse surrendered at the end of the Easter Rising was foiled. Coming back, we stopped off in Bray again and spent the rest of the night chilling at the Y.
Once again on Thursday, the ISPers were in class, so we went on our hiking expedition. Walking through Greystones harbor reminded me of Sam and Frodo returning to the industrialized Shire... "This is worse than Mordor, Mr. Frodo... This is Mordor, Sam." It was sad, but it afforded us the opportunity to meet Liam the Wise Construction Worker. Just a random working man, hauling cement in a wheelbarrow, stopped us and just drenched us in little pearls of wisdom! Such a delightful man! I hope he does that to a lot of people because I feel like there are a lot of people who needed to hear the kind of stuff he had to say more than we did. Appreciate what you've got- your two legs to hike, the weather, your friends. Don't be greedy for more, it'll never satisfy. Friends are the most important thing you've got, never let go. And the like. So we had a bit of beauty before we reached the stunning view of Bray Head and the Cross over Bray and the descent into the town. From there we picked up the DART headed north because Ben had to go to Dublin Airport to pick up Lauren and Kelsie and I went to to hike to cliff walk on Howth Peninsula. On the way there, we found that we had our whole DART car to ourselves and like little kids, we ran around gleefully because there was no one there to look down on us for being foolish. It was great. I had hiked part of the cliffwalk once before with Ben, Kim, Kristin, and Kiira, but we did the Sutton half and missed the incredible cliffs on the far side of the peninsula. It was an exhausting hike, with a good bit of windblown mist in our faces in the latter half, but we made it and barely made it back to Greystones in time to meet Ben and Lauren at the Hungry Monk for our dinner. I had always wanted to go to this ridiculously nice restaurant but it's just out of my price range, so this spring break was my time to splurge. I had the most incredible and tender fall-off-the-bone Wicklow Mountain Lamb. Best way to end a long day of hiking. i was content.
On Friday, I mostly spent the day preparing to go to France that evening. I got my hair cut in anticipation of the lack of showers, I did my laundry, packed, ate lots of food at the Y and sat around reading. I caught my DART to Dublin around three, had a fun time finding the AirLink buses, realized I had to pay extra to bring my checked luggage (stupid RyanAir) and eventually was on my way to Paris that night.
Here are the pics- You can restart the slideshow or just click on the Picasa icon to go straight to the album and preview the pics at your leisure.
Our first week (March 16-21) was spent living in Greystones near the rest of the TU students. We nearly missed the bus from Galway, got stuck in the Bray DART station like usual, but Ben and I were too elated to return to our old home to care much. We were staying not at the YWCA with the rest of the group, but at a small theological college called Carraig Eden. It was really rather like a hostel situation and Ben and I shared a room that had four beds, community showers down the hall. It was so great to sit on the rocks above the waves again and climb down to the beach like I always used to. That night Kelsie and her roommate went out to dinner, so Ben and I headed to the Y to introduce ourselves to the TU crowd and have dinner with them. We got to chat with a number of people we had kind of known from back on campus and it was really nice to chat with other people from our school. Ben and I went out later that night and even bought Tesco 2 litre colas for defenestration, but the guys didn't seem too into it. The Man House had been all refurbished and lacked it's wonderful smell and character, but it was still my old home. The rock doorstops that we named two years ago were still there!
Monday was St. Patrick's Day and so we accompanied the group into Dublin for Mass at the Dublin Pro-Cathedral and the parade, but not before I accidentally got drenched by a wave that literally rose more than fifteen feet from the sea to hit me. I think God was messing with me or something because it was totally impossible for any wave in those conditions to reach me as near to the road as I was. Aaanyway... Dublin was SO jam packed for the parade. As Megan told me later "I wouldn't wish Dublin on Paddy's Day on anyone"... yet we went by choice. The parade was so weird and fantastical with loads of awkward costumes. I didn't even upload most of the pictures; it just wasn't worth it. But! Afterwards, we had a choice of going to a Gaelic Athletic games day in Croke Park or dancing. Kelsie went off with some girls for dancing while Ben and I headed off for some hurling and Gaelic football. Some sweet games and solid pics. Being a separate group from the ISP, we took the liberty of leaving early to go to dinner in Temple Bar, but we had to meet up with Kelsie who by this point was all alone and trying to find us in an unfamiliar city. Poor kid, she did well finding the Millennium Spire, but we're probably not gonna leave her alone much more. We had dinner with a couple girls who had a mutual friend with Ben, then headed back to Bray to explore to Promenade, then back to Greystones to chill at the Y.
Tuesday, we spent the morning hanging out with people at the Y and then in the afternoon, headed off with the group to Glendalough. It was great to return there also, but it's so much prettier in August when I first saw it. Again we split off from the group and did our own little hike, meeting up at the picturesque tree with the huge swooping branch so Kelsie and her roommate could take pictures of each other in front of the lake.
On Wednesday, the ISPers had to go to Irish Lit class with Beulah Baker... not wanting any part of that we fulfilled our duty to Vance and pretty much finished off Kelsie's Irish history class by giving her the grand tour of historical sites in Dublin. We took the Hop on/Hop off bus and saw Trinity College, the Book of Kells, Dublin Castle (which I had never been to before), Christ Church and St. Patrick's Cathedral, as well as Kilmainham Gaol (where we had the same fantastic tour guide I had had two years ago. We had dinner at Flanagan's on O'Connell street which shows up in the Tom Clancy book and movie Patriot Games... this wa sonly after our attempt to eat at the pub in which Patrick Pearse surrendered at the end of the Easter Rising was foiled. Coming back, we stopped off in Bray again and spent the rest of the night chilling at the Y.
Once again on Thursday, the ISPers were in class, so we went on our hiking expedition. Walking through Greystones harbor reminded me of Sam and Frodo returning to the industrialized Shire... "This is worse than Mordor, Mr. Frodo... This is Mordor, Sam." It was sad, but it afforded us the opportunity to meet Liam the Wise Construction Worker. Just a random working man, hauling cement in a wheelbarrow, stopped us and just drenched us in little pearls of wisdom! Such a delightful man! I hope he does that to a lot of people because I feel like there are a lot of people who needed to hear the kind of stuff he had to say more than we did. Appreciate what you've got- your two legs to hike, the weather, your friends. Don't be greedy for more, it'll never satisfy. Friends are the most important thing you've got, never let go. And the like. So we had a bit of beauty before we reached the stunning view of Bray Head and the Cross over Bray and the descent into the town. From there we picked up the DART headed north because Ben had to go to Dublin Airport to pick up Lauren and Kelsie and I went to to hike to cliff walk on Howth Peninsula. On the way there, we found that we had our whole DART car to ourselves and like little kids, we ran around gleefully because there was no one there to look down on us for being foolish. It was great. I had hiked part of the cliffwalk once before with Ben, Kim, Kristin, and Kiira, but we did the Sutton half and missed the incredible cliffs on the far side of the peninsula. It was an exhausting hike, with a good bit of windblown mist in our faces in the latter half, but we made it and barely made it back to Greystones in time to meet Ben and Lauren at the Hungry Monk for our dinner. I had always wanted to go to this ridiculously nice restaurant but it's just out of my price range, so this spring break was my time to splurge. I had the most incredible and tender fall-off-the-bone Wicklow Mountain Lamb. Best way to end a long day of hiking. i was content.
On Friday, I mostly spent the day preparing to go to France that evening. I got my hair cut in anticipation of the lack of showers, I did my laundry, packed, ate lots of food at the Y and sat around reading. I caught my DART to Dublin around three, had a fun time finding the AirLink buses, realized I had to pay extra to bring my checked luggage (stupid RyanAir) and eventually was on my way to Paris that night.
Here are the pics- You can restart the slideshow or just click on the Picasa icon to go straight to the album and preview the pics at your leisure.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Back from break!
This is just a shout out to let you all know that I'm back from my whirlwind European adventure safe and sound. In the meantime, I have papers due very soon, not to mention work so the pictures and accounts of what happened will come as they may in little segments.
For those of you who don't know, we had March 16-31 off from work and for the first week (16-21) Ben, Kelsie and I went to Greystones to be with the other ISP group for St. Patrick's Day in Dublin, showing Kelsie around some of the historical sites, hiking in Glendalough and other local places.
Then on the Friday 21, we split up- Kelsie to visit friends in Liverpool, Ben to Dublin with Lauren and hiking in Scotland and me to France to visit Devon.
I went to Paris until Sunday morning took a train to Caen in Normandy to see the DDay Memorial and beaches. Tuesday night, we headed to Devon's town of Angers in the Loire Valley where we saw the sites and her stomping grounds. Here we decided based on cheapest train ticket price that my next adventure would lead me to Geneva, Switzerland and I so headed there on Wednesday, TGVing all across France and spending the remained of my days there until yesterday when I headed out for the marathon adventure of making it back here. I've been awake for far too long, traveled for 30 hours, sleeping on the streets of Paris and am hoping you will be patient with further updates. It was a trip full of amazing sights, people, and lots of unexpected hospitality.
PS Traveling alone is cool because you have so much freedom to do what you want, but it also sucks because it's so lonely. I miss you all and can't wait to talk to you in person again.
For those of you who don't know, we had March 16-31 off from work and for the first week (16-21) Ben, Kelsie and I went to Greystones to be with the other ISP group for St. Patrick's Day in Dublin, showing Kelsie around some of the historical sites, hiking in Glendalough and other local places.
Then on the Friday 21, we split up- Kelsie to visit friends in Liverpool, Ben to Dublin with Lauren and hiking in Scotland and me to France to visit Devon.
I went to Paris until Sunday morning took a train to Caen in Normandy to see the DDay Memorial and beaches. Tuesday night, we headed to Devon's town of Angers in the Loire Valley where we saw the sites and her stomping grounds. Here we decided based on cheapest train ticket price that my next adventure would lead me to Geneva, Switzerland and I so headed there on Wednesday, TGVing all across France and spending the remained of my days there until yesterday when I headed out for the marathon adventure of making it back here. I've been awake for far too long, traveled for 30 hours, sleeping on the streets of Paris and am hoping you will be patient with further updates. It was a trip full of amazing sights, people, and lots of unexpected hospitality.
PS Traveling alone is cool because you have so much freedom to do what you want, but it also sucks because it's so lonely. I miss you all and can't wait to talk to you in person again.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Historians take note!
On Saturday we took a "religious history tour" of Galway. This was not some fool guided tour with a bored kid with a memorized script. Mike knows this guy named William Henry who is probably one of the smartest men I've met (outside of Dr. Ringenberg and a few others). He was a fascinating and hilarious Irish man who's written loads of books (seemed like one on almost everywhere he took us, but the more famous ones are this book and this book, on Galway and WWI. It was wonderful to have this tour because he showed us all these fantastic historical and archaeological things that have been right under our noses this whole time. Did you know that the building I live in was once a barracks for the infamous Black and Tans? He took us to an ancient 6th century monastery that you would expect to be hidden miles out in rural Gaeltacht Ireland, but no St. Odram's monastic settlement of Roscam is a mere seven minute drive from city center! Buried in an old cemetery on Michael Collins road in Ballybane are revolutionaries from the war for independence. Surrounding it are imposing and modern apartment complexes threatening to consume the history within it. St. Augustine's Holy Well holds stories of Christianized Druidic practices from the 5th century as well as a brawl and a brush with the Gardai in Willy's childhood as he and his friends realized that coins were tossed in the well!
We heard so much in such a short time, there was no way even if I had taken notes that I could have remembered it all. Truly a remarkable man keeping alive the memories of a fascinating town in a historic land. He was so passionate about his work- especially the parts on remembering the Irish who fought in the trenches of WWI and were hated for defending their land when they returned to the anti-British revolutionary climate of postwar Ireland.
Here are my various pictures of the afternoon.
We heard so much in such a short time, there was no way even if I had taken notes that I could have remembered it all. Truly a remarkable man keeping alive the memories of a fascinating town in a historic land. He was so passionate about his work- especially the parts on remembering the Irish who fought in the trenches of WWI and were hated for defending their land when they returned to the anti-British revolutionary climate of postwar Ireland.
Here are my various pictures of the afternoon.
Friday, March 7, 2008
Nuns make me smile
I had the joy of washing our outside walls yesterday morning and as I was scrubbing away, I was approached by a little old nun who kept telling me that I was a good man, keeping things clean like that. She went into our bookstore for a little bit and when she came back out she came up to me and said, “Would you scrub my soul clean?” Not knowing what to say I said, “With soap and water? That’s not the trick.” And she replies “Oh I know, but wouldn’t it be easy if that were the way?” Then she tottered off. It was a very interesting experience.
Then today, we went to Mass with Aine at Poor Clare's Convent on Nun's Island and there was one nun who couldn't stop grinning throughout the whole Mass. It was great.
In other news, we're going on a history of Galway tour tomorrow, we have one more week until spring break and I'm planning a 37 mile bicycle trip to a castle on the other side of Galway Bay. Should be sweet.
Here are some pictures I've been neglecting to put up. Remember, you can pause the slideshow and scroll through them at your own pace.
Claddagh Church & Cafe
Swans on the Long Walk
Then today, we went to Mass with Aine at Poor Clare's Convent on Nun's Island and there was one nun who couldn't stop grinning throughout the whole Mass. It was great.
In other news, we're going on a history of Galway tour tomorrow, we have one more week until spring break and I'm planning a 37 mile bicycle trip to a castle on the other side of Galway Bay. Should be sweet.
Here are some pictures I've been neglecting to put up. Remember, you can pause the slideshow and scroll through them at your own pace.
Claddagh Church & Cafe
Swans on the Long Walk
Monday, March 3, 2008
Irish weather
I was told of a Mountaineering Club at NUIG, so we might look into hooking up with one of their hikes to get out more.
The rest of the week was pretty classic- work and good jokes and such. Ben and I got to reconnect with Alan on the bridge and I sat there quietly while they talked in Spanish and we found out that he doesn't have a job because he doesn't have the right papers to work in Ireland, so we talked to Mike to find an organization that works with people in his situation to get it all figured out.
Then tonight while I was out wandering about I met a guy named Jason from Bray who wanted some spare change because he was "sleeping rough tonight". Having been taught not to give cash to just anyone and everyone, I got him a kebab and invited him to come our cafe sometime, even showed him where it is and he was thoroughly impressed by our prices so we plan on having lunch tomorrow. Apparently I just attract these people or God just lands them on me, but I do what I can.
We walked home from church this weekend which was really nice because it was sunny. Today I walked around a lot and got rained, snowed, sunned and winded on. The weather was very shifty today.
The rest of the week was pretty classic- work and good jokes and such. Ben and I got to reconnect with Alan on the bridge and I sat there quietly while they talked in Spanish and we found out that he doesn't have a job because he doesn't have the right papers to work in Ireland, so we talked to Mike to find an organization that works with people in his situation to get it all figured out.
Then tonight while I was out wandering about I met a guy named Jason from Bray who wanted some spare change because he was "sleeping rough tonight". Having been taught not to give cash to just anyone and everyone, I got him a kebab and invited him to come our cafe sometime, even showed him where it is and he was thoroughly impressed by our prices so we plan on having lunch tomorrow. Apparently I just attract these people or God just lands them on me, but I do what I can.
We walked home from church this weekend which was really nice because it was sunny. Today I walked around a lot and got rained, snowed, sunned and winded on. The weather was very shifty today.
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