My friend Maggie is Irish, and has a ton of family still living in the country, of course she doesnt really know them, but family is family and you gotta help one another out. Pay it forward and whatnot. Family is the reason we ventured into town yesterday. Maggie had a cousin of some sort visiting Dublin for the day with a friend (from Chicago, not Ireland) and it was requested that she show her around a bit. Now this is all well and good, but to be real we only know like two neighborhoods and a handful of street names. Oh well, we headed down and met them at the spire. Have I mentioned the spire? It's just this giant spike in the middle of Dublin, strange.
These things were awesome
With cameras in hand we deemed the day a photo safari and vowed to take many more pictures than we had on our previous jaunts into town. We stumbled upon something called Trad Festival which we came to find out was a festival to celebrate traditional Irish music and art. We got to see some Irish dancing before popping into a cafe for a snack and a pint, only to find they had no guinness!! No guinness? Is that even allowed? After that we wandered the temple bar area a bit, we ran into these people dressed as giant puppets. I took a photo of the one in the dress and then as I was walking away the other guy came up and wrapped his arms around me. I must have jumped three feet off the ground. They spoke in these ridiculous voices and he said "I saw you taking pictures of my wife!" Hilarious. (They sound the hand creatures in the movie Labyrinth). After awhile her cousin was tired so we helped them back to their hotel. Unsure of what to do with the rest of the day ahead, we popped into a pub to mull it over with a pint, Guinness this time.
Stepped into the neighborhood's namesake, Temple Bar itself. We squeezed our way in through the already crowded bar, 5:45 on a Sunday, I guess the Irish do know how to party. After an hour of foot tapping, hand clapping, beer sloshing music the band was done and we decided to venture out to another pub. On our way out the bar, a woman handed us flyers, we almost didn't grab them but thank goodness we did because they were for a free half pint of Guinness at a neighboring pub! Funnily enough, the same band from earlier was now playing at this pub. We got a few head nods that said they knew we were at Temple Bar and we felt a little like their groupies. At one point one of the band members came up and grabbed Maggie for some Irish dancing. It was adorable and hilarious.
There was this mysterious door that people kept going into, we finally decided to see what all the fuss was about, and it turned out to be a show of some band doing indie rock covers, we went to the bar to order a drink but then some guy asked to see our stamps, which we clearly didn't have. How he knew we didn't have any is just as mysterious as that door. We were asked to leave out the back exit which led us into an alley.
Where we found a jazz bar, unfortunately the music had just ended but we met this old irishman who made us promise to come back and check it out next Sunday. After that we made our way to another bar, where we were bought these shots called snowglobes, there were about five different types of liquor in it, including one with little gold flakes. Really pretty, even more delicious. After that we ran into some guys we sort of knew, and then took a bus home, made spaghetti and watched music videos with Seetha and Ali.
You can click on this link to view my album of the days photos on Facebook.
Decided I would be more productive if I went into town and studied at a coffee shop than somewhere on campus. I hate the library, as previously stated, it is way too quiet. And the coffee shop areas on campus are too loud/crowded. Vibe wise this place is good, but the "barista" told me my cappucino would have two shots, I swear she lied! This coffee is CRAP. Christine I know you feel my pain, this capp is like ALL MILK.
Productive or not, I do feel better getting off campus.
Rejection of an insanely popular idea, game, show, place etc. simply because it is so insanely popular. I'm enjoying season three of 'Lost'." "Season three came out four or five years ago." "I know, I suffer from hype aversion."
This is today's Urban Dictionary Word of the Day, just think it is a funny coincidence that I didn't watch LOST back in the day bc I was literally like, naw it looks dumb. And now I am ON SEASON THREE. Somebody at Urban Dictionary knows my life.
Also, this would be the reason I have not gotten anything done over the weekend. Lost, not hype aversion although I'd have to say I think I'm a sufferer.
I slept for 14 hours last night, got up around 4pm and didn't really do anything. It was lovely.
Now I am getting ready to go out on the town. There is a drum and bass show tonight!!! 15 Euro entry but 7 hours of live djs and I CANT WAIT. Most of my readers probably know I am into electronic type music, but here is an example of a drum and bass remix of a song most of you have probably heard
From Wikipedia "Drum and bass (also written as "drum 'n' bass" and commonly abbreviated to D&B or DnB) is a type of electronic dance music which emerged in the mid 1990s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats (typically between 160–190 bpm, occasional variation is noted in older compositions), with heavy bass and sub-bass lines. Drum and bass began as an offshoot of the United Kingdom rave scene of the very early 1990s. Over the first decade of its existence, the incorporation of elements from various musical genres led to many permutations in its overall style."
yeahhhh basically I am well-rested and ready to dance my face off!
I suppose I should tell you all about my classes. While I think they are and will continue to be a small portion of my experience here, I suppose it is called studying abroad for a reason. First of all, UCD is on a semester system while UW is on a quarter system. Each quarter we take 3 classes, here I am expected to take 6 at once. WHAT. They are shorter or less often but still. So here is the rundown, I am only taking two classes that apply to my major, the others are random electives that will apply to my general credit amount.
Dublin: Its Museums
I have actually yet to get to this class, I missed a number of them when Caitlin was here, and I was misinformed about the location of the classroom. However, it shouldn't be too hard. It is an art history 101 course where we have to visit dublin museums and write about various pieces.
The Narrative Art
This is a folklore class! I am really excited about this one, I took a french fairytale course at UW and I absolutely loved it. Basically we are talking about the differences in Irish folklore from the oral tradition to a written one and that sort of thing. My professor is really energetic and there are only like 15 people in the class so it is a lot better format for me. There is also a girl I met during orientation in my class! Memory and Identity in Irish Literature
I love literature courses. I am not entirely sure about what we are reading for this yet, but we have already begun to talk about a lot of interesting things in order to define memory and cultural and collective identities. Today I read an article on screen memories by Freud. I love me some Freud. My friend Jo is in this course.
Ireland Uncovered
This is a course designed specifically for international students. It is a multi-disciplinary course offering background on irish history, architecture, culture and other stuff like that. Everyone I know is in it and it should be pretty easy. Hopefully... knock on wood.
Health, Illness and Society
This is a sociology course and it seems that we will be looking at the historical and current patterns in the way that health and especially mental illness are viewed in society.
Sociology of Celebrity and Modernity I still don't really know what this guy is talking about. He kind of mumbles and is a little twitchy. We talked about the definition of a celebrity, its first usage (talking about name dropping Jesus!) and then today he rattled on about printing presses and actors playing royalty in the theater? I'm not entirely sure where it is going but I think it should be interesting.
All in all my courses all have the potential to be really interesting. The main issue here is my ability to focus, and the fact that I will be out of the country for a lot of them. Oh well, traveling and life experience is more important than my gpa, right?
I love coffee. I have been drinking it since I was 15 and a barista for the last three years. Ireland does not know coffee. I keep trying to drink it, but it either has no flavor or the sort of gross bitterness makes me feel like this
baby is eating grapefruit
I have had to switch to tea. Tea in the morning, tea all day, tea before bed. It's everywhere!
I also miss pizza snackage
I am addicted to tumblr and need to stop wasting time online.
Even without hulu or netflix it turns out procrastination is pretty easy.
I went down to grab dinner tonight and saw on the menu a choice of poached cod or lasagna. LASAGNA! A food I hated for most of my childhood because all of the combined textures freaked me out, but now lasagna and I have a mild love affair. I could probably eat enough lasagna to feed a family of six all on my own. The smooth, creamy ricotta mixing with the deliciously seasoned ground beef and zesty magnificently red tomato sauce. Topped with gooey mozzarella and cuddled in layers of the greatest known carbohydrate, pasta. And of course I have to mention things like basil and oregano adding that italian flair.
But no, it wouldn't be that simple, would it?
This lasagna is much like the frozen Irish beef lasagna I purchased on my first night here. Tasty in it's own way but the only thing resembling my long lost love is its construction. So I ask the cook, is this a typical Irish dish, this beef lasagna? And she replies with "No, lasagna is Italian, dear"
There are a lot of things just slightly different here. Really, Ireland or at least Dublin is not all that foreign. Just foreign enough to be occasionally obnoxious. One thing I have noticed is that in all my classes, people will whisper to one another the entire time. They sit behind me, to the side of me, everywhere, just whisper whisper whisper. I feel like they always announce at classes at UW that you need to respect your neighbors and not talk in class, and I always think to myself.. how would you even get away with more than an occasional side comment on the material. I must not be the only one who thinks that way because I have rarely, if ever, noticed people continuously chatting during a lecture at UW. Not the case here. There is already enough static in my head, I don't need mumbled conversations trying to distract me as well.
Obviously we all know that the English and Irish can't spell. Color is colour and center is spelled centre, tell me how that makes sense. The thing I didn't realize is that they don't seem to use the letter 'z'. My lecture today had powerpoints and as I was looking at the words, such as industrialization, and copying them down I realized I was spelling them differently without the intention of doing so. Sorry about this posts organization, I'm just rambling, not trying to revolutionize your thinking or anything.
Maybe this is one more reason when people ask why I'm here and I say "allegedly you speak english" the response is always a shoulder shrug or a chuckle and "well.. kind of".
I had good intentions of not sucking at academic life today but as they say, old habits die hard. I can be so alert and awake walking to and from class and I’ll think to myself, what a wonderful world. But as soon as I enter that quiet classroom, the air too warm and my face flushed from inevitably hurrying to get there, it all goes out the window. Or it might, if classrooms ever had windows. I don’t know what the root of the problem is, you would think I should be able to pay attention, but I just can’t. It isn’t even that I find it boring, nearly all of the classes I have taken that weren’t science related have been wonderfully fascinating, I could discuss them for days. The problem is that there is nothing there to engage me. I’ve put a bit of thought into this (some while my mind was wandering in class, I must admit) and I think the structure of higher education just doesn’t fit my learning style. If I have nothing to relate the subject matter back to, I have no hope of remembering it. I need discussion, I need visuals, I need to see what it means in the scope of my universe in order for me to really grasp it. High school education can be lacking in a lot of ways, and I’ve heard it being referred to as teaching that is simply “holding your hand”, and when this phrase is used it seems to have a negative connotation, holding your hand implies that you can’t do it on your own, but what’s the problem with that? High school classrooms were a lot more fun. Obviously I have made it through two and a half years of University with relatively high success, I can clearly make the system work for me at least enough to get by. But if things were just a little more involved, more dynamic I think I would enjoy school a lot more. People always ask what I am going to do with my sociology degree and my usual response begins with what I like to think of as a knowing but cynical chuckle, and the response of “honestly…probably nothing”. This answer is generally met with a laugh, often a widening of the eyes and always some reproduction of, “okay so what are you going to do”? My general reply is usually to tell them about my interest in design or event planning, some sort of creative field. If I know the person a little better I might throw in that really I just want to have cute babies. If I delve in any further with the conversation it turns to the question of grad school. Do I think I will get my masters? No, I don’t. It isn’t that I want to stop learning, I have a million subjects I would love to know more about, it is that the thought of attending University for four more years sounds impossible to me. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE college. The college lifestyle suits me well, I just know that I would never be able to focus well enough and study hard enough to get a graduate degree. Going to class is painful and annoying. I want so badly to be present but I consistently find myself, as I’ve been known to say, forgetting to listen. I can do 50 minute lectures well enough, I still find myself checking the time roughly every two minutes after about the 24 minute mark but it isn’t too bad. It is the two hour lectures that really get me. How am I expected to sit still for that long? To not speak for that long? It physically stresses me sometimes, after about an hour and 15 minutes all I can think about is the urge to bolt out of there, let out a yell and move on to the next activity. Sometimes it feels like a physical pull in my chest to move, and if I take a gulp of water or have to cough I get so anxious that I am bothering people and it is all I will think about. This is why you will never talk me into studying at the library. I can’t handle the silence. Unless I am alone I can’t focus without music or background noise because I start to notice my breathing and then I start to feel like I can’t breathe properly and then I’m completely distracted from the conversation at hand. This entry went a little bit of a different direction than I was intending but what can you do. My point is, I want to learn but I hate going to lecture. I wish every class could be like a section/seminar where we have discussions and activities but I’m too far in to back out now. I got an email from the registrar the other day, graduation, after this quarter you are less than 30 credits away!
Bonus points if you know where the title comes from!
First of all, if you are still unsure about who SClub7 is, listen to this song. I can pretty much bet that if you are somewhere close to my age (or ever chaperoned for kids my age) you will be instantly transported back to the damp darkness of a middle school dance, at least I was last night when it came on. The song began and it sounded familiar but I wasn't quite sure. Then suddenly "there's no use looking back or wondering" and my minds eye is scoping out my middle school crush and his wonderfully frosted hair. That awkward boy you have known since you were 7 cuts in and you are stuck dancing with him. You see one of the "popular" girls cozying up to your twelve year old heart's desire and your poor angsty teenage soul is crushed. Awkward kid eyes you with his arms around your waist. Lucky for you, you are still an arms length from one another in typical 7th grade fashion. You fake smile with your glossy lips, courtesy of Lip Smackers and promptly run off to the bathroom with six of your friends as the song ends. Ah, middle school.
So about the concert. Doors to the student bar opened at 8pm and it was relatively quiet, because it was "late night" there were a few drink specials posted and we took advantage. My friends each grabbed a Pear Bulmer's and I went for the double vodka with red lemonade. We sat and chatted while chart music played in the background and more students trickled in. We quizzically eyed the abnormal amount of reindeer antlers and santa hats adorning student's heads before we realized it was "The Christmas Ball" and had just been reschedule due to the snow. Time goes on and at about 9:30p (The show allegedly started at 9) a student comes onstage and starts singing covers of various popular songs. We get excited to hear live music and make our way up to the stage, the girl has a beautiful voice and we are having a good time. After her set, a guy comes on. By this point it is getting later, I am tired and hadn't eaten in 12 hours, the guy's voice is reminiscent of The Tallest Man on Earth, and while this is lovely, it isn't exactly upbeat. As we start to grow weary and the crowd of students move toward the stage I cross my fingers that the show will begin soon. Finally he stops and two more students replace him. I don't know when this became amateur hour. I start to grumble to my friends, "this isn't a freaking talent show" and "another lovesong cover? real original"getting grumpier by the minute. The students finally leave the stage, and 20 minutes go by of music playing from the speakers and me and my friends getting constantly half shoved out of the way. Some guy does a dance to a backstreet boys song but we are unamused because none of us know who he is. The crowds press against us and I can't quite breathe freely anymore. Some idiot next to Stephanie keeps throwing his elbows around, narrowly missing her face. I push his arm and tell him to keep his arms down and get his elbow out of my friends face, to which he replies "not my fault you guys are such porkies and can't fit in to see the stage" OKAY, seriously?! Did you just call me fat? FAT.Really? I ask Stephanie if I can punch this guy and she advises me to wait until after the show. 20 minutes later and the time is 12:45. TWELVE FOURTYFIVE. Finally they come onstage, SClub is a lot less epic when the 7 is down to 2. Anyways they start with their big hit, Ain't No party Like An S Club Party and the crowd cheers, their middle school dreams coming true. I dance/edge my way in front of the idiot next to me and my head and his elbow fight it out for a few minutes, my head wins and he backs off. That's right, I thought, ACCEPT DEFEAT, Asshole! Happy in my small victory I danced to the first three songs before deciding to get out of what had become a really ridiculous mosh pit situation. I am not kidding you, a mosh pit for SClub. I was at the guardrail for Brand New with a bruised rib, I know when being shoved and nearly trampled is worth it. This was not one of those times. I had to push my way out of the crowd climb over a couple chairs but I was finally able to breathe. Stayed for a song or two more and then headed back to my dorm, sweaty, bruised and irritated. All in all, not worth it.
Okay, I know ghosts are a controversial subject, because you can't prove anything. But you also can't disprove it, right? This is what Caitlin sent me after researching the creepy smokey photos we took. I showed you the pictures of the smoke, and then the one of my breath. Not even remotely the same, yeah? Super creepy. I think there are a lot of weird things in the world that you can't explain with science or logic and we only use a small percentage of our brains, so I would be more apt to believe in the paranormal than not. To each his own but you gotta admit those photos are rattling.
Ectoplasm, Ecto-mist, vapor, ghostly mist
Appearance & Characteristics: Cloudy vaporous mist
The term was originally used to describe the substance that oozed from spirit mediums during a séance from days gone by. It is nowassociated and referred to as a mist or fog, and it usually displays a swirl effect within a vaporous cloud. It normally appears several feet off the ground and can linger or travel quickly at will.It's usual colors are gray, white or black but has also been seen and photographed in several other colors. Ecto has been caught on both video & all types of cameras. It's important to note however, that a camera can inadvertently create this effect artificially in cold weather by a person exhaling to close to the lens when taking the picture. The exhaled breath looks similar to ectoplasm but without the swirls. Oh, and we certainly don't want to be smoking during a ghost hunt for obvious reasons.
Locations spotted: All locations but most generally spotted outdoors and most particularly at cemeteries, battlefields & historical sites
Speculations:Believed by many to be the soul or spirit of those that have passed on from this life. It has been speculated that the spirit will transform to this vaporous state before appearing as a full-bodied apparition.
Picture: Ecto-mist with lot's of great looking swirls
Just bought my plane ticket to Stockholm for my spring break! March 3rd with at least three other girls, Jo, Julia and Seetha. Were thinking Sweden/maybe other scandinavian countries for about a week, then a few days in Berlin and back to Dublin for St. Patrick's Day//my family visiting. :) so excited!!
The way time goes always blows my mind. How is it that a day always has 24 hours but can feel like 5 (yesterday) to a lifetime? I just looked at the date and realized I have only been away from Seattle for 20 days. Twenty. Just about three weeks. While that is longer than I think I've done since I started at UW, in the grand scheme of my (hopefully long) life, it is miniscule. Yet it feels like forever. I have only skyped with my parents, and while seeing them is lovely it may has well have been a year ago that we all had breakfast together, sitting at our kitchen table with the puppies hopping from lap to lap hoping for food. And the last time I woke up on the couch at Megahau5 (my friends' name for their house) to hot coffee and some of the coolest people you will ever meet? Lifetimes ago. Even though I did little this weekend, I may as well have said goodbye to Caitlin a week ago.
Yet at the same time, I feel as though I have been nonstop here. That I have already seen and done so much in so little time. This week is packed, tonight is Julia's actual birthday (not sure what is going on). Tomorrow is an on campus concert of.. wait for it... S Club and 5ive! Was never huge fans of either, but it's about to be the nineties here for a day!
Wednesday is our regular night out to Dicey's, which is a super sweet nite club that is part indoors and part outdoors with mad drink specials every wednesday night. I think thursday is a day off and then Friday is a DRUM AND BASS SHOW. YES YES YESSSSSS. Most of the clubs play either chart (top 40) or dance music that is a bit more electro-pop/techno than I usually go for. While I can dance to anything and enjoy it, I like heavier bass and this show looks to be pretty dope.
My new friends are trying to plan an outing to County Kilkenny for Saturday and maybe Sunday, and then I am signing up for a group trip to Cork for the weekend of February 4th-6th. That leaves me then two weekends (one of which I may go to Germany) until Paris. Basically what I am saying is that now that life is getting going, I think this is going to be packed with stuff and fly by at the same time.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
I can hear one of my hallmates snoring through the walls.
While Caitlin was here we mostly just wandered around Dublin and went where the wind (or cute shops) took us. We thought about doing a lot of the touristy stuff but both of us were jet-lagged, and for different time zones too, and obviously not very good planners. However, the one activity that both of us were adamant about doing was the Dublin Ghost Bus tour. All we knew about the tour was that we took a bus at 8pm, and for two hours would be regaled with horror stories and ghost tales of Dublin with a live storyteller. Not knowing what to expect Caitlin and I decided that we would forgive one another if she pushed me in front out of fear or if I smacked her in the face for doing so. Just in case something jumped out or we saw something ghostly we practiced our scared faces. So, we get on the bus, which is decorated up inside with cobwebs and skeletons and the like. Pretty cute, we are funneled to the top half of the bus where there are dark curtains and red lighting.
Our tour guide comes up and starts playing some creepy music as he introduces the tour and our stops for the night. The curtains stay closed as we drive along and he tells us a number of stories. Our first stop (and when we can open the curtains to look out) is a University where someone named Dr. Clossy used to work as an anatomy professor back in the day (the day being like 1900 something?) apparently this professor, being a hardcore atheist would on the first day of class reveal a cadaver, slice it open, pull out the guts, hold them up Circle of Life style and pronounce "This, is what you are gentleman. And this, is all you will ever be." Our guide continued by telling us that at this point in history, each University in Ireland was allowed six cadavers a year, legally of course. Without refrigeration though, this was highly obnoxious for teaching medical students, thus the need for body snatchers also known as grave robbers. Shady people needing money would dig up and sell body after body to Dr. Clossy, the locals were terrified, because anyone you knew could end up on his table. Those who study and work in the building say that they have seen him in his blood stained lab coat wandering the halls, or have heard someone whistling his favorite tune when there should be no one else in the building. creepy, eh?
Our next stop was St. Kevin's Park where we heard about a priest who used to hold masses in this church in the middle of a graveyard when it was illegal to be a catholic, he was found out one sunday and tortured and then put to a horrible death. He is up for canonization and many people make a pilgrimage to this spot on his birthday where there have been a lot of reports of seeing his body levitating above the altar area covered in blood. After that our guide gave us a demonstration/lesson on how body snatchers did their job. He said if a body was in rigor mortis they would just put the persons arms over their shoulders and walk them to Dr. Clossy, as
everyone in Dublin would just think the person was drunk as a skunk.
After this we drove by a hotel with a room that is haunted by a little girl who died of TB and a graveyard where "The White Lady" is still heard crying at night for her long lost lover. The white lady was married to a very important man in dublin and died on their wedding night, she was buried (ALIVE!) and woke in her coffin as a body snatcher was trying to rob her of her wedding rings. Her husband refused to believe it was the wife he had buried who came knocking at his door and she died (for real) soon after. Our final stop is Dublin's most haunted place, The 40 Steps. These steps go alongside a church. This particular spot is haunted by someone I think called The Green Lady, she was a woman who owned a brothel, got pregnant by a prominent dubliner and hid the baby so he wouldn't kill it, she was then accused of being a witch because of this and was burned at the stake. In addition, this is the church where the leader of The Hell Fire Club (this club that used to burn themselves so they could smell burnt flesh as they thought they would in hell) decided to go to a priest for his penance, claimed he saw the devil walking toward him down the aisles of the church. RAN the hell out of there and never came back to the country of Ireland again.
And these are pictures of CREEPY FREAKIN SMOKE
that came out of nowhere. Literally, there was no fog, no smoke nothing and this showed up in my camera. Caitlin was sufficiently freaked out and I was insanely curious. I even took a picture of my breath in front of the camera for comparison and it looks different,
It's the last one. super weird!!! I love ghost stories.
As Caitlin packed up her belongings Friday morning we discussed our weekend plans. She wanted nothing but to stay inside with David and make up for the hours she had missed with him while running about Dublin with me, I wanted to sit around, blog, email, sleep and just generally relax and hope that my cough would finally cease. As we made one last trek across campus together, both of us were sad to say goodbye but very excited for the promise of a free moment (or 48 hours) to come. After bidding her adieu and watching the aircoach drive away down a road I have yet to learn the name of I headed back to my dorm. This was around 11am, I then fell asleep until 4 or so and planned to get up and start doing something, but I still felt pretty exhausted, dinner was at 5:30 and then I was informed that my friend Maggie was having a party in her apartment, and I am in no position to bail on new friends at the moment. This party led us to the student bar, which closed down around midnight and then in an unfortunate hug turned tackle fiasco our friend Michelle smacked her head against the concrete and fearing she had a concussion, we all went home and her roommates took turns waking her every two hours. So much for Friday.
I go to sleep and expect to sleep half the day away on Saturday and get some much needed rest, however for the millionth time I wake up around 5am completely exhausted but unable to fall back asleep. I restart Angelica (my laptop) and hop on facebook, after a little while I feel I am able to go back to sleep so I try. I am awoken with a start at 7a (which is a story for another post), and spend the next few hours talking to John and Colby on facebook which was a nice treat. The one good thing about my involuntary early rising is it allows me to catch my friends as they are returning from their own parties or outings.
Anyhoo, I head sleepily down for brunch, the only meal offered on Saturdays, which consists of you guessed it, beans and sausages and this time, chips. They seriously serve chips aka french fries at EVERY meal. Wasn't really in the mood for that so I had like, three cups of coffee instead and some fruit.
Around noon I get a text from my new friend Julia saying it is her birthday on Monday and invited me out for waffles/crepes to celebrate. This outing turns into one of those times where you expect to just window shop but everyone needs to pop into various stores to look for things and we spent most of the afternoon downtown. Seetha and I went and got our eyebrows threaded, which sounds strange but was actually a million times less painful than waxing. I suggest it if you have eyebrows that like to take over your face if left unchecked.
We (being me, Julia, Seetha and Jon) returned to campus around 5 and went our own ways, promising to meet back up around 8 to begin the birthday celebration. Those partaking in the festivities were Me, Seetha, Julia, Jo, Maggie, Stephanie, Ali and Jon. Unfortunately for Jon he is the only guy and had to sit around as we all did our hair and makeup. I bought Julia a birthday crown to wear which shockingly stayed in until our cab ride home. Before heading out we took a series of silly pictures, my favorite of which is this one; which is a reaction to a noise Jon made when we decided to make "sad faces". Being the dumb international students that we are nobody has any clue when the buses come so we trekked along, merrily belting out hits from the nineties. We waited at the bus stop for at least 25 minutes where we just kept attempting to find a song that we could all sing all the way through, bus stop karaoke if you will. Just as the final bus arrived, so did about 50 students coming from the student bar. We piled onto the double decker bus and singing/shouting matches ensued between us and some irish lads in the back. Peace was finally found when someone started a rendition of Don't Stop Believing, I think the urge to sing along to that track is pretty universal. Our next stop for the evening was a pub in Temple Bar called The Auld Dubliner.
This place definitely has that pub feeling to it, leather stools, wooden tables, brick walls, totally sloshed irishmen. We danced along to tunes such as La Bamba and spilled our beers every which way during Cotton Eyed Joe, but soon decided we needed a snack and tumbled out the bar and across the street to our new favorite eatery, Abrakebabra. This is a clever name for a Kebab shop which has like pita/gyro type things and hamburgers on the cheap. Good drunk food. What happened next has to be my favorite moment of the night.
(picture in order; Julia, Seetha, Stephanie, Me, Maggie)
In case you hadn't heard, Will Smith's daughter is a singer now. She has a single on the radio entitled, Whip My Hair, in which she does just that, whips her hair around and around. The girl is ten, the song makes no sense and you want to hate it. But in the process of trying to hate on it, you might sing it a lot, you might even search it on youtube just to make fun but then it gets stuck in your head. INCEPTION. And then you love it. Now, Julia especially but Jon and I as well as everyone else really like to use "hairography" already. By that I mean we are big on flinging our head and bodies around while dancing and this song is the ideal one to do it to. We had been talking about it all night, but knowing no dj was likely to play it. We order our delicious late night snack and lo and behold, Willow pops up on the screen! Without a second hesitation, ponytails are out, purses are thrown down and we are raging. I whip my hair back and forth I whip my hair back and forth. I'm not talking jokingly swaying your head a little bit, I am talking commitment. Out of control, scaring the irish folk, my neck still hurts as I write this, commitment. We went on like this for three minutes as the various other people in the shop looked on in awe? horror? confusion? and slowly backed away from our corner of the place. I'm not really sure what impression we made but we had a darn good time.
After we were satiated we began our long journey to Harcourt street, the location of the various nite clubs. Our goal was to get into a place called Copperfaced Jacks aka Coppers, which is supposed to be pretty poppin'. You would have thought with its reputation we would think better of trying to get in at 1:30am but we will learn eventually. After stopping multiple people on the street for directions, nearly all of whom were tourists and had no idea, we finally found it and were faced with a line edging on two blocks long. While this particular club is open until 4 or 5 am we realized the night would be half gone by the time we made it in, and you can bet we wouldn't have no space to whip our hair in there. We turned around and decided to pop into the next place that looked appealing. It is hard to make a decision with a group larger than 4 or so people and we passed by a number of places, finally stopping into a pub that was painted green, with loud music and fogged up windows. Turns out it is a pub called Hogan's. The place had a kind of industrial but really warm feel to it and I was instantly happier. Could have been the warmth, could have been the swarms of hip looking people but we got good vibes from the place. As Stephanie and I went down to find the toilets we knew it was going to be a good choice because Superfreak came on, the next was Baby Got Back and then suddenly we were transported to Stockholm. Not that I have ever been to a dance party in Scandinavia, but Jon is from Norway and studies in Sweden
so he knows whats up.
The dj starts spinning all this electro-pop and we shimmy, shake and yes, whip our hair for another hour or so. The dance floor is in a basement, wood floors, brick walls, packed with people and multiple bartenders. It was just really super cool and hip and I will definitely be going back. Around 4am we decided to call it quits and rang up Julia's favorite cabbie, Joe. Now this was my first experience with Joe, and he certainly lived up to the hype. He instantly blasted the music, started jokingly swerving on the road, and turned the lights in the back on and off like a strobe light. Happy and appreciative we started changing all the song lyrics to fit his name;
Make me feel, like you're the only Joe in the world, the onlyyyy Joe in the world (Rihanna)
Since Joe picked us uppppp, we can breathe for the first time (Kelly Clarkson) etcetera.
As a birthday gift to Julia he popped out of the van and grabbed her a heineken from the trunk as we bid him goodnight and promised to call him every weekend to drive us home. Then it was back to Seetha's apartment for a spot of tea. All in all an extremely fun night.
Oh, did I mention I didn't have a drop of alcohol the whole time? My wallet and my health are a little bit happier. Proud, huh?
You guys know that scene in the first couple minutes of Mean Girls, when Cady (Lindsay Lohan's character) walks into the lunch room on her first day of school only to realize she doesn't really have a place to sit? She looks around the room, seeing nobody she knows and decides it is far too awkward and goes to the bathroom to eat her lunch alone in a stall?
That is how I feel in my dining hall. I have met a few girls from my apartment, and maybe one or two other people I recognize who live elsewhere in the building, but mealtimes go for a few hours and I don't know any of them enough to plan when to eat. Whenever I go down there are always groups filling the tables and chatting up a storm. I suppose I could sit and eat with them, but I tried that yesterday morning and it proved to be awkward. Not to mention, I don't really enjoy strangers watching me eat. Anyways this morning (okay 1pm) I went down I had my first course, this amazing veggie soup and sat all by myself. It was super awkward and so I pulled a Cady and took the rest of my food to go and got out of there as fast as I could. Hopefully I will meet a few people soon, or run into the ones I do know because this eating alone every meal business is kind of lonely and boring.
Food here thus far has been pretty good. I am living in a hall that is catered, so I have breakfast and dinner provided for me each day (except weekends). This past week Caitlin was visiting, so we went out to eat a lot. The dining hall though, has pretty delicious food as far as I can tell. The one issue is that nothing here is spicy. Caitlin and I found a thai place and we had to LOAD our food up with chili sauce to have it even compare to a level two in seattle thai speak. I have been missing spice hardcore. I finally went to the grocery today and found saracha sauce!!!!! score! Although it isn't the same as the one in the states (milder, no seeds) it is still a victory. I wanted chipotle seasoning SO BAD, as I put it on most everthing back home but no luck. The other thing I miss here is the selection of snack food. I am not a huge snacker by any means, but when I want a cracker, I know what i want. And what I want is cheez-its. In the states you want a cheesy cracker and you have options galore, cheez-its, cheese nips, goldfish and the offbrand crap that you can't quite decide if you like or not. Here there was one option, it was like water crackers with chedder and a hint of pickle, 6 Euro. No way I was going to splurge on that so I ventured along, that is when I saw their selection of pringles. The three weird choices were shrimp, roast turkey and pigs in a blanket. You know I couldn't walk away from that. Pigs in Blankets it was, it tastes a lot like it is sprinkled with Ramen flavor. The other thing I wanted was jalepeno chips, no go. They have at least six brands of "sweet chili" flavored chips but that is it aside from the basics of salt n vinegar and plain. Strange, yeah? Other than that I have found most things here to be good, and I miss little food of home. I hear rumor there is an indian restaurant downtown so I think things are gonna be okay. :)
so there it is, if you want to send me a care package I kindly request
1. Cheez-its
2. Chipotle seasoning
3. BBQ sauce
I am sorry to all who have been expecting current updates. I REALLY truly want to have this thing be up to date, a post a day is ideal. However, Caitlin was just visiting and classes were starting, there were birthdays and bachelorette parties and things just got hectic. I will attempt to recreate the memories here for you in the next day or so but even if I don't, hopefully I will keep up better in the future.
I am still not totally registered for all my courses here at UCD. I am supposedly required to take six courses at five credits each (30 credits) for the semester, I am trying to see if I can just take 5 courses, as six seems an overwhelming amount and 25 credits would still be full time for two quarters at UW. I didn't get into any of the sociology courses that I wanted. There are a few that I may be able to register for, but I have a feeling that I won't be getting any major requirements done while I am here. If I am looking at my program requirements properly it shouldn't be a problem when I return to UW as I will have a whole year to finish and I don't think I need that many more upper division courses. I don't know.
I am currently registered for
The Art of Narrative, a class that discusses irish folklore, legend and oral history.
Dublin: It's Museums, an art history course about dublin museums!
Ireland Uncovered, a multidisciplinary look at Irish culture and history for international students
Memory and Identity in Irish Literature, a lit course about those themes
so I will be taking very interesting things and all of them have to do with Ireland. While I may be slightly behind then on my sociology courses, I will have a nice foundation of information about Irish culture from various perspectives.
But until I get this sorted I'm feeling a bit like this
I think I made friends! I met a few girls from Australia this morning, Seetha and Jess and they seem really cool. We talked a bunch about the differences in lingo and I'll definitely write more about that later as I find it really fascinating. For example, if you were like super drunk last night.. they say you were maggot. Anyways, we are going downtown to do some shopping in about an hour! Now I need to jump in the shower and get ready but things look good. They want to go out with me for my birthday as well! :) Were also on a mission to find thai food.
One night and the pubs already got the better of me. It is one of those mornings where you lay in bed in the fetal position asking the world.. WHYYYYYYY? I really need to move and go to orientation. I think I made friends last night. I got more drinks for free than I paid for. Win? Everyone cross your fingers that I make it through orientation.
I really only expect my mother to comment on all of my posts. But if everyone else could comment occasionally, or just let me know here or on facebook that you are reading, it would be really nice. It will make me feel like writing is worthwhile and it will motivate me to keep it up. Which I really want to do for the sake of those interested and as a record of my trip for me to have in the future. Thanks!
xoxoxE
I didn't manage to make it to the international student welcome, which was probably not crucial although everyone did get a tote bag which I am a little sad I missed out on. Perhaps if I go to the international office they will have extras. Went to the IT guy and he couldn't figure out what was wrong with my computer, neither could I but I logged onto a different account name on my laptop and now it works. Such a relief. While I don't want to spend all my time online obviously, it is nice to feel that I have that connection. Things seemed more out of my control when I couldn't talk to anyone when I wanted to or look things up etc. Dinner tonight kind of sucked, we had some unfortunately dry meat with mushrooms (yuck) and french fries and carrots, both things I will eat but don't really like. I found a packet of "brown sauce" which I was hoping would be BBQ but it turned out to be just that... brown sauce. Couldn't tell you what it tasted like. It is a good thing I am not too picky, although I think when term begins you have choices...
There is allegedly some sort of pub crawl type situation tonight, I was told to meet outside this one building at 8 or 8:30, which means I am showing up at 7:45 because I am NOT MISSING THIS. Its been three days and I've yet to step foot in a pub. Its absurd! Plus I can FINALLY MEET PEOPLE.
It is SO HARD not to speak for so many days. I talked this girls ear off on the way to the grocery store earlier.
Just returned from the alleged shopping tour. It was slightly disorganized, nobody showed up until 10:45 and so they sent all the guides home. About ten of us showed up, the majority from the states with one girl from Australia and two from France, anyways we were sent off to the grocery store on our own which was fine. It was so nice to talk to people, especially since we are all going through the same thing! Bought some basics, lunch materials, nutella and tea. I am now going on a mission to find the tech support offices and get them to fix my freaking computer! Then there is the international welcome thing and later on some sort of social event. I will definitely be attending the latter. Quick nutella break and I’m on my way!
I plan to be productive today, since I haven’t met anyone yet and have nothing else to do. Breakfast today was more of the same, and by that I mean beans. However I saw someone get seconds on juice so I went for it too. Plus I grabbed an orange as an afternoon snack. This whole only eating twice and eating actual portions thing is probably going to make me lose weight which is a bonus. There are “shopping tours” departing every ten minutes between 10 and 11 today, so while I really don’t need to do much shopping, I am going to go along and see if I can meet people or learn where it is that I should go next time to buy things. Then I am going to find the tech support people and cry at them until they figure out how to get me wifi. It’s absurd and it makes no sense, I tried on my iTouch as well and it doesn’t work. I should have asked one of my hallmates if there’s was working, oh well. Then there is an International student welcome at 2 which I will aim to attend. After that I am hoping I either have friends and thus plans, or I will be bored and blogging some more. You guys certainly have a lot of reading material.
I heard some commotion earlier in the evening, a few girls voices and doors closing and whatnot. I knew some of my roommates must have been coming back from break, and the entire night I have been leaving my room as often as possible in order to hopefully run into them. Going back and forth to the kitchen for no real reason. Anyways, It is 10:43pm and I finally met someone! As I went out to fill up my water bottle I ran into a girl named Jemma, she asked if I wanted to meet the other roommates, who are named MaryKate and Emer (ee-mur, sp?). They are all off to Berlin tomorrow which I am quite jealous of. They seem quite nice and it is good to know that they travel together, perhaps they will want to accompany me on one of my adventures. I guess some other people must have moved out as they asked if I had seen anyone else moving in, we also have a chap named Micheal on our hall apparently. I’m not sure when I started saying the word chap, but I guess the Irish will do that to you. I was also informed on what Black Monday is. Apparently, everyone skips lecture and goes out drinking at the student bar.
(student bar? Whaaaat) Good to know, as otherwise I would have been in class like a fool. Things are looking up.
