Guinness Factory, Howth and more!

So I haven't updated this and it seems that s much time has passed since I arrived here! This may be a long one though so hopefully you wont lose interest. I have gone on a couple of day trips and an overnight trip to cork along with starting classes and continuing to adjust to life in Ireland! More details to follow below.

My Classes

So far I have had a week of class plus one day (today). At first it was a real shock going to class in a different country and adjusting to the norms. This was most apparent in my first class Environmental Change and Policy which by coincidence me and my roommate Alison happened to have together, luckily! We were both very nervous and intimidated by all the Irish students in our class and we were afraid to talk because we didn't want them to know we were Americans! The professor then mentioned something that we had to do and we didn't really understand what he meant so we just sat there a little bit clueless. It was interesting that even in an English speaking country there were still so many differences! It turned out that me and Alison both ended up not liking the class so luckily we were able to switch out of it and now I am keeping my fingers crossed that my adviser Madeline will be able to get me into a class called Irish Cinema and Television! The rest of my classes all went pretty well and it seems like there are a lot of study abroad students in them. UCD is "Ireland's global University" so there are a ton of exchange students and it seems like a lot of stuff is catered towards us which is pretty cool. There are 2 organizations that are for study abroad students ESN and ISS and they are both always planning trips and parties. It is really weird to me however that a student organization has parties and pub crawls. Also at our orientation events they gave us free drinks (alcoholic). So weird to have this at a university! Very opposite of Marquette.

Madeline, the director of international students for the Quinn College of Business planned an awesome day for us business students on Friday. This day consisted of a tour of a crypt, a trip to the Jameson Distillery followed by a 3 course dinner. All for free!!! The crypt was really cool and I even saw the dead body of an 800 year old person, not everyone thought it was cool though. The best part of this excursion was the 3 course meal. When we went into the restaurant I saw a sign that said 3 course meal 25 euro. Obviously I was pretty pleased with getting this for free (lol typical me). I ended the meal with the most delicious espresso ice cream I have ever had. I wanted to take pictures but it was just to yummy there was no time for that. Unfortunately that is the case with most my meals here (lol again typical me).

Trip to Howth and The Guinness Factory

Another thing that I was able to do was go on a day trip to the city of Howth. Howth was a small fishing village about 20 minutes away from Dublin and it was so beautiful and awesome! We went on a trip that was led by the ESN student group. We were able to walk around the village and see the small town and we even spotted a seal in the water. I was definitely not expecting to see seals in Ireland but I was glad that we did.

Also I just realized that I have been using exclamation points a lot and it is getting a little annoying so from now on you should probably just imagine an exclamation mark every sentence but I am going to omit them to make this more tolerable for reading purposes.

Anywho, after we spotted the seal we hiked up a hill (I think it was a hill) but it was a big hill that lead us to great views of the landscape and we could even see Dublin. They also said you could see Wales on a clear day. It is funny because the Irish people do not like the Brits and they would make comments about how we would not care which direction it was and how we are glad we can't see it. We hiked more to a restaurant where I had a delish quesidilla and then we continued on some hiking on the seaside. It was really beautiful to overlook the cliffs and see a lighthouse, I even felt like I was at the Cliffs of Mohr.The path was really muddy though and luckily I had made a great decision to wear my wellies so I could fearlessly stomp through the mud.  Overall it was a really awesome day! Especially since it didn't really rain all day and the sun was out, even the locals were surprised by the weather.

I was also able to go on a day trip to the Guinness factory and Croke Park which I signed up for on my first day here. The Guinness factory is a classic tourist destination and it was cool to see. I felt the tour was a little lacking however since we all had in headphones and it was such a big group most of the time I was running along trying not to lose the group. The best part was that we got to pour our own drinks, who knew the perfect pour was such a thing to master! I liked the interactiviteness of that. Then we took our drinks up to the glass room with 360 degree views of the city. The view was pretty lackluster due to the rain and fog.  However it was still nice to be up there. I also decided to take a risk with my food choices and try the Guinness stew. I am not the hugest fan of stew but this stuff was so yummy! Every time I look at the photo of it I get hungry. I want to go back just so I can eat the stew. The tour later led us to Croke Park which is the fourth biggest stadium in Europe and home of the Gaelic football and Hurling games. Also I will note that one direction will be playing there on May 24. It was fun to hear about the games and it gave me a better understanding of the Irish culture. There are 32 teams which represent each county (I think). It was just so surprising to me that even though Ireland is so small (about the size of Indiana) they can still rally up as many fans from each county as we can from each state.

Trip to Cork

This past weekend we also decided to take a spontaneous weekend trip to Cork. We decided on Friday night and then booked our tickets and our hostel. On Saturday when we arrived we caught a bus to Blarney so we could see the Blarney Stone and Castle, another classic tourist destination. I loved seeing the castle even though I wish it was furnished so that I could picture how it was when people lived there. At the top of the Castle was the infamous Stone that I was able to kiss for 10 years of good luck! Did I mention the day before I got another 10 years of good luck from tapping some wheel at the Jameson Distillery? Pretty sweet. Anyway it was super windy and actually pretty scary to be at the top of the castle in the wind. We walked around the premise of the castle later and came across an awesome garden that made me feel like I was in a fairy tale. That night we hit up a cool pub that was playing traditional Irish music. We were really lucky with our hostel because since there were 5 of us the lady gave us a 6 person room to ourselves. A good first hostel experience.

Other Randomness

My continuing adjustment to life in Ireland has been really great! I have been learning to use the bus system pretty well and even getting to know the city better. The only setback it seems was when me and Erica were trying to walk back to her apartment one night which is pretty close to the city center and we got lost along the way. What was usually a 15 minute walk probably took us about 1.5-2 hours! Eventually we flagged down a garbage man and asked him for direction on how to get home. My legs were so sore the next day.

 I even took my bike out for a spin but I had to turn back because I was afraid to get lost in a rainstorm. I booked my trip to Italy for the first week of our spring break and will be returning the day before St. Paddys day. Now I just need to decide where to go for the second week. Having a 2 week spring break is probably one of the perks of going to school with lots of international students.

Okay well that seems to be all to say for now (probs missed alot).

-A