Sunday at WorldCon - A Walk Along the Liffey

My room mate told me he'd been back late the night before because he'd been to the party for the Glasgow 2024 WorldCon bid - where the whisky had run out! It had been a bit of a shock to him that the main gate to Trinity College was closed. The gate had been closed when I got back too, I suppose because it was the weekend, but there was a sign up pointing to the entrance that was open, round on Nassau Street. All I had to do was follow the wall round until I came to the modern buildings on that side of the campus.

I decided to walk in to the Convention Centre that morning. The weather was overcast but dry, and I wanted to see a bit more of Dublin.
I found the Famine monument:

There was an information board telling the story of one particular group of over 1,000 emigrants who had walked to Dublin from the estate they lived on to be packed into the hold of a ship and taken to Canada, I think it was. Many died on the journey.
You could walk among the statues, and there are brass plaques set into the cobbles with the names of people who have donated money. They included ordinary people like "the Sullivan family of New York", and some very famous people like Bill and Hilary Clinton, Wayne Sleep the dancer, Pierce Brosnan, Richard Branson and politicians like Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness from Northern Ireland. The money raised is used to help the homeless and people living in poverty today.

Near the statue is the Emigrant Museum - I'd seen it from the Luas line. Further along the river is the Jeannie Johnston, a square rigged ship which is also used to tell the story of the people who left Ireland because of the Great Famine.

It was very quiet - I was pretty much the only person walking along the river that morning - and very moving.