Slí Amach

There once was a house, covered in ivy…where thirty three American college students spent two months living the Irish life.  I never imagined that I could become so attached to a place and group of people the way I fell in love with Dublin and made life long friends.

I’ve been home for about a week and move back to Chapel Hill in a few days.  I’m excited to start my second half of college and see all my friends, but at the same time a small part of me is still yearning for Dublin.  The two months I spent there were long enough to make the city feel like home.  I got coffee and a croissant on the way to work, joked with co-workers, had lunch with Sarah, met Halley and Kerry for a drink after work, bussed home, and made dinner while hanging out with people in the kitchen.  I settled into a weekday routine that had me convinced DCU dorm rooms and interning at bigO was my life now.  After being home for a while and heading back to UNC, I almost feel like that was someone else who lived those two months studying and working in Dublin.  It’s as if i’m now on the outside looking in at my own summer experience.  No matter how much time has passed, where I am, or what type of reminiscent mood i’m in, I will always remember the summer of 2018 vividly with love.

I will miss so many things.  Mostly all the friends who made the experience so amazing.  I’ll miss walking up and down O’Connell Street to go to Gelato di Natura, Lilly’s Cafe, and Carroll’s Irish Gifts.  I’ll miss the views of the River Liffey from the second level of Dublin Bus and all the small bridges across the city.  I’ll miss the endless gelato shops and cocktail bars in the city center.  I’ll miss galavanting on Grafton Street and browsing through Brown Thomas.  I’ll miss going to Penny’s just to pass time.  I’ll miss Insomnia coffee and seeing a Londis, Spar, and Tesco on every corner.  I’ll miss everything about walking around city center.

I will and won’t miss the Dublin Bus.  I won’t miss running to catch buses that whiz past even when you hail them.  I won’t miss being physically squished between strangers without air conditioning.  I will miss the hilarious times riding home with friends.  After my headphones broke with only a little while left, I sat on the bus during my morning commute listening to the announcement of each stop in Irish (Gaelic).  My favorites were Botanic Avenue and Townsend Street.  With no music, and a long ride to work I found myself repeating the Irish pronunciations in my head and out loud to Sarah and Kerry who thought I was crazy.  I’ll miss riding the bus home from work with Sarah because hilarious things always happened.  Like the time a ladybug slowly made its way through the bus or the time a child ran around the bus shirtless.  I’ll miss looking for the Pigeon Man at the Pearse Station stop and how he would feed bread to what looked like 50 pigeons.  The Pigeon Man actually disappeared after a few weeks and Sarah and I were pretty worried.  The pigeons seemed to be waiting for him at the stop, but their numbers dwindled every day.  We’ll never find out exactly what happened to the Pigeon Man, but it was great bus ride entertainment.  I won’t miss the crazy people of public transit.  Like the time Kerry and I were sitting in front of two teenage girls who were blasting music out loud, talking about 20 decibels louder then necessary, and spritzing themselves with perfume and spray deodorant right behind our heads.  Dublin Bus had good times and plenty of bad times.

I’ll miss my lunch hour on Baggot Street.  Sarah and I tried everywhere from O’Brien’s Sandwiches to Boojum Burrito Bowls.  We would spend the hour laughing about how far across the city I had to walk to buy props or deliver content, and how her job rarely asked her to do anything relevant.  Potentially a front for the mafia, (at least we think so) Sarah told me how she spent her days at work counting buckets in the office and mailing one package a week.  We ranted about Dublin City pigeons.  They have no fear and Sarah threw me in front of her to save herself from an aggressive pigeon in front of Penny’s.

I will and won’t miss O’Donnell House.  I won’t miss hall style dorm living, communal bathrooms, and no air conditioning.  I won’t miss the threat of fires and endless need for fire safety (if you know, you know).  I will miss Chris lamenting the Bachelorette rose ceremonies in the common room and Michael cooking in the kitchen.  I’ll also miss the selfies of them I found on my phone after almost every night out.  I’ll miss Rob’s pregame remixes and vlogs.  I’ll miss Halley teaching me how to cook and Sarah eating cereal in the kitchen to keep me company my while I attempted to cook.  I’ll miss running up and down the hall borrowing clothes, toiletries, and small essentials from everyone since we all seemed equally unprepared for two long months abroad.  I’ll miss being one wall away from Anna.  I’ll miss Ally’s energy and Adrinne’s humor.  I’ll miss Kerry and Sarah gracing us with “how I beat Shaq.”  I’ll miss Courtney never being ready to leave on time.  I will most definitely miss getting ready to leave and hanging out in the chaos of the O’Donnell House kitchen.  Most of all, I’ll miss coming ‘home’ to such an amazing group of people.  (Side note, I am convinced the ‘CCTV’ monitoring of our dorm halls would make a great season of Big Brother).

I’ll miss nights at Dicey’s, Flannery’s, O’Reilly’s, McGowan’s, and of course Ivy House.  I’ll miss the Ivy boys, who (let’s face it) probably befriend the American girls in this program every semester.  Their accents were fun and their names were too Irish to pronounce.  I’ll miss being those Americans who requested songs, sang too loudly at the bar, and danced too badly on the dance floor.  I’ll miss the amount of ‘Seans’ I met and how Sarah told me the next boy I talked to had to be named anything but Sean.  I’ll miss trying to hail cabs “near Temple Bar in the wee hours of the morning.”  I’ll miss how George Ezra songs, in particular Paradise, were played everywhere all the time because Ireland is obsessed with George Ezra.

We began our trip at the Ivy House – the Beer Garden became our third space – and that’s exactly where we ended it.  On our last night, a Friday, we walked the weathered trail past the Cat and Cage, Peter’s takeaway, and San Sab to the Ivy House.  The bouncers looked at our USA state licenses as ID, said they really had no idea what these meant, and after eight weeks of going to Ivy, the bouncers asked us when we were going home – just in time.  Usually Ivy has a DJ starting around 11 and it’s always a ton of fun.  This particular Friday night, there was live music.  One guy and his guitar played acoustic versions of everything.  It was the perfect night to end the summer.  With our last Orchard Thieves and Guinness ordered and enjoyed, we slowly trickled home from the Ivy House one last time.  And with that, we made our “Slí Amach,” or exit in Irish.  Slí Amach became my favorite phrase because of how fun it is to say and how visible it is on all the exit signs in buildings across the city.  Now the phrase makes me smile when I think of leaving work, getting off the bus, the walk back to O’Donnell House, and the Dublin Airport.

With that thought, I’ll say goodbye to an amazing summer with incredible people.  It was great craic, thanks a mil, you’re all stars, and of course, cheers!