Today is Good Friday. This is, I've learned, a big deal in Ireland. It's one of the only days of the year that one cannot buy alcohol, resulting in a dipsomaniacal Holy Thursday, the shelves of the off-licenses pillaged by Irishfolk hoarding as if they were about the face the Great Depression, terrified that they might have to face an evening dry. And today, the pubs are all shuttered, and as every other storefront is a pub, the face of Dublin has become joyless, somehow. Luckily, the one-day prohibition makes it a big day for house parties and illegal raves, so with a little work, one can still manage to keep reality at bay.

Yesterday, one of my co-workers asked me if Jews celebrate Easter. I looked at him skeptically. He couldn't be serious, but of course, he was. They don't actually have Jews in Ireland, I've realized.

"We don't. We sort of see it as the nullification of all of our hard work." Now it was his turn to look confused. "Well, we had just gone through the trouble of killing Jesus and all," I explained.

Most days now, I forget I'm in Ireland. I don't even hear the accent a lot of the time, which saddens me. Days like today, though, remind me of what a strange, religious country I've landed in. The other night one of my close friends admitted to me (after marinating herself in wine) that her parents had met under unusual circumstances; her father had been a priest and her mother, a nun. I suspect that even by Ireland standards, it's a noteworthy "how we met" tale, but I was flabbergasted. These are not the kind of stories I would hear in America.