"They say if you get far enough away you'll be on your way back home."

Traveling is like a menu...

That has been one of the best and worst things I've discovered about exploring. There are so many choices, so many flavors you can taste, so many adventures you can chose to go on! Do I want a club sandwich? Irish stew? A Greek salad? Or a California roll? But you just can't order it all. You can have whatever you want, but you don't really know what you want until you have it. Going abroad just takes it to a whole new level, you aren't just passing through staying in hotels and seeing the sites--you are actually making a home and a life only to pick it up 4 months later. To continue with the menu simile, it's like you are committing yourself to a 100 course meal that will take you 4 months to eat!

I love traveling and think that living in one spot for an extended period of time is far more valuable for me than going on a "see it all in one week" type of vacation. I am realizing (and trying to accept) that you have to appreciate where you are AND also recognize that being somewhere else and experiencing another place can be just as rewarding. At the risk of sounding cliche, it's about living in the moment, understanding that there are many types of cakes you can eat, and enjoying every bite you take without worrying about when the cake is gone.

It's the end of the week of camp, when it's hard to respond to the question: what was the best part? Because every moment was amazing. When you have so many places you can call home, you are lucky. And boy am I lucky.

"Isn't it just horrible?" On saying goodbye, American pronunciation of leisure, and my last week in Ireland 12/9-12/24

You can tell a lot about a culture when you look at the language used daily. For example, the Irish have more words for drunk than I have fingers.

Getting into the Christmas spirit with Corky!

1. Pissed
2. In the bakes/rats
3. knackered
4. langered
5. loaded
6. twisted
7.scuttered
8. cunted
9. to be off/out of one's head
10. wrecked
11. plastered
12. trolleyed

The week after my Galway weekend was pretty low key full of studying for my upcoming and impossible nutrition test, watching bad Irish TV (Coronation Street, Take Me Out, and Come Dine With Me), and lounging about. Tuesday marked another surf party, this one was much more mellow because many members had tests that week. My friend Kelsey and I party hopped that night going from surfers to her boyfriend's work party at the Leisureplex, which is basically a bowling alley and arcade. We were pretty popular at the work party because according to Irish people American's are all really good at bowling--well I proved them wrong!! After leaving behind the surfers we headed to Cubins, a club. They were charging 8 euro entrance fee so I decided to head home, but on my way out the bouncer told me I could get in for free! Woohoo! I'm so glad it was free because the club was empty bar a few creepy old men. So far I definitely have not had the best luck with dance clubs.

A well-behaved attendee at the Cowpunchers' Ball

Thursday after my impossibly hard nutrition test I headed into town with my friend Jessie to buy a dress for the Cowpunchers' Ball that evening! Yes, you read that correctly--a ball! We started off the afternoon with lots of luck, finding a cheap and beautiful dress in the first store we went too! That only left the shoes. We marched all over the town searching for the perfect pair until we almost ran out of time. Eventually we went back to Penney's and found a sassy pair of magenta heels. The relief was short lived when we waited 45 minutes for the bus. I didn't even have time to straighten my hair before I had to head out for the ball!

The ball was sort of like a mix between prom and a wedding. A big group of food science students (the cowpunchers) and us took a cab over to the hotel where the ball was located. We sat at a table and ate a tasty meal of soup, bread, turkey, ham, potatoes, and a smorgasbord of desserts. After dinner I was too stuffed to move and that's when the dancing started! First a tacky wedding band called "Deuces Wild" played every one's favorites and then a DJ took over. Dancing around was a blast once my stomach shrunk a bit. Highlight? When they play "Rock the Boat" every sits on their butts in a line like they are sitting in a canoe and then pretend to row the boat. It's very weird, but kinda fun!

At the Loch

After all the excitement of the ball and the stress of test, the weekend was pretty uneventful complete with episodes of Father Ted and Home Alone. Father Ted is a comedy from the late '90s about three Irish priests who live on a tiny island and who don't quite fill the image of a priest. Saturday night Ruby, Kristen, and myself crossed town and went to a comedy show at the Craic House! Turns out, amateur comedy is pretty similar no matter what side of the globe you are on!

You can imagine how upset I was when the next morning I woke up feeling sick with a combination fever/cold--my last week in Ireland and I felt like hiding under the covers. Luckily I have amazing friends who came to keep me company and feed me, a student health center that is friendly and understanding, and half of an essay already finished!

I made a pretty quick recovery and was leaving the house by Friday to buy Christmas presents, go on a walking tour of Cork with Cecilia, Shane, Kelsey, and Shane, enjoy the snow, drink some final pints, and say goodbye to friends over hot beverages.

I thought packing and saying goodbye was hard enough, but then the worst thing possible happened. All of my friends went home and I was almost completely physically and emotionally ready to head back to Portland (or as ready as I'd ever be) when my flight home was canceled. Luckily I was able to schedule another flight that would get me home for Christmas Eve, but having the extra, unanticipated days was more emotionally draining than any days I have ever experienced. I could hardly spend any time in my cold and empty apartment that became increasingly more clinical each time I came home. Luckily my friend Cecilia came to the rescue inviting me to spend a couple days out at her family home in Watergrasshill (real name) 25 minutes outside of Cork city.

On a stroll through the snowy Irish countryside

I have never been more grateful for anything in my life. Not only was the thought of spending more time in my half packed, empty apartment bleak, but no one should spend the week before Christmas alone. Her house was warm and cozy and most importantly full and friendly! Her mom made us homemade pizzas and we all snuggled up watching CSI. The next morning we went on a mother-daughter-guest walk through the snowy country and passed by an estate from the 1600s! Other than the old manor, it was exactly how I would have spent the morning if I had been at home.

From Cecilia's house I went directly to the bus station, boarded my bus for Limerick, got a pint, and headed to my Travelodgethe only restaurant nearby) and bad TV. The next morning I said goodbye to Ireland and flew away from one home towards another.

Lep-a-chons, slippy streets, and great craic! Galway 12/3-12/5

Traditional Irish music performed by foreigners

After such an exciting weekend of not surfing, I needed a week to recover and recuperate- something I didn't quite succeed in! Monday was filled with Deal or No Deal, lectures, and a visit from Ruby's parents! Dinner was a blast and started out on a good note when Ruby's parents picked us up and saved us from the long, cold walk into town. We went to a pub called Reidy's where a little old lady runs the bar. Since it was my first and only time eating in a pub I figured I should really Irish it up and ordered Irish stew and a Guinness. After filling our bellies with warm stew we drove down to An Spailpin Fanac where we caught the majority of the UCC Trad Society's weekly session. I just love a good trad session, definitely an experience unlike any other live music performance.

Our boots at the Cliffs of Moher

The next day instead of getting a good night's rest I allowed myself to be convinced by my friend Hannah to go to the Surf Club party. We started out in the New Bar on campus where men with bad mustaches were flocking to celebrate the last day of Movember. Movember is a campaign to raise awareness and funds for prostate cancer research in Ireland. Basically it's an excuse for men to grow horrible mustaches, but at least it's for a good cause! From campus we headed down to Bourbon St. a bar on McCurtain, all the way across town! At the pub we all gathered, schmoozed and listened to some great student performers. When Bourbon St. closed we trooped over to An Brog as usual and danced the night away!

Some great craic in Taaffes

I spent the rest of the week recovering from my surf club induced fun and finally started studying for my microbiology/immunology exam that Friday. Studying for that test was tedious and nerve-wrecking, not only was my hypochondria flaring up but I was struggling to memorize all the information about the million diseases we studied! The test ended up not being as hard I had anticipated, but I also think I got lucky and studied the right stuff!

From the test taking room I headed straight into town and boarded the Citylink bus heading towards Galway to meet up with Emily. The bus ride took longer than usual due to wintry conditions and I wandered lost around Galway for 25 minutes before calling Ruby to ask for directions to the hostel. But it was all worth it when I heard Emily's voice in the hall of Sleepzone (what a great name for the hostel!)

The Cliffs of Moher

First thing we did in Galway was to decide where we would explore that evening. Luckily for us, the Irish are both really helpful and knowledgeable about craic and people who work in hostel are notoriously friendly. So you can imagine how nice the reception workers were! One employee took it upon himself to draw us a map of clubs, pubs, and general areas of interest and then color code them: traditional pub, dance club, late bar, or regular bar. First stop was Taaffes, a traditional Irish pub known for their pint of Guinness. Inside the pub was packed and in the furthest corner four musicians belted out Irish traditional music. The youngest member (looked a bit like McLovin) who was wearing a shirt that said "where's my pint?" in Irish switched from playing the spoons to the uilleann pipes and then even stood up for a little dance number. Basically, no more craic could have fit in that pub!

Yoga at the mini cliffs!

From there we headed to another traditional Irish pub called Tig Cóilí where the atmosphere was a bit more subdued. We bought pints of Guinness and sat next to the musicians to absorb some more trad. Unlike the other group, two members of this trio were not even Irish! One was Canadian and the other a Dane! At midnight when the pub closed we were enticed by some promoters to go into a dance club called "Club K" where half of the 20 people inside were over the age of 40 and definitely should not be dancing the way they were! Hungry after all of our Irish culture we went to McDonald's a bought 2 euro double cheeseburgers and chicken wings for the walk home. Outside of our hostel we ran into a group of Spanish men who, as many Spanish men do, gave us a mild harassing. And that concluded our first night in Galway!

The next morning woke up early, bought breakfast sausage rolls, and boarded a bus for our tour of the Burren and the Cliffs of Moher! The tour lasted all day and was quite the good time, although it had to be modified due to the weather conditions. On the bus we found ourselves reunited and even sitting next to our crude Spanish friends from the night before, who in the light of day were much friendlier and even gave us some potato chips! Our bus driver did the best he could with the conditions telling us lots of fairy stories and what life was like growing up in Galway. We stopped at the Cliffs of Moher, the mini cliffs, Leprechaun head, an O'brien towerhouse, the Burren, and the Ballyalban Fairy Fort!

craic is all about. My Irish friends will argue with me on this, but it seems to me that craic after a night out consists of talking smack in the cold while eating fried food. We met some characters that night and made some realizations about Irish culture upon walking through the late-night crowds at Supermac's. After midnight the Irish cease to be modern humans but revert to pirate culture where drinking, swearing, and random violence become the norms.

Ireland loves Christmas!

We woke up way to early the next morning to check out of the hostel and decided to spend the day exploring Galway city. Most of the morning was spent wandering around town and exploring the Christmas market in Eyre Square. The day passed quickly and suddenly it was time to board the bus back to Cork!