Member-only story
G. B. Shaw’s Birthplace
In July and August 2005, I spent two weeks in Ireland. Most of it was with a tour group via a public radio station, before I stayed at a Dublin hostel for three days.
I suspected that if I got a bed in a dorm room with 16 beds, I’d be with 15 college students, making noise and coming in at all hours, but I didn’t anticipate an obnoxious drunk babbling on and on at one am. I got to the hostel a little before 11:30 pm last night (the play was out at 11), and the lights were on in the room, #118, “the Harding Room.” A few people were asleep or at least in bed. I tried to keep quiet while I gathered my stuff to take a shower. But I had to ask for help with the door — you have to simultaneously press the “door release” button and push the door open. It’s easy now that I know how.
In hindsight, next time I’m alone in a foreign city, and the hostels don’t have single rooms, I’ll splurge and stay in a dorm or hotel, at least part of the time. I just need to spend less on books! And maybe not buy any souvenirs. Probably. Easier said than done. My travel journals are the best souvenirs.
I got up at about 9 am this morning. I lay in bed wondering how on earth I’d climb down from the top bunk. I’m in my mid-thirties, and everyone else I’ve seen in this coed dorm room has been significantly younger than I am, like about college age. So it strikes me as kind of…