The Land of Sex in the City, Hillary Clinton, Bergdorff Goodman, Harry and Sally, Al Roker and Matt Lauer, SNL and Rachel and Melissa Roderman

I am home, but before I go there, I need to recap the past few days...

The night I left Dublin was crazy and hectic and nothing worked out to plan (which is so like us) and there were people that went to bed (I wasn't one of them) and there were people who went out and stayed out (again, not one of them) and there were people who went out, stayed, had fun, then came home and still didn't sleep (that's me). Rachel, Nora and I went to the formal Gaiety Black and Red Gala at The Morgan Bar (which was crazy fancy and I totally didn't need to buy the 10 euro ticket I bought the day before) and we got all dressed up and looked beautiful and got there and saw Cathal. Brilliant. We decide that we want our picture taken with this man who all of us hope to never see again. We approach. We get side-tracked. James and David, Moe and Simon. Damn. Creeper with a camera from St. Mary's in the states (seriously, we were introduced because we were both from the states, but no one knows which St. Mary this man was from and I think there are at least 200) takes our picture. Slide past to discover that Cathal has slipped away. Talk for a while. Cathal has slipped back. He bought a drink for our friend Jane (who is 19 and he is at least 40 with a wife and two kids). We decide to sidetrack him for her benefit. Once in front of him, we discover that he is completely wasted. Cathal, the wu-chi master, relaxation king, flower-living, fairy dust eating caterpillar man that he is, is drunk. This makes our goal of getting our picture with him WAY easier. Ask James to take the picture. David joins our snapshot and James cuts my face in half. Way to go. The picture of a lifetime. The picture of MY lifetime (even though I'm only half in it). Rachel is whisked away by David to talk with creeper photo guy, Nora and I are left to engage in conversation with Cathal. He remembers that Nora is from Chicago and starts talking about the World's Fair. OK. Nora is from Chicago but not 120 years old. Nice. So he's gesticulating grandly, I'm trying to move out of the way of someone behind me, and his hand wildly slams into me. In an awkward place. Now, I'm leaving THIS conversation, Nora sees my retreating back and grabs Rachel and we all head to the front of the bar. We say our good-byes and decide to leave for another party. This one is hosted by EBS (where all the European kids are at) and we head out into the cold.

Still in our fancies and walking down Temple Bar's Fleet Street. We run into Charlotte and Hayfa and we chat with them before deciding that we're going to the Barge instead to say good-bye to all the IES Dundrum people before they have to leave for the Luas. This would prove to be a fatal mistake. Kind of. Anyway. We're at the Barge, dancing, having a few laughs and enjoying ourselves when we look at the time and realize that we better get back to Temple Bar for the EBS party before it ends at 2am. We walk outside, our companions are drunk. It takes us 1/2 hour to try to get everyone organized, and by this time Rachel and I realize that we would never make it back to Temple Bar in time, so we decide to stay where we are and get in touch with everyone later. Again, Fatal Mistake. 2:30 we decide to go home when Rachel realizes she doesn't have her phone anymore. We search for twenty minutes and it's nowhere to be found. A thoroughly pissed off Rachel, a slightly inebriated Kate and I all walk home along the Grand Canal one more time. We start to enter our terribly bare apartment when out of the corner of my eye I see Pete's blinds shoot up then down again. Curious, I walk down, followed by Kate and we discover that Mikah, Pete, Kenna and Cozy were waiting up to say good bye to everyone. Hurrah! I run back to the apartment to change (I'm still all fancy and made up) and to get Rachel (who was in the apartment) and go back. We walk in and Pete is playing a song on his guitar that I don't recognize. He starts singing. It's "Leaving on a Jet Plane" and I about flip a lid. YOU'RE GOING TO PLAY THAT NOW? Bad timing Pete, bad timing. Rachel, Kate and Cozy and I attempt to beat him up and steal his guitar, but alas, it doesn't work. He does, however, stop playing the song. Mikah is the first to go to bed, so we all say our good-byes and it's crazy sad. All of a sudden Francis, David and Mark walk through the door. Our Gaiety peeps. How cool?! So they hang out for a while, until Francis has to leave. We laughed had a lot of fantastic stories and then Nora came around 3:30 to say good-bye. That was horrifying. I was close to her, so she was the first that I really had to deal with. I love everyone on the Gaiety course, but she was uber cool and amazing and I really didn't want her to leave. It was hard. She caught the 4am AirCoach. Pete went to bed so he kicked all of us out and the party moved into my apartment. Katie V., Mark, Kate, Cozy, Kenna, Rachel, David and I all just chilled until Mark and David had to leave around 4:30 and Kate had to leave to go clean. Rachel and I raced around the apartment trying to figure out where everything was that we needed to catch the 5am bus ("where's the key? Where the F is my key? Shit! Oh. Pockets, right.") until we realized that the EBS kids hadn't come home yet. Stephanie was the one person we couldn't leave without saying good bye to, and who is the one person who doesn't come home on time like she promised? Yeah. Anyway, she got there in time to rush us off to the bus and to hurriedly say good-bye to Florian, Rachel and I. What a bus. Her closest friends in Ireland and they all leave in one bus. It was terrible. Everyone was crying with the exception of Nico, who was holding Steph back from getting on the bus with us, and saying "You come to Paris! You and Rashel come to Paris and stay with me, I will show you my home and the city!" Then there was Florian who was still drunk sticking his head between our seats and saying "ho ho ho" over and over and over again while grabbing our hands and saying "Don't cry girls, you will see her again." Oh what a scene.

I sat in Dublin airport after that horrible bus ride and call Val. To her horror (I'm sure) she hears "Val, I need you to convince me that I need to come home and that leaving is a good idea." I think I freaked her out. So, after a really long time waiting to check in, I walked slowly to my gate, ran into Cozy, laughed a little, cried a little, then waited in line with Lee who was crying a lot and laughing a little. We talked and waited, waited and talked before getting through American Customs (that's right, they make you do American customs in Dublin... I don't get it either...) I delivered Lee to Rachel and Megan Brindley (a girl in our Peace and Conflict Studies program with IES) and all three of them were on the same plane, which was cool. I waited by myself in the other gate before finding Awkward Matt (he was wearing blue scrubs and the same sweater as me... And we call him Awkward Matt, which should explain more than I could write in this space) who was sitting with his even MORE awkward friend named Rachel who he went to school with. Fun. I'm in the middle and it is AWKWARD. For all of you college students reading this, I'm doing an upside down awkward turtle right now, quickly followed by the awkward moose.

Plane was nice, I slept three times before we even got off the ground. The stewardess was strangely interested in my eating habits ("is that a chocolate muffin?" "yes, it's breakfast" "Well, that isn't a very healthy breakfast, didn't you have anything else?" "nope, I haven't eaten since 4pm yesterday, so this muffin looks awful good right now" "well, you don't have anything else? that's not a very big muffin..." "nope. But it looks really good right now, so I'm going to eat it...") Later, I pull out the sole chocolate bar that I brought home and munch on a square. You should have seen her face. Well? Don't criticize me when you don't give me any food! Anyway, I tried really hard not to cry on the plane. I succeeded, thank god. But getting off that plane and seeing Rachel's face waiting for me was the best thing I could have asked for. Knowing that I still had a piece of my journey was the best part of coming back to the states. It was only partially over.

We drive home with her Dad, Jeff (really really sweet) and get back to big balloons that say welcome home and a green, white and orange balloon to go with them. Rach immediately breaks out the suitcase and divvies up the souvenirs and, to my amazement, everything fit in that one little suitcase! We went out to Thai food and I met her middle sister, Melissa and her mom, Audrey. They all talk just like Rachel (with the exception of "obvi" and the shortened words that have been added to her vernacular) and say things like "Ma" and "Sneakers" and it makes me really happy. The next day is a relax day. We went out to lunch, they gave me a tour of their town and Rutgers University, then we made Pasta Ignazio for the fam and Rach and I headed over to Rutgers for the basketball game against UNC (the #1 college basketball team in the country... Did you see me on ESPN? I was the only one not in Rutger's Red or UNC blue... And sitting in the front row!!!) then off to a friends house to meet a couple of the kids Rach went to HPHS with. Adam really doesn't talk about anything else. And he also pretends to know Seattle. Funny kid.

Monday was New York.

HOLY COW I WAS IN NEW YORK CITY!!!!!!

Ok. So. Anyway. Railway ride into the city with Rachel and Melissa takes about 1/2 hour, walk from Penn station to Empire State Building takes 15 minutes. In those 15 minutes, we almost freeze everything off that isn't covered by wool. The line inside the building takes ages to get through. ***Side note: it's hailing here right now and it sounds like I have a tin roof. It's coming down so hard and fast that the streets are turning white. Welcome back to Seattle.*** The view from the top was stunning. Absolutely stunning. You could see for miles and miles and miles. New Jersey, Central Park, 5th Ave, Statue of Liberty, everything. Beautiful! A few bad self portraits and frozen fingers later, we're walking down some cool street looking for Time Square. And boy did we find it. Lights everywhere, people spinning like they're in a movie, beautiful women walking up and down dressed to be seen, Toys 'R' Us, Hersey's, MTV and Johnny's Pizzeria. I'm told the best pizza ever comes from this place, so the three of us sit down and partake in the best pizza ever made. Nothing special. :-) From there we walk toward Rockefeller Center to see the ice rink and the tree and NBC Studios. We toured the studios and Rachel got chills and couldn't get the smile off her face, while Melissa and I giggled at our own excitement. We got a few stares, but it was SO worth it! All the studios are being used as storage right now because of the strike, but you could still see everything, which was pretty cool. From there to 5th AVE and Central Park (it was getting dark so we didn't stay there for long) then back down 5th AVE to see the Saks Snowflakes (they light up to music if you stand there for long enough). From there, taxi to Union Square where we walked through a Christmas Market and caught a showing of Juno at the theatre. Very cute movie! I loved it and everyone should see it! From there back to Penn Station to collapse on the train and drive home to collapse into bed.

The next day we had a few hours, so we (Melissa and Rachel and I) went to a mall. Welcome back to America, here's Nordstrom and American Eagle! It was cool to be back though. Tastee Subs and iced tea for lunch then off to JFK.

Home. And I don't know what to do with myself. Dublin is so far away. Rachel and Pete and Cozy and Kate and everyone else are so far away. And everyone I left behind are still here and close by. I don't know how I feel right now. It's hard. But anyway, this is the end of my adventures in Dublin, Galway, Doolin, Trapani, Erice, Pisa, London, Belfast, Belfast, Giant's Causeway, Derry, Highland Park and New York City, and so the end of this blog. Thanks for reading those that did, it's been amazing having to write everything down and really remember it as it was and not as I might remember it in a year.

Ireland is probably the best country in the world, and Dublin is perhaps the best city in it.

New Jersey Baby

I'm here, in NJ and loving the fact that I'm in a real home with a real family and taking real showers.  Thank god.  Tomorrow I think we're going to see Spring Awakening and then Monday we're actually going to spend time in the city :-)

That's it, I'm tired and full and clean and ready to climb into a bed that is bigger than my room in Dublin...

Oh, and random note.  Is it weird that the New York Times headquarters in in New Jersey?  I think it is...

Do You Know This?

Things I never knew and/or I never want to forget:

• Contrary to what I thought I knew, you need forty-four candles for Hanukkah, not nine
  
• The presents are supposed to get bigger for each night
• Night #1: A chocolate Santa Claus. Brilliant :-)
• The Menorah is supposed to go in front of a window
• It is also supposed to be something kinda fancy
• When this fails, you should put two jars and a mug side by side and put them in front of a mirror and it's almost the same thing.
• When there is a lack of sand, brown sugar and hot chocolate mix are the next best things
• Apparently chocolate dipped candles are good enough to suck on...
• Big Daddy Noel
• When inviting someone home for the weekend to meet your family, don't tell them you're going to leave them there to get to know them better...
• Also, make sure you're ACTUALLY going home and not just extending the invitation
• Simon has this face that can contort into anything you want to see. Cathal doing a bee impression? Done. Waking up next to Moe every morning? Done.
• Gaiety kids talk terrible behind each other's backs. But they do it sneakily. "What do you think of _______" and it makes me miss Junior High.
• Guys are nasty. This is not so much of something I've learned or something I want to remember, more of a reiteration of what I already know
• "They" are making Titanic 2: The Return. It features Wilson the volleyball, Tom Hanks, space crafts, and Jack Dawson.
• Chicken and peppers every night for 3.5 months will not only sustain you for that long, but it will also make switching the menu for the evening one of the most exciting nights you've had
• It rains in Dublin
• It will also be 57 degrees outside while blowing rain sideways
• And I will still go out in it
• REI umbrellas are indestructible
• "Tha mo bhàta-foluaimein loma-làn easgannan" is Scottish Gaelic for "My hovercraft is full of eels."
• "Arthach foluaineach" is Irish for Hovercraft
• What's bizarre about this is that these languages were developed before a hovercraft was ever even thought of
• When a washing machine is full of water, do NOT open it unless you are prepared with wellies and lots of towels
• If buying an Aran Island sweater, be prepared to smell like a sheep...
• ... To water proof it they dip it in sheep urine, so you, inevitably, will smell of it.
• A pencil skirt instantly draws attention to parts of you that you haven't given thought to in years
• When apologizing for French kids, try French wine...
• The Frenchies are outrageous. End of story.
• Rachel can support someone who randomly throws himself on her. Good to know and keep in the back of my head.
• Nude has good wraps. And no one is actually naked.
• And by "wraps" I mean food, not bathrobes...
• When opening presents in front of your landlord, do NOT show them your inappropriate gift. They will NOT think it's funny, they will NOT understand and they WILL throw you out...
• Don't worry, that wasn't me :-)
• When sick, the best medicine is actually laughter and a good movie
• All you have to do is talk about Subway Meatball sandwiches and I'll collapse in a fit of giggles
• This now happens every time someone says Waterford as well...
• Kenny Chesney instant makes me ten degrees warmer thanks to his connections with summer
• He also means home
• Flour should be kept in the refrigerator...
• ... Eggs should not be.
• White paint obviously makes the party more fun. And no one will know you're putting it on their face until 45 minutes later when they take a self-portrait picture. Everyone will think you are just a "touchy person"
  
• A piece of paper can be worth more than anything else in the house, even if it looks like it was done by a 10 year old
• I type-o-ed and that said 20 year old. Which is ironic because they were all done by 20 year olds. And they definitely don't look it...
• The type of keyboard I'm typing on is called a "QWERTY" because of the first six letters on the board reading left to right on the top left side.
• If you go the other way it says "POIUY" and that's infinitely more funny
• Stream of consciousness papers are terribly hard if you think nothing about the class you are supposed to be "reflecting" on.
• 2000 words in 3 hours is not impossible
• 6000 words in four days is.
• Don't ask
• My roommate talks in funny accents, mostly French and Kazakhstan and German. Go figure.
  
• I will miss the bad things about people I've met
• I will miss the everyday things about people I've met
• I will miss having female instructors
• I will miss the people more than the country
• I will miss the country more than the school
• I will miss the city more than the country
• I will miss the pubs more than the restaurants
• I will miss some people more than others
• But the ones I will miss the most will be the ones I'm not closest to because the ones I'm closest to I will always be close to, while the ones who I merely interact with everyday will be the people that I will never see again.
• The longer I sit here, the closer I am to coming home and not living every minute of every day that I'm still in Dublin.
• Expect no more posts until I get home (or to Rachel's house) for that very reason.
  

I Got Effigy In My Eye

The sheer volume of my Saturday is staggering. This post will have many links to pictures and websites because I don't want to make this any longer then it has to be (and it will be long, my apologies in advance).

To start out, I'm watching Grey's Anatomy and am almost caught up with the current season (Horrah!). Rachel and I have been YouTube-ing all the episodes and are frantically trying to get caught up so that when we get back, we can jump right into the current episode without having missed much. So anyway, that has resulted in a few lazy nights of 3+ Grey's episodes...

Friday Night: Rachel, Katie and I go to a "Master Class" taught by Gabriel Byrne. He's the Professor from Little Women, and was in movies like Usual Suspects, Vanity Fair, Enemy of the State, End of Days and Stigmata. I was expecting an actual class. Apparently that means that Gabriel is being filmed for a documentary (on himself) and he needs to show that he talks to students and "cares about kids". A.K.A. A two hour question and answer session where he answered about four questions and then was presented with an award from Gaiety. Bravo! In all seriousness, he was interesting, and I'm glad I went, but, really? It all felt a little off.

After killing a bit of time, Rach and I decided to stop by the pub that all the Gaiety kids go to after class on Fridays called Brogans. It's this cool little pub where the bartender knows all the kids and says we're all "full of shite" before pulling another Guinness for someone. We spent about two hours there talking with Mark (a Gaiety kid) and trying to figure out these crazy coin games he was teaching us. You just wait America, I'm bringing these babies home.

Sarah Mitchell arrived here that night (a girl Rach roomed with this past summer) and we all prepared to get up at o'dark thirty for Belfast on Saturday morning.

Saturday:

4:30 am: Wake up, pack a small bag.

5:05 am: Catch AirCoach to Dublin Airport. The driver tells us not to pay now but to pay on the Belfast bus at the airport, so we get this journey for free.

5:50 am: Discover that there isn't a Belfast bus until 7am and we need to be in Belfast by 8:30. Won't work.

6:45 am: Catch an Ulster Bus that is supposed to get us there in time for our tour bus to pick us up, but barely, and the fact that Ulster Bus is 20 min. late, we think we're going to miss tour for second weekend in a row.

8:00 am: PaddyWagon Bus Tour Front Office Ladies know me by name. They are working on delaying the tour until 9 so we can get on. Conversation is as follows:

"Hi! My name is Ka -"
"Katie! Hi, I'm working on it for you. How's the ride so far?"
"Fine, thank you. Umm, do we have a tour today or should we try for another day?"
"It will be waiting for you outside the bus station. Tell Rachel we said hi!"
"Thank you again, have a great day..."
"Thanks! You both too, enjoy the tour!"

I'm sending them Christmas cards. We're like family now.

We're not late for the tour bus, in fact, we are waiting for it to show up, which was exciting :-)

We discover that our tour guide is crazy (but cool). He sings to us. Over the megaphone. It was pretty funny. And his exact words were:

"I know pretty much everything. I'll tell you what I know and make up what I don't. We'll have fun!"

10:45 am: We reach Giant's Causeway and I'm blown away. Literally. It was sunny, but the wind was incredible. I have never felt like I was in danger in any part of my travels since I've been in Ireland, but this was the first time I actually thought I could get hurt. It was crazy! The Causeway was incredible and I would have spent all day there exploring if it hadn't looked like all the strong wind was blowing in the darkest rain clouds I'd ever seen...



12:40 pm: Leave for Derry.

2:30 pm: Arrive in Derry to the sound of marching drums and the sight of hundreds of balloons released into the air. They killed hundreds of whales because you KNOW those balloons will end up in the ocean (we're on the coast for god's sake) and those balloons will land in some whale's blow hole and end up suffocating them. Very un-environmentally friendly. We're promised an art walk of the Free Derry murals, but they now say that we only get about half and hour with the tour guide because the Apprentice Boys are marching and having their annual Closing of the Gates March and there's tension in the air. The guide didn't want us out in the open when the march started. However, the abbreviated tour was interesting, and later we got to explore ourselves. I could not get over that I was standing in the road where Bloody Sunday happened. Where the Civil Rights march went on. I was looking at the wall that says "You are now entering Free Derry." and talking to a man who knew personally two people who were killed that day. A man who know personally many members of the IRA and knew who committed which crimes and who started what and who blew what up. Someone threw a Coke can at us on our tour, so we moved, while the guide said "If I ever find out who did that I'm gunna fuckin' kick their ass..." under his breath. Sweet. Tensions are still high.

3:30 pm: Rachel, Charlotte, Kenna and I jump out of the bus to see the march happening in the Walled City (Derry is the only walled city left in the UK, and inside the wall is Protestant and outside is Catholic). It's kinda scary because they are on their way up the street to burn an effigy of a man from the 1680's named Lundy. Check him out here. So, the effigy was huge and scary and intense, but the police were super nice and really cool letting us get as close are we wanted (which was still a distance away).

3:45 pm: Walked down the street to get to the walls so we could walk around them. I notice the police are in riot gear. Kenna and Rachel say it's just a precaution. I notice an alarm on a building is going off. Kenna gets a little wigged out, Rachel says it's probably a "sound the alarm" kind of thing. We continue climbing onto the wall. Rach goes to take a picture looking down on Free Derry and a policeman says something mumbled behind his giant clear mask. We ask him to repeat it and he says "You might not want to be up here, those people down there have petrol bombs."

EXCUSE ME? We MIGHT want to get down? Yeah, we booked it down those stairs SO fast!

4:30 pm: Got back on the bus and headed back to Belfast in the pouring rain, talked to Kate about the Troubles for a while before pretty much falling asleep.

6:30 pm: Arrive in Belfast in time to see our bus pull away.

7:30 pm: Catch the next bus available back to Dublin and fall into the deepest sleep of all time.

11:00 pm: Home. Finally.

Today: Christmas (and grocery) Shopping!

Sarah, Sarah, Michael, Alex, Warren, Fiona, Davey, Ellie Mskellie, and Jamie

I knew exactly two of those people before this weekend. Now I know all of them, and want them all to come visit. Maybe with the exception of Davey... Yeah, everyone but Davey. When we were introduced (in the order of Sarah, Rachel, Me then Alex) he repeated all our names back to us then leaned in to me and said "I'll remember Rachel's name. I have a daughter named Rachel." Oh boy. Why are you here?

Starting from the beginning? Rachel and I decided not to leave until Saturday morning so we wouldn't spend an exorbitant amount of money sleeping over in Belfast. OH, that's where I went, Belfast. Kind of an important thing to know. So. I went to Belfast. With Rachel. Intending to go to Derry and Giant's Causeway as well as Belfast.

Baked Mom's Apple Pie on Friday afternoon since I was longing for a bit of home. It was just what the doctor ordered, and it cured my homesickness with one slice. The rest of the house seemed to enjoy it, which was a good thing or else I would have eaten the entire thing by myself, so I'm glad they helped :-)

Saturday morning I got up early, had breakfast, packed and caught the Bus of Insanity (referring to the post below, this is my affectionate name for the AirCoach because of the insane amount of money I've spent on it). Took three hours, over which I finished one book (Into the Wild) and started my homework (Northern Protestants) and fell asleep on the long journey. I think Rach passed out in the first twenty minutes of getting on the bus and was out for two and a half hours :-)

Bus pulls into Jury's Inn, which apparently the landmark in Belfast. That's where all tours take off and leave from. Keep this in mind. Once off the bus Rachel calls Sarah (now affectionately referred to as Faude) who tells us to walk left. Once walking, we realize that people are looking at us strangely. We were headed toward Falls Road. This happens to be the 100% Catholic road and between that and Shankill Road, 30% of the people who died in the Troubles, died on these roads, and 80% of the fighting in Belfast took place on these roads. And we were headed right for it within the first two minutes of getting to Belfast. Good choice. And Faude, once called, said that we were supposed to head left if we were facing the Inn, which we weren't, so we were going the wrong direction. This should have told us how this trip was going to turn out, but, being the optimistic people we are, we turned an oblivious eye to the whole situation.

Faude's directions: "Walk right until Harry Potter. I'll meet you there."

Huh?

My impression is that we're walking towards Daniel Radcliffe. I get very VERY excited. Rachel's impression is that we're walking toward buildings that look like Hogwarts. This is not quite as exciting, but the truth, so I deal with it. Harry Potter should be around Hogwarts somewhere, right? Turns out Hogwarts is actually Queens University, and Harry Potter is not actually walking around. But Faude is, and that's almost better :-)

We meet Alex Cummings. She's our host for the evening. Faude calls Joe. At home. On his cell phone. He was in the bath. He is the cab driver that drove her and her parents around when they were there. And she had his cell phone number programmed into her phone. Anyway. So, Joe pulls up in a red cab to my exclamation "Is the Black Cab Tour actually red?" They giggle and say yes.

The Black(Red) Cab tour is where a member of the Belfast community takes you on a tour of Falls and Shankill Roads. Usually the driver is bias towards one road or the other, and ours was Catholic and was born and raised on Falls Road. He said he was six when the Troubles broke out, which means he's about 40ish. It strikes me now that a lot of people reading this will not know who I'm talking about when it comes to the acronyms that I will be using. Here's a quick run down:

IRA: Irish Republican Army. Catholic. Republican. The violent wing of Sinn Fein. Fighting to get the Brits out of Ireland. Known for their violent acts, including an attack on Margaret Thatcher that almost killed her. Referred to as terrorists by the rest of the world, but heroes by the Irish in Northern Ireland. Decommissioned in 2005.

Sinn Fein: (Pronounced Shinn Faine) Nationalist. The political wing of the IRA, fighting to get Britain out of Ireland. Huge political party, and is still around.

UVF: Ulster Volunteer Force. Loyalist (meaning they want Northern Ireland to stay a part of the UK). Protestant. Paramilitary. Prepared to use violence to get what they want. Decommissioned two weeks ago.

UUP: Ulster Unionist Party. Loyalist. Protestant. The political Loyalist party. Not too important anymore.

DUP: Democratic Unionist Party. Loyalist. Protestant. The number one political party in Northern Ireland. Ian Paisley is the head and he's the First Minister of Northern Ireland at present.

I think that's it. Back to the story:

Anyway, we froze to death on Falls Road, but saw all the murals. They're really creepy if you've never seen a picture of them. The bottom part of the Falls was mostly memorial paintings of the Irish who died during the fighting. It really starts to hit home when you see that these people died within the last ten years, and a lot of them were children. When you see that the mural was painted "in loving memory of (name) who died as a direct result of (political party) in 2002." And we were walking along their streets. We saw the Crumlin Road jail which is where all the people were held before going to the H-Blocks. Most of the people held here are Republicans or Nationalists. We also make a brief stop at the Peace wall. This wall is twenty-five feet tall made up of concrete bricks, iron, and steel, topped sometimes with netting. It was built through West Belfast between the Shankill Road and Falls Road to prevent either side from hucking petrol bombs over at each other. Before the wall, a Catholic or Protestant could literally stand on their roof and shoot down into the house behind them because they were that close. Pictures to come.

Black (Red) Cab Tour is over, pay Joe, and give him back his jacket (he saw I was shaking violently and gave it to me at the second stop of the tour). Alex and Faude take us to the Christmas Market at City Hall where we indulge on burgers that fill us twice over for 3 pounds. We meet up with Sarah Whalen (hereto forth known as Sway) and her boyfriend Michael Kaplan at the Crown. Apparently it was founded by a Catholic man and a Protestant woman, and the woman wanted to name it the Crown and the man said only if we put a picture of the crown on the ground outside the pub so that when you enter you have to walk on it. This pub had booths. With doors. How cool?! Anyway, it was filled with old men (seriously, like between 65-80 year-olds) so we left and went to the Bot which was past Hogwarts and closer to Alex's.

Here, waiting for us were Warren, Jamie, Ellie Mskellie (yes, that's her name... Pronounce it out loud and see why I love her name) and Fiona. We were later to meet Davey, the forty year-old who was apparently in love with me, but had a daughter named Rachel. The line was drawn and I stayed away from him all night. He kinda creeped me out. Anyway, we all just hung out and listened to the best play list I've ever heard and sung our hearts out until I was sure I wasn't going to have a voice the next morning. I also discovered that Belfast loves Bruce Springsteen and Bon Jovi. Go figure.

Rach and I wake up early and head out to catch our (get this) PaddyWagon tour bus that will take us to Giant's Causeway and Derry. We wait for over an hour past when it was supposed to come, then we go in search of it. We got the confirmation e-mail and the codes, but apparently they never got our names on the list, so they didn't stop in Belfast. Wonderful. We got our money refunded and were told to catch a different tour that was going the same place. Allen's Tours. OK, we thought, maybe our luck is changing! It wasn't. We wanted to go to Derry and Allen here was only taking us to Giant's Causeway. So we got off the bus and decided that since we'd wasted so much time, that we should just see Belfast and call it a good weekend. We hop on the coldest tour bus we could have found (and it was the only one that picked up at Jury's Inn, which is where we thought all tours picked up...) and sat on top in the wind. Smart girls, right? We realize we were even smarter when the tour guide tells us that there aren't anymore shootings on Falls and Shankill Roads, but it didn't really matter to him because he was in the bullet proof part of the bus and the people on the top were out of luck. We were sitting ducks. NOT FUNNY. Anyway, we see all the murals in the day time and the tour guide again makes a funny when he says "I know all these acronyms can be confusing, UVF, IRA, UUP, DUP, KFC." We turn the corner just as everyone is scratching their heads and there in front of us is a KFC. That was funny :-)

After getting off the bus and defrosting myself at a coffee shop, the decision is made to go to a movie because it's like 2 Euro cheaper in Belfast than in Dublin. Rachel and I see August Rush and Rach falls in love with Jonathan Rhys Meyers. I fall for the little boy and his dimples. I started channeling Julie and wanted to take him home. The music was incredible, and the movie was pretty cute. From there we walk to Faude's apartment and repeat back to her our day's troubles. We meet up with Sway and Alex and head down to the Christmas Market again before racing to catch our bus home to Dublin.

Again, Rach is asleep within the first twenty minutes, but this time, so was I. And we're headed back up to Belfast next Saturday, but this time for free courtesy of PaddyWagon to do our tour of Derry and Giant's Causeway. We leave at 5:30 am. Hopefully it works this time.

Alice's Restaurant

At the beginning of this week I was having a really hard time being in a country that doesn't celebrate a holiday that's so close to my heart. I'm surrounded by people who are from everywhere, not just the States, and even from within the States, there is no one who celebrates Thanksgiving the same. When I look at how amazing the day is at home, family, football games, Macy's Day Parade, Mom or Lori's Apple Pies, incredible friends and lots to eat, I realize how crazy lucky I am that I am able to celebrate like I do at home.

This is the first Thanksgiving I've ever had where I haven't been at home. And, while I'm still sad that I won't be in Valencia with Grandma and the Mutaws, or in Seattle with the Scotts, or in West Seattle with the Cannons and Mom and Mike, I'm learning. I'm learning that the people I'm with now are a different kind of family. One that I've chosen (in a way). We still have the Bone-Picker, the Olive-Finger Eater, the Mashed Potato and Corn Mixer, the Storyteller, the Stretchy Pants Person, the Newbee, and all the other people who usually sit at a table with you. They just aren't the same ones that you have at home. And I'm alright with that.


I'm thankful for:

• My family
• My friends back at home
• Being in Ireland
• My friends in Ireland. There are amazing people that have come into my life and hopefully will never leave it. I am so thankful that I'm sharing this day with them because they are my family here. They have made this experience everything to me. We're in this together, thick or thin, Amanda Maguire or Antoinette Duffy. They have helped me grow to be someone completely different from what I had ever thought possible. They are my world here. They are my family.
• The health of those around me and in my family
• Marina Carr :-)

I'm here. I'm not going home for the weekend. And, dammit, this is going to be the best Thanksgiving we can possibly make it.

I love my friends, my family and my life, and am thankful for everything g in and around my life.



Thank you!

Taco Flute and Donkey Mop

Hello to the world of blogging! Just kidding, I've done this a while now, but, whatever... :-)

Last weekend Sandy Freborg was here in Dublin, and it, guess what? Rained. But I had the opportunity to show her around despite the weather, and while most of you are thinking, "Jeeze, you've shown your Dad around, your Mom and Mike around, Emma and her friend around, Rachel's friends Sarah and Sarah around, and now you're showing Sandy around, you've probably already done everything there is to do in Dublin by now, haven't you?" While for the most part you're correct, but there were two things that I hadn't done until this weekend with Sandy:

1. Walk into the Old Library in Trinity College and see the Book of Kells. While the book itself was only kinda cool, the Library itself was amazing. I was a little disappointed by the fact that everything was roped off, but what you could see of the Library was INCREDIBLE. Mom and Mike, you were both totally right about seeing it. The Book of Kells is a book that was written by Monks and illuminated by illustrators (like Metalsmithes and such) circa 800. There are four volumes of the book, so one book was open to a page all written in Latin while another book was opened to a page of one large drawing. The book was about the size of a normal-sized laptop and about the thickness of your average Chemistry book. The Library was filled to the brim with 200,000 books, the oldest in Ireland, and they were all perfectly organized. This caused a mini geek-out in me because, as much as I'd like to pretend I didn't, I DID work in a Library for two years and in another Library for 6 months. I love old books, I have a collection (many don't know this, but ask my family, they are forever telling me to not bring any more home because we have no room for them) and would have just loved to browse the titles and edition numbers of any of the books. They were, however, behind TWO (not one, but TWO) sets of rope barriers, so I calmly walked past, pretending that I didn't just pick my jaw off the floor, and exited with Sandy.

2. We went into Christ Church Cathedral. Now, I've walked past this place hundred of times (probably, so don't doubt me) and never actually gone in. Sandy and I paid our dues and slid into the chairs at the back to watch/listen to the orchestra (?!?!) rehearse for that evening's performance. We just so happened to catch this free show, only paying what was needed to get inside, when that night, people had to pay almost 20 Euro to get in. SWEET! It's so amazing to see music performed live in a space where it was meant to be performed. I'm not sure if I wrote in this blog when I went to St. Patrick's Cathedral, but housed there is one of the original 20 copies of Handel's Messiah, all hand-written by the genius himself, and it's housed there because the world premiere of this iconic piece of music was held IN THAT CATHEDRAL. How amazingly cool is that? But anyway, that just goes to show that these spaces were not only meant for sermons and hellfire, but for music that can make grown men (and women) cry. SO, Christ Church is the oldest church in Ireland (there has been a church there since the mid 1000's... and there's still pieces of the foundation underneath the church). Once inside and deciding to wander, we discovered a wall that has been crooked (it leans, much like the Tower of Pisa... but... not...) for AGES and AGES and a CRYPT! The Crypt houses lots of graves and a museum and pieces of the original foundation. It was creepy and cool and incredible all at the same time :-)


Sunday morning (rain is falling) and we head up to Grafton so Sandy can get some shopping done before she heads out and all is well. We have lunch at this sweet little pub tucked around a corner in an ally and talk for about an hour before she had to climb back on the Bus of Insanity (or the AirCoach... The Bus of Insanity just has a better ring, and I've spent so much money on this thing that it might very well be driving me insane...) and head back to the dreary days of Londontown. But she leaves for Oregon on the 8th, so she doesn't have too much longer to wait!

Head home, eat dinner, listen to music and do a little homework before I get a call from Rachel asking if I want to see the lights on Grafton Street get turned on (duh). I look out the window and the rain is coming down so hard that (no joking you) there is a duck sitting in the middle of our parking lot. BRILLIANT! So I laughed, pulled on my wellies and headed out. I met Rach's friend Jenny (who is studying in Scotland) and sipped hot chocolate (Starbucks doesn't have Carmel Apple Cider, can you believe that?) while listening to the mayor of Dublin and the Energy President go on and on about Grafton Street and how all the lights are energy efficient. So none of us cared about that stuff, but you should have seen the kids. They were having to entertain themselves and it was the best thing I saw all day. This one little girl, she was sitting on her dad's shoulders, and she was sticking her tongue out and crossing her eyes at these two really important men, while her brother was standing on the ground next to his mother and getting in trouble for talking during the presentation. I loved it! The waterworks in the sky turned off for all of us to see the flickering on of the energy-efficient lights, then almost immediately burst into working order again. Good thing we had umbrellas.

That night (last night) we watched Jay and Silent Bob's Great Adventure (I think that's what it's called, it's Florian's favorite movie) and Wedding Crashers with Steph, Florian, Felix, Jenny, Rach and I. It was wonderful to have just this really easy-going night.

Today was class, and it was, well, class. I'm doing this scene with Rachel, Pete and Kenna from a play called Low in the Dark, and if any of you reading this blog are lovers of absurd theatre, you should check this one out. It's Marina Carr's first (or one of her first) plays and I love it a LOT!

Now it's dark and I'm sleepy and kinda hungry and cold and I'm going into the kitchen to make tea and some dinner and all will be well!

Rewind, Unwind and Take a Breath

These past few weeks have been crazy busy and, while they've been fun and I've had a few moments of down time, they've pretty much been jam packed with excitement and papers.

Two weekends ago (if I can reach that far back into the Rolodex in my brain) Rachel was in Scotland, Katie V. had a date, Stephanie worked all weekend and I ended up staying here, writing a paper or two (not getting anything done, naturally) and cleaning and going to the grocery store, which were all much needed items to have checked off my list. I pretty much had the apartment to myself for the majority of the days that weekend and watched Grey's Anatomy (Season 3 still, so NO SECRETS ABOUT SEASON FOUR!). I wanted to do something so I ended up baking a cake, Pete came over, we laughed, talked and made general fools of ourselves until Cozy called in somewhat of a panic because there was a spider on her drapes in her living room. The phone call was made to Pete who decided that I should go too, and we both trapezed next door to kill the mondo spider that all of us have seen (THE SAME ONE) in our respective apartments at least once. To calm everyone down I invited them all over for cake and Pete, Cozy and Kenna came back with me, watched YouTube videos and ate yummy chocolate cake.

Tuesday my parents left Seattle for Copenhagen then from there to Dublin. They didn't get here until Wednesday, but I wanted to inform everyone that they did indeed leave on Tuesday.

Tuesday night the theatre group all went to see Marina Carr's Woman and Scarecrow. Don't. Don't ever go see it even if someone gives you the tickets. The first act was alright; A woman is nearing death and she has created this character called Scarecrow to help her sort through her life. Sounds interesting, yes? No. Scarecrow was a very strange character and Woman was also a little out there. The second act I pretty much slept through, but I could hear everything that was happening. Within the first ten minutes after intermission, Woman's unfaithful husband comes in and climbs into bed with her, strips her nightgown off (revealing some pretty fantastic granny panties and nothing else) and Woman proceeds to do the entire rest of the show in only underwear. Scarecrow disappears and with about fifteen minutes left in the hour and fifteen minute second act, Scarecrow reappears. Woman calls out:

"SCARRRRRECROOOOOOW!!!"

And to our horror, Scarecrow becomes Death and writes a contract in Woman's blood. The show ends with Woman lying across Scarecrow's lap on her back in a Christ-like pose. Right. Weird.

Wednesday afternoon Donal (our acting teacher) lets us know that he specializes in Stage Combat. And guess what we did in class that day? Yup! Let me see, I threw Donal (easily 250 lbs), kicked Mikah in the face (to great cheers and "Great sound!"), got my nose broken (to everyone's amazement) and got slapped, punched, kicked, thrown and had chairs thrown at my face. It was the best class we've had yet!

Wednesday I pick my parents up from the airport. I can't express to you how wonderful it was to see them. We did dinner at the Canal Bank Cafe and it was good :-)

Thursday I met Mom and Mike for breakfast at the Bagel Factory, we then headed to Insomnia for coffee and Marks and Spencers for some yummy Italian dinner items.

Good Wine: Yes
Fresh Pasta: Yes
Fresh Basil: Almost
Fresh Olive Oil: No, but bottled stuff works too
Good Cheese: Kinda
Good Bread: Yes

Everything needed for Rachel and I to make the Pasta Ignazio that we learned in Trapani. Mike headed back to the Hotel while Mom and I tried to walk through the Green with the groceries to get back home. I say tried because it was lightly misting and neither of us had our umbrellas or rain jackets. I know, we're from Seattle, so we're usually fine, but we had groceries. We decided to stop under a tree in the Green to wait it out. Two minutes later it is raining harder than it has ever since we've been here. And I have bread sticking out of my bag. Wonderful. I get a text from Rachel that says "I hope you're telling your parents that this is only the second time we've seen rain since we've been here..." and then another that says "Awe, this reminds me of Italy!" Hooray for rain triggering Italy in our heads :-)

We made it home with out getting too terribly drenched because in true Dublin fashion, the storm lasted a total of ten minutes and then the wind picked up and the clouds blew away to reveal beautiful blue sky.

Enrique's class was sans Enrique, which made the entire thing ten million times better (we actually learned things! I actually have three pages of notes from that class!).

Thursday evening Mom and Mike met us at our apartment where Rach and I cooked up our awesome dinner, had great wine and had wonderful conversation. Pete joined us later for some wine and tea (which he can produce from his pants at a moments notice... the tea, not the wine). Friday was Devising where I got mauled by Big-Headed Patrick (he's not pompous, he genuinely has a big head) then Mom an Mike met me, Rachel, Pete and Bri for a delicious breakfast/lunch at Queen of Tarts. This has now become my favorite place to eat EVERYTHING.

Once back at my apartment, none other than Emma Thesenvitz called me from a pay phone, so I dropped the paper I was working on and went to meet her and Madeline (Emma's friend from Paris) and we walked around Dublin for about two hours. We decided that, since they wanted to ditch these two friends that were coming in late that night, that we'd all go dancing at Ri Ra. We did. It was Cozy's birthday eve, so we hung out until 12:00 midnight and then had a big celebration Ri Ra style with lots of dancing and general commotion.

Saturday I walked up to the market on O'Connell Street with Mom and Mike and discovered the street vendors that hide behind the Gaiety School before eating lunch at Quay's Pub in Temple Bar. I found THE BEST t-shirt.

That night we went to see Maeve Higgins perform at Vicor Street Theatre near the Guinness Factory. She's SO funny! A lot of her humor was Dublin/Irish humor so my parents, while they thought some of her stuff was funny, they weren't able to catch some of the things she said. She also had a Cork accent which made it tough for me too. That night was Cozy's actual Birthday, so naturally there was a party. I was there for approximately an hour before nearly falling flat on my face I was so tired.

Sunday I told my parents that they weren't allowed to call me until after 4pm because I HAD to write these two papers that were due the next week. They didn't, and I started one of them. For the entire day, I STARTED one paper. Great job Katie.

We went to the grocery store, Mom and Mike figured out how expensive my life here really is, went to the Barge for dinner and a drink, then I came back here to write more of my paper and wait for my girls to get home from Budapest. Yes, Rachel and Stephanie (and Matt who lives below us) went to Budapest for the weekend. How jealous am I? The answer is very. VERY.

Monday my parents came over and we set out a tradition at my house: TACO MONDAY. Hooray! I've been wanting something like this for a long time, so I'm excited that Mom and Mike did it while they were here. Dinner was Mom, Mike, Katie V., Pete, Rachel, Stephanie and me. It was brilliant, and I don't think I want to forget it for as long as I live. Some of my favorite people in all the world sitting at one table, making fun of the British, laughing hysterically at each other, and just having a great dinner. I felt a little like it was Thanksgiving. Mom was trying to take our group picture and no one would look but Mike and I. She finally says "Will you guys just LOOK at the camera? I WANT A PICTURE!" Everyone shut up, smiled, then went back to arguing. It was my favorite night I've had here so far. BRILLIANT.

Papers are finish (hence me having time to write this), class was canceled until 4:30 today, and I am loving the fact that I don't have anything to do until the end of this month. Hallelujah.

P.S. I have no idea what happened to the font and the size, but no matter what I do it won't go back to normal size... Oh well. No you can read it without your glasses on! I totally did that on purpose...

Land of the Beatles, the Queen, Ashley Taggart, Sweeney Todd, Sandy and Geoffrey Rush

I know it's been a long time, but thank you for all being so patient :-) Here's about what I wrote in my journal while I was in London:

Arrive home from Pisa at 8:30pm Wednesday.

Leave for airport on 5am Aircoach Thursday Morning.

Approximately 4 hours of sleep in between.

Flight at 7:30am which goes off without a hitch (with the exception of a girl who forgot her passport at her apartment... She got it and eventually got on, but it caused everyone to panic a little).

Sat next to Cozy and Lee (both girls) and I realized how much there still is left to know about the people on this trip. They are both musical nerds and we talked about Spring Awakening and Wicked and Last 5 Years the whole way to London (about 1.5 hour flight).

Our hostel is 10 minutes away from the Russell Square tube stop, so we arrive, put our stuff in storage, have enough time to sum up the building in one word: Sketchy.

Have just enough time for lunch. I ate with Pete and Bri and we found this really cool world cuisine restaurant called Giraffe. Very cool. Then we found a meat pie shop that would have been cheaper, but oh well. They had a sign that said "The Best Pies in London!" and we all burst into song "The WORST pies in London- if you doubt it take a bite! Is that just disgusting?" Ah Sweeney Todd. It has seeped into everyday life in a way that it should not have seeing as he's the Demon Barber of Fleet Street and makes pies out of humans...

We met up with the rest of the group to get to Leinster Square to see our first of four shows. It was raining. And I've never seen so many movie theatres in one place. Apparently this is where they do premieres. This WILL come into play later on.

Boeing Boeing was our first show. It was kind of entertaining. It was a man (Kevin McNally of Pirates of the Caribbean Gibbs fame) who had three girlfriends, all flight attendants, in the 1950's and balances their flight schedules so he never has to deal with all of them at the same time. Until Boeing comes out with this new faster jet and all the girlfriends/fiances end up at home at the same time, driving everyone to a hysterical frenzy. It was written in French originally but is written in the traditional British farce style. Think Noises Off but not as funny.

Crisps and a drink at a pub loaded with Beatles memorabilia? Check. Killed time waiting for a restaurant to open for us to have dinner. The pub was about the size of a golf club and there was already probably 20-30 people jammed in it before we brought our group of 15 into it. Cool atmosphere, but a little to close to the locals if you ask me. I sat at a table with a man who thought it was a really good idea to order two drinks at a time while intermittently chatting me up and staring off into space. Yeah.

Indian cuisine dinner on IES (HURRAH!) with the entire crew. We had a really good dinner and laughed a lot at each other trying to figure out how to eat sauce with a fork. I guess quite a few people had never had Indian food before and all were amazed that they'd gone so long without it. £250 spent at one place? Check.

Arrived back at the hostel, ready to fall into bed. We reach our room (I'm in one with Katie V., Mikah, Meghan, Rachel and Lee) and we realize that we have made a mistake. Or rather IES made a mistake. Because while I realize that location is important, putting us in a spaceship that turns into a night club was overdoing it a little. The walls were alternating colors or bright orange and bright sky blue. We were on the 6th floor (of 6) and had no bathroom on our floor so we had to trek down stairs to reach the one bathroom available to us. The sheets had spots on them, the pillows still had other people's hair on them, the showers made you feel dirty while you were in them, the people were nasty and when you wanted to eat breakfast, you ventured downstairs. Then you sat at a metal table in a metal chair, illuminated by a black light and a blue light, had either cereal or tea or coffee, and tried with all your might to not step in whatever that might be on the floor. They sold things at this little store in the breakfast room. You think this is nice, no? We did too until we realized that they sold thong underwear that said "At the Generator, the hangover is always included!" and t-shirts that said "I Survived My Stay at the Generator!" I still have nightmares.

The next day was the Tower of London where we saw all the crazy places where people were killed, queens were coronated, and Kings of England slept. I stood in the spot where King Henry VIII saw Anne Boleyn for the first time, and I stood in the spot where he saw her for the last time as she was beheaded. It gave me chills up and down my back thinking that her blood was in the ground I was standing on... I'm such a history geek! At least I own up to it :-) The crown jewels of England are housed at the Tower of London, and while you're not supposed to take pictures of it, I snuck a few. They're amazing! The jewels, not the pictures. The pictures are nothing special except for the fact that I have them... That's pretty cool. Saw the place where they house the guns, swords and suits of armor. AND had a tour led by a Beefeater. I'm not being mean, that's what they're really called, and they ACTUALLY LIVE IN THE TOWER OF LONDON. They are locked in every night at 10pm and the Beefeater said that it was the ultimate place to raise your teenage daughter.

We saw the Tower Bridge as we left the Tower of London and headed down toward the London Bridge. We walked along the River Thames until we reached the fabled bridge itself. Umm, has anyone actually seen the London Bridge? It's the most disappointing bridge I've ever had the privilege of seeing. I'm not sure why it's been the source of a great many songs, but who ever decided that THIS was the bridge to sing about must've been blind. Granted, this is not the original London Bridge. The original is in Arizona on Lake Havasu, but still.

Met up with the rest of the group in front of the Globe Theatre. While we were waiting a man in a bright green scarf walked by and was talking about "the press" having a field day with something. It took no genius to figure out that this man obviously wanted to be recognized. Duh, Captain Barbossa has invaded England and now we will all become part of his curse... We waited in anxious anticipation of the moonlight that night. Thankfully it was cloudy and no one had to discover their skeleton. Anyway, that was my poor way of saying that Geoffrey Rush walked by us outside the Globe. Sorry :-)

Tour of the Globe. While very cool, the theatre that we were standing in was a replica that was built between the mid 1980s and the mid 1990s. I'll get excited about how cool everything is and how closely they followed the original structure, but I just can't get as excited when I realize that the theatre isn't even on the same spot as the original. They have to point you in the direction of it and say "Look for signs!" That's a little strange if you ask me. Anyway, our tour guide was funny. He kept talking about his theory that all South Park episodes are based on Shakespeare. No joke, he's really proud of this theory. Then, before he asked us if we had any questions, he wanted to tell us all the really stupid questions that he's been asked. Here's a sampling:

"What's Shakespeare's last name?"
"Does Shakespeare ever attend any of his own plays here?"
"Who painted the ceiling?" (It's an open air theatre)
"Do you have that version of Romeo and Juliet on a boat?" (referring to Titanic)

After those questions, none of us really had anything left to say, so we meandered through the rest of the museum on our own. Somehow Rachel and I always end up being the last two people somewhere (maybe because we get distracted by coloring and stage fighting and bringing Elizabethan style clothing back and feel sorry for little dog stuffed animals that are left behind by a child...) Anyway, Rach and I finished up at the Globe and wandered next door...

... To the TATE MODERN! Hooray! We also saw this really cool bridge that leads right up to it called the Millennium Bridge. The Tate had all this modern art (duh) and some really cool installations. There was this one that was done by a Colombian artist who had installed a gigantic crack in the floor of the museum. It was called "Shibboleth" and it was just there, with a crowd of people kneeling down to look inside, walk over, doing anything to figure out if this was an actual piece of art or an earthquake had just happened and no one but the Tate had felt it. We picked up a flier on it to satisfy the question, and promptly became enchanted (this word will come into play later as well) with the piece. Doris Salcedo has said that the crack reveals a "colonial and imperial history [that] has been disregarded marginalized or simply obliterated... the history of racism, running parallel to the history of modernity and... it's untold dark side." The word "Shibboleth" comes from an ancient incident in the Bible where the Ephraimites were attempting to cross the River Jordan to escape their enemies, the Gileadites. As the sound "SH" did not appear in their dialect, the Gileadites stopped and killed all those who could not pronounce the word "Shibboleth". The word stands for violence, intolerance and power, and putting a crack in the floor of the Tate Modern is a mighty big symbol for this horrific word.

We caught up with a few other people (Nora, Cozy, Meghan, Kate and Kenna) and went to find dinner before another show. Fish and chips in London? Check.

The show we wet to see was called Enchantment. It was a cross between A Doll's House, Miss Julie and Hedda Gobbler, and to top it all off, the author committed suicide shortly after the plays completion because the piece was somewhat autobiographical. And the main character in the play committed suicide. So one can't help but wonder if the author also fell in love with a man who looks like Rafi and likes to lick his lips before going in for a romantic kiss. Ew. I was less than impressed with this show, even though the story was alright, there was a certain lack of sympathy for the characters that is essential to even the worst of them. Laughing hysterically at the saddest play of the season? Check. Having a stomach ache from holding in laughter during the performance while sitting in the front row? Check.

Saturday morning was a walking tour of London. Well, almost a walking tour of London. More like a sprinting tour that lasted maybe an hour and a half. We stopped exactly twice, once at Westminster Abbey and once at Buckingham Palace. The rest of the time we were seeing the sights as if we were on a bus tour. Ashley Taggart was our guide (he's the head of IES Dublin and he was born in Northern Ireland and lives in Dublin now, but lived in London for years and years) and he has some mighty long strides to keep up with. Buckingham Palace, Canadian Embassy, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, the London Eye, National Portrait Gallery, National Gallery, Double Decker buses and red phone booths? Check.

We had about two and a half hours before our next show. Let's see, what have we not done in London that needs to be done at least once in your life? That's right. Abbey Road, of Beatles fame. We get there, following Pete's handy dandy maps (that's right, he has at least two at all times), and realize that taking these pictures will be harder than anyone thought because Abbey Road is an actual working street where cars fly down it at a million miles an hour despite the fact that people are continuously crossing it. In fact, they probably have a tally sheet in their car of the number of points they get per person, with a sliding scale depending on time of day, age, country of origin (if you hit an English person in the afternoon, 0 points because they should have known not to cross at that spot, but if you hit an English person in the morning who looks like they could have been IN the Beatles, 25 points). Anyway, our group of 13 people wanted to cross the street at the same time, but someone had to take the picture, so I opted out. Later, Kate, Rach, Cozy and I decided that there needed to be a four person walk, so we tried. Pete tried to take the picture. We all tried really hard. It didn't work. But, we did take the next album cover photo as the four of us were walking back, laughing hysterically at the fact that all of us almost got run over... Abbey Road? Check.

Off to the Portrait Gallery back in Central London. There was a Pop Art exhibition that had a bunch of Andy Warhol paintings, including his famous ones of the Queen and Marilyn Monroe which was pretty cool. They also had this entire room designated to Diana, and all the photographic portraits of her from the time of her engagement to the last picture of her before she died. For the Queen not liking her, Londoners seem awful proud of their princess. See a princess, a queen and a legend? Check.

The afternoon show was called Dealer's Choice, and it was at a place called the Chocolate Factory. We figured that since the name of the venue sounded amazing, the show probably would be too, and that since the name of the venue included the word chocolate, that there were probably going to be chocolates on/under our seats. One out of two ain't bad :-) The show was incredible. It was written by the guy who wrote Closer and Notes on a Scandal, and starred a few well known faces (Samual Barnett who played Posner in the Touring Company and movie versions of History Boys and Roger Lloyd Pack of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire fame, Malcolm Sinclair who has been seen in V for Vendetta, Casino Royale and played the Headmaster in the National and Touring Company of History Boys). This was by far the favorite show of the trip. Three mega stars in one show written by a mega writer? Check.

Taxi to the Royal Court Theatre (the taxi almost took us to the Royal Court, which is the jail...) to see Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco, one of the major absurdist playwrights of the 20th century. And it didn't fail his reputation. It was about this man who was bored with life in his small town when all of a sudden, rhinos start appearing out of no where. It turns out that people in the town are turning INTO rhinos, first really slowly, then all at once. The first act was really funny while the second kind of dragged on. We were in the first row and one of the men onstage stripped completely naked and stood at the edge of the stage. A little more than we bargained for. Male Nudity? Check.

Called Sandy Freborg, figured out how much I miss her, after much screaming we decided to meet up at 10am the next morning at King's Cross tube station.

As disappointed as we were to leave, Rachel's friend offered us a place to crash at her apartment for that night and the night after. We arrived at 12:30am and fell asleep at almost 4am.

Arrive at King's Cross Station at 10am, which is really 9am because the damn clocks fell back an hour because of daylight savings time ending and me, being the smart one, completely forgot about it. SO I'm there an hour early, walking around the station, being bored, eating breakfast, walking through shops. Sandy calls at 10:15 and says she's been there since 8:30 because she forgot too, and we'd both been wandering around the station killing time when we were there together the entire time. Wow, we felt smart...

From King's Cross to Hampton Court Palace (where King Henry VIII lived with all his wives) took us an hour and a half, but we didn't mind so much as we hadn't seen each other in ages and we needed all that time to catch up on each other's lives. The castle was amazing, but the highlight was definitely being there with Sandy.

High Tea in jeans? Check. Went to Kensington Palace in Hyde Park for High Tea, and while it was expensive, it was definitely worth it. Beautiful!

By the time we left, I realized that I wasn't with Rachel and her phone was dead and I had no way of getting back into the apartment now that I was out of it. So Sandy volunteered to wait with me and we took the tube over to Mariah's apartment. We get off and there are only three other people who get off too. Mariah, Rachel and one of her housemates. Hallelujah!

The next morning we got up, Rachel went out to buy breakfast, and we sat and had a great talk with Mariah and her housemates before Rachel and I said our good-byes and headed out for the day, wheeling our super cool suitcases behind us. She headed for the London Eye while I headed for Covent Garden to buy a t-shirt I fell in love with on the first day.

Wasted time, hung out by myself for the day, it felt wonderful. I needed that alone time before heading back to the hustle and bustle of Dublin.

OK, now that that is finished, I can stop procrastinating on my paper, then, later, when the paper is finished, I can tell all about my parents and how they're visiting right now :-)

London Post? Check (phew).

La Fronte

Holy cow, I'm so sorry! It has been so incredibly long since I've updated, and so much has happened! I think I'm going to just bullet point again because there is SO much to write and I know most of you have better things to do than read my blog for an hour :-) So here it goes:


On Sunday, the 21, I left for Trapani, Sicily with Rachel at 3:55 in the afternoon. The entire plane was filled with Italian people, who only spoke Italian. Not joking, we were the only people on the plane that needed the English instructions on how to evacuate the plane in case of emergency. I now know that you are supposed to be chewing when you put on an oxygen mask, no high heels are allowed on the blow up slide, and all you men and women wearing skirts, please remain calm enough to remember to hold your skirts down while jumping out of the plane.

I sat next to a woman who thought I could understand Italian. I shall call her Carlotta. Carlotta kept asking if the aisle seat was "occupado". I kept responding "no" and so therefore, I spoke Italian. When she sat down she started chatting away, asking what I can only assume were questions because she kept pausing and looking at me expectantly. Rachel sat back and was entertained while I was struggling to figure out how much French and Italian were really alike, and if I spoke to her in French, would she understand it? Carlotta eventually figured out that I was NOT Italian, and asked where I was from in the most broken/incomprehensible English I've ever been able to understand. I said "America" she said, "Belgium?" "America" "Belgium?" "THE USA" "oh. New York?" I point to Rachel and say "She is". So ends my conversation with Carlotta until we take off.

We flew over Paris so I woke Rachel up and told her where we were, and she was promptly very confused as to why we were in Paris instead of Italy. We could see the Eiffel Tower and the Champs Elysees and the Arc de Triumph and we observed how cool it was that it was sunny in Paris. We hoped that Italy was the same.

Rach went back asleep and Carlotta, seeing that I was eating peanuts, offered me one of her hazelnut chocolate cookies. When have I ever turned down a cookie? Never you say? You're right, I still have never turned one down. She gave me one, talked to me in Italian again (no matter how many times you repeat it in slow Italian, I STILL won't understand you... You can even get louder and repeat what you said and that still won't help me...). I thanked her in the only Italian I know (grazie) and offered her peanuts. She quickly turned her nose upwards and exclaimed something in Italian that must have been "ew gross" because she scrunched her face up and wrinkled her nose. She then proceeded to eat the entire package of cookies. I found this to be much how I ate for the rest my time in Italy. If it's in front of you, EAT.

The flight attendant, who shall be called Alfredo, was a regular Jerry Seinfeld. In Italian. He would get on the microphone and give a bland English translation of what he was about to translate into Italian, then proceed to crack up the entire plane (including the guy directly behind Rachel who looked as much like the Godfather as anyone I've ever seen) with jokes that only they could understand. Rachel said that she always envied the people who could talk and know that the people around them had no idea what was being said. I feel different. I hate feeling like the one that's completely left out from a conversation, the only reason being a language barrier.

When we landed it was dark, but it was also raining. As we got off the plane, Alfredo assured us that this would change because "it never rains in Sicily". The famous last words.

Silent cab ride to our B&B in the middle of "posh" Trapani (by the way, that's pronounced TRA-pa-ni) and 30 Euro later, we are standing in the middle of a white room with three beds, a HUGE chest, a desk and a window. And two chairs with no table. The breakfast room is plastic patio furniture that has been moved inside because of the rain, there are movies, but the cabinet is locked, and the bathroom is past the breakfast room, so if you want a shower in the morning and it's past 8:30 you have to walk through the breakfast room with people eating in it to get there. In a towel. There was a towel warmer though. Which was cool. And a bidet (pronounced bh-day).

After a good laugh and a little bit of disappointment, we woke up the next morning in time to eat breakfast (which I now call the Italian Breakfast, consisting of pastries, focaccia bread, egg bread, tea, coffee and marmalade) , drink all the tea and meet the two other people staying with us. We didn't catch their names that morning, but we did catch that they were from Lubig, Germany, that they had two sons, they thought we were movie stars (which we promptly said "Of Course") that the woman had taken a Greyhound bus tour of the US (almost exclusively to California, Nebraska and New York...) and the man's mother lives in Yakima, WA. Small world...?

We stole the remaining pastries to eat for lunch while we were out then set off to explore the town. The day was at that instant, sunny. But I had an umbrella just in case. It took us 15 minutes to find the beach and we were almost blown away. Literally. The wind was so incredibly strong that it was hard to do anything except stand there and try to take pictures. It was beautiful though. It took us about another hour to figure out that we were walking in the main shopping district and that this was also old town and it was also where the tourists go. For that entire hour we were on the same road going up and down. At one point we looked up and realized that we needed shelter stat because there was a black cloud about two inches from us. We ducked into a ceramics store. Low and behold, Sicily is known for their ceramics! Hey hey! We waited the storm out, walked outside, then quickly ducked into another store (also ceramics) to avoid yet another storm. After three or four storms, we decided to just keep walking, finding cover when needed.

I say aloud, "I wonder what that building is?" We walk past, then Rachel turns around and says "let's see." It turns out to be gated inside (... go figure) and the guy at the gate, who will be called Tony, called me over. After a few gestures and a few failed attempts to understand him, I get across that we're American students. His face lights up and he opens the gate for us and gestures for us to go inside. Magic words, apparently. Tony then practically runs over to us and starts talking in wild Italian, presumably telling us where we are, though neither Rachel or I can understand a single word he says. We explain again that we are AMERICAN STUDENTS (we're really good at saying this in Italian by now) and this look of recognition flashes across his face as the notion hits him that he knows no English and we know no Italian. So he calls this other guy over who speaks French. Maybe we're not as good as we thought we were. Then Tony calls ANOTHER guy over who speaks nothing but Italian. Way to go. Finally, after many men, a guy claims to know English and says to us in our broken language "Good morning, you are Americans? My name is Joe." All three men (the French guy was still there) proceed to tell me that my eyes were beautiful, Tony demanded that Rach take her sunglasses off so they could see her eyes too. "BELLA!" I guess blue and gold eyes are rare here in Trapani... Tony is asked to go back to work at the front gate (we've figured out at this point that this is some sort of governmental building, and Tony just left the gate unattended to talk to some foreign girls... This would get you fired in America) and Joe asks us to follow him and we get in this elevator meant for one, Joe is huge and Rachel and I are small, so we are practically having the floor buttons imprinted on our backs while Joe is standing in front of the door, smiling, trying to talk to us in English, when the only English words he actually knows are "good morning, you are Americans? My name is Joe." It was now that we decided that this was probably not the smartest idea, getting in a small elevator, going somewhere inside a gated building with a man the size of a medieval door. All the same, we were there, we were together, and we were trying hard not to laugh. Tony later joins us as we are being let into what we learn is the Sicilian Parliament. This building is the Sicilian Parliament and the president/mayor/representative of the isle of Sicily works here. No wonder it's gated.

Once explaining that we wanted to leave, they put us (ALL FOUR OF US) in that tiny elevator and brought us to the front gates where they told us to wait there. So we did, and they were STILL trying to find someone who spoke English well enough to translate. While they were unable to find anyone, we succeeded in one try by asking a polizia a question. He and another man told us to go salsa dancing, that our Italian book was crap and how no tourists ever came to Trapani, which is why no one spoke English.

As we leave, we believe we're in the clear because Tony and Joe never came back for us. How wrong we were. They were waiting, OUTSIDE the gates AROUND THE CORNER, wanting us to go to lunch with them and let them show us the town. In Tony's car. In Rachel's words, the first thing I learned was to never get in a car with strangers and the first thing I learned from the Soprano's is to not get in a car with strange Italian men. Needless to say, we hastily looked up the word for leaving in our little book then practically ran in the opposite direction. They stood behind us and laughed. Comforting.

Hunger pains hit at about 2pm.

Discovered MTV at the same time.

Chose TV. Sad, I know, but it happens.

Crashed an Italian Wedding where everyone was dressed up "nice" in their animal print and leotards and suits with tennis shoes.

Discovered how strange it was to see everyone with the same types of features; dark hair, dark eyes, olive skin, strong bone structure. When you're used to seeing even diversity in hair color, it's very strange to realize that the only blonds in this church were bottle blonds and the only people who had a different natural color were about 75 and gray.

Returned to Novecento (the B&B) and relaxed/dried off, Rachel napped and I wrote in my journal. Headed down to the corner American Pizzeria for some authentic Italian food and discovered that Italians watch dubbed American movies and charge you for using their silverware. The food was really good though!

The next day we discovered that there was a town called Erice. ERICE. How could I not go there? If I block out the E, I'm going to a town that is named after me! (sorta) Anyway, we steal the leftover pastries again and head out (in the rain) to the cable car that takes us to the top of this "mountain" where the medieval city is perched. As we are going upwards and taking pictures of the city below us, we turn to find ourselves being enveloped in a cloud. Wonderful.

The city is beautiful though, even in the cloud. I think the cloud added to it even more because it made the area around you just disappear. It seemed almost magical in the way that it shrouded the buildings and the people.

We walked through the walled city and went into even more ceramic stores to avoid rain, then watched as the cloud lifted and we were granted possibly the most beautiful view I've ever seen. The city literally sits on a hill that overlooks the island of Sicily. The vineyards, the villas, the beaches, everything. STUNNING. Then there were the castles on the cliff.

We returned for the sunset and took pictures of the castles lit up and of the cities at night.

We made an Italian dinner with Ignazio and Peter and Helga (who were our resident Germans... I can't go ANYWHERE without having at least one resident German, and I'm learning to love that...) We call the dinner Pasta Ignazio. It was the best dinner EVER. Homemade sauce, fresh tomatoes, basil, homemade olive oil, hand picked and cured olives, locally made wine, and pasta that was made less than twenty four hours before we ate it. INCREDIBLE. Helga and Peter were slightly drunk and asked if I was Chinese. ?!?!

Pisa was next. Our flight left at an obscene time of the morning and got into Pisa at 9am. And, can you guess what the weather was? RAIN. We got on a bus, pretending to know where we were going and where we were supposed to get off. Rachel was the brilliant person who got us off at the right stop, I would have stayed on it forever I think...

Bought an outrageously expensive ticket to the Leaning Tower, had a rushed lunch, then checked all our bags because we couldn't take them up for fear it would make the tower lean more (?!). Climbing up the inside of a circular, tilted tower makes the equilibrium in you go a little wacky. Especially because you had to look down to not step in the puddles that formed on the crooked stairs from the rain. The view from the top was pretty spectacular though.

Then we got on a plane and returned home to Dublin. Rachel fell asleep in a weird position and stayed that way the entire flight so I entertained myself by reading and laughing at the child sitting across the aisle from me who thought he was a siren. Apparently that was not as funny to Rachel who was trying to sleep...

London is next, but hold your horses. This took me a good two hours to remember and write...

Slainte

What I've learned this past weekend:

I've witnessed someone's worst nightmare and laughed at it, which, by the way, doesn't make me a bad person...

Guinness tastes strongly of wood and alcohol (go figure)

Parrots pop up out of nowhere

Rachel knows way too many people name Sarah

The two Sarah's that I met, however, were pretty amazing

When in doubt for a costume, go for a blind Mexican fortune teller, you will almost certainly have what you need in your overnight bag

I miss my friends from home, although I would prefer it if they were here, as I never want to leave

My roommate doesn't like cigars

My other roommate likes the room freezing cold

I'm leaving (on a jet plane) for Italy with the internationally known test taster Ratchel Rodernon...

... And it's supposed to rain.

I'm going to miss my humble apartment while I'm away

Weetabix is the best thing to happen to cereal since sliced bread

The Irish are fickle and passive (Mizzoni Pizza! Probably the best pizza in Dublin! Buy your tickets today! Or this weekend! Weetabix, anytime and as a tasty evening snack!)

The French view American men as either a White Trash man with mutton chops, a beer belly, a beer hat, a dirty t-shirt and aviator sunglasses, or as frat boys who chug beer. I'm really happy that Americans are viewed so highly...

When asked to go to a theme party, you are generally given a theme, although it is INFINITELY more fun when you get to choose the theme you go as

Katie V.'s parents are sweet people

Amanda Maguire does an uncanny impression of Enrique (our Drama teacher) without realizing it...

... And she likes cheese hats and to be called Pablo

You can, contrary to popular belief, get the titles "Ice Age", "What Women Want", "Center Stage" and "The Mummy" into classroom discussion when talking about Beckett's Not I and Footfalls.

You can also incorporate the titles "Dancing in the Dark", "RESPECT", "Leaving on a Jet Plane" and "Born in the USA" into the discussion when talking about Ourselves Alone by Anne Devlin

To protest conditions in a prison in Northern Ireland, men went on a Dirty Strike where they smeared their own feces on the walls of their cells. This didn't work so they went on a hunger strike. Bobby Sands was the first to die of this hunger after 66 days of only water.

Someone came dressed as Bobby Sands at the Theme Party. However, no one knew who he was so it didn't really matter what he was dressed as.

Simon has one funky eye

And he loves stage make-up

You can tell how funny someone is by how they react to situations where they aren't in control of their own emotions and actions

A viable costume option is going naked wrapped in Tibetan Prayer Flags... Don't worry, it didn't happen, it was just an option...

Pink leopard print leggings are a LONG term investment

The people on the LUAS might actually be nice...

Antoinette is green and wears a cape

Miss Cleo is white and Mexican and Jamaican

Nora is the 80's AND Nala

Peter can make up a song about anything (What makes something a chair and being allergic to shellfish)

WOP is actually better than it sounds

So are peppers and onions

To greet people in Zulu you say Sawubona

Loosing your lucky rocketship underwear = the end of your life

The is no point to our Voice class. No. Seriously. He told me there wasn't.

Marc knows David Beckham

There are no black people in Northern Ireland

While the rest of us Americans were told not to go near the highway, especially after dark, and to be home before everyone's porch light was on and to not download rap songs onto the family computer, Irish kids our age were running barefoot through the heather while their parents worked in the peat bog until the sunset.

Yoga people like having mats...

... And apparently they like having blankets too (?)

Lowering your voice instantly makes you more intimidating and more menacing

I never want to be Catholic in Ireland and be pregnant out of wedlock...

Ryan Air will nickel and dime you for everything you ever thought of doing on their airline

IES doesn't want to wait for us to pick up our baggage from London. But are we bothered?

When you don't know someone at a party and they have an Irish or British accent ask a Gaiety IES student. When they have another European accent ask Felix. When they're American and you don't know them that means that they aren't supposed to be there or you really need to learn the names of your classmates...

Texas people are way more friendly in Ireland than they are in the States.

Butlers continues to prove itself as the best hot chocolate ever in the history of mankind

Guinness chocolate, however, tends to hit the spot if you're hungry.

The entire school of Skidmore was at the Guinness Factory and in Dublin. Not joking. I met probably 6 people that I didn't know but someone else in the group of Faude, Sway and Rachel knew. Including a Parrot (who squeals) and a rich gay/straight man from Harvard who had bugs in his room (don't stay at the Brewery Hostel for anyone planning a visit. That is also something I learned this weekend).

Rachel looks amazingly like Amy Winehouse with the Elvira wig and winged out eyeliner and a pair of pants in her head.

More people say "obvi" then I realized. I had never heard this before...

"Cool Beans" is actually a place on Long Beach Island and they sell t-shirts.

I think that's all I've learned, which, I would say, is a pretty full weekend, and we haven't even left the country yet, and it's only Sunday...

"I've worked with priests before. That was hard. PRAY BETTER. PRAY LOUDER."

Since the last post, I've been extremely busy, which is why it has take me so long to write again! I'm trying, honestly, I am!

I guess I'll start with the basics: I will NOT get kicked out of the country when I try to get back in after Italy. OH, and I'm going to Sicily in ten days with Rachel to sit in the sun, mash grapes with our feet and cycle around the beaches. OK :-) I'll take it! Back to the VISA.

Rachel and I (on our third attempt) visited the Immigration Bureau near the River on the Monday before our VISAs expired. Both of the other time we had arrived too late to get a ticket (the first time at 1 pm and the second at 9 am) so on Monday we got there at 8:30. They started giving out student tickets at 9:30, so we figured that we'd be one of the first and that we'd get out of there in time to get to our 1:30 class. Well, we weren't one of the first, in fact we were numbers 182 and 183 and we waited in line to get the number for a half hour, got it and they said to come back in two hours to get the stamp. So we left, thinking that we'd get some coffee and study our monologues in a little cafe. We were there for two hours and fifteen minutes, got back to the Bureau and were surprised to learn that they were only on number 137. Fantastic. So we sat, me next to a man from Pakistan who continually reminded me that we were "almost next" and Rachel next to a really awkward man who kept hitting on the girl on his other side. Another hour later, Rachel is called, and I immediately afterwards. She goes to Desk #2 and I head over to #11. The man I had was young, really nice, took all my information, passport and letters, said I didn't have to pay the 100 Euro fine. I was done in 10 minutes. Rachel had a man who was nice, old, took all her information, passport and letters, didn't give her any of it back and made her pay the fine. Then made her wait for another 45 minutes to get a "non-identification" card. It has her picture, her name and her birthday, but it's not to be used as an ID card (?). So, needless to say, we were late for our class, but we are now legal. Thank god.

We're working on monologues for Acting, which is proving tougher than I thought it would be. It's great to work with Amanda, who, contrary to PLU profs (who are wonderful) really doesn't care about your ego and will tell you exactly what needs to be fixed, then will work with you personally until you figure it out. I love it!

Dad got here last Thursday and I couldn't have been happier to see him. He looks like he did (duh, it's only been a month...) and everything was just the same, except he was in Ireland! We went on a road trip around Ireland, which was amazing. We started here and took off toward Athlone in the midlands, then over to Doolin (see previous post), the Aran Islands, Cliffs of Moher, then headed back to Dublin by way of almost every small town and dirt road we could find. It was FABULOUS! Oh, and I almost got a cow wet willie. Yeah, gross.




We've seen a few shows since Galway including The Pride of Parnell Street (amazing), The Playboy of the Western World (OK) and History Boys (absolutely one of the best contemporary pieces of theatre I've had the privilege of seeing). Saturday night is Long Day's Journey into Night by Eugene O'Neil and I'm REALLY excited about it. I think. It's four hours long. We'll see. Apparently they sell ice cream and pop corn at intermission :-)

We have absolutely NO food in the house. I'm talking, wheatabix, bread, honey and lemons. Ummm, not enough for anything except breakfast. Which means that I'm going shopping after class and it will spend an exorbitant amount of money. Great, just what I need!

Am I Bothered?

Just got back from Galway a few hours ago, and I loved it. Stephanie, Rachel, Katie and I were pretty much nomads, wandering throughout the countryside, loving almost every minute.

We started in Dublin, leaving town on the train at 11:10am, getting into Galway at 2:30 (can you imagine being able to cross an entire country in a little over 3 hours... That would get me to Portland at home!

Once in Galway we wandered through what seemed to be the central part of town (Shop St. I think it was) which led us to the water front and I saw the Atlantic Ocean for the first time in person (!!!) and it was beautiful. We hopped on a 6:00 bus from Galway to Doolin in County Clare (pop. 200) and spent the night in a tiny little hostel called "Paddy and Josephine's Doolin Hostel." How awesome is that? By the way, everyone here is named Paddy, it's wonderful :-) We were all hungry, so we meandered down to the local pub call Gus O'Connor's Pub and had incredible fish and chips and enjoyed some real live Irish pub music. There was a guitar, banjo, penny whistle, accordion and a few other instruments, and almost the entire pub knew the words to the songs they were singing. THAT is the Ireland I wanted to find!

The next morning we woke up at 7am to the mooing of cows on the hill behind us, outside our window. We rushed to get dressed (not showered, because, silly us, we didn't bring towels...) and got to the bus to get to the Cliffs of Moher before all the tourists got there. At first we all seemed slightly disappointed. They were pretty, but there was a wall going along the length of them so you couldn't look down. Then we decided to not follow any rules and we hopped the wall, walked to the edge and easily could have stayed there forever. It was completely indescribable, to the point of saying that you have to go there sometime in your life before the tourists. The minute you put your head over the edge it's like your whole world changes; things are not only literally upside down, but the whole idea that you are on the last piece of land until you reach the US and all that you have to do is take one wrong step and your swimming with the fishies just blows my mind. We took these pictures that don't do anything justice, but they are pretty cool.

We left and headed back to Doolin for some amazing soup at O'Connor's Pub then caught a ferry to the smallest island in the Aran Islands called Inishmere, or Inis Oirr, depending on the map you look at and sat on the beach while trying to dry ourselves off after a very rough, VERY wet boat crossing. We only succeeded in getting sand stuck to the wet parts of our jeans...

From Inishmere we caught another ferry to the biggest Island, Inis Mor and after another very rough, but not as wet, crossing, we docked and got pretty much caught in bad weather. We were bombarded by a man in a red taxi-tour-van who we paid €10 each for a tour of the entire island. It turned out to be cool, and sort of worth it, but we still felt like the best part of the day was spent on the Cliffs and on the first island. However, from the first stop on our tour, we saw a really cool 3,000 year old fortress that was on this huge cliff. Seriously, the Cliffs of Moher were incredible but the cliffs here were breathtaking. They were concave and we could stand on the very tip of a rock and look down and see absolutely nothing but turquoise water. The wind was so strong that you could throw a chunk (yes I said chunk) of sod in the air at the cliff and it would fly backwards almost 30 meters away. It's a new game. "Harry Potter Eat Your Heart Out" is what the guys kept saying... (?)

From the island we took another ferry back to the "main land" and then a bus to Galway. We met the huge group at a pub, then went to the B&B to shower and get ready for our trip back home. Rachel and I stayed up writing everything down that we did during the weekend and it took up 4 pages in my journal... Crazy.

Now we're home. And it feels great.