Aemeyra: Baile Atha Cliath a.k.a Dublin

That was Gaelic and no I dont speak Gaelic. I just love to Google Translate. I went to sunny sunny sunny Dublin (in comparison to gray London), the city populous with Malaysian students and families, for an amazing weekend off - away from sick people madness and nasty smell in the wards.

My traveller spirit would still say Dublin is lovely tho many people may disagree. True that it's small and a bit slow paced during the day - but haven't you noticed the notch and crannies? They are historically pretty! Having my lovely mates there was a major plus point. Another plus point is it was Eid-Adha on Sunday. Previously while booking my flight, my mind had already went through all the images of food they would enthusiastically served for "open houses". It would be very much like home.

Heart-to-heart talks, Iftar, Eid prayer and lots of traditional Eid food. I couldn't describe the euphoria of doing all this with my lovelies. Had of lots of chatters with old mates, in Malay most importantly! I miss all of them by now because I dont get much real life chatting with real people here. All my friends are either English speaking people or the Malay speaking ones just disappear.

Note that this was the third time I'd been there but phesssh, its never enough of sightseeing. Temple Bar and its market were an impromptu visit before we went off to Ali's for Iftar. I like Temple Bar area, it's sorta an artsy area where people do street performance, there'll be Boho-ish shops, and the area is secluded away from the main street as if it's a square hidden between rows of shops. Prolly it'll be a bit dodgy at night and it's a place to go in the day to get into the funky monkey spirit.

We also took some time to do a tour around Trinity College for its library because I'm a freak and I like old stuff. I like museums and libraries. Epa, Syafiq and I went to the Book of Kells and there we saw amazing barrel ceilinged library with collections of old books. Too bad no picture was allowed. If I were allowed one it'd look like this.

Source: Google

Seeing this made us came to the thinking where people in the ancient days werea smarter than we lots are anow. Justification: because what they do were read, collecting books and talking nerd. Unlike us in modern days. What do chat about now? Reality tv? X factor? Kim Kardashians? Which are all craps and not healthy for our pea brain.

Then Butlers! Yums, the purveyor of happiness. You cant go to Ireland without having Butlers amazing hot chocolate. I preferred the classic chocolate chocolate instead of white because it was unbearably too sweet to drink. I wonder how Farah could deal with that amount of sugar. In Ireland, there's a shop called Aldi which sell delish hazelnut chocolate which is cheap and so good. I think many Malaysians like it and they often buy it as gifts to non-dubliners. I found it tasty only I am on low sugar low calorie diet, I cant go near that chocolate. And I just realized Johnny's Cupcakes are tasty too and way cheaper than fancy cupcakes in london by a few quids!

Thank you Epa, Farah and housemates for the hospitality despite your lovely crib was struck with flood a week ago. Thank u Ali and Luqman for iftar on Saturday. Thank you to the other Malaysian Dubliners for all the lovely omnomnomnom experience on Eid. Love sangat :)

If I were to come to Ireland again, I'd like to do Wicklow, Cork, Belfast, Viking tour, Dundrum and more Temple Bar. And Butler's and chocolates, and cupcakes...