Today it's only one week until I go back to Sweden; it is such a bittersweet feeling. So I would like to post a song of a Swedish singer; Lars Winnerbäck. Not many of you guys will understand the lyrics, but at least you will get to hear some real Swedish, not just The Swedish Chef/Muppet-style. It will do you good:
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It's about returning to a place that's dear to you, a place you feel is as big part of you; a place that is like your second home. That is what Dublin has become to me, and I just can't believe I am going to leave this place, my beloved Ireland. So what I've been doing with this blog in comparing Dublin to Stockholm, which is not an easy task. Or hey, it is easy to compare, but not to come up with a conclusion. I am pretty sure I won't.
So, now it is my last seven days here. At this time next week I will be on a plain back to Stockholm and probably swift from crying hysterically and smiling like a moron... I am going to make these 168 hours here the best hours ever, wish me luck!
I just realised I made a post with pictures from Stockholm a while ago (you can find it here) but have none with pictures of Dublin, so it is about time, since I am doing the whole comparing thing! Here we go:
This is my dream house, so damn gorgeous!
Georges street, they got a really cheap piercing shop in here. I wouldn't advice anyone in the entire world to get a piercing done there though. I've seen the lady who does it, she's like 80 years old and her hands are all shaky... Not very good qualities for someone who's supposed to puncture your body.
If there is one thing I love it is Dr Martens. In this awesome record shop called Tower Records they had a whole corner filled with all my favourite shoes. I fell in love with it.
This sweet treat is what you get for free when you buy some hot chocolate at Butlers; it's deadly.
I think I have a fetish for houses, or architecture overall. I just love the steam punk feeling of every street here in Dublin. I wanna live in one of these!
Filip having some shots at Headline, the pub me and my friends alwaysalwaysalways went to the first three weeks we'd stayed here. Although the boss there yelled me out once for nothing at all, so hey I don't go there anymore. Grand.
Just love this street, it's so full of colour!
Steam-fucking-Punk, that's all I'm saying. It's savage.
Adnan just outside of college.
Sometimes it's okay to look like a total tourist. At least if your blond and pretty, like Alex.
Oh this is from the best shop ever. Its called John Gunn's Camera shop and it is the best place to get pictures developed or any kind of camera service, since it is very cheap and the staff there is soooo lovely.
Outside of Forbidden Planet, the unreal sci fi shop that I just want to live in.
And the absolutely best thing about Dublin is this; all the live music that's going on.
When I walked down Grafton Street the first time I was amazed by all the street musicians that were playing. Not one, not two, not three but at least five different ones - on the same street. You wouldn't see that In Stockholm, not that many. Or that good... One more point to Dublin.
Irish people seem to think that Swedish language sounds like just randomly burped noise, pretty much as The Swedish Chef from The Muppet's. Some people have actually asked me if I can understand him:
Well... I would love to though, but unfortunately; I can't. What I would like to respond though is that the native tongue of Irish sounds like something totally made up and doesn't make any sense at all. But, of course, I would love to learn it. Although I am pretty swamped with all the Irish-English slang people use over here. I gotta be honest; one of the main reasons I wanted to come here, to Ireland, was because it is the sexiest accent on earth. No joke, it is so unbelievable cool. The slang though - not so much.
To seriously say: Last night was ANIMAL just sounds... strange. I love it though, the weirder the slang the better the slang, haha. Me and my Swedish friend Alexandra got a private tutor (Holly!) to teach us all these foreign words and put them in the right context. We want to believe we've become very ''Irishanized'' and can't stop using words as grand, deadly, unreal, savage, class etc etc. Now it just comes naturally to me, all these funny words I used to make so much fun of has become a part of my everyday language. Who would have thought?
When I go back to Sweden I am most certain to keep this weird vocabulary and therefor I will probably get bullied to death. But hey, as we say in Sweden: Vad gör det om hundra år? (= what does it matter in 100 years) Good point there.
This Wednesday me and some friends went for a pub crawl - a to me very new event. In Sweden I'd never heard of such a thing. What I learnt is that a pub crawl is a group of people going from pub to pub, getting one or a few beers at each pub and don't stop until they've been to at least 7 different ones.
Hm, so okay. Well grand, maybe. To me, with my Swedish oh it's too cold to walk- attitude, I thought it would suck. Why would you like to go from place to place if the place you're already at has good music, cheap beer and cool people? But hey, I am always (alwaysalwaysalways) up for trying new things, and as usual I am glad I did, since we had a blast. We only made it to three different places though, but we had such a good time. The whole oh it's too cold to walk attitude disappears after a few beer, so even that was fine.
This old couple seemed rather pleased by our presence...
Alexandra and me in the ladies room of the second place we went to; Whelans.
Bastian was there with us as well.
David, Aaron and us two Swed's again, Stockhomie!
Johanna was the one to organise the whole night. Here she is standing with Hannes and Jack, all Swedish!
Our third and last stop was Bruxelles where we hanged out in the rock bar. Shooting pool and drinking to the screams of Phil Anselmo (singer of Pantera, if you didn't already know that) is such a great combination.
From there people all went their separate ways, so I guess it wasn't a ''real'' pub crawl since we didn't go to the magic number 7 (or 4, 5, 6) but still it was a great night. I might grow fond of the idea, although it is pretty silly thing, this pub crawling business.
One thing I've noticed here in Dublin is the way people (girls) dress when they are going out - Or perhaps I should say NOT dress. Girls here seem to have forgotten that sometimes less is more, and just take everything possible off instead. I was so shocked the first time I went for a night out here, and realised none of the girls had any clothes on. I was wearing a t-shirts, shorts and my converse while everyone around me had the tiniest tiniest dresses on, all sparkly and ass-showing. To that they all wore heels as high as me and their hair were all messed up. On purpose though, as if they were trying to compensate their non-existing sparkly dresses with some morning hair, to look a bit more casual. Or they might just be going for the 'after sex hair', aka knullruffs in Sweden, to make the boys aware that they are 'sexable'.
Of course girls in Sweden dress up before heading out as well, although that is the keyword: dress up, not undress. Well sure, by the definition of dressing up the skirts get a bit shorter and the heels a bit higher, but at least you could actually walk in them. I can't even count how many girls I've seen here, bumbling around in their heels, shaky, unable to lift their feet in the right order. Then the short (non-existing) dresses don't help very much, since they curl up at the bottom, fall down at the top and show all their most sacred parts.
Actually a few days ago I saw a girl crew coming out of a taxi and entering a club, without any jackets. In 98939572 inch heels and just hot pants, with a top covering only their boobs. The worst part is that it was 0 degrees outside... It is very interesting, really. I can't really imagine what goes through these girls heads when they stand in front of the mirror before leaving the house, in only underwear. I would love to know though, I would really love to hear from one of these many many many Irish girls what the purpose if it is. To get laid? To get attention? To get a cold?
What is even more interesting is that the guys here seem so used to the girls lack of clothes that they don't even acknowledge it. For a bit of fun I watched a couple of these girls wobbling down the street a few night ago, and the reaction they got from men passing - which was zero. If a girl in Sweden would go dressed in only a bra-ish top and hot pants in the middle of December she would probably get raped or picked up by the police and everyone passing would stare until their eyes popped out.
It just screams of insecurity and a lack of self respect.
A few weeks ago I realised that you can get pierced in Dublin for less than in Stockholm, actually less than half the price. Being a big fan of puncturing my body (haha) I decided to get new ones. Since it would be silly to just get one done when the price of two here is less than the price of one in Stockholm, I went for snakebites. I've been wanting to get them for a long time and couple of weeks ago I did.
Me and Holly (to the left) who wanted to pierce the side of her lip went to Dublin Ink to get it fixed. I figured the standards of the place wouldn't be as great as the piercing studios I've been to in Sweden, since the price was so low. And of course I was right, the standards in Sweden are much higher but it didn't really look as bad as it could.
The guys who work there are deadly, the studio looks really cool and they've done some really fierce tattoos. What I noticed though was that they didn't ask us any questions about our health, alcohol or smoking habits - which they always do in Stockholm. The piercer, a girl from an Irish TV-show, drew my snakebites on very uneven (you make small dots with a pen where you're gonna put the piercings) and didn't even see it until I pointed it out AND she told both me and Holly to take deep breaths after pushing the needle through our lips, haha. Other from that it seemed grand.
The day after both our piercings fell out though. The balls of tour studs were lost so we had to go back and get new ones - only to have to go back a few days later again to get more balls, since they fell out again. They guys there are really cool though, so it's hard to get mad at them. But if this would have happened in Sweden you'd probably be given some compensation the second time it happened and they would have cleaned it properly before putting new ones on. The third time they would have.. nah wait, it would never happen a third time if you got it done in Sweden. They are so careful, clean and precise. Although the price is twice as much.. Tough call.
So yesterday was the fifth time a ball fell off and I just heard Holly's was lost again as well. So now I guess we're going back again. They're lucky to be so good looking.
Right before getting pierced at Dublin ink. A little nervous!
This is Rakan. He's the one who always gets to put new balls on our studs... And he happens to be my future husband.
Last weekend I went to Galway with some friends of mine. I'm not going to write about how amazing it was or how much fun we had though, but what I am going to do is upload some photos from the trip to speak for themselves. After all, this is not a traveling guide - it's a totally haphazard blog where I get my odd 'Stockholm vs Dublin' thoughts out... And since photography kind of is an obsession of mine (I never leave the house without some sort of camera: system camera, mobile camera or disposable camera. I just feel naked otherwise) so I might as well get some use of all the pictures I take. Here you go, GALWAY:
I recommend you to listen to this song while scrolling through:
Me and Holly went hungover but excited to Salthill.
Holly by the shore.
We went to Charlie Byrnes - an awesome bookshop in central Galway. I wanted to live in there, so cosy!
Josh - the guy we stayed at. He gave us a tour around town.
Holly having a smoke.
Me and Alex, a bit tired after the trip.
Holly on the bus, taking photos of the landscapes.
Josh being all dramatic - such a poser.
This is his room mate Jason, you can tell he studies drama, right?
Bernard, aka Bear, in the apartment after a few beers.
Me in Salthill, freezing my ass off.
Alex was in a hurry to get home, it was a cold night!
Went to eat at La Salsa, the best mexican place I've ever been to. It was so cheap and students got a discount, plus; the people who work there are savage! We even got to taste the food before ordering, to see what we wanted. Really awesome.
At Josh's place you could smoke inside, by the window though, but still. It always makes me feel like Im in some romantic 50's movie, gotta love it.
Holly and me chilling (and freezing) at Salthill shore.
Such beautiful landscapes. Was a pity though that we didn't have more time to see more of it...
