Belfast

So last weekend my roommate and I went to Belfast. One of the most interesting cities I have ever been in.

We get there by taking a bus to Dublin and then another bus to Belfast. We arrived there sometime around 11:30 PM. Now, I have mapquested our hostel but I have no idea where we are. So we are told by a cab driver that it's just down the road. Comforting at 11:30 PM. We walk down the road a little bit and see this picture.

Toto, I don't think we are in Cork anymore. We find our hostel a little bit down the road from here and pretty much crash. The next morning we are up, bright and early, because it is Giant's Causeway day. We find out that a tour leaves from our hostel. PERFECT. So we get on and find out our first location is the Carrick a Rede Rope Bridge. This rope bridge was constructed 90 feet above the water by fisherman to collect salmon. Now there are no salmon left but the bridge is there. So we decided to cross it and it's a little bit scary.  It is a little more bouncy than I would have liked and a bit windy but we crossed the bridge. Here's a picture of what the bridge looks like.

Next stop is Dunlace Castle. In good Irish fashion, the bus driver decides to tell us a story about the castle. Supposedly there was a party going on, but the wind was a whipping, the rain was a slapping and all of a sudden the crowd heard a large bang. They run outside and think it is lightening. But oh no, the kitchen and part of the cliff has fallen into the ocean. (This is the part where I go, "WHAT???") Anyway the wife didn't want this to happen again so she moved the family somewhere else. Good call, that's a very good call.

After Dunlace, we had lunch at the Bushmills Distillery. We didn't actually tour the distillery but I ate a very delicious Guinness and beef pie. Finally after Bushmills, it was time for Giant's Causeway. Now there is the boring story of how the rocks are formed which was volcanic eruption...or the fun Irish one. So back in the day, Finn McCool was a giant who roamed the land. Since the Giant's Causeway is only about 13 miles from Scotland, he could see another giant skulking around in Scotland. Being all height and no brains, he decides to go challenge the Scottish giant. So Finn constructs this bridge made up of rocks (the causeway) and he crosses over to Scotland. Once there, he finds out that the giant (named Bennadonna) is a wee bit bigger than expected and turns right around and runs home to Ireland. Finn goes to his wife and tells her his predicament, ie. that a huge ass giant is coming over to Ireland to give him a beat down. Finn's wife quickly constructs a crib and tells Finn to lay in it. When Bennadonna arrives at the McCool family residence, he says (and this is a direct quote from the bus driver), "Woman, where is your husband?" Mrs. McCool just says, "I don't know. It's just me and the child at home." Bennadonna takes one look at the "sleeping" Finn and thinks that if this the baby, he really didn't want to meet the father so he leaves to go back to Scotland. In the process, he purposely destroys the bridge that Finn built.

Anyway day two of Belfast consisted of the Black Cab Tour. One of the most interesting and thought provoking rides I have ever taken. We started in the Protestant section of town to see the murals. We learned about the history of the "Troubles" and how the two major para-military groups still retain a lot of influence in the area, the Ulster Freedom Fighters for the Protestants and the Irish Republican Army for the Catholics. Belfast is kinda crazy because it is only 20% integrated and most areas still remain 100% Protestant or Catholic. From what I can understand from our cab driver the "troubles" started in the 60's with the Catholics taking cue from the protests going on in the United States and started demanding equal rights even though they were the minority. Anyway Protestants weren't a huge fan of this and riots started and then escalated into an over 30 year conflict. The cab driver emphasized that it has never been about religion, but politics. About 3600 people have died in the "troubles." I think the ceasefire was signed in the mid-90's but it seems like an uneasy peace.

If you go to the Protestant side, you have murals commemorating leaders of the Ulster Freedom Fighters and one particularly creepy one called the "Belfast Mona Lisa" because no matter how you look at it, it appears that there is a gun pointed at you. They also have ones advocating for more community involvement in the government and ones celebrating heroes to their faith, like Oliver Cromwell. We then crossed the "Peace Wall." This was not a "oh lets celebrate peace in our communities" wall, the bridge is 42 feet high and is only open certain times of the day to let people cross. If you are anywhere in the city, you are also videotaped. We got to the Catholic side and saw more murals with IRA heroes like Bobby Sands and the other ten people who died as part of the hunger strike in the attempt to get political prisoner status in prison (which they had until Margaret Thatcher took it away.) There was also a mural commemorating the women and children who, when there was a sweep of the community by the police for weapons and the place was put on lock down so no one in or out, smuggled weapons out by saying they needed to feed people and then hiding weapons under children and bread. It was an interesting tour. Nothing like I had ever experienced before.

We also got to go to the Belfast Christmas market where I had the traditional Irish food of kangaroo. I figured, why not? Bit gamey. Anyway back in Cork but really interesting weekend.

Update on the Smurf Hand Situation

I went back to the office to turn in another paper today and I cracked some line about "alright so far, so good, no exploding pens." The woman laughed and asked if I had seen the outside of the door.

I opened the door and looked on the other side. Yeahhh there is definitely blue ink on the other side of the door. I hadn't realized that my pen had exploded yet and had put my full hand on the door (not the door handle, but door) to open it yesterday. They have to repaint the door now. They had just had it repainted last week.

Hodgepodge

Random Things I Learned:

1. People don't clean their sidewalks after snow for fear of getting sued. This is what an Irish person told me today. They worry more about cleaning it and then someone falling on ice that forms when the freezing rain comes down. This is why the sidewalks and street are covered in a sheet of ice at 8:30 this and every other morning this week.

2. While I was at a bar last night, some guy called another girl, "a real scuttlewoman," - apparently this means that the person is up to no good.

3. There is apparently an Irish way of doing things. For instance, a politician got called out for building a fence on his property using public money. Instead of being turned over to the Garda, he had to donate $10,000 to a Lourdes Invalid Fund.

4. There is some debate being the Catholic Church only has to contribute 300 million for clerical abuse victims and then anything above and beyond that is covered by the state.

5. They talk about "freezing fog" coming in. I don't know what that entails but it sounds somewhat like death as an atmospheric condition.

6. When I went to turn in my paper today, as I was filling out the receipt to prove that I turned in the paper, my pen exploded. My hand looked like I put it a stamp pad of blue ink. It was a bit of a mess but I had someone help me get the papers out of my folder. However I really didn't care that much and was joking around with the woman in the office that I had to go de-Smurfify my hands. She said I could have some fun with it and pretend I have frostbite to people on the street. I enjoyed the suggestion.

7. If you have any kind of a warm sandwich here, they call it toastie. I enjoy it.

8. They wish people a "happy Christmas"

It's Rugby Time of Year

Quick post:

There are a lot of big rugby games going on right now. I can't actually name any but the commercials are great. There is the national pride Guinness one and then the scrappy bar one from Heineken.

Sinterklaas

Last night I got to celebrate Sinterklaas for the first time in my life. Sinterklaas is how the Dutch people celebrate the arrival of good ole Saint Nick. Dutch children receive their presents every December 5th instead of on the 25th.

However there is such a huge backstory so I will try to capture it properly. Sinterklaas lives in Spain. He comes to Holland every year around November 20th. On a boat. It is a HUGE deal. He comes to a new town each year and crowds line the waterways to greet him on his boat. Not only that but there is a newcast that goes on. The anchor broadcasts the arrival of Sinterklaas and the town goes nuts. They sing songs. The mayor comes out. This year the anchor and the mayor were shocked because Sinterklaas came in a different direction than was expected. And Sinterklaas is a tricky fellow. Sometimes he leaves little gingerbread snap things called peppernoten on the ground to make the crowd THINK that he has been there.

So Sinterklaas comes in on his boat. With his black posse. They are called Black Petes, as in short for Peter. And they are basically Santa's little helpers. Dressed up like minstrels that belong in Henry XVIII court. Supposedly they are black due to going down the chimney.

Anyway Sinterklaas comes in and stays in his palace and his job is basically done. However over the next fifteen days or so, his representatives travel to every town in Holland. In addition, there are segments on the news like "oh no, someone stole Sinterklaas' book (ya know the naughty or nice one)" and then they follow it up on the next day with "found the book, all is well." Or there is some debate that Sinterklaas may get stuck and not get under a bridge. In addition, there are little stories that are told each year about Sinterklaas and his black helpers. On the night of December 5th, generally people are eating dinner and they hear a knock on the window (Black Pete) and they rush in and all the presents are there. They exchange gifts then and read poems to each other.

Another tradition of this holiday is to eat chocolate and candy until you feel nauseous. (No problem with this part.) So after a Dutch meal of kale and potatoes and meatballs, we ate lots of chocolate. Like Sinterklaas and Black Petes made up of chocolate. Giant chocolate letters, like a giant M made out of chocolate, and a box of peppernoten (gingerbread snaps kinda shaped like corn pops) with other fun candy interspersed.

All in all a really interesting holiday. I've included a video of the Black Petes. They are singing in Dutch but if you see a fat woman running, she is one of the naughty people. I'm not sure if the video is available in the United States, but hopefully you can watch it.

Black Petes 

Traditional Irish Songs

Before I came over to Ireland, I knew some Irish songs. I have heard some quality songs over the past few months.



The Boys From County Cork



Come out Ye Black and Tans - I am in rebel country



Galway Girl



Seven Drunken Nights

Marks And Sparks

So to get in the Christmas spirit, I found my second favorite Christmas commercial shown over here. The first one involves people singing while they go through a McDonald's drive thru to the tune of 12 Days of Christmas.

My second favorite though is the Marks and Spencer singalong. Because really any commercial involving Twiggy, the Bee Gees and overt movie references to classic song and dance movies I am bound to enjoy it.



In other noteworthy news (to a very small population ie. me), I was asked for the second time since I have been here if I'm Polish. Despite my actual Irish heritage, apparently I look Polish. Go figure.

Ice Ice Baby

Nobody does black ice like the Irish. Ireland and the United Kingdom have received a massive amount of snow in the past week and it looks like the Arctic Spell is not going to let up for another week. Edinburgh airport has essentially been shut down for a week. 5000 tonnes of salt have been used on Irish roads. Passengers were stranded on an abandoned train yesterday in West Sussex. Basically, it's a mess.

And one that is not likely to get better anytime soon. Ireland has pre-ordered salt coming in from Turkey and Egypt....but it isn't getting here for another two weeks. As someone big and important said but I can't remember the name "we are not going to salt every road in the country, only those to keep the national network."

I happen to live on one of the so-called unsalted roads. It's as if the Irish motto is "just say no" to walking anywhere safely. So this morning I thought I had class (turns out I didn't but I didn't check my email early enough to find this out). I leave my apartment. Issue 1: I can't get out of the complex. I essentially slide on my sneakers out of the complex and manage to turn before going into the road. Now I know how to walk on ice. I grew up in an area where winter involves ice. I learned though that a sheet of ice on a hill is a whole different ballgame.

I manage to make it down to class by essentially waddling down a hill. It was a good look, I can assure you. I had on sneakers but really when the the ground is a sheet of ice it really doesn't matter what shoes you have on. Although the two Irish girls who had stiletto boots on seemed to be having more trouble than others. They literally were tottering down the hill and grabbing onto windowsills. They were laughing, I was laughing. It was ridiculous but funny. So I make it down to my now-canceled class. Once I realize that class was not going to happen, I decided to get myself a coffee and trek back to the apartment. Coffee+ice+hill = not a good idea.

The walk back to my apartment was treacherous. Absolutely treacherous. Coffee was flying everywhere as I would slip and catch myself. I essentially had to side step up a hill. I was the one now grabbing onto windowsills, bushes, poles, anything I could grab. And then I would fall again as the windowsills would be covered in ice.  But I gotta say I had an absolute blast because really where is the fun in being able to just walk to class and not feel like you are participating in an obstacle course?

In other big news, as I'm sure everyone knows, Russia and Qatar are the two next World Cup hosts. We got to see it from the primarily English perspective as that is where our news comes from. As can be imagined, the Brits were not too thrilled about being voted out in the first round. Particularly after they sent Beckham, Cameron and Prince William to speak. Personally I don't see why Russia should get an Olympics and a World Cup within the same decade but that's me.

Anyway while reading my free Irish Times this morning (which had lovely coffee stains on the front page due to the walk back home) there was an article that was funnier that I will ever be at describing the World Cup decision so I decided to enclose it.

Three lions but just two votes as Sepp and the boys play it, um, safe

MARY HANNIGAN

WORLD CUP 2018/ 2022 BIDDING: ON THE COUCH: Pity the Fifa committee members who had to choose between the highest bidders. Highest in merit, of course
SO THEN, D-Day,
Russia v England v Netherlands/Belgium v Spain/Portugal. A decent line-up, it has to be said, pity the poor old Fifa executive committee members who had to choose between the highest bidders. Highest in terms of merit, of course.
It must have been tougher still after they’d witnessed such emotional presentations in the morning. Andrey Arshavin and David Beckham, in particular, yanked Fifa’s heartstrings for all they were worth. The cynics say these presentations count for nowt, but surely they underestimate the Fifa lads’ sensibility?
“I could never ’ave managed what I’ve achieved froo football – I owe my life, everyfing I ’ave to football,” said Beckham, while Arshavin tearfully begged Fifa to believe in Russia, as his coach, when he was a wayward young fella, had believed in him.
“I was not the easiest kid to manage when I was little,” he conceded. (“WAS??” hollered Arsene Wenger in front of his north London telly).
It was Nethergium, though, who kick-started the proceedings, with Johan Cruyff, Ruud Gullit, Guus Hiddink and a blast from the goalkeeping past, Jean-Marie Pfaff (still permed after all these years), as their star line-up. Ruud promised us a green World Cup and two million bikes for fans, enough to earn a standing ovation from Fifa.
Kidding.
Eurosport dragged a Dutch journalist, Edwin Struis, out in to the cold to ask for his verdict on the Nethergium presentation: a chirpy thumbs up. He was particularly impressed by Hiddink’s contribution – which, curiously enough, was accompanied by the Monkees’ I’m a Believer .
“He’s a global trotter,” said Edwin of Guus, “they know him all the world, he’s a famous guy.”
Alas, Edwin was less kind about Spatugal’s effort, reckoning it was “like a tourism advertorial” – “It’s the World Championship of football, not the World Championship of tourism.”
Spanish journalist Francesc Aguilar begged not to differ. “I think it was a disaster,” he sighed, although, in fairness, Spanish executive committee member Angel Maria Villar Llona had, at least, tried to introduce some levity to the proceedings by declaring: “Fifa is a clean institution! Fifa works honestly!”
Hats off to the fella, he had them rolling in the aisles.
Alas, injury prevented Cristiano Ronaldo from travelling to Zurich, but he was good enough to send a message, in which he insisted that “Portugal and Spain are like brothers”. And with that the Iberian peninsula was united in mirth.
Next up, England – William and the two Daves their three lions.
Manchester City community worker Eddie Afekafe did his bit too, but all eyes were on Becks, as they had been at that press conference the day before. One of the more searching questions put to him was: “How do you manage to stay so beautiful?”
It was a fair question, one for which Becks had no answer, but he was far from tongue-tied when putting England’s case.
Russia, too, put up a good show, not least Olympic pole vault champion Yelena Isinbayeva, who credited Sepp Blatter and the boys with boosting the women’s game.
“My message to you, dear gentlemens, is a simple one: thank you,” she purred.
Then Russia’s bid chief had a bit of a go at Sir Winston Churchill, and we were done.
Decision time. “Over to you, Matthew Amroliwala,” said Gabby Logan, presenter of the BBC’s coverage of the shindig.
“Prince William has just arrived and he said ‘fingers crossed’,” Matthew told Gabby.
“Thanks Matthew,” she said.
Finally, out came Sepp.
“This game has a value,” he told the audience, which nodded knowingly. “Football is not only about winning, it is also a school of life where you learn to lose,” he said, his stare drifting a little towards William and the two Daves.
Out with the envelope. Well, that’s a stunner: Russia!
Mind you, if star power did the trick in this type of carry-on, Chicago would be hosting the 2016 Olympic Games.
Just the two votes, then, and one of them from former English FA chairman Geoff Thompson.
The consensus? Panorama should live out its days in the Tower of London.
Oh, not to forget the 2022 bidding contest. Well, it’d hardly be Qatar, deemed “high risk” by the Fifa inspection team.
Over to you Sepp.
“The winner is . . . Qatar!”
Russia and Qatar it is, then. Lovely. Almost 50,000,000 Google hits combined when you tap in “human rights abuses”.
Crikey, what you wouldn’t give for Fifa to be WikiLeaked.

Not a "Stairway" to Heaven

Every once in a while I have these grand plans to learn one new thing every day. Usually these grand plans fail relatively quickly but every once in a while I go in learning spurts. Like since I've been in Ireland, I've learned how to make a turkey, how to pack for a weekend in just a backpack, how to pronounce Irish names and the rules of Gaelic Football to name just a few.

But part of learning new things is trial by error. Sometimes in order to learn, you may fail in the process.

And today failure happened....

with the StairMaster.

Yes, that same StairMaster that is ubiquitous in gyms around the world. 

During one of my rare bouts of exercise enthusiasm, I went to the gym today.   Now as previously discussed I'm not a huge fan of gyms and so I'm a bit behind the curve when it comes to gym equipment. For example, the treadmill. Seemingly simple, right? Not when you are an outside runner by experience and so when you turn to talk to your friend, you forget that the machine is still running beneath you and you may or may not have flown off several times.

But finally I felt comfortable enough with the treadmill, I was a pro at the bikes and I could mostly figure out the weight situation. It was time to master the Stair Master. First problem, the machine asked for my weight...in kilograms. I've been writing papers for days and my fried brain could not compute conversions. I did a random guess. No idea if it was correct or not.

So I got on the machine and I tried walking up and down. It's a machine that is supposed to mimic stairs, how hard could this be? And then that moment that I fear in the gyms happens. When you are trying to look confident on this contraption, some person who works at the gym kindly walks up to you and gently asks "has anyone showed you how to to work this machine?" So she attempted to show me, and said a bunch of stuff about compression and to take baby steps and don't lift my feet off the pedals (which is incredibly difficult for runners). I was told to loosen my hips and knees and then she stood there watching. While it was a necessary intervention, I still felt awkward. I tried my best and finally she was satisfied enough that she left. So okay, I think I have the hang of this. I supposedly have walked up 7 floors and am averaging a floor a minute. Sweet. Yay, gym success! .... Then the machine kept thinking that I wasn't on it anymore and kept asking me to resume the routine while I'm attempting to walk. Finally the beeping noise every 30 seconds was making me feel self-conscious and declared defeat.  On the plus side, I was a bike fiend today. Not enough that the Tour De France will happen but maybe I can find a niche at gyms.

So in conclusion, I may or may not go back to the Stairmaster. I'm sure there is some other contraption in the gym I could try...

Snow In Ireland

Now I know that several of the entries have focused on the weather...but today it actually snowed. In Cork. Granted it was for forty-five minutes (all of which I was in class for but that is the benefits of windows) but the entire campus was having a blast/waddling on ice. The total accumulation - rough estimate but approximately 1/4 of an inch. However I saw multiple snowball fights and one ambitious house on the way home even had a little snowman. The campus was beautiful. I took a picture about three hours afterward and a lot of the snow had melted but you can still see a little. This is the Quadrangle which my roommate affectionately calls, "the Harry Potter Quad" because it looks like some place where Quidditch is played.

Winter Has Come To Cork

So the frost and potential for snow has set in although compared to the rest of Ireland, Cork still remains a pretty snow-less city. However schools were closed in Dublin, as was the airport in Edinburgh and the Garda has warned citizens to stay off roads as much as possible.

Slight note: I enjoy how the police are called the Gardai or the official name is An Garda Siochana. It is just more fun to say.

I have been on a few "invigorating" walks these past few days. Despite the presence of heavy gloves, my hands are starting to match the Cork City colors of red and white due to the various levels of freezing and defrosting. I managed to get out on Friday night to Jackie Lennox for some chicken and chips. So my chicken and chips (ie. fries) are wrapped in brown paper and I am at the cashier getting ready to pay. Sidenote: Corkonians talk very quickly and in a sing-song manner so the words tend to run together to an un-trained ear. So I think the cashier asks me if I want a drink, I shake my head no. Then he asks me something else, I say "What?" and after about two more times of this "What is it? - What?" interchange, I finally figure out he is asking what I got. I proceed to apologize and make some line about zoning out or not being with it. The man just goes "oh it's alright, it was Thanksgiving yesterday, you are probably still hungover." It's 6:30 pm the next day. I just laughed though because really it was a very quick line on his part.

This weekend was pretty quiet. I got some Christmas shopping done. The city is decorated with lights hanging across the streets and the stores blaring Christmas music. Now with the expected snow, all you really need is Santa. From the looks of it though, Santa appears in the main city park at various times. None of this wimpy indoor mall Santas for the Irish, we like our Santas to have rosy red cheeks due to the weather.

On a different note, I think I may have mentioned that I get like seven channels. One of which features Skynews which is filmed out of London. Not offense to the British press corps but I think Skynews overuses the expression: "breaking news." Two days ago breaking news was that President Obama received 12 stitches during a pickup basketball game....Seriously, this is breaking news? Their Irish neighbor just received a huge bailout, the entire British Isles is freezing and North Korea attacked South Korea but Obama getting an elbow to the mouth warrants breaking news. I guess his lip was busted open so something did break in the whole experience but still I don't think Skynews was intending on using the word "breaking" literally. 

Regardless, I will miss the television. Particularly the fascination with soap operas and the X Factor. Although having watched the X Factor, I can understand the obsession.

Thanksgiving Dinner

This year was my first experience cooking Thanksgiving Dinner. And I chose to kind of take responsibility over the turkey. Because really what is better for someone who doesn't have any cooking experience but to tackle the main centerpiece of the biggest holiday relating to food? It's like tackling the English Channel when your only swimming experience has been passing the swim test at the local pool.

So the big turkey experience actually started the night before when we got the turkey. Slight issue number 1: the usage of kilograms in Ireland BUT I had prepared for this (spent too much time looking up conversions) and had a handy little chart ready for me at the local supermarket. Success 1: The roommates and I purchased a turkey and got it back to our apartment.

Slight issue number 2: Defrosting. Since we got it the night before, according to the handy websites I consulted it was wayy too late to consider using the traditional refrigerator method. So we left it in the fridge until the next morning when we were going to do option 2: defrost by cold water. At 7:30 I was up and got the turkey out of the fridge and then realized we had another issue. Slight issue 3: the size of an 11 lb turkey. We had no kind of cooler or large bowls. I was not going to be deterred however and found...a plastic bucket in our bathroom. You know the kind that usually collects water or you put mops in. I washed the bucket out and put the turkey in. And who knew turkeys float? Sooo I balanced a plate on top of the turkey to weigh it down.

                                                                THE CONTRAPTION


Now the handy cooking website advised me that I had to replace the cold water on the half hour. Which I did...for five hours. At 12:45, the turkey I believed was defrosted but I really had no idea. I got one of my roommates into the kitchen and we opened the turkey from the wrapper. And then this happened....

FALSE. But it would have been great if it did. No, but we did play with the turkey for a while. We may or may not have moved it's wings and talked to each other in turkey voices. Anyway we realized that it was not all fun and games and there was giblets that needed to be removed.

Except we weren't quite sure what a giblet consisted of. We looked it up on Google, and there was a lovely picture involving all possible turkey giblets. So I took one for the team and stuck my hand up that turkey and pulled out some organ or another. And we thought we were good, until we realized that the long thing was a neck and needed to come out. Conversation: "It looks like a bone, you wouldn't remove a bone right?" "I dunno, it looks like it is that long thing in the giblet picture." We ended up pouring like five cups of steaming water into the turkey. And I tried and tried to get that neck out but it wasn't coming out.

And then all of sudden, there was the shrieking girls moment as my roommate pulled the neck out. "Oh my god, oh my god, what do I do?!?" "Ahh I dunno, okay, okay, you pull the trash over and I'll throw it in" "Oh my god, this is so gross!!" And I whipped the trash can over and we threw it in there and shut the lid really quickly and shuddered for a couple of minutes. She never really got over it. And it gave my other roommate a lovely surprise when she opened the trash can later that day.

We had one more giblet removing experience. After this, I convinced another roommate to baste it. I was still recovering from the whole giblet experience. I kept repeating that my hands were so cold and I could feel turkey innards, like it was a traumatic experience.  We got the turkey into the oven and managed to cook the thing. (My one roommate had suggested naming it....until she was the one who pulled the neck out.)
We had a full thanksgiving dinner with turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots and string beans, stuffing, apple pie (homemade) and the traditional brownies. And you know what, it was really good.

After we sufficiently recovered from our turkey coma, one of the bars on campus was showing the Saints-Cowboys game so we all went down for a half. I then attempted to explain to our German friend how American football was played. I also got to talk with the fam back home as well. Overall, not a bad Thanksgiving.

Interesting Law

So I haven't been able to get this verified but it's supposedly a law that at Trinity College in Dublin you can shoot a Catholic with a bow and arrow on Sunday as long as they remain in the college grounds. I hear it hasn't been repealed either. 

Another interesting thing I read in class was MnM v. CM which is a family law case and one member of the couple was trying to get a Judicial Separation Decree (basically you are relieved of your rights to cohabit but are still married to each other and the clock starts ticking for divorce because you need something like 4-5 years of separation for divorce.) Anyway in this case, one of the members of the couple were trying to prove that what was going on was not normal behavior for marriage and accused the other one of excessive drinking, violence anddd setting off of cattle...  I'm not sure what that entails but it isn't normal apparently. The Judge told them to pray to St. Francis for guidance.

From Cork to Catalunya

This past weekend my roommate and I went to Barcelona for the first time in our lives. Friday we managed to get to the city center from the airport relatively unscathed (point 1 for us) and needed food. We ended up going to a quintessential Spanish restaurant...KFC. BUT we managed to order our dos peces de pollo en original recipe con Coke en espanol so we were both pretty excited. (It didn't hurt that the menus had numbers on it - my roommate suggested we go to restaurants with numbers on them from then on.) After our peces de pollo we were ready to conquer Barcelona...and by that, do a hop on hop off bus tour.

First stop, Sagrada Familia. This incredible church by Gaudi has been under construction since it's inception and is likely to remain so for the immediate future. It's hard to describe. It has a Christmas tree as a main center point. It has salamanders and snails as Gargoyles. The entire thing looks like it is dripping.

After Sagrada Familia we went to Parc Guell. Gaudi had built a park for his family when he was alive and the family left it to the city upon his death. It's like walking in Candyland. There are mosaic lizards, benches that curve around with mosaics, everywhere you look there is something different. In addition, it offers one of the best views of the city.

Saturday, we decided to Gaudi-it up again. First we went to the Gothic Quarter which has a bunch of little streets and as can be guessed lots of Gothic architecture. We then found the zoo by mistake. After that little detour, we decided to visit Casa Batllo and Casa Pedrera. Gaudi was commissioned by people to basically build giant apartment buildings. Casa Battlo has a scaly outside, and a fish like theme in all of the rooms. Even the center light area is blue mosaic starting at a light blue and going into a dark blue when you reach the top. Which naturally features a giant dragon. Casa Pedrera is just as neat and as hard to convey.

We also had our Spanish tapas meal on Saturday. We had ham croquettes, paella and Spanish tortilla. At night we walked along Las Ramblas which is a major street. They had a bunch of street statues who would move when you would give them money. My personal favorite was this Quasimodo looking one who would jump out at people and then mimick their laugh.

Sunday, we went to Montserrat which is an old Christian monastery up in the mountains. It was beautiful, it was really interesting and it was absolutely freezing. We took a subway-train-train to get there. One of the wonderful things about the Spanish subway is all the stops are listed in the train car with little lightbulbs which light up when you get to the stop. We ended up on the train with a honeymooning couple who were very conversive. We learned more about Mexico City/ their families / how they met / how saints are incorruptible / how there was going to be only one world government / how the Hindus apparently worship devils / how saints bodies don't bleed if you cut them and so on. Definitely made the ride more interesting. We managed to finally get to Montserrat and the views are stunning. Montserrat, I learned, is where Ignatius of Loyola had a vision of Mary and where there is the Black Virgin. So we waited in line for a long time to see the Black Madonna which was a neat experience.

We came back and had our second Spanish meal, Paella con Sangria. Then walked along the beach area and all through the waterfront. Monday morning we were up before five although we didn't really sleep due to some lovely individuals in our hostel who decided to have a forty five minute discussion in the early morning hours consisting of one girl accusing the other girl of taking her phone and not giving it to her and how she was so angry. The other girl would then tell her to shut up and go to bed and how she was going to be so embarrassed in the morning. This pattern repeated on the 30 second mark for forty minutes. Turns out the phone was on the floor lol. I heart  inebriated strangers but they were  nice people when sober. We made it to Barcelona airport which involved more tram rides than necessary to get to the right terminal. (Basically we learned the hard way that Barcelona has a lovely car park.)

Anyway back in the Emerald Isle. Barcelona was a really neat city. Kinda like a cross between San Francisco/Miami/New York. And we made it through a weekend on our Spanish which was kinda awesome.

Quick Highlights From the Day

So a much longer post needs to follow this one concerning my weekend but today was just a day filled with little highlights:

1. When I was walking to school, I was stopped at a light and all of a sudden cars started honking because one car was stuck in the intersection. They continued to keep honking however even after the car had moved. I then realized about three cars were just having fun with each other and honking a rhythm out between their cars.

2. Thanksgiving Signs. Interestingly, the Hot Beverage Society at school is having a Thanksgiving celebration with pumpkin cider, hot chocolate, Charlie Brown and "festive arts and crafts." I'm not quite sure what festive arts and crafts entails but I enjoy the effort. I'm also not sure what the Irish are being thankful for but just like we celebrate St. Patrick's Day, I guess they can celebrate Thanksgiving.

3. I was wearing sweatpants and a hoodie and was told "that my tracksuit was simply grand." I'm seriously going to miss the Irish and their descriptive adjectives.

4. The city turned on it's Christmas lights. Even the school has a Christmas tree with lights on at the student center.

5. There are sales on Christmas chocolate at the local convenience store.

6. Harry Potter comments on the female bathroom stalls. I'm not sure who is taking the time to write comments about the new Harry Potter movie while in the female bathrooms but there is an entire conversation thread that goes: "Harry Potter comes out today!" --> "Yay" --> "Voldy is mouldy" --> "Dumbledore is hot" (seriously??) and --> "Dumbledore is dead."

Ring of Kerry

This past weekend I went with the school to tour the Ring of Kerry and it was absolutely beautiful. No wonder it is one of Ireland's top tourist destinations.

Friday, we went to Kerry Bog Village. We saw little bog huts, and the Kerry Bog Pony. One of the most exciting bits was seeing these 2 Irish wolfhounds. They are HUGE dogs. We heard about their excellent hunting skills and how they basically freak out if there is a cat around. So we see these dogs and hear about them but what happened next is up for debate. We were getting back on the bus and all of a sudden we see one of the Wolfhounds taking off...with a cat in it's mouth. Half the bus thinks it was a real cat, the other half thinks that it was a decoy for the tourists. I haven't made up my mind but it certainly was interesting. We also learned about this guy who lived near by and was quite a character. Apparently he used to go in the lake and "tickle the fish." To tickle fish you have to stand still about waist high with your hands in the water. The fish come to rest against your hand thinking that it is the bank and once they do, you somehow flip them out of the water onto the bank. This guy also used to have a significant moonshine operation going on (they call it potchin over here.) He used to string the bottles of alcohol across the river but under the water, so they would be naturally cooled by the running water.

That night we got to the hotel and had a guest speaker talk about growing up on a farm in South Kerry. She was fascinating. I learned about going to school with no shoes on through peat bogs and being distracted and getting to school late but it didn't matter because the speaker would bring in peat bricks to heat up the classroom. I learned about milking cows (which is apparently pretty boring) but her brother would squirt her in the face with milk. Apparently life was full of hard work but full of happiness. People would come in and out of houses and tell stories or play instruments and dance around. After the talk, we had a caeli which is always so much fun.  We learned three different dances and while I'm not sure I have the hang of swinging people around, I had a great time.

Saturday we went to the Skelling Experience. We couldn't go to the Skellings because it is winter but we learned about them. The Skellings are two rocks. On the bigger rock there are the remains of the monastery, and on the little one there is the second largest gannet population in the world. I have no idea how monks built a monastery on this rock. It is literally 7 miles into the ocean, with no shelter and winds whipping around, waves crashing and oh the Vikings would come around every so often. The rocks are ridiculously steep as well. Saturday night we had a guest speaker who was a former professional Gaelic footballer. He was great. We got to learn about how the game is played, about rising through the levels (you are basically born into a club and grow up with them) and how Gaelic footballers put in the same level of commitment as any other professional athlete but they essentially play for free.

After the talk we had Quizzo which I always enjoy. I got a few questions right like what ingredients go into a Bloody Mary or what canal is a Greek god spelled backward. I even pulled out who Homer Simpson's neighbor is which kinda shocked me because I don't really watch that show. But anyway there was a wide variety of questions, so most people get at least a few right.

Sunday we hiked to these forts that we got to walk on top of and then drove around the rest of the Ring of Kerry. It was a clear day and the Ring is absolutely beautiful. Overall, a great Irish cultural weekend.  

Hot Beverages

The weather has gotten colder which means it is appropriate hot beverage time.

Now I've never been a big coffee person but I'm learning to appreciate it's caffeinated qualities. I went into a cafe a couple of months ago and basically stared for two minutes at the list of choices available. My thought process went something along the lines of "hmm Americano has the word American in it, that's probably fine." I learned quickly that was a faulty thought process. However it is not so bad with about five cubes of sugar in it. Last week I went into the same cafe and got a Mocha and I think I have finally found my choice of coffee. It was a good combination of being a legitimate type of coffee but not really tasting like coffee. I know this defeats the purpose of coffee but at least I can order Mochas in most cafes as opposed to Strawberry Mochachinos which had been my go-to Starbucks drink.

UCC is so big on their hot beverages that they even have a Hot Beverage Appreciation Society.

However another one wonderful thing about being in Ireland is that it is the home of Baileys. And I learned that Baileys with hot chocolate....pretty good drink for a cold day.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

Winter weather has finally arrived in Ireland. Everyone thinks it's cold but expresses it differently. The Irish are more "it's a bit chilly today" whereas the Americans are more "whoa, did it become winter overnight, I'm not prepared for this, why did I pick to study abroad in the fall when I am going to come back to the United States for the winter season?" One of the quirks about having classrooms in buildings that are from 1849 is the heating systems are from that time as well. Actually they probably aren't but they aren't functioning yet, so we are going to pretend like they are. In class yesterday (where I had a jacket on the entire time), students shared stories about cold classrooms. One of my classmates remembered the time when every student in Ireland used to have to bring a brick of peat (correct terminology?) to class every day to put in the peat moss fire. It would get so smokey however that students would have to jump around and flap their arms to dissipate the smoke. One of the benefits of being in Ireland is I get to hear stories like that. They are a lot more interesting to tell and listen to than "so it was cold today at school so we had to have recess inside."

However one of the best things about Winter is that lovely little birth of Jesus Christ every December 25th. In the United States, the Christmas season is tempered by Thanksgiving occurring at the end of November. While the malls start decorating before Turkey Day, it is generally socially acceptable to officially open the Christmas season after Thanksgiving. Here, there is no Thanksgiving so Christmas decorations are already up. The coffee shop across the street from school has a lighted wreath up, the town center has wreaths and lights hung across the street. The stores put out their Christmas merchandise the day after Halloween. Christmas season has already come to Cork and I am thoroughly enjoying it.

Yay For Norway!

So back in September, my roommates and I were looking at cheap flights on Ryanair and it turned out we could fly to Oslo and back for 30 Euro. The cheap flights available over here still boggle my mind but I digress. Anyway none of us had been to Norway so we went ahead and booked it... and then we looked at the weather. Well first I actually looked at the record high by mistake. Turns out that is misleading. We learned that the average high is in the low 30's. But whatever, that's what layers are for. (And I wore three socks at every point during the weekend)

So we flew into Oslo on Friday night. It is a really interesting thing to be in a foreign country where the first language is not English. I had been once to Mexico but I can understand a bit of Spanish. Norwegian is no way shape or form like Spanish. Weirdly enough, its actually a bit like English but with excess letters. So Stop becomes Stopp in Norwegian. The TV channels were either in Norwegian or in English with subtitles. Turns out you haven't watched Spongebob until it is in Norwegian...

The first night we figured out our touring plan for the next day while drinking our tap water. The Norwegians have some of the best tap water in the world so I'm told. The next morning we started out bright and early and on the public transportation system. We managed to make it to the Viking Ship museum which was very cool. I learned that when the big shot Vikings would die, they would bury them in their ship. Kinda like Egypt with the pyramids. So they would be in the ship, with slaughtered food, games, jewels etc. But then the ship would be buried in a mound of clay.

After the Viking ship museum, we hit up the FRAM museum. From what I could understand the FRAM was a polar exhibition ship which is HUGE. And we got to go in it and explore a few different levels. I have officially crossed off leading polar exhibitions from a list of future careers. It looked like very difficult work and you had to worry about tiny insignificant details like being crushed by the immense pressure of all the ice.

We then went to Vigelandsparken which is a park of sculptures. I think the pictures are worth a thousands words here.

After Vigelandsparken, we walked around the city for a long time. Went to the palace and Parliament which is called Stortinget. We walked on the Opera House roof. This was neat because it is on the water and the sun had started to set. At 2:45. P.M. Yeah. We then went to a Norwegian bar where I got the Miller Lime of Norway. After the Norway bar, we went to an Ice Bar. This was very cool. We were lent fur lined capes with gloves and you go into a room completely made of ice for forty five minutes. The tables, chairs, sculptures, even your glasses are made of ice. We had way too much fun in there.

Next day, we went to Akershus which is a fortress in the city. Awesome views of the Oslofjord. Then we went to the National Gallery where we saw the "Scream" by Munch. Oh and we also ate the traditional Norwegian hot dog...which having now eaten one, can safely say I prefer American ones.

Anyway it is now back to work but awesome weekend.

You Can't Touch This

So much to write about this weekend and I will write a longer post later but I wanted to share this commercial while I still remembered it. It made me laugh.

Music Fest

I will be attending another music fest this weekend so I thought I would do some preliminary research to see who I would enjoy watching.

And out of all the contestants, I like this guy the best. He's Russian. He came in 11th place in the Eurovision Song Contest in Oslo. I felt I had to share his music. More importantly, his video. Songs like this should not only be kept in Europe.

Keening

So today I showed one of my roommates one of my favorite clips from the Carol Burnett Show. While we both had a good laugh at it, it allowed me an excuse to look up an Irish word that I had no clue as to it's meaning.

Keening. Comes from the Irish/Scots Gaelic term "caoineadh" meaning to cry. From what I can understand it means a type of vocal cry or lament over the dead, accompanied by physical movements such as rocking, kneeling or clapping. Contrary to popular belief, it is not just wailing but a series of high pitched laments by women trained in keening. Keening cannot be practiced until the wake when the spirit is thought to have left the body.

As with all Irish traditions, there is a story behind it. Supposedly the goddess Brigit viewed her son Ruaden mac Bres being speared right in front of her by Goibnu for being a spy. On witnessing this, Brigit let out the first keen heard in Ireland and after her, all fairy women would keen for the dead in a like manner. (source: http://www.maryjones.us/jce/keening.html)

Interestingly enough, the practice of keening has been very much opposed by the Catholic Church over the years.

However, as fun and lighthearted as this blog post has been, there will be no tears of sadness over the following clip. 

Spooktacular Samhain Parade

To celebrate Halloween some of the girls of Casa Study Abroad decided to go to the Samhain Parade on the other side of the city. It was an interesting experience. There were giant skeletons, a band and people all dressed up as ghouls. In addition, there were what looked like giant skeleton fish boats in the river. The parade took place after dark to add to the scare factor. We were able to get a spot right on the road so we could see everything. There were children trying to scare us by running up to us and screaming, and people dressed up as wolves, and we just had a generally great time.

After the parade had passed, we went to the house of a Dutch friend of ours where we had traditional Dutch pancakes. Unlike American pancakes, they had pieces of ham in them with melted cheese on top. Very good.

Now it's Monday and back to work, but good weekend overall.

Halloween...More Irish Than You Would Expect

Before coming to Ireland, I thought Ireland's only contribution to the holiday schedule was St. Patrick's Day. Last week however I learned that the Halloween is actually Irish.

What?

Yup. It is thought that Halloween derived from the Celtic Festival Samhain.

According to Wikipedia (which is never wrong), Samhain means roughly "summer's end." This festival celebrates the end of the "lighter half" of the year, and the beginning of the "darker half." From what I can understand, it involved lots of bonfires.

So where did all the creepy scary stuff come in? The ancient Celts believed that the border between this world and the Otherworld was thin on this day, allowing spirits to come through. Since one obviously needed to ward off evil spirits, they would wear costumes and masks and basically disguise themselves as evil spirits.

The pumpkin carving even has an origin in Samhain. In order to commemorate souls in purgatory, you would have candle lanterns curved from turnips. This evolved over the years into jack o'lanterns. (Emphasis on the O'lantern - I should have known it was Irish).

Trick or treating is thought to have Irish (and Scottish) origins. A practice called "guising" was popular in the 19th century where children went door to door in masks, offering entertainment (usually a ghost story or song) in return for food or coins.

In conclusion, be Irish - celebrate Halloween

Low Key Weekend

So this weekend has been kind of a chill weekend. November is going to be really busy month with schoolwork and traveling, so this has been a weekend to just relax.

Friday I went with some of my roommates to see RED. It was pretty good. I figure any movie featuring Helen Mirren with automatic weapons will be entertaining, and I was right.



Saturday I went back to Cobh with my roommate. She hadn't been yet. There's not much to do in Cobh but it was nice just walking around. And walk we did. We found what is alleged to be the steepest hill in Ireland...and then climbed up it. It's called the "Deck of Cards" and they aren't kidding. Needless to say, by the top we were feeling some pain. We took the train back and kind of collapsed on the couch. I think we meant to get up and go out at some point but it just didn't happen.

So now it's Sunday and homework day, but happy halloween any one who is reading this. Hope you have a spooktacular day!

Fun Times Buying Fruit

I never know when I'm going to have a fun interaction with an Irish person. Generally it is in the places I least suspect it.

Today it was buying fruit.

The day started off productive. Went to class. Went to the gym where I learned that biking without headphones gets old real quick. Got supplies for the Halloween costume. So on the way home, feeling good about my productive healthy day I decided to stop and buy fruit.

I go in, pick out five oranges and bring them to the counter where the cashier is talking to another man in Gaelic. This is pretty much the interaction that follows.

Cashier to me: "Can you speak any Gaelic?"
Me: "Beyond Caed Mile Failte, not really."
Other Man: "Where are you from?"
Me: "Philadelphia"
Other Man: "As in Philadelphia, United States."
Me: "Yup"

(Other man and cashier at this point break into a rendition of "Streets of Philadelphia.")

Other Man: "Is that where the Liberty Bell is?"
Me: "Yup."
Other Man: "I've never been. Too long of plane ride. Like six or seven hours, right?"
Cashier: "Did you fly into Shannon or Dublin?"
Me: "Ah I went London-Heathrow to Cork"
Both of them: "Oh stay away from the English"
Other Man: "You guys managed to get rid of them. We still have six counties to go and then we will get our own Liberty Bell."

In conclusion, I had an amusing time buying fruit.

Singin In The Rain

Every year I deceive myself into thinking 55 degrees is warm weather. Coming out of winter, I get excited for weather where I am not shivering all the time that I inevitably bring out the flipflops way too soon.

Similar to my being deceived every year about the warmness of weather, I was deceived again today about the likelihood of precipitation in Ireland. I thought "oh It's nice and sunny today, I don't need an umbrella." Famous. Last. Words.

So I went into the city today in the great hunt for a Halloween costume, and was on the way back to class when the first downpour occurred. It was one of those things that there was nothing I could do but put the hood up and just continue walking for fifteen minutes. It was that angular rain as well that manages to hit the entire body. Soo class was spent slightly soaked. On the way home from class, the heavens opened again. I tried to pretend like "oh it's just a little bit of Irish sunshine, won't hurt anything" and then it started to rain harder. I ended up running back to the apartment, and my roommates just started laughing when they saw me. It was not my most attractive moment.

Regardless it's been a good day for the sheer fact alone that I got one of the Cadbury Creme Eggs that they are advertising for Halloween that has green goo inside. And Glee is on tonight. And I got my paper turned in.
And because all the rain has reminded me of one my all time favorite movie clips.

Halloween Dalai Lama

So Halloween is fast approaching and the big debate in Casa Study Abroad has been what to wear for this momentous occasion. Now I hear in the UK and Spain, Halloween isn't a big event. I'm told in Spain the big night is Carnival. However in Ireland, we are celebrating it.

Currently in Casa Study Abroad, we are half and half with having costumes planned. Because I like to figure out things with plenty of time, I still have no idea. Generally in the past minus some creative gradeschool years and one year in college where a few friends of mine all went as Julia Roberts characters, I have alternated between a witch or hippie. Not real original ideas. Now normally I wouldn't care about figuring out a costume until about Saturday but they feel the need here to have multiple Halloween events before Halloween which requires me to get on my game regarding a costume.

So this is the conversation I had with one of my roommates earlier who had just finished carving a pumpkin and baking the seeds. (I had never had baked pumpkin seeds before, they were pretty good.)

Her: Do you know yet what you are going to be?
Me: Nope. Any suggestions?
Her: You could dress in brown and find antlers and go as a moose.
Me: What?
Her: BULLWINKLE. Find a red scarf and brown clothes and an antler.
Me: Sounds more like Rudolph.
Her: Scrap the scarf.
Me: I could just wear a mask.
Her: This is true. That is easy.
Me: Ah but then I was Phantom one year, and the mask kept irritating me.
Her: You could be suicidal. They look just like everybody else. I swear I didn't make it up, it came from the Addams Family.
Me: .... I'm speechless. Was not expecting that.

Needless to say, just like how every year Linus is in search of the Great Pumpkin, I'm still in search of the great costume. Any recommendations would be appreciated.

Castle Day Trip

On Sunday, one of my roommates asked me if I wanted to go to Blackrock Castle and Observatory. Never one to turn down a castle, I agreed to go and went with her and some of her friends. The castle is in city limits which still throws me off that there are castles this close by to where I live.  Like I was walking along the parking lot and all of a sudden I look up and there's a castle.  The castle was used as a fortress to protect against raiders and after being burned down a few times, was restored by the city in 2000 and is open to touring. It's other main attraction is the observatory. While we couldn't actually use the observatory, we could walk up to it (still hate those narrow castle steps) and there was a lot of science oriented fun in the lobby like learning about the planets and interactive games where you could write a message to aliens and try to guess which animals are found on Earth and which ones aren't.  In case you were wondering, giant mushroom fungi do exist whereas griffins do not. We also got to color in a spaceship or an alien depending on which page of the coloring book you managed to get a hold of. We had a picnic and after a few tries, managed to find the appropriate bus back to our apartment.

Here are some photos of the weekend.

                                                               The Swinging Blue Cats!

                                                                   Blackrock Castle!

 

And a little clip of the weekend courtesy of El Hombre Blokes

By Jazz, You Mean Swing...And By Swing, You Mean Queen

This weekend has been jazz festival weekend in Cork. My roommate and I went into the city yesterday and it was a lot of fun. First, we saw a blonde middle aged female rapper. Naturally. At the Jazz Festival. We listened to her for a few minutes. We were so taken aback when she rhymed circadian rhythmn that we forgot to actually listened to what she rhymed it with.

We then moved onto guys drumming and playing on a guitar and they were really good.

And then we passed the pub we always go to and I saw a sign for the Swinging Blue Cats. There was no way that I was going to pass that up. So we went in and listened for a while and had a lot of fun. They played Glenn Miller, Louis Jourdan, Cab Calloway, Brian Setzer, Cherry Poppin Daddies and then naturally Queen "Crazy Little Thing Called Love."

We left there and found this cute hot chocolate shop where I got milk/white/dark chocolate and my roommate got cinnamon and nutmeg hot chocolate (it tastes like fall, so I'm told) and with our hot chocolates came little mixed chocolate drops. Like tiny Hershey kisses. We drank our hot chocolates while watching the marching band that was coming down the street. After the day, as my roommate put it, she would like music to accompany her whenever she goes shopping.

Later that day, because you can't have too much jazz festival, we bundled up and went back up. What the intended plan was to find a bar and chill and listen to jazz music. What actually happened was approximately four hours of straight dancing. We found a bar with live music and although it was packed, we danced for a while. Then we went to this bar which was the same bar which had traditional music playing in the first week we were in Cork. Tonight though it was a DJ. And you know it's going to be a good time when "Doncha" is the first song you here when you come in. We had a good time dancing although we managed to bring the age down by like forty years.

Overall it's just a fun weekend. People jamming in the street and the entire city comes out. Ironically I've heard no traditional jazz music yet. There's still time though, the festival ends tomorrow. 

Working For The Weekend

Bank Holidays = Awesome.

So the Irish (and the British I believe) feel that every so often they should just give a day off for no reason whereas us Americans qualify it like "oh it's Memorial Day, that's why we don't work today." Regardless of if a reason or no reason is used, I'm a fan of days off. And this weekend we have one. Bank Holiday Monday. Which means no classes on Monday. While I only had one class anyway, I am still not complaining.

AND this weekend is the Cork Jazz Festival (sponsored by Guinness). While I don't know what it quite entails, I will be down in the city finding out. I hear it's the best festival of the year. As someone who went to the Lithuanian, Italian, Chinese, Indian and Book Festivals in Baltimore, I'm a fan of festivals. You learn so much random stuff about different cultures like the word smitana is sour cream in Lithuanian. Now I haven't figured out how this knowledge will help me in the future but I figured it's best to be prepared.

So to recap: a festival and a day off on Monday, two things I'm a fan of converging on the same weekend, I'm excited.

In addition, this past week was the Languages Party in a bar entitled Sober Lane. Everyone wore name tags with what languages they could speak. This would be more effective if people didn't switch languages such as my Dutch friend who all of a sudden could speak French. I ended up with a sticker that said I speak Gaelic. At least that is what I think it said, but since I don't actually speak Gaelic, I'm not quite sure. A lot of events draw students in by promise of free food. This one promised free jelly shots and free pizza. While I didn't actually get any of either, I appreciate the effort that was made to draw students in like that.

Anyway time to get back to work so I can enjoy all the fun that is festival weekend.

Stavros Flatley

So things are a bit busy here in the Emerald Isle, but I wanted to share this clip.

Stavros Flatley

This makes me laugh every time I see it.

Gymming It Up

I'm not a huge fan of exercise. As a concept, sure, I think it's great. I understand the health benefits and as Elle Woods phrased it in Legally Blonde, "exercise gives you endorphins, endorphins make you happy and happy people just don't kill their husbands."

I'm just lazy. Sure, I was a runner for many years but it was predominantly for the social aspects. Without someone to push me, I'm just not a huge fan of exercise. I'm more of the "let's justify the hour of walking around town today" or "I climbed four steps of stairs to class, that has to be healthy" mentality.

So as can be surmised, I generally need someone to push me in order for actual exercise to happen. And that person yesterday was my roommate. She had heard about an aerobics class happening at the school gym and basically informed me that I was going. No option. So I go to sign up at the gym and learn that I have to give my fingerprint. WHAT? I don't know if biometric readings are common at gyms but generally the only times my fingerprint has been taken was for security clearance purposes for going into prison. Prison - Gym, interesting correlation.

So after I give my fingerprint, I enter into THE GYM. This gym is like no other school gym I've ever seen. It has a pool (which was featuring water aerobics), there was a separate gym for girls and boys, squash courts, basketball courts, volleyball courts, a track outside, a weight room and the natural feature of all gym...a rock climbing wall.

So by the time, my biometric registration is over, class is at least 1/4 of the way through. We decided to bike instead. I have to say I found it a little deceiving that if you sign up for 30 minutes bike time, they don't warn you about the five minute cool down at the end. We did some of the "core strengthening" machines. Slightly more difficult when the weights are in kilograms but we managed. And then it was rock climbing time. I started on the easy wall which you don't need people to belay you. There was an interesting moment when I got to the top and realized that I had no clue how I was going to get down but I figured it out and it was a lot of fun.

So there you have it. First gym experience in Ireland.

Family Part 2

So after spending a great week with family (and family to be) I am now back to the grind in Cork.

The family did touring for most of the week and I joined up with them when I didn't have that silly little thing called class. One particular highlight included a driving tour of West Cork (although Dad wasn't too keen on like driving 60 MPH on the little Irish back roads.) We went to Baltimore which is a small cute fishing town.

Over the weekend, we went to London to visit old friends. It's interesting to be back in the village where I spent my early childhood. It's like everything in my head was frozen in time to 17 years ago when I left and I forget that the teacher I had in Kindergarten would probably not be still teaching today. It was good to be back though.

We also went into London and saw Legally Blonde which was fantastic. LOVED it.



We went to Windsor on Sunday where we learned Royal Family fun facts like how one of the kings had two seperate beds, one specifically for getting up and meeting people in the morning and the other one I guess for sleeping? That night we went to a bar that had been around for 900 years...cause you know they have those everywhere in the US. It was pretty cool.

Anyway now time to get back to work but it was a fun week and a half.

The Eagle Has Landed ... And So Have We

And those were the first words said to me by my parents as they got off the plane in Dublin. That's right, it is family week in Ireland. The sibling and fiancee came the next day and we all met up in Cork in Sunday.

It's been a lot of fun to hang out with all of them and go touring.
We did the Blarney Stone on Monday which was neat because last time I went I was 3 and don't remember it. I learned one crucial fact about myself. I don't mind heights... however climbing up to them in dark enclosed stairs that get progressively narrow the higher you go does kinda freak me out a little bit. Fun castle fact: they design the stairs so if you are right handed with a sword charging up the stairs you would keep banging it against the wall, and the right handed person coming down would have the advantage. This mind you is after you make it into the castle where they would have random holes where they would pour boiling water on unwelcome visitors. Brings a whole new meaning to the term warm welcome...

Anyway we reached the top where we had a good time quoting Monty Python Holy Grail lines back and forth to each other. See the below scene. The brother and I can recite word for word. Only me and the brother kissed the stone. It's actually a little nervewracking how far back you have to lean. Blarney is also interesting for it's Poison Garden. Someone decided to make a garden full of poisonous points as a method of education. So it has Wormwood, and Cannabis and Belladonna and other such fun plants which will wreak all kinds of havoc if ingested.



After Blarney, we went to Jameson. So now I am a certified whiskey taster X 2. I wish I could somehow put that on my resume but somehow I feel like that is not what my future employer will be looking for. Call it a hunch. The next day we went to St. Finbarre's Cathedral, and the Butter Museum. Everyone may not have been enthralled with the Butter Museum as I was but all were glad that they went. However we did discover the song featured below and it's a gem. Who knew that was the secret to a faithful husband?



We also checked out St. Anne's Cathedral because St. Finbarre's is actually not Catholic. Yesterday we met up after class and went to a bar called An Spailpin Fananc. I have no idea how to pronounce it but it played Irish music and I even recognized some of the songs like "Whiskey In the Jar" and "Wild Rover." It was a lot of fun. Anyway it's been kind of a whirlwind week and still continuing...

The Wide World of Cadbury

Some people need their coffee every morning. Others like tea. I've always been the "need a little bit of chocolate" person.

My enjoyment of chocolate has been going on my entire life. For example, in fifth grade, I got stock and I could pick any company to invest in. I chose Hersheys.

I don't even care about what kind of chocolate it is. Dark, Milk, White, I'm an equal opportunity chocolate enthusiast. I also don't adhere to the "oh just a little bit of chocolate" camp. I'm the chocolate cake with chocolate frosting kind of person.

So now that I'm in Ireland I am thoroughly enjoying the easy accessibility to Cadbury chocolate. You know the scene in Willy Wonka (the original) when the kids walk into the main part of the factory and they can eat everything and there is a chocolate river? And everyone is so excited to be there and in awe of the place. That scaled down to what is socially appropriate is what I'm like in every convenience store in Ireland. There are at least five different brands of Cadbury original bars. There are Cadbury flakes. There are Galaxy bars. There are Smarties, and milk chocolate buttons (probably how my love affair with chocolate started) and candy I've never heard of. Since it's getting close to Halloween, they even have Cadbury creme eggs with neon green goo inside of them. (I don't understand how they can advertise no artificial colors for it but that's a different point.) Oh and Aero bars. Mint and chocolate goodness with little air bubbles. It's a sweet time to be in Ireland, I must say.