Scotland was an amazing place full of history and rugged terrain worthy of Lord of the Rings grandeur. Ireland was not. While the Scots take pride in their culture, language and identity, the Irish seem to almost resent theirs. Probably due to the great potato famine (i kid you not) where the separation between the rich and poor became so extreme that millions died or left the country. The rich dealt with their English conquerers and could speak the language but the poor spoke only Irish. Thus the Irish language became a peasants language and English slowly took over as the native tounge. Irish is rarely used today except by 'uncultured' country folk. The country are gradually starting to take pride in their culture and language but its still a while to go yet.
True story: A couple of farmers came into Dublin to check out their Irish capital. Irish was their first language and they happily conversed in this... until a schoolkid yelled at them to go back to where they came from. (He thought they were Polish).
Anyway enough history (sorry about that but the Micks didn't give me much else to talk about). Went to the Guinness factory - cool tour, Guinness tastes gross. But the real highlight of my trip around South Ireland was our tour visit to
THE CLIFFS OF INSANITY Thats right - THEY DO EXIST!!! The princess bride was filmed here. View was special but it was so much cooler knowing Andre the Giant once powered his way up this mountain with 3 people on his back. Inconceivable!
Happy birthday to my little bro who turned 21 recently. Seeing that I can't be there to do it personally can someone do me a favour and wrestle him to the ground (Watch out for his headlocks) and remind him he's not so big :o)
As a maker of wands and all things nerdy I feel it has long been on my list to create my own bow. Here in the heartland of the Robin Hood legend I found a 2 day longbow making course. With the aid of Lee the guy who makes longbows for a living I recreate the merry outlaws weapon of choice and 6 arrows of my own colours. It was a jolly good fun to make and is an incredible memento of my trip to the motherland. Just hope I can get it home :o)
