Day 2 in Dublin - 1st Day of Orientation

In only one evening, the eight of us had managed to form a group. When Geoff met us in the dining room as we had breakfast the next day, he found us all eating at the same table, talking nonstop. We rode the bus downtown to Merrion Square where the new IFSA offices are. Dublin has a series of squares in them, the centers of which are occupied by beautiful park spaces, albeit ones that are considerably wilder-looking than parks at home. The IFSA offices are located in the basement of an old Georgian house, so we actually went down the stairs to the entrance from the sidewalk, into a lovely building, freshly painted, with comfortable seats for us to sit in while we were oriented about Life in Ireland, our first topic. To be honest, I don't remember a whole lot of what the body of this discussion was about - presumably things like the differences between tipping in the US and Ireland, the importance of sport, and other equally useful topics. As far as I'm concerned, the most interesting thing was that I didn't fall asleep during this, or any of the other lectures that day.

After Tim finished his spiel, we had some free time so the group of us went on a walk through the square. Parts of it are really heavily wooded - it's all this dark, rich green and the air was moist and cool, really lovely - and then all of a sudden it would open up into this totally hidden, perfectly manicured expanse of lawn, with gorgeous flowers everywhere. As we walked through, we came across three monuments which two of my friends and I went to investigate. The first was a statue of a woman donated by Brewbaker's Bakery to the City of Dublin and for all Dubliners to enjoy. It was so interesting - the bakery was so old (from the 1800s I think) and yet later that day we passed Brewbaker's Bakery! It was right there! Sometimes I forget that things - places, buildings, businesses - can survive that long, because so little in the US seems to last. In Ireland, even if something doesn't survive, the memory of it does.

The second monument I practically stumbled over. It was placed between the other two larger monuments or I wouldn't have seen it all. A small marker stone on the ground bore a simple inscription that honored victims of every and any form of abuse. It was so unobtrusive and hidden, so unassuming, and yet such a powerful symbol. Sometimes less is more - although I could still understand how someone could say that such a small monument, so camouflaged is disrespectful to victims, that this is an issue that should get more attention, but I think the monument as it was had dignity and was lovely.

After the first two monuments, we had no idea what to expect for the third, which turned out to be a beautiful poem about children. It turns out that one of the foremost natal hospitals in Ireland was only a block away, so it was very geographically-appropriate. By then, it was time to go back for our next lecture, on Nutrition. Sum up: Don't eat white bread. Make sure to get lots of fruits, veggies (or veg here), and protein. Try to prevent blood sugar from getting either too low or too high. Yay for health food! Plus we got all kinds of recipes for stuff we can make in our apartment kitchens, so that was nice.

After lunch, Karen, a representative from UCC (University College Cork, where I'll be going to school), came and spoke to us about courses and campus life and then it was off to our first real activity of the day: a tour of the Georgian and Medieval/Viking parts of Dublin!!

What I learned about Georgian architecture: Very geometric. Georgian architecture looked for symmetry and straight lines.Traditionally Georgian houses have 5 levels: the basement, housing the kitchen, furnace and laundry rooms; the ground floor with the waiting rooms and coat closets, presumably; the 1st floor with dining room, parlour, sitting room, drawing room, etc., 2nd floor with family living quarters and; 3rd floor with the servants living quarters. There really wasn't a whole lot to see besides that, although there's a house near the office that is restored and people can walk through - I wanted to do this, but didn't get a chance while in Dublin. Maybe next time - I'm sure I'll be back at some point. Dublin experienced a time of great affluence during the Georgian period, which lasted until the aristocracy stopped going to Dublin, at which point the Georgian houses were converted to tenements.

From the Georgian section of town we headed over to Trinity College, which is beautiful and MUCH bigger than St. Peter's, the college I stayed at in Oxford. Trinity was originally intended to be one college of a university like Oxford or Cambridge, but the money ran out. This was the mantra repeated LOTS of places we went, but in this case, it doesn't seem to have worked out too badly. From Trinity, we went to Dublin Castle, which no longer exists in it's original form or in many of it's subsequent parts. Today the oldest part I think dates to the 11th or 12th centuries, and the moat was filled in. The castle is used for government inquiries now and when we were there, there were 4 impressive sand sculptures in the courtyard. Dublin was a Viking settlement so Dublin has three names, technically - 1. Viking, from which we got 2. Dublin, the English version and 3. the Irish version. We wandered around Temple Bar, to look at the remnants of the Viking city and our tour guide (a history lecturer at university here) complained about Ireland's disinterest in preserving archaeological sites and then we were turned loose - on our own until our evening entertainment: Riverdance!

Kathryn, Sophie and I decided to go to the National Gallery, where I discovered that a man named Harry Clarke has a lot on common with Erte. He's a BIG deal in Ireland and actually did the stained glass in the chapel at UCC. Besides his regularly displayed work, they were featuring an exhibit of his illustrations of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales which we all loved. Very creepy and colorful, but the detail was insane. We were entranced, enraptured and totally into it, to say the least... and then it was time to meet up with the other girls, because we had arranged to all have dinner together in Temple Bar before meeting the adults at the theater. (Yes, we're all technically adults, but come on.)

Riverdance was great fun, though I did fall asleep during the first act. Not sure if that was jet lag or that part of the show - I definitely wasn't the only one and Provigil can only do so much for an 8 hour time-shift!

First Day, cont.

Bridget and I checked in at the IFSA (Institute for Study Abroad) table with Geoff, who we learned was one of our program advisors. We got our keys, free breakfast coupons, maps of Dublin and health insurance info, plus the schedule of events for our time in Dublin. After deciding to go down to breakfast after settling in a bit, I went into my room and met my roommate Elle, who was trying to rest - jetlag hit everyone pretty hard. (Incidentally, that is the one real benefit to my sleeping problems - I don't really get jetlag because I'll sleep whenever I get a chance to sleep!) Bridget's roommate was sleeping, but she came over and met Elle who, it turned out, goes to school with Bridget's roommate. Elle went back to sleep and the two of us went downstairs.

Breakfast was a buffet - choice of two cold items, plus hot items, toast, and tea or coffee. IFSA arranged for us to have enough breakfast coupons for every day we were in Dublin which was lovely. We pulled out our maps of Dublin and tried to figure out what to do that day, since we didn't have anywhere we had to be until 6:30 and it was only mid-morning. We decided to go to the National Gallery and maybe to look for cell phones. Bridget wanted some time to unpack, so we agreed to meet up in a few hours. Against our best intentions however, none of that ended up happening. As I found out later, Bridget fell asleep and slept the whole day, so I spent the day reading, surfing the internet, and watching bad tv with Elle - basically anything except sleeping.

The group of us met up that night for dinner all freshened, at that point, having no idea how many of us to expect. Between Elle, Bridget, Bridget's roommate Sophia and I, we knew half the group, because it turned out, there were only 8 people signed up for the Early Start Program who had applied through IFSA - and we were all girls. I don't know what we'd all been expecting, but that wasn't quite it. While we were in Dublin, IFSA provided us with breakfast and one other meal each day - that day it was dinner and they spared no expense. Little did we know that we wouldn't likely be getting quite such royal treatment in the future - though we all agreed it was nice while it lasted! Dinner gave us and our 3 advisors a chance to get to know each other. Geoff was a young lawyer and rather the restraining hand on Tim, the head advisor I suppose. They both work in the Dublin office. Suzy is our person in Cork - who was really helpful when I got sick this week! After dinner, us 8 girls went to a nearby pub to hang out for a while and then split up with 3 girls going out for a while longer and the other 5 of us going to sleep, after a painfully long day. Day 1 in Dublin, over and done with!

The Trip Here

IMPORTANT NOTE:
Some of the stuff that will be included in these entries will probably not interest you. Sorry. Feel free to skip anything you don't care about! This is going to be like my travel journal, so some of the stuff that is included is more for me to remember and not because I necessarily think everyone cares about everything I'm going to be doing.


And now, on with the trip here!
I was nervous, I'll admit it. I always am before I go on an adventure - whether it be to camp Oxford, IU, Israel, BCI or anywhere where I don't really know what I'm getting myself into, I will always spend anywhere between a week ahead of my departure to a day before totally and completely freaking out. This is my normal process and I'm used to it, but it means that I always make a point to start off as positively as possible. Great idea in theory, but this doesn't take into account Murphy's Law which was in full effect after my dad dropped me off at the airport shortly after 5am Sunday morning.

After asking whether I should be in the domestic or international line for check-in at United, I was directed to the international line, where, upon trying to use the machine, I was electronically informed that I had to go to Aer Lingus at the Bradley terminal on the other side of LAX. I hopped on the shuttle bus, frustrated and got to Bradley, where I asked someone who worked there where I could find the Aer Lingus section. He told me they didn't open until 2pm, which made catching a 6.50am flight rather difficult. He sent me back to United so I got back on the shuttle bus to return to Terminal 7 and United Airlines. By now, I'll admit I was utterly frustrated, trying not to cry hysterically and totally afraid of missing my flight. By the time I got back to United, it was a quarter to 6. I asked the first person I saw where exactly I should go, since I was running out of time and I didn't know which line to get in. They sent me to the paper ticket line, even though I had an e-ticket, so I asked someone else. She didn't work for United, but she found a man who did, who took me to a free check-in machine, got the same message I got and then directed me to a woman who quickly checked me in. I finally had my boarding ticket, and I could only hope that my suitcase got on the right plane.

From then on, everything went smoothly. I arrived in Chicago after sleeping the whole flight, got in a cab and was off to meet Cayle! The cabdriver's name was Beck. I learned that he and his wife had gone on their honeymoon to Hawaii, that they were expecting a baby girl in December, and that he was studying to be a CPA. Beck was from Kyrgyzstan, although he had been going to university in Turkey before moving to the US. He was very friendly and so nice - a lovely experience after my miserable airport mess. I got to Cayle's house, where I met her roommate Sam and Sam's parents. We hung out for a while (and watched a bunch of YouTube videos - highlights includinging the John Mayer/Ellen DeGeneres duet and Eddie Izzard's Learning French) and then I had to go back to the airport - but the Midwest gave me a lovely thunderstorm as a send-off present. :)

Back at O'Hare, I checked in and called a bunch of people. I was full of nervous energy and I'm sure I annoyed everyone sitting near me, but I couldn't help it. I was too excited to sit still. The plane ended up being fairly empty - I was in a two-seat row with no one sitting next to me, so I curled up and stole the extra pillow. The flight to Ireland was maybe the smoothest flight I've ever been on. There was absolutely no turbulence. I slept on and off, finding time to finish the book I was reading, start reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and eat the banana bread Cayle sent with me. I tried to figure out how to work the little tv on the back of the seat in front of me but the remote controller didn't seem to be working so I gave up on that.

Once we landed, I went through customs, got my luggage and met a girl named Bridget, who's on the same program as me, though she's doing the Irish music program and I'm doing Irish literature. We got our bus tickets and got on the shuttle bus without a problem, although we did almost get off at the wrong stop. The hotel we're staying at 'til Thursday is called the Bewley's Hotel and it's far nicer than I expected - definitely not your typical college student accommodations!! It's right across the street from the Dublin Four Seasons, actually, which made me laugh. Not much more to say yet, but I'm sure I'll have more to talk about later!