Home Sweet Home

Hello all! I'm back on my side of the world, ready to fly to Seattle for a medical school interview tomorrow morning. Our European adventures, alas, are over, but here's a few memories of the last couple weeks:

Water from the ground. Walking on a quiet, warm Sunday morning in Sofia, Ben & I noticed crowds of locals filling huge water jugs from a series of fountains. Turns out the city is built over mineral springs, and the "healing" waters bubble up for free, public consumption. I ignored all my public health intuition and filled my bottle with the hot mineral water. Didn't get sick and the water had a unique, good taste. We returned to the fountains again before catching a train onward.

Getting out. The day I flew back to Dublin, I scrambled through three different countries (Bulgaria, Romania, Ireland).

Ben and I left Veliko Tarnovo in Bulgaria on the 11am train, stopped for 2.5 hrs (with no explanation as to why) in the middle of absolutely nowhere, and finally arrived at the border town Ruse. We leapt out, bought tickets onward to Bucharest, and reached Romania at 7:20pm, horribly behind schedule thanks to the mysterious delay. I took an overpriced taxi to the airport and made it Dublin by midnight. My aunt met me with an Irish fry, which has to be one of the greatest culinary achievements in the history of mankind.

The backroads of County Louth and Meade. Aunt Frances, Mom, and I piled into Frances's mini-jeep and drove through the vaguely signposted county roads towards some of Ireland's hidden historical sights like Monasterboice, Mellfont Abbey, the burial chamber at Dowth, and attempted to reach Newgrange via backroads. And while Mom finished her pot of tea at the Drogheda, Frances & I slipped off to see the best relic on the trip so far: Saint Oliver Plunkett's head at St. Peter's Church in Drogheda.

My goodness, my Guinness. My cousin and I headed to the Guinness storehouse, where we had perfectly doubled-pulled pints with a 360 degree view of the city of Dublin. The Irish drink nearly 500 million pints of beer a year, mostly stout. By the way, the population of Ireland is less than five million. You do the math.

It's been a fantastic trip with plenty of everyday and extraordinary adventures. Thanks for reading! :-)


(Photos from top to bottom: Alexander Neviski Church in Sofia, Bulgaria; Mr. Plunkett's head; Howth harbor, Ireland)