Field Trip to Bowenscourt

On Friday we went to a large field where the Elizabeth Bowen's novel was based. The house has been burnt down, and the land now belongs to a farmer.

Field where the house used to be.

This is a photograph of the house.

This is an art gallery in Cork that Mary brought us to.

First Week Completed!

I have officially been in Ireland for one full week! It seems like I left home with my big bed and home cooked meals years ago. I started my Early Start program on Monday, which is one course based on Irish Literature. So far the text, Elizabeth Bowen's "Last September," we have been reading for the class has been interesting because Mary chose a novel that is set in Cork. On Friday we are going on a field trip to the specific location in North Cork that the novel is specifically based on. The Early Start program is a great way to start the semester because we get a feel for the campus before the other 18,000 students arrive.

Everyone here has been so welcoming and helpful to us everywhere we go. I am definitely fascinated with how much we stand out to everyone here, apparently before we speak it is our clothing choices and teeth that set us apart from everyone. Many of the people that I have met have asked a million questions about what life is like at home, and what the differences are between the United States and Ireland. The differences do not seem that large, but at the most random times I remember how far I am from home. The most difficult adjustment has been shopping at the grocery store. My two roommates and I wandered around the grocery store as if we had never been in one before. We have not been able to locate some of our favorite foods that we did not even realize would be nonexistent in Ireland (pretzels, American cheese, and regular butter). This is obviously just something that we have to get used to and we will definitely make a list before the next time we go back. One big difference is that they charge you for bags, so we had to bring backpacks with us to bring all of our stuff home. I actually think that charging for bags really does dramatically reduce the amount of paper and plastic waste. With the exception of the grocery store, the adjustment to the Irish way of life is probably the easiest change to make. I could definitely get used to the half hour coffee breaks in class, the ability to sit in a restaurant for hours, and that everywhere we go is within walking distance. Life here is just very calm and relaxing.

Some exciting stuff coming up in the next couple of weeks is a three day trip to Dublin with my Early Start class. Then Mary gave us a three day weekend following the trip so we are flying out of Dublin on Thursday to go to London till Sunday!! I cannot wait for either trips, when I get to London I will have to reenact the entire Royal Wedding for sure. I will start posting more pictures when we start going to newer places!!

Pictures!

Gap of Dunlow

Gap of Dunlow

Downtown Cork

Jameson Factory

Beach where we had dinner

Gap of Dunlow with Kathleen (RoOmIeS LoL)

Bodega

Mountains, Boats, and Pubs Galore

Here I am, made it through the first weekend! After orientation we went to this pub for dinner called Bodega which was so cool! It was more trendy than I expected, but the decorations were kind of bizarre and reminded me of Alice in Wonderland. There were massive random origami cranes hanging everywhere, and then all of the artwork had different themes. Besides the odd decorations the restaurant was really cool and delicious. So far the weirdest aspect of the food to me is how they use mayonnaise as a dipping condiment, similar to ketchup.

Saturday during the day we went to Kilarney national park for a tour/hike. The day started off with a two hour bus ride through the lakes, which was really beautiful. I was very skeptical of the ride considering it was a large row boat with the tiniest motor I have ever seen, and the boat driver starts the trip with "you all can swim right?" In the end it was beautiful and we all got to sport super cute neon orange lifejackets that smelled like body odor for two hours. After the boat ride we did a 10 mile hike through the mountains, yikes. This was to see the Gap of Dunlow that was absolutely beautiful, unfortunately we still had 5 miles post-Gap to get back to our bus. I am happy that we did the hike, but was not the happiest camper during the hike.

I forgot to mention before that our bus driver Liam is amazing. He brings us everywhere we go in Cork and is the nicest guy. Unfortunately we cannot understand his accent at all, yesterday he said something to a couple of us as we were walking out of the bus, then just walked off the bus that was still running. We were left with jaws dropped wondering if we were supposed to watch the bus while he was gone. Overall though, he is so nice and a great person to have.

During the evening we went to two new places that we haven't been to before. One of them was called the Brogue that had lots of dancing and the best part, lots of American music. After that we went to "The Wash" (that's what the locals call it) and it was 70's night! I knew it was the place for me when I walked in and the Grease theme song was playing. The music was a lot of fun and everyone in the bar was wearing Afros and disco clothing.

Tomorrow I start my early start class so I should probably should go to bed! Goodnight!!

First Days!

I am officially on day three of my four month visit to Cork!! The city is the CUTEST place I have ever seen. All of the store fronts are bright colors with the most stereotypical Irish names (Baileys, Bradleys, MacSweeneys). The first day we were taken on a tour around Cork to help us set up our rooms and figure out our surroundings, then we went to Luigi Malones for dinner. Kathleen and I caused a scene when we ordered the knickerbocker dessert, on the menu it said that this item will bring a sparkle to your eye, so there literally was a lit sparkler in the middle of this weird ice cream, fruit combination. Not going to lie, not a fan of the knickerbockers. Then later that night we went out to two bars, Baileys and Reirdens. Reirdens had a live band that played lots of fun American songs, like Journey, Little Lion Man (made me think of Christopher and Ray), and other music.
Then on Thursday we went to the Barryscourt Castle, which looked huge on the outside, but once we got inside it was pretty disappointing. It was only three floors with just one room on each floor. After the castle we went to the Middleton Distillery which is the Jameson factory. Kathleen and I could not stop laughing because the way they were speaking of the whiskey you would think that they were describing the process of making some time of precious, rare artifact. At the end of the tour 8 of us volunteered to do the whiskey tasting, where we took shots of Jameson, Scotch, and Jack Daniels, I hated ALL of them. The only relief we had from the harsh, disgusting whiskey was water... because that really helps. We received certificates after so I guess that made it all worth it in the end.
Today we made it over to UCC for orientation the campus is beautiful and the buildings look like castles. All of the teachers that spoke seemed really nice. Alright well we are off to go food shopping now!