Galway and Western Ireland

This is one of my back-log travel entries that I have been meaning to write for a long time.   Right after submitting my doctoral thesis to the big-wigs at the university, I took off for a week to Ireland to meet up with my sister. We had a blast exploring wind-swept islands, going hiking, and drinking perfectly poured pints of Guinness.  It was fun travelling with my sister; we both seem to like the same food, same hostels and same tourist destinations, plus we walk at the exact same speed, which is helpful when you are walking for a few hours each day.   Many people suspected that we were sisters and some people asked us if we were twins, one guy even asking if we were “Mediterranean twins”.  Ooh la la.

On our first full day in Galway, we took a bus tour to the Cliffs of Moher (which also featured as the “Cliffs of Insanity” in the Princess Bride, one of the best movies of all time) rising 120 metres above the Atlantic Ocean. 

The (suspected) Cliffs of Insanity!

We saw O’Brien’s Tower, a round stone tower at approximately the midpoint of the cliffs.  According to Wikipedia, it was built by Sir Cornelius O’Brien in order to impress his lady visitors.    To be honest the tower didn’t do too much for me, but along with the very cool cliffs, I was seriously impressed by the delicious honeycomb ice cream at the visitor centre.

Other impressive sights on the tour included the burial mound Poulnabrone Dolmen, dating back to 4000 B.C., the high crosses at Kilfenora, and the incredibly rocky landscape of the Burren.

Portal tomb Poulnabrone, ~2000 years older than Stonehenge

Other fun times:

Free Trad (traditional) music and meeting mostly French tourists (French sailors one night, who were there to board illegal fishing vessels) in the pubs.

Aran Islands.  We just checked out one (Inish Mór, the largest at ~4x20 km and 800 scattered inhabitants).  There are no trees and pretty hilly terrain, but it’s small enough to be explored by bike including chapel ruins, sheer cliffs and a mysterious structure called Dún Aonghasa, a prehistoric fort from ~ 800 B.C built on a high cliff some one hundred metres above the sea and consisting of a series of four concentric walls.  In one way it’s amazingly authentic since there is no guard rail or warning signs as you stand mere feet away from the sheer cliff, but on the other hand I couldn’t help but thinking how one gust of wind and you could plunge to your doom (it was pretty windy). The exact purpose is unknown although archaeologists suspect its use was religious and ceremonial rather than military.   

Kiran looking fabulous on her rental bike:

I was in charge of navigation and not doing so well with the windy conditions and trying to read my map.

Chapel ruins

A few wrong turns led us to these amazing cliffs with no other tourists to ruin it!

One wrong move and you can get swept off to sea at the prehistoric for of Dún Aonghasa.

Galway was our home base for a few days where we enjoyed walking around the very picturesque harbour:

We also liked just wandering around in general and making fun of their stylish maternity wear and cheesy storefront advertisements. 

Their liquor stores are literally hole-in-the-walls the size of two telephone booths:

After the Aran Islands and Galway, we moved on to the beautiful Connemara district in the north-west.  We walked the long (~16 km) Sky Road (and not the “Air Walk” as Kiran mistakenly called it) which offered glimpses of the coast and mountains.  The best part was an abandoned, derelict castle.  

Olympic Anniversary, Vancouver

So I have to admit that I was a little disappointed to have landed in Vancouver almost a year AFTER the Winter Olympics had come and gone. If I’m ever stuck trying to make conversation with a Vancouverite, all I have to do is ask “how was it here, last February?” and they erupt in a wide grin and start talking up a storm. Most mention where they were for the men’s gold medal hockey game, and the sonic boom (well OK…but “loud noise” probably just doesn’t cut it) created by over a million people simultaneously cheering in the Greater Vancouver area the moment Sidney Crosby scored the “golden goal” on Feb. 28^th, 2010. Here is an overly lengthy (but so darned heart-warming) mash-up video of people celebrating the win (9 minutes, but who can deny them their unbridled joy?).

(props for this picture go to the CBC website)

Interestingly, aside from that goal, a lot of people mentioned how amazing it was to have seen the Paralympics. Most are just regular people who could never afford to go to many of the Olympic events, but the Paralympic tickets were much more reasonably priced. Some said that for the first five minutes it was hard to see beyond the person’s disability, but after that they got so caught up in the athleticism of what they were watching (be it wheelchair hockey or blind biathlon where athletes hurtle themselves down hills and curves they can’t see) that they forgot about any of the athletes’ limitations.

Anyways, I digress. Thanks to the one-year anniversary of the Olympic Games, I was able to witness and experience some of that Olympic spirit myself. On the one year anniversary of the opening ceremonies I headed downtown to see the relighting of the Olympic Flame (no uncomfortable-looking Wayne Gretzky this time folks). My spot in the crowd was so poor all I could see were a group of people huddling under umbrellas (it was raining…are you surprised?) and a giant Canadian flag.

While waiting around for stuff to get started some people spontaneously started singing Oh Canada, which was heartening. And then voilá, after another 20 minute wait and a 10 minute speech, the flame was lit!

There are actually two Mounties and a ton of former-volunteers in Olympic blue jackets in the crowd. My favourite is probably the guy in the foreground in the Canada jersey with a flag, about to topple backwards into the pool in 2 degree weather.

Cool orca statue by Douglas Coupland in the vicinity. Captures the symbol of Vancouver and our digital lifestyle:

The obligatory non-photoshoped picture to prove I was at the scene:

And half-an-hour later “holding” (well, touching with the supervision of two other adults) an Olympic torch.

There were plenty of other activities going on along Granville St. and Robson St. including street hockey, couples dancing, and free ice skating. I also witnessed a flash mob of hip-hop dancers which happened so suddenly and was over so quickly I didn’t manage to capture them on camera. It was neat how as soon as their choreographed dance was over everyone just melted into the crowd.

Lots o’ fun and lots of happy people out and about. I’ll leave you with a few more shots of a quieter part of Vancouver near Jericho Beach. I ventured out a little further than usual though and almost came across a nudist beach. Probably no one out in February, but I turned back before I could disturb anyone ;)

Eurovision Song Contest 2010

Greetings from Vancouver! I am settling down just fine and am happy now that all my furniture is here and has been put together. It’s a nice feeling to no longer eat dinner sitting cross-legged on the floor with a moving box acting as a dinner table. Everyone warned me about the rain and it’s true it is rainy. Just look at the forecast for the coming week:

I normally look up Edmonton’s forecast directly afterwards to make myself feel better. There it’s typically blowing snow with a high of -20°C. Brings out the Schadenfreude in me.

But Vancouver weather is not actually what this post is supposed to be about. Rather, I found myself bored the other night and started to watch the Miss America pageant on TV, which reminded me somewhat of the spectacle which passes for the Eurovision Song Contest. I somehow managed to live in Germany many years before witnessing this uniquely European cultural phenomenon on TV last spring, when it was hosted in Norway.

I suppose unlike Miss America, a lot of Europeans take this quite seriously. The way it works is that each member country submits a song which is performed live on TV, and then each country casts votes for other countries to determine the most popular song in the competition. It is part spectacle, part talent show, part popularity contest and always controversial. It often seems that there is some political bias as judges and televoters are perceived to allocate points based on their nation's relationship to other countries, rather than the musical merits of the songs. The contest has been broadcast every year since 1956 and is one of the longest-running television programs in the world. It is also supposedly one of the most-watched non-sporting events in the world according to Wikipedia.

In 2010, 19-year old Lena from Germany won it all (Youtube link to her performance). I’m personally not crazy about the song, but at least she seemed pretty down-to-earth compared to most of the contestants.

Although most of songs were exaggerated emotional love ballads with overly sexy costumes and dancers (not really my type of music), it was entertaining in its cheesiness. I loved how at the end of nearly every song, the over enthusiastic wind machine guy would really turn on the air, completely destroying some perfectly coiffed hairstyles and throwing the artists’ long flowing scarves and dresses in their faces.

The Ukraine contestant gets some wind in her face towards the end of her ballad.

Even worse is this poor girl whose hair is now defying gravity:

Some of the songs weren’t so deep, such as Azerbaijan's aptly-titled "Drip Drop". A surprisingly hard-rockish song from the group Manga ( representing Turkey) won 2nd place. The cool-looking robots in the background probably didn't hurt either.

I think my favourite though was Greece's more traditional "Opa!". A lot of countries choose to play up their own national stereotypes. Georgia's entry (Sofia Nizharadze) was kind of strange, as the woman got carried around the stage by these two guys the entire time:

Other interesting facts:

The rule regarding in which language songs have to be sung in has changed over the years. During various periods it had to be sung in an official language of the country, but as of 1999 it can be in any language. More and more countries sing in English since nearly all Europeans can understand it to some degree, and winning the contest depends on having other countries (not your own) vote for you. The new language ruling has been pushed to the limit in various years though as in 2003 the Belgian entry was sung in an entirely fictional language.

Lots of crazy hair (eg. of Milan Stanković from Serbia, where young boys are imitating him everywhere) and outrageous costumes make for half of the fun.




Cheesiest costume ever: butterflies from Belarus

ABBA won the contest in 1974 for Sweden, which launched the band's career