Ah! So I’m finally finally hereeee! After waiting months and months, I have finally touched down in Dublin, Ireland.
The past few days have been really busy and disorienting- getting used to jet lag, getting used to campus, getting used to Guinness ( J) and going through Orientations has really filled up my schedule. I’m just gonna give you a brief rundown of the things that have happened so far since I’ve been here:
On Sunday, the 19th, my mom, sister and I drove to Boston’s Logan Airport. We got there around 4:30 or so, and after checking my bag, waiting in an absurdly long line for security, and saying a tearful goodbye to my mom and Michaela, I was able to meet up with the 2 girls that are travelling with me from Northeastern. I didn’t know either of them beforehand, but we’ve grown closer with a 6 hour plane ride and 3 full days in Dublin. Alex is a middler (3rd year for those not familiar with NU’s 5 year plan) studying International Affairs. Tricia is a senior who has never been anywhere other than the East coast! What a change for her! We waited just a little while before the plane began to board and passed the time by talking about our backgrounds at school, what we’re looking forward to in Dublin, etc. When we boarded, the three of us were in row 19 (close to the front on a 45+ row plane!) and began to pass the time by playing the games in the headset in front of us. After my unsuccessful attempts at winning a million dollars on “Who wants to be a Millionaire,” I switched to watching some random TV shows from the selection that the plane had. We got served a meal of chicken, veggies, and rice with a small side salad about halfway through the flight and it was surprisingly good.
We landed a little ahead of schedule, at about 5:00am Irish time, and went to get our bags. Walking through the airport with 2 bags, a camera bag and a sling was an ordeal in and of itself, but I made it work J We had to wait until about 7am for Don and Martin (the University officials for the program) to come pick us up in a coach bus. While we were waiting, we met 3 kids from Siena College in NY- Katie, Maggie and TJ. We all loaded our bags, boarded the bus and went to our new home for the next 3 months. After getting settled into our rooms, we went on a short walking tour of the campus with Martin- just something to get ourselves oriented. We didn’t have to do anything until about 1:30 that day, so we were all able to go back to our rooms and take a short nap to make up for the lack of sleep and time change we’d all experienced. Funny enough, when I got to my room, I realized that I had absolutely no way to set myself an alarm clock. My American cellphone wasn’t receiving a satellite signal so the time was not displayed, hence me not being able to set an alarm. My iPod and computer were both dead and not salvageable at that point because I didn’t bring a European converter with me to plug them in to charge. I walked around my new apartment for a little while, exhausted and just wanting to go to sleep, looking for everything and anything that could wake me up in 3 hours time. Riona to the rescue! Riona is one of my roommates- originally from about 40 minutes outside of Dublin, she had gotten up to get herself a waterbottle and ran into me (very Zombie-like) in the hallway. After introducing myself and chatting for a moment, I asked her if she had any kind of alarm that I could borrow. Thankfully, she did and all was well. When that alarm clock went off, all I wanted to do was throw it across the room and go back to sleep. I got up though, got myself ready and went to meet the rest of the group.
With everyone there, Martin took us for a more comprehensive walking tour of the campus, and then lead us about 10 minutes off campus to the local mall. It’s called the OMNI center and it’s much like the Emerald Square mall, just with a grocery store. First thing was first, I needed to buy sheets, towels and other basic necessities to make it through the first few days in my new apartment. I was also able to purchase a phone here- we all know how technologically reliant I am J I feel like I reverted back to my 7th grade cellphone/brick. It’s really not that bad though, and the prepaid plan and mobile to mobile package that was included is perfect for the purpose this phone is going to serve. We left the Omni center after about an hour or so and headed back to campus to chill for a little while.
In this time, instead of napping again, I decided to set up my room so that I would be all set that night. Here are some pictures of my room/apartment before and after:
My own bathroom!
hallway of the apartment
And here's my bedroom post-decorating!
That night, I also met my other roommate, a 4th year boy named Shawn who is originally from about 2 hours west of Dublin. We talked for a bit and then he had to run!
A couple of us had talked earlier in the day about getting dinner together or going out to the city, so around 6 o’clock (1:00pm at home), we ventured to the nearest bus stop and hopped on, paying exact change of 1.60 euro to ride the bus to the city center. We started talking to 2 girls who were on the bus with us and got the low down on some of the city’s hot spots. When we got off of the bus, there was a large crowd gathered outside. Naturally curious, we stopped and joined the throngs of people, wondering what it was all about. Fast forward 3 minutes and an announcer booms “Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome star of ‘The Town,’ Ben Affleck!” ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! What are the chances of that even happening? Off of the city bus onto the red carpet?! He walked through the crowd lined, red-carpeted walkway, into the nearest building for the European premiere of The Town- which was released about a week ago in the US.
We stayed for a few minutes, snapped some photos, marveled at our luck and then made our way down the street. Ryan, a kid that I was with, was asking random people what was good, where we should go, what was fun, etc. After a few interviews, we wandered into Temple Bar- the most touristy/young-people-targeted/drunk section of Dublin. We ended up settling on a place called Gogarty’s Irish pub- a three story stucco building vibrating with music. On the bottom floor was a regular bar- full of people drinking and dancing to a local performer’s rendition of Ireland’s most traditional music. We were in the mood for some food too, so we went up to the second floor, where we found a less crowded version of the first floor. Two men were singing and playing traditional Irish music and there were tables to sit down and order bar food. First stop: the bar. I must admit that my first beer in Ireland was not a Guinness (even though my second and third were!), it was actually a Smithwick’s. It was still delicious though! After a few minutes of idling at the bar, we were sat at a table in the corner and ordered some food. I ordered an Irish soup of the day- which actually turned out to be a delicious steaming bowl of White Asparagus soup. Some of the others in the group got the Seafood chowder and Fish and chips- a lovely first meal in Ireland. We stayed there for a little while listening to the Irish music, singing along when we could, and having a good time. We left the city around 9 or so to head back to campus, as we had been invited to nuBAR (one of the on campus bars) by an Irish student we had run into earlier in the day. NuBAR was so much fun! There was a DJ playing music and tons of people in the bar area, on the dance floor, and outside. We stayed there until it closed around midnight and headed back to our rooms to try to catch up on some sleep that we were severely lacking.
The next morning at 9:30, we were to meet for our first official day of Orientation with Martin and Don. We talked about a lot of the logistics of the program, adjusting, the way the week would be set up, etc. and then were free for lunch. Alex and I went to a 7/11-esque type of store that is on campus and got a wrap for lunch. Delicious and relatively cheap too! We met back up with the rest of the group at 1:30 when we all got on the city bus together and travelled to the city center. We met at Trinity College, where Martin and Don split the group and took us on walking tours of the main roads in the city. I’ve got some pictures of this walk for you too!
Trinity college
First leprechaun!
River Liffey
Millenium monument (or something like that)
The city really reminds me of Boston, surprisingly. While no buildings exceed 4 or 5 stories, there is a similar atmosphere here. We walked around with Martin for about an hour on the walking tour, and then split off on our own to grab a few things, get some coffee/a milkshake, and explore at our own pace. At around 5:30, we hopped back on the bus to campus. We also had decided to make food as a group that night, and about 10-15 people were going to come over to my apartment to cook. So, a group of us went to Omni again and picked up some pasta, sauce, salad, frozen pizza, and alcohol. The pasta and sauce was simple, but delicious! In the mix of things, my other roommate who had already moved in joined the party and brought some of his friends. His name is Kosuke and he is from Japan. He’s really fun and actually ended up coming out with us later!
From some new acquaintances on campus, we heard that there was a toga/paint party being held at nuBAR that night. Well- we were all for it! Instead of togas though, we just dressed in white Ts and headed to nuBAR for the party. Outside, a student group had set up cups of different colored paint, and Alex and I joined the line to wait for our turn to stick our hands in the cups and get messy. By the end of the night, we both looked like a mural of Green, Orange, Red and Purple paint. NuBAR closed at 12, so all paint covered; we headed to a friend’s place off campus to keep on goin’. The off campus apartments are much like the ones we live in at DCU, but are not owned by the University. There were quads in the middle of big apartment complexes though and we were able to meet a lot of different people throughout the night by walking through the quads and into apartments that were having parties. We actually met a few really cool kids from Ireland, who we agreed to cook an American dinner for (in exchange for an Irish breakfast!).
I got home around 2am or so, took a shower to get the paint off, and went to bed. Orientation at 9:30 AM again! Today we talked mostly about our classes and timetables, but that will be finalized tomorrow & we’ll see what I’m officially taking.
We’re having another dinner party here tonight with a bunch of people so I’m looking forward to it. We’re going to go into the city center tonight too- you’ll hear about that another time! J
Cheers!
Great first post, Jilly! So happy you're settling in well...and a dinner party on day/night 1 - why doesn't that surprise me?? Miss and love you tons. Mom/Dad
ReplyDeleteWow- guess what? I have had dinner at that place in temple bar! I basically stayed a drunk mess in Temple Bar the entire two times I was there I think! You are so lucky to have an awesome apartment and your decorating skills were put to good use :) The paint/toga party sounds amazing- cheee-HOOO!!
ReplyDelete(Ummm btw- get used to this- I am gonna comment on EVERY post!)
<3 youuuu