So today was officially my first day of work at the Irish law firm! It was definitely a good first day...it started out awful (short/cold shower, the iron spilled water all over my skirt as I was ironing it, and I was rushing around because I didn't want to be late) but it ended pretty nicely. And I learned a lot about the legal system here in just one day. Obviously there is a lot more to learn about, but today was a good start.
So I'm working at a small law firm of solicitors (which are lawyers) and it sounds like I'll be helping the solicitors with anything they need; things like running errands down to the Four Courts for them, helping write the booklets the barristers need, and just anything that needs to get done I suppose. Today was also an exciting first day for me! I read about a case that one of the associate solicitors is presenting tomorrow (some lady is suing a rec center because she slipped on the tile and fractured her wrist) and then I went down to civil court with a few of the solicitors. I'll explain a little bit about everything from today so it is easier to understand.
So the Four Courts is the area where the four different buildings that hold the Four Courts are (if that makes any sense). All four of the individual courts (circuit, district, high and supreme) are located in this one place right along the River Liffey. They are referred to as the Four Courts when you are talking about all of them together or where they are located. Here is a map I found off Google to help give you a visual...
The building that I am working in is called the Capel building, and it is right down Mary's Abbey, towards the top of the map. It is probably a five minute walk from my office down to the courts. Which is great because I'll be going there a lot! So I went down there twice today; once to watch a solicitor do her thing in civil and bankruptcy court, the other time was to drop off some documents for the district court. The Irish court system was pretty awesome to witness today. There is this huge round room in the main building where a lot of different court rooms are held (I think they are all for district/circuit court). And you go into the court room where you need to be, and they have different sections of benches for you to sit depending on why you are there. So I sat in the back benches just to watch, but there were three rows of benches on my left and right, both facing away from me but towards each other. That is where the other solicitors sat, waiting for their case number to be called, and I think that is where the "jury" would have sat, if we had one (or I might just be making that part up, I'm not sure). So directly in front of the gallery seating were four rows where the "barristers" sat. Barristers are different than solicitors, and from the little knowledge that I have from today, the solicitors are the people who do the things behind the scenes; they gather info, write up court documents, etc. The barristers act as the middle wo/man between the judge and the solicitors, and their clients. Luckily you can distinguish between solicitors and barristers very easily, by the way they are dressed.
This is a picture of the wig the barristers wear while in court that I got off Google. I would have taken my own pictures of this stuff, but cameras aren't allowed in the Four Courts! Aren't those crazy?! Both the men and women wear them, although I don't think they have to. Along with the wigs the barristers also wear a long black cloak and white neck ties; they look very traditional. I haven't figured out exactly why they wear these things...I'll let you know when I do find out though. Unfortunately I couldn't decipher a lot of the content during the cases because the sound in the room was really bad and I was sitting all the way toward the back, and when I did hear something I just heard snippets so it wasn't enough to really know the specifics about the case. But I'll be spending a lot of time in all of the different kinds of courts, so I'm sure I'll have enough time to really submerge myself in the legal system. That's the other thing I'll be doing a lot of....observing court proceedings. And not just civil stuff, but also criminal, maybe some human rights law, stuff like that.
Oh and both judges that were presiding over the court rooms our cases were in today were both women! It was really cool! Definitely an educational/interesting experience today in the courts.
That's about all that happened today...it was a lot more than I expected to happen and it was pretty fun! I'm excited for the rest of the time I'll spend at the law firm.
But because I couldn't take pictures within the Four Courts, I wanted to take pictures of SOMETHING. I didn't think that getting some pictures off Google would cut it. So, on the way home I took pictures of people! It was really nice out today - nicer than it usually is in Dublin, that's for sure. I think it got up to 70 degrees or higher today, and that is almost a record for Dublin. It hasn't even rained since I got here! But I'm sure it will start raining all day everyday as soon as I start getting used to the warm weather. Well anyway, there were a bunch of men walking all around town with their shirts off today. And I just thought that it was the funniest thing because it was only 70 degrees! It was gorgeous out, but it was only 70 degrees! I'm used to the high 90's during the summer, so 70 doesn't feel warm enough to be walking downtown shirtless.
This is from my bus ride home, haha!! I saw these two boys and I was just like "perfect!" They totally saw me taking a picture of them though, so they were probably creeped out at me! OOOPPS! I was hoping that they wouldn't see me because that's kinda weird and embarrassing, but obviously I wasn't being sneaky.I have another picture of some guy outside his outside tanning with no shirt on, but it isn't letting me put it on here. And that's not even an exciting picture either. So I'm sure you won't care if I don't put that on.
Sorry for the kind of boring post with boring pictures...but I couldn't take pictures of the really exciting stuff! My apologies!
So tomorrow I have the day off from work because my supervisor (one of the solicitors) is going to another town for a case that goes to court tomorrow, which is in another town. So because she won't be in the Dublin office, I'll get the day off! And being the nerd that I am...I am going to be spending it in the library. Wow, sounds even cooler when I post something like that on the internet.
No but really.
I'm going to get a pass so I can check things out and hopefully get a lot of research done tomorrow. That would be awesome if it was a really productive day. So I'd imagine I'll be posting pictures of the library tomorrow! But luckily for you, the library is going to be a lot cooler and exciting then random guys with their shirts off. Seriously. It's supposed to be a gorgeous 'brary.
Until then.
;)
