Finally Legal!

Legally allowed to stay in Ireland that is!! ;)

Hey Everybody!

I know its been a while since I have written you all but there hasn't been that much to report. The first week of classes came and went and the weekend was a mix of the market, going out, homework and sleep.  I have decided to give myself some breathing room by only taking four classes this semester instead of five so that will free up my mornings and give me four day weekends (allotting more time for sleep and exploring!! Err.. I mean homework).  So the classes I'm taking are as follows: The Development of the Castle in Medieval Europe, Theories of Personality, Imagining Modern Ireland: An Introduction to Irish Culture Studies,  and Memory and Cognition.  I figured I'd let you all know what they are so that when I talk later about earthwork castles and Freudian theory you'll know it didn't just fall from the moon and land in my blog.

Monday I had my appointment with Irish immigration, the appointment it self I was not concerned about it was getting there that was the problem. Oh what an adventure that was!  I did learn a very important lesson though, if given the choice between vague directions and a hard to make out map from your school and even vaguer directions and no map from your landlord listen to your landlord!!!!! Keep in mind that this place is a good 30+ minute walk from my apartment, not exactly in town.  Thinking that there is no way I could follow Oliver's (my landlord) directions because he basically said to get to the town square and then go straight for a long, long while and that there would be a cemetery on my right a bit before it came up on my left.  Now who would go off of just that??  Not me, it made me nervous.  So I walked 15 minutes to campus just so I could walk the route that the school had told me to.  Long story short I got really lost and confused and eventually found myself back in the town square heading on Oliver's route.  I'll tell you, after walking for what felt like forever and almost getting killed in a roundabout I was never so happy to see a cemetery.  One day I'll walk back to explore the super old church there but who knows when that will be.  I eventually found my way to the immigration office which was tucked away in between a sandwich shop and a printers.  I walked in, pulled out something to read and waited.. and waited and waited.  Eventually I was called back to an overwhelmed but still friendly Garda officer.  He took all my documents and 300 euro, gave me a cute little license-like identity card and told me that if caught without it I would be arrested and fined out the wazoo.  Needless to say that card is like never ever ever leaving my wallet! (Bonus points if you read that sentence and now have the T-Swift song in your head like I do)

After a very long walk back to campus I sat through several long lectures.  I didn't know that there was so much to say about mounds of dirt that people built 'castles' on but now I know a whole lot that will probably never come of use to me.  Basically, mounds of dirt = protection for the wealthy, the more wealthy you are the larger dirt mound you have; that is all.  I also learned Freud for about the millionth time.  I don't know how many of you are psycho-theoretically inclined but if you are you'll know that all classes love to teach Freudian theory. I don't know if its because he himself was one leap over the cuckoo's nest or because he was sorta onto something about the subconscious but it is done to the point of overkill.  I swear if I get home and have to "learn" about penis envy or the Oedipus complex one more time I will go off the (proverbial?) deep end.  Either way, it has been a week of lectures that have been less than stimulating but social life that has been quite fun.

Something I have discovered about Ireland is that it doesn't matter what day it is, people will be out at the pub.  Monday, when I was feeling a bit down for a whole load of reasons I won't go into, Lauren and I decided to go out to our beloved Taaffe's as well as the Front Door to hear some music and kick back.  We were lucky to find seats when we got to Taaffe's it was so packed, we were quite shocked at the number of people sharing in pints and music and merriment on a Monday evening.  It was at the bar bobbing our heads to some Irish folk song that we met Emily.  Emily was at the bar by herself so we adopted her into our conversation and low and behold she was from Australia and had been traveling all over Europe on her own for 6 weeks!  We moved over to the Front Door and had another drink with Emily while she told us about all her grand adventures throughout Western Europe as well as a bit about Australian culture.  All and all it was quite a pleasurable evening and we were sad to part with our new-found friend.

We didn't do much Tuesday night, we call kinda needed some time in to do school work (yes Mom and Dad we are doing school work) and I feel like tonight will be much of the same.  Tomorrow we have our first get together with the international student society at our university and we are excited to expand our friend circle and plan future trips around Ireland.  I guess I will leave you with parting wonders on what we will do next (rest assured in the fact that we don't really know either).

Until next time,
Sarah