In case anyone is worried, I did not just stay in Belfast.  It just so happened, Belfast is where I was when I arrived home.  I haven’t had time or desire to write since.

Luckily for me, when I got home, there was a manufacturing company in Eugene that was looking for an Accounting Manager.  I stepped in temporarily until I leave for Mexico in August.  It is really nice because it pays well and gives me the flexibility to work, yet take time off to travel. 

I have kept busy since I have been back.  One of my favorite activities is Saturday morning breakfast at the Pinecone Café with Adrian and Leon.  I have also been trying to get into rock climbing and Leon and I have been building a rock climbing gym in our family’s warehouse.  We also spent a weekend in Bend to go to a Death Cab for Cutie / Decemberist concert.  It was amazing.  I also got to reunite with Tyler.

I don’t know what has been up with this weather but it is really depressing me.

Another exciting thing going on is the Last Comic Standing on NBC.  Normally I don’t really like the show that much but this year is different.  One of my buddies from Seattle, Jeff Dye, is on the show.  It is so fun to see a friend on TV every week and sometimes on previews.  Last Sunday, a crew spent a few hours filming Jeff and his friends in Seattle.  I got to meet the producer of the show and they even interviewed me, so maybe I’ll get my mug on tv. If I don’t I will be offended because they will have purposely edited me out of at least 30 minutes of film.  I’m proud of Jeff and all his hard work.

I’ll finish the Europe narrative soon.

We woke up to the traditional and stereotypical Irish rain the next morning.  I walked around for a bit trying to get my personal time quota filled and bought probably the best chocolate croissant I had ever tasted.

Tyler and Heather were ready to go when I had returned from my walk and we set off to see the city’s multiple noteworthy sites.  First stop: The two largest cranes in the world which built the Titanic.  We walked and walked and I became a little grumpy trying to figure out why we were trying to see some boring cranes (I had seen them from the freeway the day before).  By the time we got some pictures I was pretty wet.  We ducked into a nearby Starbucks for some rest.  It was so nice to be able to be in a familiar place and gather our bearings and thoughts.  I spent most of my time in the bathroom trying use the hand dryer to dry out my coat.

We took off for our second part of the Belfast tour: Shankill and Falls Road.  These roads represent the Protestant and Catholic neighborhoods respectively.  Between the two neighborhoods is a wall referred to as the Peace Wall, because it separates the two groups.  Here is a little history on the Troubles:

For nearly 700 years the British ruled the Irish.  Many times, Irish people rebelled in an attempt to gain their independence.  One idea the British had to better control the area was to move a bunch of British (who happened to be Protestant) to Ireland in the hopes of making the area pro-British.  In a way it backfired in the sense the British took land away from native Irish Catholics to give to the British.  This obviously made many Irish mad, fueling the Irish independence movement.  Eventually, Ireland was able to declare its independence from England, however all the Protestants who had moved over in previous generations from England wanted to remain a part of the United Kingdom.  Sooooo, Northern Ireland remains a separate country, apart of the United Kingdom.  However, naturally, everyone in Northern Ireland is not Protestant or loyal to England.  Over the years the Protestants made life very hard for the Catholics living in Northern Ireland creating a lower class.  This persecution led to all the fighting by the IRA and other pro-Nationalist groups crying out for equality and even better, a united independent Ireland.

As we walked around the Falls and Shankill neighborhoods it was really interesting and a little scary to see all the very passionate murals painted on the side of buildings.  I have pictures of many of the murals posted on my Flickr account (Tyler took the photos).  It was hard for me to imagine how reconciliation and healing can come between the two groups with constant reminders everywhere of the bloodshed caused by others.  While we were in Belfast, Yahoo News actually had an article about Belfast and the current state of the conflict, it was really interesting. You can read it here!

We were all exhausted from all the walking and the sun was out and we ducked into Crown Bar, one of the most famous bars in Ireland.  We looked around a little and then left in search of some Kababs.  We never found an open Kabab shop so we ended up eating at SPUDS (I do not recommend if you ever go to Belfast).

By this point in the evening, the day had become downright gorgeous.  We walked up to the local University to take pictures and check out the Botanical Gardens.  Somehow Heather got stuck in one of the trees.

After the gardens we moved over to a local Pub and tried our first experience of Guinness (in Ireland).  Tyler and Rick Steves had been trying to convince me that Guinness is much better in Ireland because it is fresh and doesn’t ‘travel well.’  I hate to break the news but Guinness tastes just as bad in Ireland as it does in the USA.  I know this is really unpopular but I really don’t like Irish Beer, or Irish Whisky while we are on the subject of Irish things I don’t like.

We were up early in the morning all vying for a position in the bathroom.  The thing I dislike about hostels with ensuite bathrooms is everyone has to wait in line to use the toilet and shower.  If you have communal bathrooms then everyone can share at the same time and efficiency is enhanced.  Our hostel did have some free breakfast which was nice given the internet was really expensive to use. 

We arrived at the car rental office by 10:00am and got our sweet ride, a Ford.  I quickly assigned tasks in order to safely get out of Dublin.  Heather was assigned to make sure I was on the correct side of the road, Tyler was in charge of the map and I simply tried to avoid any collisions.  Before we knew it we were on the open road only after running over one leprechaun.

What I enjoy about driving in Ireland is the speed limit.  It is set so high I never really felt like I was safe driving at the limit.  So I never had to worry about speeding because I drove at the speed I felt safe.

I did get honked at twice when I turned into the wrong side of the road (Heathers fault, she was in charge of me being in the correct lane) and for some other reason I wasn’t sure about (I’m just going to assign blame to Tyler for no reason).  I got a friendly wave once (I’m going to take credit for this) so I feel like that cancelled out one of the honks.  Someone casually flipped us off once but I think that wasn’t due to my driving more likely it was him just having a bad day (or maybe that is how Irish greet each other).

Outside of Dublin an hour there are 3 ancient burial mounds, the most famous being Newgrange and Knowth.  We stopped for the tour and it was amazing.  These mounds are older than the Egyptian pyramids at Giza. Not a whole lot to say about the mounds besides the fact they were really cool.  I saw some graffiti in one of them from the 1800’s.

On the way back to the freeway we had to dodge a couple cars on the road.  The roads are so narrow you don’t have a lane, you just share the same path.  We stopped at a little store and bought a sandwich for lunch.

Our next stop was Monasterboice, an old abbey.  Because the population was largely illiterate, large crosses were carved with Bible stories on them that the priest would use to illustrate stories and teach the people.  Monasterboice had some amazing large crosses with great carvings.  It also had a large stone tower used during Viking raids.  When raiders would come, the locals would all jump inside the tower, pull up the ladder and wait it out. Simple, yet genius…what will they think of next? Castles?

The sun broke through the clouds by this point and we were all high on our love for the sun and freedom the car provided.  This euphoria died a little when I noticed there was a 17 car trail behind me.  I was a little stressed because there were speed cameras everywhere and I didn’t want to speed but the posted speed limit seemed ridiculously slow all of a sudden and cars continued to back up.  After doing some quick mental gymnastics we came to the conclusion we had passed over the border into Northern Ireland, where the speed limit is no longer in km/h but m/h. That little fact really sorted out a lot of stress and got us to our destination much quicker.

What was our destination you might be thinking? It is the birthplace of C.S Lewis and home of politically charged tension: Belfast!!!

We were hungry after all the driving so we found our hostel and received a recommendation on the best fish and chips in town.  We ordered happily and sat waiting for our food.  The ladies working yelled some words I couldn’t understand.  I thought it might be our food so I walked up and looked at them expectantly.  They pointed at the food and asked a couple more questions I failed to decipher so I just grabbed the food and walked off hoping for the best.  The fish was amazing!!! Everything a hungry American could ever hope for.  We all relished the fish happy to be in Ireland.

I went to sleep that night with visions of fat Irish sheep jumping over fences and of Bushmill’s Wiskey being distilled in the year 1608.    

The opposite of free trade is not slave trade—the opposite of free trade is freedom itself.

 
It is trade that enslaves: economics dictates life as we know it, paves over forests with parking lots, reduces the complex beauty of the world to commodities that can be bought and sold.
 

Gifts are free, trade is precisely that which is not free – and today, trade is the means by which the rich get richer at everyone else’s expense. Some are born into billion-dollar fortunes while others begin life in abject poverty, and starting ahead in the game makes it easy to stack the cards; it’s not a coincidence that there are then thousand homeless people for every Bill Gates.

Those advantages aren’t enough for today’s fat cats. They want to remove all barriers between them and the maximum profit. If they get their way, there will be nothing to stop them from turning the last of the rainforests into junk mail, from moving the factory that employs your cousins to a country where they can pay fifty nine cents and hour for the same labor, from buying out the last vestiges of democracy.

Some of us believe it is people who deserve freedom, not commerce. In our protest against so-called free trade, in our efforts to act according to our consciences rather than in return for cash, we are rediscovering what real freedom is. Don’t trade in our freedom—join us.

I read the above in the hostel we stayed at in Belgrade. There were so many posters like this up. Not surprisingly they all seemed to come from some organization in Olympia, WA. I disagreed with this poster it really made me frustrated.

Two nights ago in Derry I met a Canadian girl traveling. She is getting her masters in Anthropology. We actually discussed free-trade and the world of economics at great lengths. Though we obviously disagreed on basically every rudimentary idea, we had a nice chat and I hope we both learned a little from each other. It was funny, I mentioned I had read some Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged and Anthem) and she almost freaked. I guess Anthropologist don’t really like her, haha.  Either way it was really nice having a nice strong intellectual discussion

Because both Tyler and I were not really enjoying Riga, for various reasons, we decided to see about going into the Latvian countryside. Tyler had worked at a camp a couple hours outside Riga a couple years ago. He called the people at the camp to see if they needed help. Naturally they did so we caught a ride with a guy to the countryside to help build a church.

The guy’s name was Edmonds. The funny thing about Latvian names is they add an ’s’ to so many words. For instance ‘bar’ is bars and ‘Tyler’ is Tylers. Edmonds was really nice to talk with. He informed us on everything from Latvian healthcare to his travels in the United States. Surprisingly he and a bunch of his friends listen to Mars Hill sermons online.

Getting to the small town near the camp, we met Marvin. I really liked this guy and the work he was doing. He is originally from Salem, Oregon, but he grew up in Africa. After college at Oregon State he lived in Mongolia for 2 years and now he is in Latvia for 2 years helping build a church and run camps.

As soon as we were dropped off we started working. It was sunny and hot so about 30 seconds into the job I had sawdust stuck to every exposed piece of skin. Our job was to cut out pieces of plywood to connect the support braces on the trusses for the roof. The skillsaw failed to have a blade guard which really worried me but I still have all my limbs and fingers.

We met a giant man named Bruce from Olympia who has been living in the area for 5 years.

We met a Latvian guy named Dicks (American name would be Dick). He was really funny and worked as a contractor. He had obtained the ultimate driving machine, a minivan. Marvin said that in Latvia minivans are considered a pretty sweet ride. Oh how I wish that were the case in the Willamette Valley in the late ’90s. I would have been a cool kid in my ‘86 Dodge Caravan (Probably not but at least I would have had what was considered a nice mode of transport)!

Latvia has no hills. The countries main ski resorts are in the village we stayed at and the resorts only had rope tows. Also at the top of the hill there was a huge ramp built to extend the height of the hill. I had to laugh inwardly.

Has anyone read Asterix and Obelixs books? Well they were one of my favorite books growing up. I guess they are a bigger deal here in Europe and they even have some cartoons. I watched one after work.

The second day of work we started building the trusses. Our time improved from around 15 minutes a truss to 6 minutes. We completed all 24 in one day and Marvin was really happy to get the job done in two days instead of the many days he was worried it was going to take.

The third day we were there we tried to put up the trusses. Almost immediately we realized we were not equipped for the job. I lack balance when perched on the top of a narrow wall trying to hoist a huge truss into place. Marvin was limited by the fact his help lacked talent. We gave up soon and Marvin and I grabbed a canoe and explored a local river for a couple of hours. It was interesting to learn some of the pros and cons of being a missionary. I learned a crazy fact that Marvin knew a close friend of mine from college, Mary. They went to HS together in Africa.

Nearly as soon as I arrive back in Oregon I had planned to go to Mexico for 3 months on a mission trip. I was not really look forward to leaving so quick and missing out on all the fun in Oregon during the summer (and number of other reasons). Lucky for me the trip has been moved back to August so I have some time to recoup after this trip and work for a bit before leaving again.

Do most people have strong sense of internal locus of control? I have been thinking about it some lately and I believe I do feel like I have a strong sense of internal locus of control. In general, I feel that I can affect my environment more than my environment affects me. Things don’t just happen, people need to make them happen.

After Tyler was found safe and sound after working out, we headed out to a Tallinn microbrewery that was really touristy and funny. Since I had already eaten, I sat and observed Tyler consume the local homemade sausage. There was a fun Estonian folk band playing and Kai convinced me to dance while Tyler was finishing up. I twirled her around a bit, looked pretty foolish and then sat back down.

Before going to sleep that night we watched an episode of The Office with a Russian/Canadian girl staying in our hostel (She too, was creeped out by Porn Man). As we tried to fall asleep she started talking politics which got us all chatting and then before we knew it the clock read 3am.

The next day we took a self guided tour of the city. We went to an old church, which was the tallest building in the world at one point, and the newest building in the world at one point. It was pretty amazing seeing the view from the top. Climbing the towers in those old churches always amazes and winds me. This church tower was 124 (roughly 375 feet) meters tall. Touring the bottom of the church was really encouraging. Unlike many huge churches we come across here in Europe, this church appeared to be very active and alive. There were tons of Sunday School coloring pictures up, and other fliers about youth events.

We walked to a supermarket to grab some lunch and it was so fun. I love wondering around European supermarkets to see the unique goods being sold.

I ended up getting a haircut, finally, and I started to freak out!!! I think most men have a point in their life where they start to realize they are going bald and try to stay in denial. While getting the haircut she lopped off most my hair and wetted it down and I swore I was completely bald and no longer could stay in denial. A couple tears were shed but I didn’t want to look weak in front of the Estonian so I tried to hold myself together. Then I remembered another reason I hate going to salons:

The ladies/gents doing your hair at salons always seem style your hair the worst way possible right before you leave. I always hate how they style my hair, I left and ran to the hostel hoping no one I knew saw me. That was a pretty sure bet given only Tyler and Kai knew me. When I got the hostel I quickly restyled my hair. I took comfort in the fact my head of hair looked much fuller, the mirror at the salon must have been broken. Tyler reassured me that salon’s mirrors often lie and make people look balder than they really are. I hope we aren’t all in denial! If I am, please don’t tell me.

Kai wanted us to come to her University Class with her that evening. We took the bus over to her house. I believe we have been getting our fair share of crazies lately:

In Vilnius Tyler left me to guard the bags while he shopped for some bus food. While he was gone this big drunk guy walked over into my personal bubble and started jabbering in Lithuanian. I tried to play along with his antics the best I could nodding frantically and laughing at what I thought were jokes while inwardly frustrated Tyler was taking so long. Tyler got the next crazy at the bus stop to Kai’s. He was sitting on the bus bench and a big guy sits right next to him with dried blood all over his hands and on his face. He just sat there a while before mumbling something incoherently and then getting on the bus. I had to give the visibly shaken Tyler a big hug.

Getting to Kai’s house she started to make crepes/pancakes at a frantic pace. They were so good! We jumped into her newly purchased car and drove off to University. She was excited to show us the seedier part of town and her professor, she was convinced was gay. Luckily the class was in English and was Industrial Marketing so I felt at home. For some reason the class was dismissed about 15 minutes after it started so we had plenty of time to kill. We drove to the beach to watch the sun set and take some jumping pictures. Everything was going great until I jumped for a picture and landed in the ocean! We grabbed some tea and chatted a while.

Next we took a driving tour of the outskirts of Tallinn and the Russian district. Kai made us get a traditional Estonian hamburger and it was really good. Arriving back at her place she insisted we go out on the town with her. We tried to distract her, make excuses and basically be lame in the hopes we could get out of it. But before we knew it the taxi had been called and we were on our way to some place she liked.

We ended up meeting some of Kai’s nice friends and they all ended up dancing long into the night. I ended up having much more fun than I anticipated! Walking back to the hostel with Tyler I was sad to see the sun was starting to rise.

We had to leave the hostel by 11am to make it to the bus by 12:30 to leave for Riga, Latvia. Tyler wanted to stay around to connect with Kai before we left so I left to go to the bus station and grab a Kebab on the way (We have been craving Kebab’s for many countries now and it was a pleasant surprise to find a place selling them). I ended up having plenty of extra time so I walked the entire way to the station.

Leaving the hostel I was a little worried Tyler was going to miss the bus but he assured me he wouldn’t. I wait and waited for him at the station I decided I couldn’t wait any longer and decided I was going to have to buy the ticket for Riga. The unfortunate thing is I had waited too long and the line to buy tickets was especially lengthy (and Eurolines service is horrible and it takes about 10 minutes per customer). I realized I wouldn’t make it through line before the bus left so I went back outside to wait for Tyler. He arrived about 12:35.

Kai was waiting for us at the bus stop to spend time with us while we waited for the next bus to Riga two hours later. We went to the Estonian Presidential Palace and were able to see the President driving in his car. We sauntered around the beautiful gardens and took alot of pictures. Before we knew it we were on the bus to Riga. I love and already miss Kai, Estonia and the beautiful Tallinn.

I have uploaded some videos to the Flickr website, you can see them using these links but I am not linking some so maybe you should just check them out there.