Breathtaking Ireland

We are very happy to present you the photos of our weekend trip.

None of us can’t really find the proper words for what we were experiencing. I think that everyone of us will agree when I say that it was the most amazing and breathtaking trip of our time here in Ireland and it was definitely one of the most inspiring journeys I made in my life.

There is not too much to say, there are just loads of photos that wants to be shown. It is nearly impossible to explain or show on photos what the wonderful landscapes and natural wonders are like. But at least you got an idea.

Like last week we rented a car to explore some hot spots of Ireland. So we planned a route with destination Galway and set some stops for sights and citys on the way. And so we could see Limerick and its medieval district, Bunratty castle and its old village, the wonderful beach of Lahinch at the Atlantic Ocean, the amazing Cliffs of Moher, the rocky wasteland The Burren and the party town Galway.

And here comes another Ireland experience for you 🙂

Departure

8.30am: This Renault Megane was our car for the big trip 🙂

At this place I want to say “thanks a million” to Fabian. He was the driver for the trip like he has been before with Mathias. He is always doing a great job and gets us safe to our destinations. Keep up the good work and spirit, man! 🙂

Of course everyone is in best condition. Ready to go!!! 🙂

At least nearly everyone is in best shape 🙂

 

10.30am: arrival in Limerick. Let’s see if we will find out where the poem style comes from

Limerick

When you think about Ireland – what are the first cities that come to your mind? Dublin, Belfast, Cork and…?
Limerick of course. And thats part of why we went there… To be honest no one of us knew something about Limerick except of the fact that there are poems with a metre called Limerick. But it turned out to be more interesting than we thought before.

Limerick was once a city of poverty. Alcoholism, homelessness and unemploymen was dominating the city of Limerick.
And the city still looks poor, old and shabby in some parts. But most of it has been renewed. There is a big old castle, a beautiful cathedral and a medieval district. We really enjoyed that part.
There is also the biggest river of Ireland crossing that city – the river Shannon. But have a look for yourself.

Our first view on the river Shannon

The first sight on our way was the old St. Marys Cathedral, built in 1200.

It’s a very old church but it is still really beautiful.

On our way to Limerick Castle…

On our way we saw the rehearsal for the day of comemoration.

Limerick Castle. Most of it is reconstructed, but it is full of information of the medieval.

12.30pm: On the road again, heading to Bunratty castle

Bunratty

Bunratty castle was just on the way to the Cliffs of Moher and so we decided to see it.
The caste is one of the most attracting castles in Ireland. Next to the old fortress there is a reconstructered old Irish village. There are also medieval banquettes in the villages regularly.
The castle itself is really interesting and reminds a little of Blarney. You can climb up small and narrow stairways, see the living rooms of the people who lived there in the past and visit the huge halls of the Earl.

The village wasn’ really existing there in the past, but it is nice to get into the feeling of old times in Europe.
Enjoy the photo trip…

Bunratty Castle

The village at Bunratty Castle…

View from a garden in the village

Really beautiful garden at Bunratty

An old mill

village life

2pm: Only a few kilometres left for the Cliffs. Our anticipation is strinking…

The Atlantic Ocean (Lahinch)

At half 5 we finally saw the Atlantic Ocean for the first time. Lahinch is a little city with a huge beach. There you have a wonderful view on the Cliffs. Mathias and Stefan also jumped into the very cold water. But they enjoyed it and their cold isn’t too bad yet.

Me at the beach of Lahinch.

The atlantic ocean

Inspired by landscapes, thinking about life or just posing for a photo

Then we finally arrived at the Cliffs of Moher – one of the most beautiful places in Ireland

The Cliffs of Moher

When there is one argument to come to Ireland than it is because of a visit at the Cliffs of Moher.
You can walk along the cliffs for 8 kilometres. They reach 230m at the highest point. There is an official visitor area. It is saved by some fences and walls, because of a lot of accidents in the past. Few people lost their life on the old cliffs.
There is a look-out of a landlord of the 19th century called O’Briens Tower. But if you really want to experience the cliffs you got to go beyond the warning signs and wander around the sharp edges to the brawly sea.
And all of us did. It was really dangerous at the very edge of a cliff, because there was also a really strong wind that could catch you there. So you had to be extreme careful. But it was worth it. We have rarely seen such a wonder of nature before.

You can even touch the clouds on the cliffs…

Thin air and breathtaking views… not rare right there.

“Solid as a rock”

Cliffs of Moher – view in direction to the look-out

A cave in the old cliffs

O’Briens Tower

The look-out of Cornelius O’Brien

Three happy Germans at the Cliffs of Moher

There are a lot of warnings before you leave the visitor centre

And that’s for a reason

But some of us were breaking limits…

Behind me there is nothing but the sea

Fabian conquering the cliffs

…thinking about life…

Just sitting around…

So did I…

What a lovely seat 🙂

Just a lovely place you’ll never forget…

We were already exhausted and lucky, but it was only the half of the tour. The Burren and Galway were still waiting…

lunch break after getting the first impressions. What do you think about a candel in a bottle of Guiness..? The Irish guys really seem to believe in what was proved of value

The Burren

The Burren means nothing more than “big stone”. It is a wasteland and a stone desert at the Irish westcoast, located north of Clare. In all the centuries some cracks in the stones of the land has been filled with rain and water from the Atlantic Ocean. The water was seeking throuh those cracks. In this way the special wasteland has become to what it is now.
But between all of those stones there are puddles, flowers and also little animals… another wonder of nature.

A typical view on The Burren

Blooming flowers between lifeless stones…

Fabian reached the Atlantic Ocean at the cliffs of The Burren

The Burren at the sea

Dramatic scenes at the cracks of a lostwasteland

also worth a travel. You should’ve seen it…

And finally we went to Galway – the city of the young people for parties…

Galway

Galway is at the westcoast of Ireland. This is the party point for everyone. There are only living about 75.000 people, but on the weekends it is totally crowded. People from all over the world come here to join the big parties in the streets.
And like we experienced – you can’t even just walk through the city because of all the people standing outside, talking to each other, dance with each other and drink of course.

The Eyre Square – centre of the city

music on the quay of the river Corrib

The haven in the evening

Great atmosphere in the city centre

very crowded streets. the whole city is a street party

Review

After this trip everyone of us said: Great to be here and if only for one of those experiences.
We will remember every single step of this journey for the rest of our lifes for sure.
It was a great time…

Wether for having a big party in the streets of Galway

or just having fun in the Cliffs of Moher

or finally see The Burren at The Atlantic Ocean…

We are looking forward our upcoming time…

Greetz from Fabian and Manuel

“The Pubnasen” on tour

 

Hi everybody

now finally the review of our weekend.
We had the plan to rent a car and visit a few cities and highlights in the southeast of Ireland. The drivers were Mathias and me. We picked up the car on Friday so we could start early on Saturday. My first time driving on the left side from the rental place to our home was much easier than I tought and we made it home alright 🙂
On Saturday we started at 8 am. Now it was Mathias’ first time but he also managed it very well. The weather in the morning wasn’t too good but since the weather changes literally every twenty minutes we were optimistic.

Our first stop was Cashel. We drove for like two hours before we saw this picture:

We parked in Cashel and took a little walk around the city. The rain had stopped and even a shred of blue had fought their way through the clouds. Cashel is a tiny but beautiful town. I think most people there live from the tourism the Rock of Cashel attracts. But there isn’t just the stunning Rock of Cashel. First we had a close look at the Hore Abbey. An old abbey right at the foot of the Rock of Cashel. It is just as beautiful and impressive as the Rock itself but stands a bit in the shadows of the old and popular Rock.

After lots of climbing and picture-taking we started to ascend the famous Rock of Cashel. The Rock itself had been a castle and its history goes back until the 5th century. In the 11th century the Rock was given to the church and in the 13th century the cathedral was built.
Unfortunately for us the Cormac’s Chapel is being restored so it was surrounded by scaffolds. But it was still an amazing view from the Rock and it is definitely worth a visit.

The Cormac’s Chapel is one of the oldest Romanesque chapels in Ireland. Inside of the chapel one can visit the oldest and best preserved wall paintings in Ireland.

After a lot of pictures we got back on the road and drove towards Cork. We decided to visit the Blarney Castle which is only a few minutes outside Cork. At first we were thrown of by the high price at the entrance but after entering the Castle Gardens we forgot all about that. It was really beautiful. The sun came out and the view from the castle and at the castle was just breathtaking. Stefan and I were the only ones who kissed the famous Blarney Stone. Legends say that it will give the gift of eloquence to its kisser. We will see about that 😉 After climbing down from the Blarney Castle we walked around in the garden. There was lots to see: a poison garden, dungeons, caves, stable yard and on top of it the Blarney House which was closed already.

– Blarney Castle

– Blarney Castle

– Blarney House

– Poison Garden

– me kissing the Blarney Stone

Back in Cork we were already a little tired and hungry. We took a quick walk through the city centre and climbed the tower of St. Anne’s which gave us a stunning view over Cork. After that we searched for traditional fish and chips. We even found a great English Market but no fish and chips. Can you believe it? We ended up eating traditional burger at least with chips 😉

– Cork

– English Market Cork

We changed drivers and I drove the rest of the tour. Next stop Waterford, Ireland’s oldest city according to Manuel. Due to the fact that it was already 7 pm when we arrived in Waterford it seemed to be a very sleepy city. We were almost alone on the streets. Nevertheless we enjoyed the visit. We made the inevitable group picture and saw our first mural.

-marina of Waterford

– mural in Waterford

Our last stop this day was Kilkenny. We heard lots about the unique nightlife in Kilkenny and Galway. And at least fifty percent are true – we will see about Galway next weekend. But before we hit the pubs we visited the mandatory castle and a church – only from outside because it was already after 8 pm. Time for us to do a little sightseeing in the local pub scene. It was amazing. We took Peters advise and switched pubs after every one or two drinks. We were in three different pubs and it was really great. Music, drinks, packed with people, dancing, … what more could we ask for?

– Kilkenny

– castle of Kilkenny

– on our way to the third pub 🙂
I had the honor to remain sober and drive home at midnight. It was a very fun ride until everybody except Mathias fell asleep. I had to stop on the emergency lane because apparently there are no rest stops as we know them in Germany. But the motorways in Ireland aren’t so busy as in Germany as well and at night you’re almost alone.

We made it safe home and fell exhausted in our beds. It was a wonderful trip and we are already looking forward to the next trip.

On Sunday we slept long, of course, and after noon we visited O’Connell Street and surroundings. Across the branch of Scientology we witnessed a demonstration from Occupy.

– O’Connell Street

The weekend was pretty amazing but also exhausting. Domenico and I catched a cold and had a bad start in the week. But it’s getting better now and the car for next Saturday is already booked 😀

So long
Fabian

My internship at Webroot

What the hell do you do instead of travelling around the country and drinking in the pub?

 

That is not everything we do here

That must be one of your questions when you read our blog.
But as all the other guys I am also working here. And so I want you to read about one day in my worklife abroad.

Introduction
As said before my company is called Webroot International Limited and it is a provider for an Antivirus-, Firewall and Cleaningsoftware. It is working internationally and has its headquarter in Broomfield, USA. There are branches of it in Colorado, Australia, Japan and Dublin of course. Dublin is the city where the company was founded about 14 years ago. It is a serious opponent of Norton. There is currently no branch in Germany, Netherlands, France and Turkey because all the other providers are stronger.
But soon there will be a support for those countries to spread it a little more in Europe.

Our logo at the cantine

I work there in the Contact Center. That means I support customers from all over the world, especially from the UK in the morning and from the US in the afternoon. It is up to me to answer tickets and to answer calls.
My topics are…

– renewing licenses
– installation help
– precise uninstall and install support to get rid of of old software
– troubleshooting about licenses and software
– troubleshooting about infections and malware
– setup and general help
– analyse virusscan protocolls
– purchase products for customers

What happened the last weeks?
In my first week I started on tuesday. At the first two days I was in a product training. Thats how I met John. He is the trainer and one of the escalation engineers in the Dublin departement. They prepared for me my own workstation with all accounts necessary to have access to every portal that I need for work. John showed me all the programs and functions of my laptop. Then he made a presentation of all the products, their prices and the capabilities and configuration in the software. We had this training in one of the conference rooms. There is also another girl from around Dublin who comes from another department to learn the work at Webroot. But she does not work in the technical customer support, but in the threat anaylst team.
On thursday and friday I was shadowing the agents to get to know the programs and the work itself better. Shadowing means that I am plugged into the telephone and can watch the screen. So I can experience exactly what the agent sees and hears. It was also great to get used to the English speaking customers.
In the following week I started on monday and tuesday to drive the computer while the agent was calling to get used to the systems when I use them myself.
And finally wednesday I was thrown in at the deep end and my team manager asked me to do the call on my own with the help of my trainer. I wasn’t too nervous because I have done the job before in German and I am used to talk to English speaking customers in general. But it is a new topic and so it was challenging of course.
Since friday last week I am working completely on my own and all skills are applied for me. And it works fine.

A day at work

Our office buildings. I am in the highest tower in the middle.

9.25 am
I arrive at the building at George’s Quay Plaza at the Dublin city centre.
I am scanning my security badge at the front door to get behind the security doors.
I enter the lift and go up to the sixth floor.

9.30 am
Arrival in the office, talk to the team, getting coffee, opening my drawer, set my computer on the docking station, starting it and all the programs including logon.

9.45 am
Starting the telephone software to get calls “auto-in”. In the morning there is usually not too much going on at the hotline. So I am mostly working on tickets and there are calls like every 10 minutes. Because of the time difference between the USA and Ireland there are no calls from the US until 2 pm. So we are only receiving calls from the UK.

One of our workplaces with multi-screening

12.30 pm
Around 12 and 1 pm I have lunch for an hour. We have to talk to each other, so that there are not too less agents on the line. For lunch I usually walk into the city to enjoy the weather, go shopping, see sights or sit down at a bench on the promenade of the river liffey.

At the promenade on lunch time

2.00 pm
At 2 pm the US awakes and the people from there are calling us. From this point of time we are really busy, because we get US calls every second and there are also tickets waiting to get answered.

5.30 pm
If the last issue is resolved at this time I can call it a day. Otherwise I have to finish the case and can go afterwards.

view from our floor

Thats it. If you have any questions, let me know.

Greetz, Manuel

Fotosession Week 2

Hi everybody,

our second week is already over and here are the photos to the weekend…

Fabian will tell you more about our amazing saturday in Cashel, Blarney, Cork, Waterford, Kilkenny…

Here are the pictures of the week in a slideshow.

This is Dublin…

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

– Manuel

Are we ending up in politics?

Hi there,

Last week we had an appointment in the Leinster House which is the Irish parliament. It is based in the very city centre of Dublin near Trinity College. As you can remember in one of my last posts I told you about our contact to a politician who had some drinks with us in the pub.

Previously in Ireland 🙂 Frank is the guy on the far right

He is Frank Feighan, the minister for tourism and Member of Fine Gael. Thats the biggest party in parliament here in Ireland. And he answered Mathias indeed when he sent him a text message. So he invited us for wednesday at 10 am to the Leinster House.

The Leinster House
Usually all of us are working at this time and so it was up to us to go to our boss and ask if it is ok to start work later. We felt a little bit silly to ask for it, because we could’t really imagine that we would really meet the leader of the Irish government.
Well, my boss immediately said: well that is how things work in Dublin. You drink with someone in a pub and then you realize that he is an important person. So have fun.
The boss of the 3 friends working at “computerdoctor” wanted to check if this will happen for real. So he was calling Frank to ask him and while he was talking to him he somehow managed it to invite himself. And Mathias boss just agreed on condition that he gets a photo.
So it was no problem. And then the day has come.
Fortunately all of us except Mathias brought a suit. And so we suited up.
And that was a good thing, because we would have felt really uncomfortable without a suit.

Suit up!
And so we had an exclusive insight in the parliament and the senate for some hours and could see a questioning of the prime minister and the parliament members. You can also see the questioning on TV.

the parliament

Afterwards Frank fulfilled his promise and asked us to wait outside for the prime minister.

Frank and us
We had to wait about thirty minutes, but it was a sunny day and so we could enjoy our anticipation. And then he came out, had a little chitchat with us, took some photos and it was done.
It was really interesting to have such a close insight and to meet the prime minister for real.

Brian (boss computerdoctor), Enda Kenny (prime minister), Frank Feighan (minister for tourism, sport, culture) – from left to right.

prime minister kenny and Mathias

He was also interested in talking with us

Domeniko, Mathias, Nadine, Stefan, Brian, Enda Kenny, Peter, French guy, Fabian, me (from left to right)

I think Angela Merkel is owing us a meet and greet as well 🙂 So lets see…

– Manuel

work experience abroad

Hi everybody

i’ve received recent complaints that I’m not writing enough about my work here. I checked my posts and it’s true 🙂 So here it is:

I work at computerdoctor. The main business is to repair laptops and desktops. They also provide stuff like software installation, virus removal, etc. There are only a few employees but there are all very nice and the atmosphere at computerdoctor is pretty much like in a big family. The boss, Brian, is a bit excentric but apart from that nice and funny. He insists for instance that we all wear ties at work which is a bit annoying because we don’t have any contact with customers and while taking laptops apart it can be quite annoying and we always feel overdressed. The manager, and also our mentor there, is Peter. He is also very nice. He’s actually from Germany which makes things sometimes a bit easier but on the other hand we don’t talk that much English. But after the first week we’re talking less German and more English, so that problem solved itself.
So what have we done so far? We started off with taking laptops apart and back together. Then some basic troubleshooting and repair jobs. We also repair displays, PS3’s, … Last week we started to learn soldering, which is a bit tricky because you need a steady hand to solder cables or motherboards.
In the next few weeks the store moves to another location. I’m really looking forward to this because Peter said he wants to set up a small network there. So it’s not going to be boring over the next weeks.

That’s it for now.
Fabian

fireworks

wow, we just experienced a major example for the deep love the Irish share with the English. When the English footballteam lost the penalty against Italy Dublin fired up some fireworks 😀 cheers to good neighbourhood 😉

Our apartement in Dublin

Finally after moving into our appartement some pics of it:

Fotosession Week 1

Here are some photos:

First week is over…

Hey there,

Thanks to Fabian for his wonderful post.
Yeah in the blink of an eye two very exciting days have just passed.
Fabian told the important facts about our arrival and what our apartements are like.
In one word: great! Check Fabians last post to get more information about that 🙂
So you know everything necessary. The fitting pictures will come afterwards.

I wanna tell you about my experience in the first days here.
After our orientation with Margaret yesterday we went together to the city centre and got our Irish mobile phone numbers und our Leap-Card.

The Leap card
The leapcard is kind of a prepaid card that you can use to go cheaper and on the easiest way by all of the transportation vehicles in Dublin.
There are 3 different authorities of transportation. The LUAS which is a tram. This one is divided into the green and the red line that go in different areas of the city. Then there is the train called Dart which is going at the coast and the busses that go all over the island.
Therefore you cant use one monthly tickets for every kind of vehicle.
And so I can clearly say that its a lot more expensive than at home, but it’s ok. We get along. By the way, you get the leap card at nearly every news agent and you can also charge it there with the amount of money of your choice. Just ask at a news agent for it or pay attention to the leap symbol.

Travelling in Dublin and Ireland
Like already said, there are also busses going through the city and the country. It is hard to figure our where exactly they are going to, cuz we dont really know the Irish districts and places here, but the bus network covers a whole lot here…. Further it is really cheap to go to other cities. There is a bus travel company called gobus.ie that is bringing you to the hotspots of the island for 10 € per way in a comfortable bus with WiFi. So things are easier than we thought in the first place 🙂

Funny irish dialect
People here use to have a really straight dialect. It is one thing to be prepared for that and it is another thing to really get confrontated with it. Here are some of the striking differences:

Thing = Ting
Three = Tree
Both = Boat
Nothing = nouttin
Bug = Bog
Whats the story / Whats the craic = Whats going on? / Whats up?
Lads = guys

I could go on forever like that, but this gets you the idea 🙂

A remarkable night in the pub
Just in our third night here we had one of the best nights ever. It was Fabians birthday and so we of course decided to go out and “quaff a pint of Guiness or five” but you would never guess how true this phrase has become.
So we went down to Temple Bar which is the most popular pub and party district here in Dublin. First we went into “The Auld Dublin” and heard a guitar player singing “Country Roads” the first time. It shouldn’t be the last time. He was kinda trying to appeal to every guest there by singing fitting songs. We even heard a crazy english version of “An der Nordseeküste” telling a story about the Irish coast instead. Then we decided to change the pub…. To the next one just over the street. And that was the best decision to make.
All the people were even in a better mood than in the other one. And after our first beer (and after our second time hearing country roads) we went to another table. Some rich Americans were sitting there waiting for some people to talk to. And so we started to talk. Both invited us to several beers and some shots, so that the night ended with us and a big group of people who were dancing, singing and of course drinkinh with us.
We even met the owner of the pub who was as drunk as we were. And a politician from the biggest party in Ireland. He gave us his number so that we can meet the Irish prime minister next week. Mathias is trying to arrange that. Lets see if there will soon be a pic with us and him. Well the night ended up that security was kicking us out of the pub… Well in fact Stefan was the last guy who was slightly pushed infront of the door.
Finally we went home singing “You never beat the Irish” and “You never beat the drunken germany” out loud. So that was totally what we expected from our trip here. And since it is raining for two days we have finally arrived.

Now starts our first weekend and we will check out Dublin. So here we go 🙂

– Manuel