Originally published in print February 2021.

I’ve never known Dublin outside of the pandemic. I’ve never experienced the city at its ‘peak’, on a rugby weekend thronged with fans and revellers. But somehow returning to Dublin, after only four months in the city and having unfortunately been caught up in the post-Christmas travel ban, fills me with a paradoxical sense of homecoming. Something about the way that the city is articulated –  wide, open streets peppered with cut-throughs and alleyways – is welcoming, as if it was designed to evoke a sense of freedom and curiosity. The city’s contradictions are part of what makes it such an evocative place, its mishmash of Georgian, industrial and modern architecture thrown together in quick succession conjures a sense of its patchwork history. In this sense, Dublin is a city of parts, a city of multiplicities. Perhaps this is why, even in a pandemic, Dublin has continued to feel welcoming to outsiders like me. Returning to Dublin means re-joining the community of city-dwellers that walk anonymously side-by-side in the streets. Coming from a small, rural community this can feel like release from a suffocating environment where every dog-walk could lead to a high school-reunion. The joy of cities is in its business, its action, but even in a pandemic when Dublin has been forced to slow down the city hums with a sense of resilience and warmth. And this is why I don’t need to see Dublin post-pandemic to know what it’s really like, to observe what’s underneath the surface, because if in the most challenging of times Dublin can uplift and charm even the most uncertain newcomer then it will always remain a city of welcome.