old dubliners

Last weekend we were visited by old Dubliners Mattias, KP and Sofia (who hasn't really lived here but been visiting enough to count to the category).

Started the visit with Guinness at the Temple Bar bar, Irish food at the Quays and a couple of pints at the Globe. When the kids continued the adventure I went home to my bed.

On Thursday Olle, Ruth and I had dinner at Yamamori before Phantom at the Opera at the Grand Canal Theatre. It was great, only disappointment was that Peter Jöback didn't play the phantom but you can't get it all! 

Met up with the visitors at Noname for a after work pint (and apparently shot) on Friday. Then dinner at Yamamori for the third time in a week... Will be at least one more visit before I leave.

After a shower, a pre-party and a quick visit at Morgan's I headed to Whelan where Mattias, KP and Sofia were dance, dance, dancing! When we got to sweaty we continued the dancing at the Workmans Club.

 KP had bought Jaffa cakes that he offered to everyone at the place. They were not that popular.

 But we finished them all eventually.

Saturday started with cinema - Seeking a friend for the end of the world. After that we had a couple of pints at Pygmalion, dinner at some french restaurant with way too spicy pasta (first time in my life I sent back food I think) and eventually ended up at Noname again.

The no evil monkeys.

Pedro and Ruth came.

Half the group went out, half of us went home. And that's the end of that brilliant weekend. 

12 days left in Dublin now... 

i got in!

After a few hours of refreshing the web page that would tell me if five years abroad would come to an end, I finally got the result. And I got in. And I'm freaking out a bit, changing my mind, maybe I should just stay here? 

But nah, I've said YES now and are starting my new "freedom" by not taking off my converse and painting my nails at work. No one can stop me now!


Celebrating tonight with dinner at Yamamori, Phantom of the Opera and karaoke at WoolShed.

festival

So. Dead. At. Work. Today. Should probably use my time to update work instructions before I leave but, nah. Here are some pictures from Saturday instead when we went to Phoenix Park to see Calvin Harris, Snoop Dogg, Tinie Tempah and Swedish House Mafia.

Bananas.

Party mode: ON.

 Pepp at Swedish House Mafia!

Here are some more, better pics from the day. It was a top notch (how many years since I used that expression? Haha.) Saturday and the first warm, sunny day in a while. Almost skipped buying wellies as the sun was shining but I'm so happy Olle convinced me, the whole place was mud, mud, mud!

Fortunately I managed to stay on my feet, unlike this poor guy. Captured some Irish fashion for you as well, you're welcome (the shorts should actually be even shorter, no tights and feel free to add as much extensions, fake tan and fake eyelashes as possible). Despite the mud it was one of the best Saturdays on this Island, can we do it again please?

monday - check!

Last five minutes at work and I've survived yet another Monday (and one of the last ones at Pfizer!). While waiting for the clock to turn 16 I can tell you that on Friday I ate this:

It's a Korean dish called Kimchi (with steamed tofu) and it was delicious! It was also huge, it's actually a whole head of lettuce filled with spiced cabbage, peppers and spring onions. Therese, Monique and I had a small girls night out starting with the Korean dinner and ending with cocktails at Capitol. I didn't manage to stay out long tho, all that food killed me (and didn't even eat half of it). But it was for the best as Saturday was festival day!  

But more about that tomorrow, now it's time for a coffee and a catch up with Pedro.

aw and ls

It's hard to stay away from the aw on Fridays, you have to celebrate the best day of the week! And after a few it just feels stupid to go home and sleep, right?

Met up with Josef, Olle and Johan at Noname where they have a beer garden with the best circus feeling ceiling.

When Olle and Johan got hungry Josef and I joined with some sangria at Havana. 

After a pit stop at my place where we were joined by Ruth and Pedro (and lost Olle) we entered the dance floor at Lost Society.

Musi came.

Ruth and I did the drunk test. If you can't do this, you should stop drinking. We could.

Ended the evening at the After Party where I lost my phone, no surprise. Ah well, material things. Great, spontaneous Friday anyway!

five years

I can't really understand it was five years ago I moved away from Sweden, and I can't really understand I'm about to move back. But I am, with mixed feelings of course. 

Gustav and Vidar on one of our first visits to Temple Bar.

One of the best weekends in Dublin (or maybe ever), on the road with Linnea, Chrille, Ida, Johan, Johanna, Wille and Lasse.

My leaving party 2 years and 9 months later.

Spent 2,5 months in New York with Emily, Freddie and Nina.

Celebrating 4th of July at the Gaslight with Emma.

Ice skating in Vancouver with Lex, Dennis, Ant, Josef and Jaan.

Halloween party in an underground car park.

After 6 months in Van I moved to Malta and met this lovely lady. And Josef was there too, of course.

Met loads of other awesome people, like Lucas, Nicklas and Chrille.

First night back in Dublin after another 6 months on the Rock.

  

One of many Dublin parties.

Wow, the five years felt so short now, especially since I moved from here the first time. I've learned so much, met so many great people, got friends for life and have had so much fun. I'm a bit scared to move back, scared to be bored and miss everything, miss having friends from different cultures and miss the freedom of living abroad when coming home to stuck-up Sweden. But I'm sure it's gonna be great. There are  great people in Sweden too, I have many of my best friends there, my family and my PiC Ruth. Haha, feels like I'm leaving tomorrow, but I still got another month and Ruth and I will make the most of our bucket (budget) list, including singing karaoke at WoolShed and eating fancy dinner at Marco Pierre.

It will be awesome. All of it.

never give up

When you get in to work after walking 40 minutes in pouring rain with half of an umbrella, and the first thing you see in your mailbox is this,

the world doesn't seem so gray anymore, knowing you've finally won over the Revenue Office. Hello MacBook, you're mine!

midsummer

Oh, a weekend update on a Wednesday, how unusual. Well, here it goes. (Pics stolen from Ruth, you'll soon know why.)

As it was midsummer on Friday Josef, Ruth and I decided to celebrate it as much as we could. All according to tradition, I stole a Swedish flag from work and some flowers from the church next to me. I don't believe anyway so if hell exists I guess a few flowers won't do much difference. 

Then I bought salmon, eggs, potatoes, vodka and other necessary stuff and managed to get a pretty traditional midsummer dinner together. Even found some old sill (pickled herring) in the fridge that I used for a "gubbröra", omnomnom.

Even the Portugese loved it!

Even though I spent half afternoon making flower crowns out of paper Ruth went for a more Irish midsummer style.

After dinner, some nubbe (vodka shots) and singing we headed to Lost Society. After what felt like half and hour it was time to leave and we decided to go home, get some more drinks and go to a big after party. Then it went downhill. Someone had stolen my jacket at the club and when the taxi stopped outside my house I realized my key was gone as well. The annoying thing was that I had asked for my spare key back from Ruth the same evening and that's the one I lost. If not Ruth could have let us all in. Also, my feet were killing me (never high heels again. Maybe.) and the SD-card was not in my camera. After going through the whole cab I found my SD card but all my pictures before we went out were gone, weird! As I didn't have my key we couldn't get the drinks and all my money was in the apartment so couldn't come to the after party anyway. So I went home with Ruth and slept on her couch (thanks!) until I could call my land lord the next day.

Saturday and Sunday was pretty much spent on the couch, boring but nice. Went to see Abraham Lincoln - Vampire Hunter on Sunday with Josef and Olle, wasn't really worth getting off the couch to see.

This week I have my first ever CouchSurfer at my place, a nice Estonian girl called Liisi. She doesn't like sport much but WoolShed is a part of my Guided Dublin Tour so football it is. Go Portugal!