On the 29th of September, I travelled to the Guinness storehouse in Dublin.
When I arrived at St James' Gate, with 6 other classmates, we joined a surprisingly short queue for our tickets.
After collecting our tickets we followed the tour guide into a room full of barley, where I learned that the word "beer" is derived from the Anglo Saxon word "baere" meaning barley.
We were then led into a room with multiple screens on the walls. In each screen there was a video giving a different account of St James' Gate in the past from a different perspective.
I found these accounts very interesting as they were supplied by everyday people such as bartenders and cab drivers rather than an everyday historian.
After absorbing a couple of more rooms my friends and I decided to sit down and get a drink for a few moments. While sitting down, I noticed a middle aged man, from France or Germany, having trouble finding a hotel in Temple Bar. The man asked me to help him, and after doing so I realised how privileged I am to be a native English speaker, which is the international language.
I, a 16 year old boy, had a greater ability to find a man's hotel than the man himself. This experience opened my eyes to the endless inequalities in the world and how lucky I am to not be negatively affected by many of them.