Lost Blog...

Originally posted Jan. 11, 2006

OK, I am now going to try to recreate my hourlong blog that was lost the other day. This better #$&*(! work.

Back in 1998, my high school choir took a tour of the British Isles (England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales). Alumni are always invited to go on these trips, and I had already gone on my first European choir tour in '96, after I graduated, so I decided that for the reasonable price of $3K, why not? My sister was going, and the cost of the trip covered airfare, lodging, breakfasts, dinners and tour fees (guide, bus, admission to some places, etc.). Singing in foreign lands is fun, and I had always wanted to see Ireland and Scotland.

So for the second time, I saved up all my movie theater earnings and paid my way to the British Isles. I think paying for it myself gave me a better appreciation of the trip. I was 20, working a full-time job and didn't have to pay rent, so I was able to spare the cash. Many of the other singers' parents paid for them to go (i.e. my sister), and I'll be honest, a lot of them took advantage of that. I won't say I was traveling with the most well-behaved group, but eh, I was still 20. I could understand.

We left early (I think around 6 or 7 a.m.) on the departure day, and because there were 65 of us on the tour, we were split into two United flights. I was on the second flight, with my sister, and left SFO for Newark, N.J.

I can easily say this was one of the worst flights of my life. The damn plane was bouncing all over the place, plus we got saddled with Susie Cheerful, the flight attendant bitch from hell. Apparently she was not happy about being assigned to the section containing 30 youths, and she took her wrath out on us. Not to mention I was sitting in an aisle seat, and one of the chaperones, who happened to have a bladder the size of Jessica Simpson's brain and a voice louder than Roseanne, was sitting by the window. She didn't want to change seats, even after she made me get up and reposition myself 42 times so she could use the loo. Eventually, Susie Cheerful locked her in the bathroom when the plane got too turbulent.

At some point, I pretended to fall asleep with my foot in the aisle, and Ms. Cheerful (whoops!) tripped over it. Aw, too bad, Susie.

Finally, we arrived in Newark, where we were greeted by an international terminal still under construction. I think we had something like a 4-hour layover, so everywhere you looked, there were Danville teenagers stuffed into cold and sawdust-covered corners, trying to sleep.

Respite came when we boarded our Aer Lingus flight for Shannon, Ireland. They passed out REAL blankets -- tartan-patterned, afghan-like things. And little bottles of whiskey (to those of us who could have them). And I seem to remember real slippers. All the flight attendants had accents and really WERE cheerful. We were in heaven.

After arriving in Shannon, we met our tour guide, an Irish lassie named Brenda Campbell, who hailed from Belfast. (The accent in northern Ireland is different...she always said "nie" instead of "now." Eventually we got the idea to make her keep saying "how now brown cow," which came out "hie nie brine kye" and always kept us in stitches.) Brenda worked for the tour company we booked our trip through, EF Tours. We also met our tour bus driver, who loaded our luggage into the coach and began the daunting task of carting around more than 50 American youths and about 8 parents.

The first thing we did was stop in Killarney for an official group photo and a ride in jaunting cars around Killarney National Park. It was cold, of course, so we loaded up on the blankets piled in the jaunting cars and marveled at the cool, quiet countryside that rolled out before us. Ireland was proving itself to be the wonderment I had expected.

While in Ireland, we took a tour of the Waterford Crystal factory, where we got to see live demonstrations of glass-blowing and how valuable crystal pieces are manufactured. We also drove past the Guinness factory, when we were told about what a commodity Guinness is in Ireland. It's a medicine, it's a meal, it's a panacea! They serve it warm and it's different from the Guinness we get here. It almost tastes coffee-like over there. Anyway, we didn't go into the factory because although most of us were of drinking age in Ireland (18), we had to follow our home rules.

One of my favorite stops in Ireland was in the countryside where they filmed part of "Far and Away." Shot in 70mm, directed by Ron Howard, starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, it's always been one of my favorite historical fiction movies (because I'm a sucker for that type of thing). We ran around the hillsides there spouting quotes from the movie. OK, so in hindsight that was probably dorky, but when else would I have the chance??

Another favorite stop was Blarney Castle. Home of the Blarney Stone, it's a castle mostly composed of ruins, and containing fantastic gardens. You could climb all over the place, and even get lost. But the thing to do was kiss the Blarney Stone. Legend has it that doing so gives you the "gift of eloquence" (or "gift of the gab," as they say over there). Kissing the stone is somewhat more of a complicated process than you would think. You have to lay down on your back, then tilt your head back to kiss the belly of the stone. Basically, you're upside-down, and your head is over a drain grate that offers a glimpse of the grounds 100 feet below. It's a little scary. Here's a picture of what it's like. When you're all done, they give you a little certificate saying you've received the gift of eloquence.

Yet another highlight was seeing the original Book of Kells at Trinity College. The Book of Kells was basically an illustrated version of the gospels of the Bible, intended for poor Irish folk who couldn't read. The book is considered a great achievement in the Celtic art form. It was fascinating to see the exhibit at Trinity, where most everyone rode bicycles, which were locked up all over the campus.

Having driven through southern Ireland in our trusty charter bus (and endured our choir director's lectures about sleeping too much while the landscape passed us by), we boarded a ferry for our next leg of the tour, England. The kind of ride we had made me wonder whether United owns and operates ferries. The boat was all over the place, and our group was quickly lying on the floor in various places, trying to keep seasickness to a minimum. It was an awful, awful ride, and we were relieved to finally reach England's shores.

I've been to England many times before, so I was pretty complacent about our activities there, but I have to say that the singular moment of our time in England had to be our performance at the Victoria & Albert Museum. We sang in a room that housed the Raphael Cartoons, which were originally commissioned as designs for tapestries intended for the Sistine Chapel. Here we were among these historic works, in a chamber that featured a 7 1/2-second echo. The reverb effect, coupled with the collection of secular music we performed, was enough to bring one to tears. You just felt like you were part of something sacred.

We also saw "Miss Saigon" in London, which angered me because although the play was good, I had several pounds in my pocket (money, not weight, thanks) that fell out when I had to squeeze myself into a seat next the hugest kid on tour. I think I lost the equivalent of $90. I had to move around in my seat so much to make room for him that it slipped out of my pocket, unbeknownst to me until I got back to the hotel. Bollocks!

I have more to say about London, but will have to pick it up in the next blog. I just want to take this moment to talk about some of the weird hotels we had. Before leaving, we signed up for preferred rooming groups of 2, 3 and 4. Mostly we'd be in two's, and I signed up with my sister. We got a doozy of a room in Ireland. When you opened the door, it hit my bed. My sister's bed was shoved up against the closet, so the only way to get into it was to sit on the bed, open the closet, then get inside the closet. We had a vanity with a sink, but where was the bathroom? Eventually we found a secret panel in the wall, which revealed a toilet and a shower. It was so small that when you sat on the toilet, your feet and legs were in the shower. And forget it if you dropped something in the shower...you ain't gettin' it back until you get out. We also accidentally got a suite in a hotel in England. Everyone else had tiny little rooms that barely afforded space to walk, and here we had this huge suite with a huge bathroom and windows that let out onto the roof. I liked going out on the roof to take in the view and write in my travel journal. Meanwhile, I heard horror stories about the annoying chaperone from the plane -- how she had to get up to go to the bathroom a million times a night, and that she snored so much, one of the other chaperones finally put her mattress on the floor in another room. Hey, I told you we had an interesting group.

Well, there's so much more, but fear not, I'll continue it later. Slainte! ("Cheers" in Gaelic.)