Shamrock Shenenigans

After the group’s Berlin trip, I went to Ireland for the travel weekend. It was so interesting to be back in an English speaking country. Though combined, Irish accents and fast talking sometimes made it just as difficult to decipher English as German. It was cool to compare the culture and infrastructure in Ireland both to Germany and the United States. I also found it exciting to experience traveling independently through Europe. 

Flights

To get to and from Ireland I had layovers in London and Amsterdam. While planning the trip I made sure to have about an hour between flights, though as it turned out this was not quite enough time. On the way to Ireland I had a connection through London. I only had 50 minutes planned between flights, but leaving Berlin I was delayed by 15 minutes. When I landed in London I was racing to get to my next gate, only to realize that I had to completely exit the terminal and re-enter security due to the UK not being a part of the EU anymore. I managed to get through security based on the kindness of some strangers and then I was full sprinting toward my next gate. I made it with one minute to spare.

After this ordeal I was quite worried about my flights back, though I was connecting through Amsterdam so I hoped that I could stay behind security. This turned out to be true but the passport check line was over an hour long. Luckily an airport employee was kind enough to let me through faster. I ended up making my connection as well as the train once I landed in Germany, which was late of course. This trip definitely made me more confident in my traveling abilities and helped me learn some important lessons about planning flights in Europe.

Infrastructure

There were some main infrastructure differences I noticed in Ireland, one of which was the traffic patterns. The biggest difference is that they drive on the left side of the street. I did not expect this when I hopped in my taxi from the airport. I was quite surprised when he was sitting on the right side of the car.

Most of the countries which still drive on the left side of the road were British colonies, and only four European countries drive on the left, Ireland being one of them (Zandt, 2024). Another difference between Ireland and Germany is the use of countdowns on pedestrian crossing signals. In Germany they switch to red without warning.

Also, in Ireland there were many more double decker buses than in Germany or the US. A similarity I noticed between Germany and Ireland is the use of metal bars on pedestrian paths to block bikes. At first I didn’t know what the barriers were for, though after watching people get off to walk their bikes through the busy paths, I understood. These barriers can sometimes be contentious because they dissuade bikers in what potentially should be a shared space(Mallon, 2023). These were some of the main infrastructure details I noticed on my travels.

Written by Maya

References

Mallon, R. (2023, January 25). Councillor calls for anti-bike barriers to prevent “dangerous” cyclists “zooming across” foot tunnel. road.cc. Retrieved March 6, 2025, from https://road.cc/content/news/councillor-calls-anti-bike-barriers-foot-tunnel-298871 

Zandt, F. (2024, August 15). Infographic: Which Side Of The Road Do You Drive On? Statista. Retrieved March 6, 2025, from https://www.statista.com/chart/9261/which-side-of-the-road-do-you-drive-on/