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Today I returned to Ireland. I had a great time in Alfeld where I shared some good ol‘ German beer with my „homies“, spend a lot of time with my family and ate way to much of the „good stuff“.
I could write for ages without covering even more than yesterday evening (which was truly brilliant!), but I prefer to dedicate this blog to my adventures in Ireland and I think noone would like to read all of that anyway.

So here I am. Back. Finally. Why „finally“? Well, while my flight to Germany went well, coming back was rather stressful.

But let me tell you about my trip to Germany first. Due to the fact that there are no non-stop flights between Dublin and Hannover I chose to fly with RyanAir to Lübeck. Lübeck is a town in Northern Germany and has a veeery small regional airport called Lübeck-Blankensee (LBC), which is advertised by RyanAir as „Hamburg (Lübeck)“ although it is basically in the middle of nowhere.
The fact that it is so small turned out to be a huge advantage, because it took me only about five minutes from my seat to the tiny car park two steps in front of the airport’s exit. I did not even really have to wait for my suitcase that was stuffed with Christmas presents. My father was so nice to pick me up with his red American car (Thanks again!).
That’s the downside of Lübeck: it’s a three hour drive from where my parents live.

Fast forward: family, friends, beer, family, cookies, Christmas, presents, reading, more great food, family, friends, bye bye, sigh.

So today I took the train. I was so happy that I had found a good connection where I just had to switch trains once (in Lüneburg, another Northern German town) with plenty of time in between arrival and departure. The risk of missing the connecting train or even the plane was minimal. And even if I missed the former I would still be on time, although I’d have to hurry up a bit. Bullet proof plan.

Expect the unexpected. The train that was supposed to take me from Alfeld to Lüneburg had already accumulated a noteworthy total delay of 45 minutes. Fortyfrickinfive! In consequence, I was late already before I even entered the train, thank you. Until then I spend most of the time waiting on the platform. Nine degrees below zero, thank you very much.

The ride itself was pretty good: I read a very entertaining book by Horst Evers, watched two cute little children playing conductor („tickets, please“) and had a nice conversation with a young Englishwoman who wanted to go to „Leeeeds“ for New Year’s Eve, but lives in Hamburg and therefore speaks German with a pretty cool Northern German accent. Nevertheless, I could not really enjoy it, because I was constantly worried to be late.

I arrived at the „when I’m grown up I want to be a train station“-train station about an hour before the planned departure. Did you just notice the word „planned“? Guess what. Righty right, a one hour delay. Argh. All the worries. For what?
At least I had nice company during the two hours flight.

Anyway, I’m back in Tallaght where Herr Doktor and Thomas, who is here for some days before he returns to Swansea, welcomed me. It still feels a bit awkward at the moment to be here, but I think this will be gone by tomorrow. Then, I’ll have to make plans for the evening.

By the way: wide parts of the terminal in Lübeck are tents. You think I’m kidding?