Easter in Áth Cliath

This one is for all the parents and relatives out there. Call me a traditionalist, but I cannot imagine Easter without family. Maybe it is all those years of Easter routines, the Good Friday services, the Sunday morning masses, or the colored eggs and kielbasa mom always cooks up after Church. Good news for me; my parents saw it the same way and decided to spend the holiday in Dublin. My parents, younger brother Dan, and grandma flew in on Saturday morning and I met the gang at their hotel in Ballsbridge. For the most part I have not felt homesick over the past few months, but it was damn good to see everyone. After a bit of downtime, we headed out to fulfill priority number one: a good meal and a Guinness at the Hairy Lemon, the last stop on our trip to Ireland back in 2006. I spent the rest of the day as semi tour guide, attempting to demonstrate that I know a thing or two about the sights and happenings of the city I've been living in for three months. We had a good run throughout most of the afternoon, and even made it down to UCD to see my pad, but it was not long until the jet lag started to set in and those nice hotel beds came calling. A relatively early dinner and bed was well deserved. Sunday dawned beautifully in Dublin as we gathered at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Donnybrook for mass at 9:30. Even Ardi couldn't help but come out to see what all the fuss was about. After mass we headed up to city centre to meet Una, a relative of ours from Cavan, and caught part of the parade and memorial service for the 1916 Easter Rising. The day was dedicated to family, great food, and equally good conversation in a variety of eating and drinking establishments around Dublin. On the wishes of grandma, on Monday we ventured down to Wexford to discover some family history. Our destination was a church in Castlebridge, a small town with a one pub and a convenience store a mile up the road from the town of Wexford. My great grandfather (grandma's dad) was baptized in the church and she wanted to show us the baptismal records. Given that it was a holiday, I was not surprised when we found no one home at the rectory. The church, however, was open and gorgeous inside. We could not find the records, but at least we found the spot, arguably the spot where it all (or at least part in my case) of it began. I think a Wexford GAA jersey is in my near future. It was quite literally blowing a gale in Wexford but we still spent a bit of time meandering around the town. The bus back to Dublin was packed with UCD students, an unfortunate reminder that I had work to get done that evening for the coming academic week. Following a beer with the family at the hotel, I left them to their own devices to go for dinner in city centre and headed back to normal life for a few days. They are headed out to Galway until Thursday evening, as we did not get up that way the last time around. Dan is spending two nights with me at the end of the week when they get back and I have a great day lined up for Friday. As always time is flying by, but I guess we make the most of it. Cheers.

Dockside in Wexford

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