Dublin—Day 7

Today had a simple plan. We were to go to the countryside with Billy, the director of DCM, and then head to DCM around 4 to prepare for tonight’s girls’ clubs. 

The countryside was beautiful! There aren’t sufficient words to describe it; the pictures will have to speak for themselves.

We walked around St. Kevin’s legacy, and toured Glendalough, the land that houses his church, a graveyard, and his bones, though no one is quite certain where they are. The oldest headstone death date I saw was 1736! Can you believe it? 

I’m totally fascinated with the age of everything here. What a rich history and culture! I feel like I’m learning so much. We also saw some of the scenery that was featured in P.S,. I Love You, so that was fun.

We got back to DCM a little later than expected due to traffic that was due to the Queen wandering the city. I went back to the hostel with Kelly and Becca to freshen up, and then headed back to DCM to meet Aubrey and make plans for the girls’ clubs. 

As we were deciding what to sing to them, Rochelle (super cool woman from South Africa) came in and told us that Samaria had gotten stuck across the city with all the girls for the club at a MacDonald’s in Kylemore, and that if we got on the Luas it would only take us about twenty minutes to get there. So we rushed to the Luas, got our tickets, and got on the Luas and sat. And sat. And sat. Finally an announcement came on and the man said “The Luas has been stopped for security reasons until further notice… that is all.” So, defeated, we headed back to DCM, where everyone who was there was leaving for the evening. More bad news: they had also blocked off all the bridges across the Liffey, so we also couldn’t get back the hostel. It was only 5:30PM, and Becca and the rest of the group were off somewhere else cleaning up after one of DCM’s camps, and we had no way of contacting them. 

Aubrey and I ended up wandering Henry Street and doing a little shopping while we waited for the Liffey bridges to open up. We had a nice time and found some cute little shops and trinkets and such.

We went back to the hostel with Kelly and waited for the others to arrive. When they did, they had a visitor with them—Martha, one of my new favorite people. She’s a missionary from Kansas who has made her current residence in Dublin, Ireland working with DCM. After making some dinner at the hostel, she took us to this great gelato place—my first time eating gelato—and showed us around the city. We got to see where U2 records when they’re in Dublin, and the area of town that they have, I suppose, been a huge part in renovating. There was graffiti everywhere from people who were thankful for U2’s influence on them and on Dublin, and it was beautiful to see. 

But even more fantastic than the sights we saw was getting to know Martha. I told her about how I was thinking of moving to Spain, and we talked a lot about the things a person has to realize when they live in a different country—the homesickness, the inability to simply go see your family whenever you want to, feeling like a stranger in a foreign place, learning new politics and ideas and ways of life. She gave me a lot to think about. We ended up talking for a couple of hours, walking around the city, and we had a wonderful time. 

Our plans have been destroyed and disastrous for the majority of this trip, but getting to know the people around here—the people who have left their homes to live somewhere else entirely—have been so encouraging to me, and I think we have been an encouragement to them, which is a ministry in itself. Even if we never get to work with the kids here one-on-one, we will have had the opportunity to be an encouragement and refresher for the people who do. To tell them how much we look up to them and aspire to be more like them in the future—to remind them the impact they are making even when they don’t feel they are.

I love this place. Aubrey, Nathan and Kyle are considering the Year Team for DCM, actually, and my heart is still pulling me to Barcelona. What an inspiration these people have been, and what an impact they’ve been on the team!