Irish Immersion
Chris, Hugo, and I moved to Dublin, Ireland a few short weeks ago. It has been loads of fun exploring and experiencing our new city. Read below to see how we've been getting on in our new country!
After the most amazing and fantastic trip and wedding in Germany and a relaxing beach honeymoon in Greece, Chris and I began our travels to our new home -- Dublin, Ireland! [by the way, the wedding blog is coming soon!] We had to fly from Thessaloniki, Greece to Istanbul, Turkey to Dublin. It was a long day, but boy was I excited to walk into our beautiful new home in Dublin city centre.
We landed in Dublin on Tuesday, October 10th and had a lot to do before Hugo was going to arrive on Thursday. Chris had gotten our kitchen organized and our place came furnished, but there was still some things to buy [most importantly, dog food!] and "nesting" to do. I asked my Irish friend, Stephen, where the best shopping is and he directed us to the Dumdrum shopping centre, which was perfect. It's the largest mall in Ireland and is probably similiar in size to Southdale in Edina. We got me set up with a phone plan [woohoo!], stopped at Tesco for cleaning supplies, and TK Maxx [TJ Maxx's European counterpart] for some home furnishings like hangers, bathroom rugs, etc. We had so much stuff with us that we could not possibly take the lightrail back into town and walk 1.5 miles home, so we had to cab it home. So worth it! Our house was becoming a home!
Our apartment is absolutely gorgeous. We got so lucky getting this place. We're on the top floor of a big complex, but our entrance only services 6 units. It's considered a separate "house". The LUAS, which is the light rail, is right outside our place, which is pretty convenient. Also pretty loud, but it doesn't deter us from hanging outside on our beautiful balcony. Even when the tempterature is chilly, if the sun is shining, it is so warm sitting out in the sun on our balcony. It's just lovely.
Some of the interesting adjustments we've had to make are turning on our hot water. I think I mentioned this in a previous post, but it's worth mentioning again. Every Irish household has what's called a "hot water press" that controls the hot water. When ours is on, it actually warms up our apartment too [unintentionally], so we try to keep it off once we've showered. We just have to remember to turn it on again before hopping in the shower!
We've also had to adjust to using the stove top, oven, and microwave. Neither appliance has many buttons or dials and there are no words on either to describe what anything does. So that's been interesting! Luckily, no food has been burnt or undercooked ... so far!
There are a few things that we are struggling with yet. Our place didn't come with any dressers, so not all of our clothes have been put away yet -- t-shirts, socks, etc. We heard Harvey Norman is a good place to shop for those, so we are going to take a trip there. They deliver, so no worries about how to get it home there! We are also desparately short on adapters for the outlets. Luckily, Chris' parents are awesome and are sending a care package with Chris' birthday present and some adapaters I ordered to their house from Amazon!
Oh! One funny thing... there are no outlets in the bathrooms. None. At all. Our toothbrushes are currently charging on a bedroom floor. :)
It was good that Chris and I kept busy those first couple days because I was internally [and let's be honest, externally] a wreck while Hugo was making his long journey across the Atlantic. [If you haven't and are interested, you can read about how he got to Ireland here.]
Minneapolis > Chicago > Frankfurt > Dublin. This dog is worldy!
As promised, Pet Relocation gave us updates along the way and sent pictures, which helped ease my anxiety... a little. However, nothing felt as good as getting the little bugger back in our arms! When Hugo arrived at our home, Chris went down to go get him. They hadn't seen each other in 37 days, so I wanted to give them a moment. Then, when they came up, I would be waiting down the hallway when you enter our apartment filming our reunion. Hilariously, Hugo ran toward me, saw his food, slammed the brakes, and made a hard right for his dish. Watch below! #pressplay
Hugo landed himself as Pet Relocation's "Pet Move of the Month"! They did a super cute blog post about his travels that you can read here!
It took about 4-5 days for Hugo to get acclimated and seem like himself again. We made extra effort to love on him and take him everywhere we went for those first few days. We even found a cute brunch spot that allows for dogs and the food was fantastic! Anyone with pups in Dublin needs to check out Herbstreet.
Once the weekend was over, it was time for Chris to go back to work after being off for 3 weeks. Hurricane Ophelia had other plans, however, for the entire country. You can read about that in my last blog post here!
With Chris back at work, Hugo and I have been settling in and doing a lot of our own exploring. I usually spend the mornings reading [currently it's Hillary Clinton's What Happened?] and brushing up on my German via Rosetta Stone. Chris has been coming home for lunch, which has been a nice break up to the day. In the afternoons, Hugie and I hit the streets for our long walks and exploration. Many of you know that Hugo wasn't the biggest fan of walks in Minnesota, but he LOVES them here. I don't know if it's the new smells or that the temperature is not too hot and not too cold, but whatever it is, I'll take it! Here are some of our pictures from our explorations!
One of mine and Hugo's favorite part of the day is when Chris is done with work. We walk the two blocks down the street to go "pick him up", but we always make a pit stop in the little park right next to his work to run some energy out of Hugo. Hugo loves it!
It has been exciting and a little stressful adjusting to a new city, figuring out normal day-to-day tasks, and maneuvering around town. I was definitely a little self conscious the first couple of weeks. These Dubliners walk so fast and confidently and I did not want to stick out! Here are some of my observations from my daily walks into town.
Dubliners always look put together. We live in the business district, so that could be part of it, but I appreciate how fierce everyone looks. Always.
Except for the fact that athleisure is not a thing for the ladies. Can't a housewife go grocery shopping in the middle of the day in a cute Nike hat and black leggings?!
What side of the sidewalk do we walk on?! They drive on the left side of the road, so do we walk on that side? But this is an international hub, so some people walk on the left, some on the right. Dublin is dense with people, so walking around is more often than not a crowded affair. I tend to stick to the left.
A great thing about all the international people is when we walk down the sidewalk or ride the train, we hear several different languages. It's humbling to be around it.
Smokers. There is someone smoking outside EVERY doorway. Ireland did lead Europe in being the first country to ban smoking indoors [hallelujah!], but as someone who walks everywhere, I am always walking behind or past someone who is smoking.
Retail stores close so early. They close at 7:00 p.m.! And on the weekends, Starbucks stores don't open until 9:00 or 10:00 a.m.! The devastation!
Grocery Shopping. Grocery shopping has probably been the biggest adjustment I've had to make. Everything here is fresh and there are few preservatives. Breads and meats come in fresh every morning. These aspects are fantastic! The closest grocery store is one called Fresh and it's about a 10 minute walk. I compare it to a Whole Foods. The more conventional grocery store is Tesco and the best one is about a 20-25 minute walk away. So I can only ever buy what I can carry home. Because of the freshness of the food and that I have to walk to and from, I find myself at the store at least every other day. More often than not, I am there every day. Spices can be a little strange -- garlic does not come in a powder form, but in granules or salt. Sour cream is not in the refridgerated section, but with the exports. Anyway, slowly but surely, I am figuring this out!
We are getting better when crossing streets to look right and then left. Dubliners are notorious for their jay-walking. Our tour guide said that traffic lights are really just suggestions rather than requirements. Lucky for us newbies, we always get these reminders below.
In the last week, I have really started to feel like Dublin is home. I met a nice guy named Mark for coffee, who is going to be one of Hugo's caretakers when we need. Or as the Irish say, he can "mind" Hugo. :)
It was also Chris' 30th birthday and I wanted to make sure it was a special one. I marched into town and was determined to find all the ingredients to make a German Chocolate cake, something his Grandma Sue made for him every year for his birthday. I walked miles for the ingredients and my last errand was to get giant 3 and 0 balloons that I had to haul back home. Needless to say, blood, sweat, and tears went into planning his birthday.
We had a fantastic day. It started off with a 3-hour walking tour of Dublin, fish 'n chips with a pint lunch at a traditional Irish pub, a gourmet donut for the walk home, a walk to a local park to meet another dog "minder" and her Frenchie, Digit, dinner at Dublin's top-rated restaurant Bloom Brasserie [thank you Natassja and Jon!], and ended with blowing out candles on his made-from-scratch German Chocolate cake.
Birthday celebrations continued Friday night at our dear friends Stephen and Michael's home in Dublin. They hosted us for dinner and cocktails and were the definition of hosts with the most! For those of you who don't know, Stephen and I met one night in 2011 on the island of Hvar and have stayed in touch ever since -- never knowing if we would ever see each other again. Last year, Stephen married his love, Michael, and we were honored to be able to have gone to celebrate their love. A year and a half later and we were sitting in their living room as Irish residents. Unreal! It was a night filled with love, lots of laughs, belting songs, and lovely conversation. We are truly lucky to have such amazing friends in Dublin.
We capped off our weekend by cheering on the Dublin Marathon runners over by Merrion Square. The runners started at 8:00 a.m., so we headed over to the last 100 yards of the race at around noon to see some finishers. There was such a buzz in the air and everyone was excited and cheering on the runners. There was a runner who started cramping right there at the end and two other runners each grabbed one of his arms and helped him run the last little way. The whole experience was inspiring! We really enjoy attending events like this to feel part of the community.
Funny little tidbit -- on the walk over, we crossed the river Liffey and Chris saw all these little pink things lining the bank. Turns out someone dumped a bunch of pink rubber duckies in the river and we saw the clean up crew at work!
It's a bank holiday day here today -- All Hallow's Eve -- so we headed down to Dún Laoghaire [pronounced "done leary"] to go walk the beach! It was great to walk the harbour and enjoy a the sunset with my two boys.
Next up -- wedding blog! Stay tuned in the next couple of weeks! Until then...
xo, cheers!
