First off: Sorry this next post has taken sooooooo long for me to put up! Every time I’ve gotten time to sit down and write this, something else has come up that I’ve had to take care of… minor things like grocery shopping or a society meeting or, you know, class. But now I’m done with classes for the day and I only have a tiny bit of homework so I can put that off for later J
Life has been busy as usual here. In addition to classes, my friends and I have spent a considerable amount of time lately trying to plan some trips outside of Ireland! Over the past month we have visited Blarney and Cork, the Aran Islands, and Dublin (to be in a Dublin pub for the toast to Arthur Guinness, celebrating the 250th anniversary of Guinness)! This is all in addition to exploring Galway itself, partaking in the Oyster festival (at which I discovered that I actually quite like oysters… hooray for new discoveries!) and finally scoping out which are the best pubs and which are better left to tourists and freshers (the overly-rowdy first years). I am super excited about the trips we have planned, though. After about 4 hours on Monday night (thank you, slow internet) we booked the cheapest combination of flights to the Netherlands. At 1:30 am, we decided to put off booking a hostel until the next day. This time meeting on campus with a much stronger internet connection, we researched different housing options. Everything from hostels to hotels to canal boats to apartments. Dennis finally found the cheapest option, an apartment, complete with kitchen, that would fit all of us and would only cost 14 euro a night per person. BOOK IT! We all shouted. Then Niki wanted to just see the pictures so we would know what it looks like… Niki take his computer to look at, I look over her shoulder, and notice one tiny little detail… the apartment is located in Wroclaw…POLAND. Luckily we caught it before we booked, and we now know not to ever leave planning details up to Dennis. Anyway, we finally managed to get everything booked, for the right city, and we’re heading off at the end of October, taking advantage of a bank holiday giving us a day off of class. It should be a good weekend, everyone is actually really excited about going to the museums so our next project is to work out an itinerary with everything we want to do so we stay organized, don’t miss out on anything, and work in a trip to the Efteling amusement park as well because everyone wants to ride in the cannibal pots and eat poffertjees. Yum!
The following weekend I’m leaving everyone here behind and heading off to Barcelona, where I’m meeting up with one of my sorority sisters who is studying abroad in Rome, and then we are making our way to Valencia to meet up with another abroad ADPi! That weekend will be the Valencia Tennis Open so we may try to catch a couple tennis matches (rumor has it Andy Roddick will be playing… no word on Rafa yet, though). Valencia also apparently has the biggest aquarium in Europe so we’ll most likely go see that, too!
The last trip we have planned (so far) is a weeklong trip to… MOROCCO at the beginning of December! As most of you probably know, Morocco has been at the very top of my list of places I want to visit for a long time, so finally being able to go, and at a really good price, is super exciting! We will be staying in Agadir as our “home base.” We talked to a travel agent about going to Morocco and she said it’s actually among the top tourist destinations for people from Europe, and specifically for people from Ireland. Agadir is on the coast, so we’ll certainly fit in a beach day, and then we can arrange tours to Casablanca, Marrakech, Fes, etc through the hotel. We can also arrange camel tours into the desert so… that’s a must! I’ll certainly have more details about that trip as we get closer!
Aside from planning trips, we have also been exploring Ireland, as I mentioned before. We recently had a very busy weekend, spending a few days in Dublin for the Guinness festival, going to the Aran Islands, and exploring the Galway Oyster festival. Dublin and the Oyster festival were both really neat, and we’ll be returning to Dublin in a few weeks through our study abroad program. The Aran Islands were also through out abroad program, and were absolutely amazing. We rented bikes, which was an adventure in and of itself since most of us haven’t ridden bikes in years. After a couple crashes (into walls, each other, thorny bushes, and even a car or two (luckily both parked)) we made it out onto the loooong road around the largest of the islands, Inish Mor. We were very lucky and got a fairly clear, relatively warm day! While riding around the island we stopped at the old lighthouse, which gave spectacular views of the entire island. We also biked up to Dun Aolaugh, a bronze age hill fort that uses a cliff face as one wall of defense. Naturally, when you have ten 19-22 year old students ready to explore EVERYTHING, they’re going to want to lean over the edge of the cliff and see the ocean crashing against the rock face below… After about 20 minutes of this… and countless pictures trying to get the cliffs, and the ocean, and the STEEP drop off into the picture, our study abroad director had to excuse himself and go where he couldn’t see us anymore. Later we asked why he left… he couldn’t stand watching us without worrying we would fall. Oops! Mental note: don’t do anything adventurous… or potentially dangerous… in front of Brian.
All the societies have now started to pick up. I joined a couple different ones, and have a “meet and greet” for the archaeology society tonight! Fun fact: the head of the archaeology department here is named… Dr. Jones! I am amply amused by this and now have a great desire to rent Indiana Jones. Okay, back to societies… I also joined the Film Society, a society that watches films, runs workshops on making them, etc. Last week they showed three films in three nights. I went to the Tuesday night film with a friend and saw… Twilight! Always an amusing choice. The best part however is that I stopped by the vending machines to get a snack for during the movie. As I’m looking through the options-potato chips, sodas, candy bars-I come across a… MORO BAR! Now, I first had a Moro bar in NEW ZEALAND and haven’t been able to find one since. They’re not sold in the US, or in Europe (so I thought), or even in Australia, so you can imagine my surprise! Naturally I bought it, and googled it when I got home (I was too nervous to try it in case it wasn’t a real Moro bar). Lucky day for me, turns out they’re sold in two countries: New Zealand and Ireland! Random? Yes. But oh so exciting and delicious. They’re a bit different from the original, but still yummy so I’ll be sure to bring a bag of them home… and actually share them this time since I always rave about them. (Side note: I did bring a bag home with me from New Zealand all those years ago… and I fully intended on sharing them! But they were just so delicious…).
Now lets see… last bit of information… I finally got registered with the Garda (immigration), which means… no more threat of being deported! I can stay! Hooray! J
Well I guess that’s about all… nothing much planned for this weekend…possibly a day trip out into the country or something. Going out for dinner tomorrow night at a multi-ethnic food place for my 21st birthday! My roommate’s birthday is actually on Friday too so we’re doing a big joint party extravaganza… well, dinner and then out to a pub. Very excited!
Love you all and hope all is well!
<3
Sigh.......in my next life I'm coming back as you!
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