It’s Monday and I am in Ireland! Now, this traveling might take a little toll on my health, but you know I seem to sleep it off often. However, after arriving in Waterford, I had to call in sick.
Lluis woke me up at 9 o’clock. He was ready to go to work. He explained me how their 20pence coin shower worked and took off, leaving me half a sleep and very thankful.
After the shower I packed my bag again and got back on the road.
With currently only around 10 invitations from the whole country of Ireland, it will be hard to hitchhike trough this nation, however Jim’s article in the paper tomorrow might change things!
I decided to skip the hitchhiking for today. Somehow, my left-eye had become very sensitive and very red; irritating a lot.
With the money sponsored by Andy and Chris in Liverpool and the Anglo Irish Bank on the Isle of Man, I bought myself a train ticket all the way south to my first next inviting city: Waterford.
And after I got this minor medicine at the Ranalagh local pharmacy, some eye drops that would help clean the infected eye and stop this congested eye.
For the train to Waterford I had to move back to the Dublin centre again to find Heuston Station. From this station the train to Waterford would depart at 3.05pm.
But it was only 1pm when I arrived at the station. Surprising to me, just across the street, was the big -really BIG- Guinness beer brewery!
I definitely had to see that from the inside, so I rambled all the way around the complex and found the Guinness Storehouse, which was the tourist visitor centre of the brewery.
Divided over 7 floors this storehouse gave a good glance at the brewery of the world famous Guinness beer, also known as Ireland’s Black Gold.
But also known from the Guinness Book of Records. Though it’s not really an advertisement as such, this book is a record breaker itself.
According to the Guinness Storehouse museum the Guinness Book of Records is the best-selling book of all time, not including non-copyrighted book as the Bible or the Koran of course. It all started in 1951 when Sir Hugh Beaver, then Managing Director of the Guinness brewery, missed a bird while out shooting. Back in the pub, a discussion followed about which game bird flew the fasted – a question that couldn’t get resolved.
Three years later, Sir Hugh found himself having another argument about which was the fastest European game bird. He realised that similar debates must take place in bars all over the world and that a book was needed to help bar staff settle the quarrels of his guests.
Another thing learned was the history of the Irish Pubs, expanding all over the world. Did you know that everyday somewhere in the world, one Irish Pub opens? Did you know that the average Irish Pub in Sweden sells around 2,000 pints of Guinness every week? And Irish Pubs in Perth, Australia, have to be very careful when they order their new supplies of Guinness. The kegs of beer have to travel for over four days by road to get there.
My previous host Jim in Dublin wasn’t so satisfied about these actions. Most Irish people call those Irish Pubs plastic pubs, because they all look the same and nothing originally Irish is developed in it.
An Irish Pub can be built within 4 weeks, from scratch to shine, but it still won’t be a pub that has been visited by Irish for decades: the real Irish Pub.
Enough beer talk for now (however I thoroughly enjoyed that free pint at the 7th floor viewpoint), I had a train to catch!
The train took over 3 hours to reach Waterford, where I had a short walk to go to The Browns Townhouse, a guesthouse where the owner Leslie waited for me.
Leslie wasn’t my host for tonight, that would be Alan. But he had to work until 7pm, so Leslie and his wife lovely received me in their house, feeding me with coffee, tea, sandwiches and pasta.
Around 7pm I met up with Alan, a big guy with long hair. If you see him, you wonder where his Harley is parked.
Alan works at America OnLine (AOL) and enjoys programming the specialized troubleshooting software for the company and its helpdesk.
We walked to his home from the guesthouse to his home, which looked like a student apartment. A friend of Alan, Shamus, was sitting on the couch, not being very talkative because of his Playstation addiction.
Shamus is living in Alan’s house for a while, looking for a new home in the neighbourhood. After some slices of pizza (I had the pasta, but Alan didn’t have dinner yet), he settled up his laptop for me so I could write some reports (as my reports from the Isle of Man still had to be published).
Then it all begins: I sneezed from that point on every minute, using almost three rolls of toilet paper. With my nose red and my eyes teary, Alan had one conclusion: these eye drops I got a this pharmacy this morning, were giving me an allergic reaction!
That was it and there was I, sneezing my reports out on the keyboard.
Alan had seen I was pretty tired from the last days and offered me to stay some more days, suggested to even go see a doctor tomorrow.
I think that was a good idea. I ended writing my reports and joined on a couch where Alan and Raph, a visiting friend of Alan, were about to watch Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. Shamus continued playing on the Playstation.
After this film, my eyes were already half closed I got to bed in my personal bedroom.
Goodnight -sniff sniff- Waterford!
