Here There & Everywhere

Home is where I am

2010-01-15T08:02:00.000-08:00

So I have officially been back in the states for more than 3 weeks. The holidays have come and gone, a new year has begun, I've moved back on campus in Boston, and classes have begun once again.

Returning home this time around was much easier than my return from China. Although I was gone for a much longer period of time, the cultural adjustment of returning to the states from Europe was no problem at all. On top of that, I returned the week of Christmas so I was overwhelmed with family, friends, and the overall good feeling of being where my home is. When my mom drove me down to Boston last weekend she noted how I hadn't sat still or gone a day without plans my entire time being back.

I haven't forgotten about what I've done, learned, or the people I've met- but I have definitely resparked relationships at home that I took for granted before leaving. Other relationships have also grown more distant, but I still have not been home long enough to really tell what is going on there. It's nice being here, regardless of how much fun I had while being way. I took some time on new years eve to look back on this blog and recap on the things I saw, emotions I felt, and people I met.

It's hard to pick a favorite memory from Northern Ireland. Belfast overall was a very cool city that I'm glad I got the chance to experience. It's not the typical city that people would choose to travel too, and I especially felt that as the only Northeastern student who chose to study there. Although the Troubles are "over", the secular tension still remained. This was something I never really experienced at home.
The night before I left for Belfast I did some research on Lonely Planet to see what kind of a place I was headed for. My favorite quote from the website goes as follows:

"Once lumped with Beirut, Baghdad and Bosnia as one the four ‘B’s for travellers to avoid, Belfast has pulled off a remarkable transformation from bombs-and-bullets pariah to hip-hotels-and-hedonism party town."

This was just the kind of place I wanted to go to, and this is exactly what i got.

Although I really enjoyed Belfast, the ability to travel to other places from this location was my favorite part of the trip. Munich, Amsterdam, Scotland, London, Dublin, Newcastle, and Galway were only a short bus or plane ride away. I developed a much bigger appreciation for the size of the United States, and how many drastically distant cultures exist within our own country.

2009 had been one wild ride: Spain, Israel, China, Taiwan, Northern Ireland, Ireland, Germany, England, Scotland. I think I"ll make 2010 about seeing what the good ol' US has to offer.

I've officially been home for 3 weeks and my wanderlust is back.

better late than never

2009-12-21T01:13:00.000-08:00

flight outta belfast delayed 4 hours and 5 minutes for "mandatory crew sleep time". lame. now getting into boston around midnight

maybe ill update from the airports in a true profesh blogger fashion. talk soon!

Home is wherever we are if there's love there too

2009-12-20T13:06:00.000-08:00

so today was my final day on the emerald isle! very exciting indeed. The time has definitely come for me to go home though. All of my friends here have been slowly leaving over the past three days and now I'm pretty much the only one left. Having it be my last day, you'd expect that I'd be going wild with guinness and wrecking as much European havoc as possible, but it's been pretty low key.

I woke up this morning around 9am after a terrible nights sleep. I am sick here AGAIN. i seriously don't know what it is. I take care of myself pretty well. I sleep enough, eat healthy things, exercise when im feeling good, blah blah blah. But ya, i went to bed last night with a stuffy nose that turned into a sore throat that turned into a sleepless night. booo.

BUT then I looked out my window to see this!
snowstorm in belfast!!! I've been dreading the concept of snow for the past few days because I want my flight tomorrow to go off without a hitch, but there really is nothing like the first snow of the season :) I walked down the road to pick up some orange juice, enjoying the big fat snowflakes. I guess it had started around 2am and it ended around 10- an hour or so after i woke up. We only ended up getting about an inch or two, but that didn't stop the Belfast kiddies from wanting to eat dirt on the snowy pavement.
After taking my sweet time waking up and starting to pack, I headed downtown to do some last minute souvenir shopping/stopped at the library to print my boarding passed.

Yesterday was the last day of the Continental Christmas Market at City Hall so they were tearing it down. :( It was sad to see it go, but also made me feel even more like it was an appropriate time to be heading home.

After exploring downtown a little bit for one last time and buying some gifts for peeps at home, I headed back to pack. this was definitely a tough job. I don't know why I thought it would be okay that one suitcase coming home would be good when my one suitcase coming over was STUFFED. I ended up having to throw away some nonessentials to make room for new beer glasses/gifts/etc. Well worth the trade off.
Look at my new coaster collection :)
Got guys there from Belfast, Dublin, Galway, Derry, London, Amsterdam, Munich, and Glasgow. Ya buddy.
The hardest part was figuring out what to do with all the crap on my desk. I'm kind of a packrack, collecting lots of useless things when I travel that end up cluttering up everything. but! success!
Before:

After:
i cracked open my commemorative 250th anniversary Guinness can to celebrate. I had actually intended on bringing it home to keep..forever...but it really wont fit and i dont want to risk having a Guinness can explode in my luggage. So instead it was my job well done celebration beer.
3 months of stuff in one suitcase, a carry on, and a backpack. Nicely done.
Now I'm bored out of my mind. No one is here, I am broke, and it is freezing out. I could go out to a pub but I dont really want to sit in a bar by myself on a rainy Sunday night. I also literally only have the exact change to pay for my bus ticket to the airport tomorrow. Oh well, i've had a good run in Belfast, I don't need a crazy last night to prove anything.

SO QUICK RECAP OF THIS PAST WEEK.
Thursday
Thursday started the fun around here because everyone had to hand in their final papers for the semester. A bunch of people started leaving on Friday as well so Thursday night was the final big hurrah for everyone. The international students in Grant House threw a big Christmas party. Our original plan was to eat, go to the Grant House party for a bit, and then head to the Stiff Kitten ( a really good club in Belfast which I had never been to). Anna Anna Hannah and I started out with a delicious/unconventional dinner of a Mediterranean olive/artichoke/sundried tomato mix , hummus, a variety of cheeses and french bread/crackers. and wine of course. this meal was surprisingly really filling. yummeee
We were then a little delayed getting to the party because there was some countdown of the best christmas music videos of all time. I wasn't going to leave until I saw Mariah.
After lots of silly Xmas videos, we felt merry and headed off to the party.
But first i'll throw this picture in for good measure. I'm going to miss my little french anna!

The party was a lot of fun. Pretty much all of the Europeans who I'd met over the past few months were there. I guess no huge stories from here. I did some mingling with the Queens rowing team and bought a copy of their lovely holiday fund raiser calendar. oh baby.

FRIDAY!
or should i say FRYday. "Ulster fries" are basically one of the least appealing meals possible (well, I think). Fried eggs, fried mushrooms, fried sausage, fried bacon, fried potatoes, pancakes, baked beans, and toast. BUT they are Belfast's most prized culinary attraction. So on Friday morning a bunch of us went out to a breakfast place to order some. HOWEVER, I was actually feeling pretty sick on Friday morning and ended up sticking with scrambled eggs and toast. I know. Lame. but oh well. Anyways, here is a picture of Jenn's fry:
And here are some buddies who came along:
Britney! (Tennessee)
from top right clockwise: Mike (LA/goes to school at BC), Julia (Germany), Laura (Belgium), Brittany (Tennessee), Tessa (Holland).

yes yes good fun.
The rest of the afternoon was spent hanging with various Belfast friends before they started heading off over the weekend. Jenn and I spent a few hours just bumming around her apartment, doing the usual- boytalking and singing shakira. We got pretty restless around 3 and decided to head downtown so I could go on the big belfast ferris wheel once before leaving.
check it outttt
good fun :)
Following the wheel we played around the christmas market a little, meeting up with Alex, Mike, Anna, and Anna. The market was in full swing because this was it's last weekend

We tried to find a good pub to stay in, but downtown Belfast was packkeeedddd. The weekend before Christmas is a madhouse. We ended up settling on a pizza place at the mall. Not quite the cute irish pub night we had planned but good fun all the same. The bottle of wine with a dinner deal lead to lots of laughs/close calls of getting kicked out. good times
Jenn knows how to get in Mike's face.

ANYWAYS, so from there we went on to Morrisons- one of Belfast's top pubs for a few drinks. Anna Anna Mike Laura and I then split off from Jenn and Alex to go see Where the Wild Things Are at the the theater nearby. I loved it. That book was a huge part of my childhood, and Jack and I would NOT go to bed without rumpussing first. The movie was kind of depressing though, and I can't even imagine how it was the first time around (originally made as a dark movie but lightened up to keep the kids happy).
Saturday
Brittany, Sean, Jenn, Anna, and a bunch of others headed out on Saturday morning. Anna (france), Mike, Laura, and I spent a good part of the day down at St. George's Market. Mike had never been so we took our time strolling the stalls and sampling until our stomachs hurt. I bought some niiice aged stanky cheese to bring back. I didn't really consider how that was going to luggage smell but oh well. worth it. Sorry if your christmas present smells like cheese.
Then I went to the gym and tried running again! I've been slowly getting back into it lately because I've been sick. I did a solid three miles but my knee started hurting again. lame. i'm also sick again today so i guess no running for a while AGAIN. ugh.
Last night was pretty relaxed. Anna Mike Hannah and I made dinner then watched Babe cause Anna had never seen it and it was her last night here. She had to be up at 4am for her flight so we didn't do anything too wild.
Then today was today, as talked about earlier.

Oof, I'm at the point in the entry where i am tired of writing so i'll update later with my flight status and whatnot.
cheerio

A Day in the Life

2009-12-19T03:22:00.000-08:00

This has been a crazy last couple days. Between getting all the final work done, celebrating, and farewells-there is definitely a lot i could write about. but not right now. this post'll be dedicated to every normal day in Belfast that I never thought was worth writing much about.
SO HERE WE GOOO. welcome to my walking tour from rowan 1 (my glamorous student housing) to the spankin new queens university library.
so here is stop number 1: my building.
I live on the third floor (referred to as the second floor in this foreign land). It is what it is- freshman housing, but I have my own bathroom and a comfy bed so no complaints from this girl.
Next door to my building is the bar for our dorm housing. seriously, if only stetson west had a bar on the first floor. imagine the possibilities....
Next stop! reception! now the tours getting really exciting. this is where i go when I lose my key and get locked out of my room. if you lose your key 20 times a semester they charge you. let's just saying im pushing the limits on that one...two more days to keep that puppy in my sight.
okay, we are now exiting my student accomdation. ooo eeee. This is the fancy shmancy entrance to Elms Village (where i live.) located on beautiful malone road. mm yep.
Now this tour is just gonna get CRAZY. welcome to the spar gas station. roughly 30 second walk down the road from the entrance to Elms. This is where we grocery shop when we're too lazy to go to the real store. They actually have a ton of stuff- vegetables, baking stuff, cheese, milk, etc. told ya this tour was gonna get crazy.
Walking right along...welcome to Grant House. This is the international student housing right down the road from Elms. I don't really remember my reasoning for wanting to live in Elms instead. Whatevs
After this it's smooth sailing right to campus...well, after another 10 minute walk. lalala strolling down Malone road. this is the point where I realize I'm probably going to be late for class

Now we are at this place. I dont really know what it is, but it is SCARY. We live in a pretty nice part of Belfast with lots of big houses, but this one located right on the main road is all cemented up. eeekFisherwick church! This is about the halfway point to campus. Turning right on this road brings me to the gym while going straight heads right to classes and the library. straight we go.
Belfast is big on its club paraphernalia and chalk advertisements. exhibit A:
I've never been to Rain, but I guess according to this it is pretty gay so I'll pass.
Now we are pretty much on campus. This is the post office where I send all of you your postcards and presents. That is the bank that I opened a bank account in and never used ever. And that is some church that I've never paid much attention to. Best tourguide ever.
We can now bang a right into the Botanic Gardens for a scenic shortcut to the library. Sorry about that garbage truck thing.
In the gardens is the Ulster Museum, full of Belfast and county Antrim history. I've heard it's pretty good but I've never been in. Maybe today I'll check it out. probably not.
la de da, walking through the garden
hark! the library (straight on)! While to the left is the big green house in the botanic gardens. I've never been in here either. I actually do wanna check this out though. So pictures from here to come

And there's a lovely field across from the green house where people chill when it's not cold or raining (so like never.)
Now the fun ends. Library time. It's actually a really sweet library, just opened this past summer. There's a restaurant/cafe on the first floor and this scary statue out front. i HATE it. I have seriously had nightmares with this thing in it.
Thennn when I'm done doing my thang at the library, I walk through the campus to go to classes or back home. This is the Lanyon building courtyard. My philosophy lecture was next to this
After finishing all the school stuff, I usually take a different way home (up Lisburn road) to mix things up. This is also where I buy veggies/groceries/etc

Eatwell is the greatest store ever. but expensive :(
The best part of Lisburn road is the view past the shops and houses:
oh hai ireland.
so yep, that is my daily route. Nothing too exciting, but this is my travel jounral so I guess talking about how I get to campus in a foreign country is a legitimate thing to record.

So tomorrow is my last day. oof!
I'll update tomorrow about this past weekend and my packing progress

A Wine and Cheese Christmas

2009-12-16T02:10:00.000-08:00

First off- FIVE DAYS LEFT?! how the heck did that happen. I mean, I know I've had a countdown for a while but all of a sudden I feel like the concept of being home is terrifying. Well, maybe terrifying isn't the word, but I just feel like there's so much left to do and see. It's also getting really sad as different friends of mine leave every day as they finish their final classes and papers. I know this isn't the end of anything, of course I'll be back and of course I'll see those who I'm really close to again but still. One week from yesterday I will be sitting in a dentist's chair in Nashua instead of looking out my window at the hills surrounding Belfast.

Everyone keeps asking me if I'm excited to be home, and the short answer is absolutely. I miss certain people more and more every day, and traveling really does take a toll on you. I'm especially excited to be back for the holidays because my family does them really well. I feel like I'd rather bring those certain people from home back here with me though so they can see everything I've been doing for the past 3+ months. This happened when I came back from China too. No matter how many pictures I show or stories I tell, no one can ever relive the experiences, eat the food, meet the people that I did. Even though this is the longest I've been away, I'm glad that I'm prepared for this when I get home. Coming back from China last summer was really tough.

BUT ENOUGH OF THAT! time to highlight some FUN. Last night was the Queen's University Wine and Cheese Society Holiday Gala in the Great Hall. The Great Hall looks like something out of Harry Potter and is in Lanyon building (aka this bad boy on our campus) :

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=6626870474334535785

It was brilliant. Free wine reception, 3 course meal, great convos, and then lots of dancing. It was a black tie event, all girls in dresses and men in suits or tuxedos. hot damn.

but OF COURSE, something had to go awry in my attempts to get ready just because I am me. My initial plan to curl my hair was an EPIC fail. I brought my american curling iron over in September but I hadn't tried using it yet. I knew the voltage would be off but I figured worst case scenario would be that I broke the electricity in my building (no big deal.. haha). But NO, it was much much worse. I plugged in the curling iron and it immediately smelled like intense burning in my room. I forget how my curling iron smelled in the US, so I didn't think much of it. I proceeded to curl a bottom strand of hair (THANK GOD BOTTOM). I knew something wasn't right as my room started smelling like burnt hair and the curling iron was making a loud hissing sound. THEN when I tried pulling away the devil beauty appliance, IT TOOK MY HAIR WITH IT, burnt to a crisp. and then the hair continued on to catch FIRE. Sorry for the disgusting picture to follow, but I don't think anyone's charred hair would look any more attractive.

BARF. SO yes. now I have a hot little bald patch/a lifelong fear of curling irons. I had bought a pretty good bottle of wine the other night to celebrate with friends on Thursday when we were all finished with the semester, but this traumatizing experience required a glass (or two) ahead of time.

wahh :( all i can say is, at least i didn't start with say..my bangs. oof. Not to mention, my entire floor smells like burnt hair, which is probably one of the worst smells in the world. I couldn't even eat breakfast this morning because the smell of burnt hair made me nauseous. So..sorry everybody.

BUT, the show must go on. I continued to get ready but with a plan B hair style. Anna Anna Dominika Florant and I met at the Scholars Bar for a quick drink on the way and then arrived at the reception at 7. Everyone was dressed to the nines. Girls wearing floor length gowns and guys in tuxedos. We were also happy that they assigned our group of friends to the same table. :)

Checking out portraits of past university presidents in the Great Hall
anna (france), dominika (germany), anna (sweden), florant (france). smokin.

a haw haw haw. woody banter with wine.time to take seats and await delicious things
cheers! being thankful for the hair that i have on my head that could fit into that ponytail.
course one: bomb split pea soup

they had those goofy Christmas party popper things. mine had a plastic spider in it. sweet.oh yea. and it had a crown.

course TWO: the main meal. turey with cranberries, brussel sprouts, SWEET POTATO mashd potatoes, carrotscheers, prost, salut, skal

course THREE! cheese sampler plate with grapes, celery, and chutney. incredible (oh yes, bottle of Riesling with all)WINE AND CHEESE!

after dinner chit chat. i'm gonna miss these ladiesMerry Christmas

Oh yes, and they hired the DJ from the Stiff Kitten (one of Belfast's best club) for some after dinner dancing. We were definitely the rowdiest ones there, can't always keep it too classy

SO that's that! It was a really fun night. Northeastern really needs to get its act together and allow a wine and cheese club. Such an educational experience.

Soooo yes. this morning i wake up to a room smelling of burnt hair and a minor wine headache. I was assigned to do my final presentation for genetics this morning on the "future challenges facing metagenomics". I had not prepared for it AT ALL. Yes, it was part of the topic of my final paper, but I had no visuals or organized talk ready in the least. I was stressin. I tried to pull together last minute notes this morning and arrived in class just hoping that my ability to public speak would get me through it. Not to mention, all the kids in my class are overachievers and had awesome things prepared. Anyways, the minutes tick away as people give their talks and I just feel terrible about how poorly prepared I am. Everyone in the class knows that I'm the American girl who had a 6 month internship at the Harvard center of genetics so I knew they were looking forward to hearing me talk (maybe also just because my accent is cool). AND THEN, before I know it, the class time is up. The last presentation to go was the person ahead of me in line. The professor lets me off the hook and says he believes that I had something great prepared so I'll get full credit anyway.

There is a god.

Birthday Recap

2009-12-10T12:43:00.000-08:00

What a fun two days. If the past 48 hours are any indication of how the rest of my 23rd year of living will be then there are definitely good times ahead.

So after Tuesdays Genetics, I did go downtown for some shop therapy instead of my philosophy lecture (seriously, who would want to learn about Heidegger's theories of angst and dread on ones birthday? exactly.) So I headed straight for Zara down by City Hall because there was a dress there that I had my eye on for the black tie holiday ball next week. It fortunately fit great and ended up being way cheaper than i expected. an easy sell. then i spent another hour or so just browsing stores until I spent the birthday budget I ended up with a new top that was on clearance and a sexy headband from urban outfitters. Their headbands are one of my favorite guilty pleasures. love em.

So yep, after that I headed back home and instead of working on one of my 4 papers due next week, I watched a few episodes of Weeds online. Kyle raves about that show and we have pretty much the same taste in TV, so I decided to check it out. What a great show. I can't wait until I'm done with the semester and I can dedicate lots of lazy hours to getting through some seasons. At around 3, the Annas were out of their classes so we headed to the bus station to catch our ride to dublin fort he Lily Allen concert. wooooo

The bus ride seemed a lot longer than usual. AND the bus was actually stopped at the Irish border for a passport check. I have made that trip 5 times in the past 3 months and never have the checked passports. Of course I didn't have mine with me, and after a brief scolding they let me into the country. haha gotta love that border security.

We arrived at the bus station just in time for the concert. The doors for the concert opened at 6:30 and we didn't end up getting there until about 7:45. The show started at 8, so TG we didn't get there an hour and a half early. I only had time to order one 7 euro beer before the opener came on, so if we had waited any longer I probably wouldnt be able to afford this week's groceries. ha.

So Lily Allen was amazing. I haven't been to a big showy concert in a long time, and the vibe was great. Lots of lights and effects and energy. The O2 Arena in Dublin was also a very cool concert venue. It was enormous and there really wasn't a bad spot to watch from in the whole place. Lily was really cute and rocked it. She had a keg of Guinness on stage and was pouring pints for the people in the front row who couldn't get out for a drink during the show.

The show got out a little after 10 and we caught the 11 oclock bus back to Belfast. 2.5 hours later I was happy sleepy 22 year old ready for bed.

The next day (yesterday) was pretty typical during the day and I got a lot done on my Genetics paper, but then the nighttime was more fun and games. A bunch of Belfast friends joined me for a birthday sushi dinner at Sakura, a Japanese place near campus. The food was great. I got an order of Red Dragon rolls ( i kinda forget what was in them: salmon, sweet potato, avocado, cucumber?) and a bowl of seafood hot and sour soup. mmmmmmmmm. Then for dessert the whole table got sake bombbssss. That's when the real fun started. One sake bomb each turned into 3 or 4 pretty quickly. At that point one of the little waitresses had to come over and tell us to stop because we were "scaring the other guests". hahaha oops.

I got great things from the Belfast friends :) Anna and Anna got me a super warm comfy scarf and a box of dark chocolate ferrero roche chocolates. do they know me or what. Jenn made me a hilarious card full of lots of memories from the past 3 months, and Laura got me a cool candle holder thing from the Xmas market. Thanks again everybody :) I couldn't ask for better abroad friends.

Following sushi, Anna Anna Sean and I headed to Modest Mouse!!!!! at the student union. The student union on campus has a couple of bars and clubs inside, hosting a few concerts a week. Modest Mouse was great, playing about half old and half new stuff. They have TWO drumsets on stage which was ridiculous. We all shared buying rounds for each other and danced away. After the concert, the party headed over to the Bot for a few more drinks before calling it a night. They were playing live irish music so there was more dancing and and good convo. :)

Today i was on top of things. I headed to the library around 10 and just banged out my entire genetics paper. This puppy is worth 85% of my grade, and I think it turned out pretty good...at least for a first draft. It feels so good to have that one out of the way. Tomorrow I'm gonna start my immunology paper (worth all 100% of the grade), but it's the shortest paper so hopefully I'll have that one finished by Sunday. I am a paper writing robot. beep boop.

It's very weird to be leaving here in 10 days. I had been looking forward to going home so much when I had a ton of schoolwork left to do, but now that I'm getting it out of the way I'm starting to get sad. I have had some of the best times in my life in the past 3 months. Last night reminded me of all the awesome people that I met and really will miss when I go back to Boston/Merrimack life.

OH and tonight anna invited me over because she found out that they sell B&J PHISH FOOD FROYO IN BELFAST. where has that been for the past 3 months? not in my life obviously. but yes, oh so good. I think with that treat my birthday is now officially over. bring on 23.

Lá breithe mhaith agat!

2009-12-08T00:12:00.000-08:00

Good mornin! It is December the 8th, and that means I am now a whole year older!

Time certainly has flown since the 21st birthday extravaganza.

It's currently 8:15 in the morning and I'm getting ready for the day. You know it's going to be a good day when it starts with oatmeal and presents :)
Oatmeal was 1 packet Quaker oats cooked w/ skim milk, cut up small apple, chopped banana, couple spoonfuls greek nonfat yogurt, pumpkin & flax seed, spoonfull of peanut butter. i am SO full from it. power breakfast.

So yes, I opened the gifts from the family, and they were great :) very cute. They sent over socks (because i never wear them hence why I CANT STOP BEING SICK), the PS I love you soundtracl (???? was my reaction too but then i realized the movie is set in ireland, haha cute), bracelets, a cool scarf from this craft shop in peteborough, LOTS of swan chocolates, and some shepard fairey OBEY stickers to litter Belfast with before I go. Jack also sent over an arrowhead that he picked up while working in Bryce Canyon this past fall, so cool!
I also got an envelope w/ some cash (already converted to UK pounds! my parents are the greatest), so instead of my afternoon classes I"m going shopping downtown :)
The wine and cheese club is having a black tie holiday gala next week so I'll go find me a new dress or something awooo

then tonight anna anna and i are going to see Lily Allen in Dublin! I don't know much of her stuff but I've been listening to her more and more lately cause she's huge here. I dig a lot of her stuff so I'm pumped. And look! She has a whole song called 22. hot damn.

I couldn't embed the real music video, but this gets the point across :)

So yea! I'm off to Genetics now (yeaaa i'll actually go to one class today...).
Do I look different?!
THEN (circa 1993?):
NOW (literally right now on the webcam. gotta keep this accurate):
OH YA. And I got this greatest beer stained bar napkin birthday card in the whole world from my fabulous friends back home. Miss you guys :) 13 days left in Ireland, holy cow.

Lám Dearg Éirinn

2009-12-06T13:18:00.000-08:00

The O’Neill family is like no other.

I finally got around to meeting my long lost family down in Dublin, and it was easily one of the best weekends of my life. It blew my mind how at home I could feel with these people who I had never met before and it put the idea of family in a whole new light for me.

First, a little O’Neill history (well, from what I understood from stories last night): during the Great Depression my grandpa Jack and 2 of his brothers shipped over from Ireland to US to find more opportunities and raise families. They were all between 17 and 20 at this point. Jack settled in White Plains, NY and started a successful AC/heating business. During this time he married my grandmother Mary Larson and they went on to have 10 rambunctious children: Maureen, Susan, Tara, Deborah, Rory, Timmy, Peter, Brian, Sean, and Kevin (my dad!). I think it was around the 60s (??? Gotta check this) that grandpa Jack went down to Florida to check out a piece of land that was for sale near the Everglades- a part of Florida that was hardly developed up to this point. That is when the O’Neills became one of the first ever families on Marco Island, Florida and it has remained a homebase for the family ever since.

Meanwhile, while Jack was having lots of little babies and being a pretty successful business man in Florida, HIS parents had more children. So Jack had a brother who he had never met before. This brother had children of his own in Dublin, and THESE are the people who I met last night. Therefore it was my dad’s cousins and their kids who I visited. Yes, quite a distant relationship, but they remarkably felt just as close as any relative I have.

I headed down to Dublin yesterday at about 330. My dad’s cousin Brendan picked me up at the airport (where my bus got in) and we headed to his house. I chatted with Brendan and Annette (his wife) for a while over a couple of beers. Brendan is a splitting image of my dad but with hair. It was unreal. They showed me some home videos of when they visited the US in the 90s, which was really cool as well.

Shortly after, we headed to Marie’s house (Brendan’s sister and my dads other cousin). Marie had a FEAST waiting for me. I had no idea that they would give me such a warm welcoming, it was amazing. Marie, who is EXACTLY like my aunt susan both physically and personality wise, cooked up a big lamb roast with potatoes and veggies. It was out of this world. I met tons of people. Robert was Marie and Brendan’s other sibling. He came with his wife, and they were just as awesome. Helen is Brendan, Marie, and Robert’s mother. She was a doll- really the sweetest little old lady I have ever met. She just kept going on and on about how my dad was one of her favorite people and she was so happy to see me all grown up. Her memory was going and her hip really bothered her, but other than that she was full of life. She sang me some Irish songs, which made most of the people in the room cry. Basically it was just a big fun O’Neill party- just like the ones I remember as a kid on Marco Island. My big regret was not taking more pictures of the whole family. I just got so caught up in the moment that I didn’t even think about my camera.

There were also lots of kids there my age (my dads cousins kids). Orlagh was Brendan and Annette’s daughter, and I have pictures with her when I was a baby and her family visited in like 1990. Marie and Rob had Kate (25) and Ciara (22, pronounced Kira), and their boyfriends (Mick 1 and Mick 2) were all around. We all had a ton in common, and I wish we lived closer cause I’m sure we’d have a blast going out in Boston. Around 1am they took me out to a club in Dublin, the palace, and I knew it was going to be a good time when the first song I heard was All I Want for Christmas Is You. It was a Christmasy themed night at the club, and at this point pretty much everybody there was drunk so the DJ was doing whatever he wanted. I was amused. The “cousins” were awesome, and they kept buying rounds- never letting me pay for a thing. We were out until about 4 in the morning before heading back to Marie’s house and crashing.

I woke up at around 10 this morning to the smell of an amazing breakfast. Marie made eggs, sausage, bacon, toast, the works. It was delicious. Me and the girls were prettttttty tired from the night before so we just bummed around on the couch watching TV until Brendan took me back to the airport at around 1. I slept the whole bus ride home, and now I’m back in my little Belfast room writing papers for the next two weeks.

In other news- I got a package from my parents today! 22 in 2 days yeayy. The box had tons of delicious Swan chocolates and a couple other wrapped things that I can’t open until Tuesday. The theme of this entry is how I have the best family in the world.

Also got a letter from Olga :) Cant wait to open that Tuesday as well.

Oh yes, and I know I kind of gave up on making this a “food blog” because I really just got bored of writing about all of my meals. I know none of you care, and neither do I. BUT tonight I made something awesome.

BUTTERNUT AND QUINOA CHILI!!!

It was fantastic. Super spicy as I was generous with the chili powder. I had to take off my sweatshirt while indulging.

Okay, I really gotta do work now.

Outline the achievemens of the plant genetic engineering industry to date, and discuss the challenges that it faces in the next decade in 3000 words. REAAAADY GO. I wanna be done by Thursday. I’ll report back.

That's What She Said

2009-12-02T01:52:00.001-08:00

I'm siiiiiick :(

I feel feverish, and it hurts to swallow.

It's currently pouring (and i mean POURING) rain in Belfast, and my classes today aren't that necessary so I'm staying in to recover/ get a good amount done on my genetics paper.

Also- my combination of 1hr bodytone/pilates followed by 1hr core strengthening classes on Monday night has left me totally paralyzed. Every muscle in my body is sore.

Currently sitting in my bed with oatmeal & tea, watching TED videos to warm me up for this paper. Life isn't too bad.

watch this. very cool.

la la london

2009-11-30T07:54:00.001-08:00

So London was an incredible city. I dont know why, but I really had low expectations of it. It really wasn't on my list of things that i must do while in Europe during this semester, but seeing as it is so easy to get there from Belfast and I had a place to stay, I figured hey why not.
But my low expectations were blown out of the water. I loooved the city. I think I was always turned off my London because it didn't seem like it was much of a challenge. I always thought of it as big, commercial, English, predictable, and expensive. Lindsay and I decided to hit up London for Thanksgiving weekend a few weeks ago when Lauren and Christine (two girls we met on a pub crawl in Amsterdam) offered for us to crash on their floor. A weekend in London without paying for housing expenses? yes please!

So we were off! I was up at 4am on Thursday to make my 645 flight out of London. It was really easy to get to the tiny Belfast City Airport (flies around the UK), as the bus left every 20 minutes starting at 5am and was only 3 pounds roundtrip (awesome.). I passed out on the hour long flight, and I landed at Gatwick airport at about 8. I then took the National Express bus from Gatwick to Victoria Station in London. The trip from the airport to downtown on this bus is about an hour and a half. It's by far the longest method to get into downtown, but it is also by far the cheapest (about 14 pounds roundtrip i think?). Anyways, once I got to Victoria, I headed for the tube to meet Lindsay's train at St. Pancras station (where her train from Paris was arriving).
We met at the "meeting point statue"- a huge statue meant to symbolize the romanticism of traveling. cute london.

After a successful meet up, we now had to figure out where the heck we were gonna do and what we were gonna do. It was about noon at this point, and Christine was in classes until 5pm. We could've explored the town a bit, but Lindsay had a ton of luggage that prevented us from doing very much. We decided to head down to Camden town (where Christine and Lauren live) and stop in at any cafes along the way.

We ended up spending about 3 hours in this one place called the Eco Cafe. They served up a mean sweet potato with grilled veggies, which was the closest thing to a Thanksgiving-ish lunch that I could find. Before the Eco Cafe, we went to this other British restaurant called The Crescent which pretty much sucked. We split a cranberry and brie sandwich (again trying to find something thanksgivingy), but we were not satisfied. The Eco Cafe was a cool spot. It had free Wifi so Lindsay and I got on her netbook and watched a live stream of the Macys Day Parade all afternoon. We also skyped our fams to say happy holidays. The owner of the cafe thought we were nuts.

So 5 o'clock rolled around soon enough. We made our way over to the UCL dorm, that was right near the Camden Town Markets...a very cool area of London. After dropping our bags off in Christine's room and mingling for a bit, Lindsay and I headed to the grocery store to get all the necessities for a makeshift Thanksgiving feast. We had a very dirty/poorly supplied kitchen to work with, so we couldn't do anything too extravagant. We ended up with some sliced deli turkey, instant gravy/mashed potatoes, rolls, the worst instant stuffing in the world, and some CRUMPETS for dessert. Check us out.

Post "Thanksgiving" it was party time. Ndu, one of the American kids from Harvard that we were visiting, is a club promoter in London this semester, so he invited us along to the "Club Neon" for the night. After some significant pre gaming (hell no am I paying for drinks in London), we headed across town. I have no idea where this club was, but it was far. It was also freeeeeezing, and I was not wearing a jacket because someone had told me that no one was going to (and nowwwww I am sick today, I deserve it I guess). So yes, the night was very fun. London nightlife definitely goes way later than Beantown, and we were back at Christine's around five. Lindsay and I both fell happily asleep on Christine's floor, using our jeans as pillows and jackets as blankets. Gotta love traveling on a budget :)

The next day we were supposed to wake up for an 11am walking tour but that did NOT happen. We eventually rolled out of bed (floor?) at around 11, slowly got dressed, ate, and headed out for our own self guided adventure in Londontown. We took a bus down to Trafalgar Square then got out and just walked around. We covered a bunch of ground, eventually crossing the river and ending up at the Tate Modern Museum. It was pretty much one of the best art museums I've been to. They had a diverse collection of modern art, and the whole thing was free! We ended up spending a good few hours there until we decided that we were starving and had to move on.

We crossed back over the Thames to find a pub that would get Lindsay some fish N chips and me some quality beer (we all have our priorities). At first we stopped by the Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, which was sick. This pub was over 400 years old, the only one in the area to survive the great London fire (whenever that was). One of the bars in the place was even still serving gentlemen only (the bartender was female though haha). We wanted to stay here but we were too early for dinner and didn't feel like waiting around. We crossed the street and ended up grabbing some grub and beers at The Punch Tavern, which was perfect. I had the Hobgoblin handpulled ale, which may just be one of my favorites of all time now. Lindsay preferred the Hooky Bitter, and I ended up having that as my second one so that I could have a variety. Lindsay got the most kickass fish n chips I have ever seen, and I got the crabcakes. Yeah, crabcakes may not be the most famously british meal, but I haven't had them in forever and seemed like the most appealing thing at the time. They were great.

After dinner and good conversation with some London lads, we headed back to Lauren's place in Camden. We were beat from the night before and the day full of walking. The 3 of us ended up watching Love Actually until sleep. How cute.

After a less than enjoyable night of sleeping on the floor with no pillows or blankets (again), Lindsay and I were up and at 'em and ready for our 11am walking tour on Sunday. Danny, a guy visiting Ndu for the weekend (another Harvard kid), decided to join us. The tour was great: free, funny, informative, covered a good amount of ground. Only downfall: IT WAS FREEZING. I dunno what happened but it really turned into winter in Europe this past weekend. It's been pretty cool for a few months, but just recently it became downright terrible. The tour covered Buckingham Palace, St. James Palace, Pall Mall Street, Trafalgar Square, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, and other places along the way. After it was done we searched desperately for a hot drink/food. We ended up finding one cute little cafe and then proceeded on to O'NEILLS PUB to really get warmed up.

After each enjoying a good Irish Winter drink, the 3 of us met up with Christine and Lauren at the Hyde Park Christmas Market. London really knows how to go all out for Christmas. The market resembled Oktoberfest in its cute German way, but was way more holiday inspired. There was a moose singing christmas songs, dozens of stalls selling gifts, and even more stalls selling food and hot drinks. Mulled wine was the hit of the evening, and I plan on finding a good homemade recipe asap. We walked around the market for a while, but it started to rain so we decided it was time to find some better coverage. We headed over to Leicester Square and ended up settling on a Mexican restaurant that looked pretty popular. The food was bomb. I had veggie fajitas, while the others got burritos and chimichangas. Holy food comas after that. We decided to top off the evening by hopping around to a few different pubs in the area. I had to get up at 530 the next day to make my bus for the airport so we weren't out too late. Overall, it was just a really fun, chill evening around downtown.

So yes! Thats my little London recap. Ive been typing on the computer all day so sorry if the grammar/typos got worse as that entry went on. My eyes are killing me from looking at the screen.

******************************************************************************
Now I'm in the homestretch. I land back in boston 3 weeks from yesterday, and in that time I have 4 papers to accomplish

Genetics:
-the expansion of microbial genomic and metagenomic data in recent years has had a profound impact on our understanding of microorganisms and their interaction with the environment. Discuss

-discuss the advancements in plant genomics made in the 21st century. Discuss the hurdles the field must overcome in the next 10 years

Philosophy
- Critically assess Hegel's view of the connection between history and reason

Immunology
-Monoclonal antibodies: How the answer to a theoretical question led to practical tools. Discuss.

Just gotta do about 10 pages for each of those topics then DONEZO. 3 weeks is probably a fair amount of time to get that done, it just means no more fun and games. It's okay- im too poor for that anyway.

Oh yesss, and I registered for classes for the spring. I am officially taking the easiest semester in history
-parasitology & lab (sounds hard but I've had the professor before, basically girls get As.)
-International affairs and globalization (easy freshman level class that i need to complete my IAF minor)
-Statistical Thinking (probably easiest math class offered at Northeastern, but I need it for genetics grad school so there ya go)
-Beethoven (should be cool/easy, and it fulfills my humanities biology requirement)

Okay, this post has been a pretty good way to procrastinate. Back to worrrrk

THANKS

2009-11-25T14:20:00.000-08:00

So first Thanksgiving EVER not at home with the fam. I figured it would be a weird kind of day, but I had no idea it would be this weird. I don't know what it is- if its just because im gone?- but it seems like things at home are 10,0000 times more festive and celebratory this year than I can ever remember. Olga brought up the good point that everyone we know is now 21 (except a select select select few...tom groner.), so now everyone can go out. It's also been over 3 years since high school so perhaps people are now feeling the actual desire to reconnect with those who they haven't seen in while.
Not to mention, people really really really don't celebrate Thanksgiving here. haha. I figured it would be like a US celebrating Cinco de Mayo kinda thing (it's not our holiday but hey its an excuse to have a party so why not?) but nope. Only the few American kids here I know even recognize that it's tomorrow. Odd for sure.
Anyways, I'm super glad I'm heading out to London tomorrow with some fun people or else I'd probably be pretty down in the dumps. Lindsay and I will find turkey sandwiches and indulge on the London Eye. Or Something. :)

SOOO YES. I think I will now take the time to have my own little sentimental Thanksgiving moment because it's my blog and I can do what I want.

10 thangs I've become particularly thankful for in 2009
Not necessarily in ant particular order, but more or less so I guess

1.) My family
Not to be cliche putting this first and foremost, but it is the almighty truth. Anyone who knows my family, knows how incredibly close we all are. I'm not in any position to go comparing us to any other family, but I would say that not only are my mom, dad, jack, and I related by blood, but we are best friends. Jack and I are now at the age where there isn't a lot that we don't talk about in front of our parents. I think that is the mark of a great upbringing. I am very proud of Jack and myself, and the things we have accomplished.. even if they are very different. My parents have taught us to not measure our success by grades or money, but by how happy and challenged we are in gaining that success. Not only is my family fun, but I couldn't ask for more supportive and caring people in my life. Being abroad has made me realize just how much my time and effort my parents and willing to put into keeping in contact and making sure that I'm doing okay. I miss them more and more everyday. The 4 of us have not been together for just about 11 months now, and I know seeing them at the airport will be phenomenol :)
Not only am I thinking about my direct family today, but also of my extended family. In recent years, I've become more connected with my cousins, aunts, and uncles dispersed all around the US. We're all coming into adulthood now and are sharing a much deeper bond than ever before. Spending New Years on Marco with some of the O'Neill aunt and uncles will be a wild time, and I cannot wait. Christmas Eve at Grandpa Dick's is always a yearly highlight as well. So yes. That said. Cheers to the fam :)

2.) Friends
I have the best friends in the world. donezo. I could finish this segment right there. Whether it's someone I talk to everyday or someone I only talk to once every few months, I feel like we are all a closeknit family no matter what distance we are apart. A lot of the kids here that I've met don't have friendships at home like the ones that I do. I'm constantly talking about people at home and referring to them as "one of my best friends...so and so", and a lot of people can't understand how I can consider so many as "my best". I don't know if it makes it easier or harder during holidays like this to know that I have such a strong foundation back at home, but I really do appreciate it. Whether youre someone I met in elementary, middle, high school, college, camp sargent, coop, china, israel, ireland, florida, new england, or anywhere in between I wish you could ALL be here in Ireland with me :) Seee youu sooooon.

3.) Health
not just my health, but the health of the people around me. and not just physical health- but mental and emotional too.
The past few months I've become particularly health conscious, and I've felt better than I ever have in my life. This is the first year in my life that I haven't tried to diet to change the way I am, but instead I've just taken on a whole different way of living. I overall eat better quality, balanced, colorful food... work out because I like to not because I feel like I have to... take the time to relax.. and push myself to achieve things that I never thought I could. A year ago it was a struggle to run a mile and now I am comfortably running 5 (minus the whole knee ordeal). I don't crave things like fastfood, but find really exotic and interesting meals to be the best indulgence. If there's a great desert out there, I'll eat it, and not regret it. I'm also grateful for other aspects of my health- such as having all 5 senses. Losing any one of them- sight, touch, smell, taste, hearing would be devasting, and I love being able to experience the world for what it has to offer.

4.) Nature
I've seen a lot of the world this year. And I've seen a lot of crazy things that man could never dream of reproducing. We live on one cool flipping planet, that far too many people take for granted. I'm not talking about recycling more or worrying about global warming, but just taking the time to slow down and look at what nature's got to offer. From the jagged Yellow mountains in China to the alien Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland to the giant redwood trees in the western US to the woods in my own backyard, I don't think I could pick a favorite. The best things I've seen this year have been outside, and I am thankful that I have the time and energy to enjoy every second that I can of it.

5.)Music
Whether its Bob Dylan, Lady Gaga, Hillstomp, Debussy, Coltrane, JUSTICE, the Dandy Warhols, or Joff Cleveland... I don't care. I love music and the way it makes me feel. I have something on my Ipod for just about every occasion and mood. You will hardly ever find me studying without Jack Johnson, running without Timbaland, driving without Dave Matthews Band, or walking to class without Miles Davis. When I feel homesick, I listen to tracks of my brother playing guitar and I feel like I'm home again. When my brain is completely fried from reading genetics papers, I can listen to top 40 trash and feel like a fun person again. I love how certain songs can bring you back to a moment.
"Good Vibrations" ...Tampa spring break 2007
"Superstition" ...Deval Patrick's campaign in 2006
"Wannabe" ...making up dances with Abbey Feloney in 4th grade
"3rd movement of Beethoven's 5th" ...watching my parents put presents under the christmas tree when I was probably 5 years old
I guess there's not much else to say, but that I am very grateful for this form of expression and how it's kept me such good company this year.

6.) Financial Security
There's not a lot I want to say about this, but a lot has happened this fall that has made me very thankful for the life I have been provided. I have seen the poorest of the poor this year, people living in conditions that I could never begin to fathom living in every single day. Although the economy has been shaky at home, and both my parents have had close calls with their job security, I know that we will never end up in a rut that we couldn't get out of. I know that I live a comfortable life, and although I try to work as hard as I can to support myself, I am fully appreciative of what is provided for me. Getting my full scholarship was a tremendous relief, and it has taught me that working hard and being passionate will pay off somehow or another.

7.) The United States
I am thankful for Barack Obama. I remember when Olga said this at a Thanksgiving party last year, and I wholeheartedly agree. Yes there is much to be skeptical about with his progress, just as there would be with any president one year into his term. However, Obama has sparked an interest in politics for a generation who had little hope about the future. The world is talking to America again and willing to listen. I have met many people from dozens and dozens of countries, and even if they are not the biggest fans of the United States, they still have a respect for how our leader is trying to improve the future with confidence, intelligence, and grace. Aside from Obama alone, I am also thankful to be a citizen of the US. I am thankful that I can vote, that I can choose my occupation, that I can choose my husband, that I can attain a quality education, that I can have friends of different races religions and sexual orientations, that I can run for office, that I can choose to read from a variety of newspapers, that I can travel, that I can climb the economic ladder, that I have liberty

8.) PUPS
The past few "thankfuls" have been pretty global, but this one comes right back to home. I love my dogs. Bode is a friend like no other. He knows when I'm sad, when I'm happy, when I'm excited, when I'm lazy. He is the goofiest, blockiest, clumsiest dog I know. Maddie is a breed of her own..literally. Although she takes a lot of crap, she's still the sweetest girl...once you get on her good side. I love how my dogs have personalities. I love that they keep my parents company when Jack and I are gone. I love that when I walk in the door, no matter how long I've been gone (2 months in China or 20 minutes to the grocery store), they both act like they haven't seen me in years.

So I was going to go to 10, but I'm beyond exhausted. I have to be up at 4 (IN FOUR HOURS HAAAAA) to catch my flight to LONDON :D

however if i did have to do the last two they'd probably be....gravity...and...beer. Can you blame me? See, no explanation needed anyway.

I hope everyone has the greatest of Thanksgivings. I'll be thinking of you all!

ps- i know i half-assed the pictures on this post, i'll fix it after London, but no time to finish it now!

Galway or bust

2009-11-23T15:28:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday, even though I am sad to see an end to such an awesome weekend.

I’m going to go ahead and boldly state that anyone who ever travels to Ireland, must make Galway one of their top priorities. This is by far my favorite town I’ve been to, even though I guess that is not a very educated opinion since Dublin is the other city I’ve been to in the Republic. It is simply Irish culture at its highest. Cute colorful town with lively pubs and people surrounding by rolling hills filled with sheep and not far from the spectacular cliffs of moher.

Let the weekend recap begin.

So Jenn was my trusty travel companion for the adventure. For those of you who don’t know, this is the girl who was down to travel to Munich with me for Oktoberfest 2 months ago when we had only known each other for 2 days prior. This girl is down for anything, so I knew only epic things could come from this trip.

So I haven’t seen much of Jenn since our bender in Munich, but she has not changed a bit. I woke up at 4:30 in the morning last Thursday in order to pack up and eat breakfast before meeting Jenn at her place at 5:45 so that we could catch our 6:30 bus to Dublin. I arrive to find Jenn looking miserable, as she locked herself out of her apartment. Without her luggage. In the wee hours of the morning. Great start to the weekend haha. After making a pretty significant amount of ruckus, some girl from her building finally woke up and let her back in so that we could retrieve her bags. (Not without a stern bitch out from the girl first though). But we didn’t care…we were on our way!

The bus ride from Belfast to Dublin went off without a hitch. The bus driver was jamming out to old school tunes such as Cyndi Lauper and Meatloaf, while I managed to get in some shut eye. The aircoach bus ride from city centre in Belfast to the airport in Dublin was a little over two hours.

Then the real adventure began. Usually it takes about 3hours 15 minutes to get from Dublin to Galway, a trek across the country (which is about the size of Maine). I had failed to consider all of the news stories that I’d heard about the massive flooding going on in the Republic of Ireland this whole past week. Our bus was fell victim to these floods and it ended up taking almost 6 hours to reach the Galway bus station. Although it sucked to be sitting down on a bus for that long, I was listening to some good tunes and taking in as much scenery as I could. There were times when the bus was diriving through close to a foot of water. Tons of roads were shut down, so we had to take narrow little country detour roads instead. I’d be very curious to see what we did on a map because I’m sure it was the most ridiculous way possible.

Anyways, we eventually did get to the adorable city of Galway. We threw our things down at the hostel before setting out to explore the town. We walked through the main streets a bit (keeping pubs in mind for our adventures later that evening) and made our way down to the harbor and seacoast. The beach reminded me a lot of Maine: cold, rocky, and pretty. I’m a sucker for beaches and totally loved it. We also explored the fishing village of Claddaugh, right next to the main streets of Galway city, to find some souvenirs and gifts for people at home. (Yep, I did get a claddaugh ring and celtic necklace for myself, I looove them!).

By this time it was about 4pm, and we were ready for dinner. It was pretty early, but we had been on busses with no food all day. Olga’s roomie recommended the fish n’ chips at The Quays pub, which was conveniently located right across from our hostel! Jenn got the fish n chips, and I got the Shepherds pie. We splitsied a little bit, and it was probably the best Irish meal I’ve had so far. Comfort food at its finest. A peculiar fellow named Neal or Ethan (we decided to just call him Nealthan) sat down with us and talked some hardcore American politics. Nealthan was a strange fellow, he was about 50 years old, lived with his parents, and knew just about everything there is to know about American politics and history. When he realized Jenn and I were American, he got all excited and said “now I have something that you will reallllly appreciate”, and pulled Paul Krugman’s latest book out of his bag. Cool Nealthan.

After an exhausting conversation about real estate costs, wall street, obama, renewable energy, gold, and iraq, Jenn and I headed back to the hostel for a power nap before hitting the town.

Jenn had been to Galway before so she had a list of favorite pubs that we had to hit up. The comprehensive list ended up having about 8 pubs. I made it to 4, Jenn only got to 3. The first was a pub called ___ (i forget). It was a pretty good place, packed and playing live irish music. The music stopped before we finished our first drink though so we decided to move along to Jenn’s all time favorite “Hole in the Wall” pub. This place definitely had a college-y feel to it, playing top 40 music to a younger crowd. I met a guy from Boston who had to leave the US after 9/11 because he didn’t have a proper Greencard. He was sad. Jenn and I then took to the dance floor, and decided to leave after the DJ played our She Wolf request. Good times at the Hole in the Wall. We were then off to Taafts pub. It was not originally on our list of places to go, but it seemed like it had a rowdy crowd inside. We were correct. We ended up meeting a bachelor party inside, celebrating the joys of single living to the fullest. These guys were great fun, and the live irish music was also a big plus. The “stag” of the bachelor party got us kicked out for dancing on the band however, so we headed on to The Quays pub (our dinner site). I stayed out with these guys for a while until I decided to call it a night (and luckily our hostel was across the street!) And that is a very abridged version of me and Jenn’s epic night in Galway.

The next day I woke up to the sounds of pouring rain. This was terrible for 2 reasons.

1) I really wanted to go to the Cliffs of Moher that day and seeing it in the rain was not ideal.

2.) Many people had warned us that rain would make the floods worse, and we could potentially get stuck in Galway for days. This was not an option because Jenn had to catch an early morning flight back to the US out of Dublin the next day.

We went down to talk to the hostel lady, and she suggested that we do the half day tour to the Cliffs of Moher to ensure that we made it back in time to catch a bus. We decided to roll with this plan and just figure out any speedbumps that camp up in the meantime. We grabbed a quick traditional Irish breakfast at the An Pucan pub (fried egg, baked beans, sausage, bacon, French fries…I wasn’t a huge fan but it was definitely good fuel for the day).

As soon as the bus tour started, the clouds broke apart into the most gloriously sunny day. The first leg of the bus tour was through the green rolly hills of the burren. Lots of livestock, lots of little stone walls, lots of useless information learned about straw and soil composition of the irish countryside. We had a tourguide named Billy who knew just about everything there is to know about everything. Billy was not a man of few words, and he garrulously filled the entire 6 hour tour with useless facts.

After the Burren came the most anticipated event of the weekend: the cliffs of moher! As soon as we arrive, the sunny day disappeared and was replaced by gods wrath. We were standing on the Cliffside with hurricane winds, pelting rain and hail, lightning, and thunder. It was pretty exciting. We tried to take pictures in these elements, but soon took shelter in the gift shop until things blew over. About ten minutes later, everything was glorious once again. That’s Ireland for ya.

I can’t emphasize enough how glad I am that I got to go here. I loved looking at the pictures of my aunts and uncles next to the Cliffs at my grandma’s house on Marco as I kid. Going here has always been one of my life goals, and now I’ll just have to make it a goal to return with my family.

After the cliffs, the bus took a coastal route back to Galway. We stopped in the adorable seaside village of Doolin for a quick lunch at Fitzpatrick’s pub. I got the seafood chowder with a side of steamed veggies (aka cabbage..gotta love Ireland), which were both pretty good. The rest of the bus ride was filled with beautiful scenery, occasional stops to explore, and loads of facts from Billy. Ask me about fairies. I dare you.

As soon as we arrived back in Galway, we hopped on the 6pm bus to Dublin. This ride back was much quicker, as they had opened up a main highway that was previously closed, however it still took about 4 hours to get back. Upon arrival, we scouted out our hostel, threw down the bags, took much needed showers, and headed out to find a bite to eat. We had planned on having another night on the town Dublin style, but we were just too exhausted. We ended up finding a great Mexican restaurant (The Alamo) in Temple Bar. Jenn and I split an order of chicken nachos and veggie fajitas (what I had been craaaaving all day) with a jug of sangria on the side. It was perfect.

Now for my Dublin hostel horror story.

So we got back to the hostel around midnight to crash. We had to be up by 7am to get Jenn to the airport on time for her flight, and we both needed a good nights sleep.

Minutes after falling asleep, these two wild Austrian girls come stumbling back after a night out at the Temple Bar. After taking a little while to finally settle down in their beds, one of the girls stares making little whining noises in her bed. This girl already had a voice similar to that of Alvin and the Chipmunks, so this noise was just a little obnoxious. A few minutes later, she starts coughing, choking, then throwing up in her bed. Keep in mind that we are staying in an orphanage style 12 bed hostel room, where each of the beds are about a foot or so apart. The girl then falls asleep like this as the room begins to staaaank. After a little while, she gets up and goes to the bathroom for a while. Who knows what she was doing it there. Her next move is to try and make the throw up in her bed go away. No she does not do this by cleaning, she decides to FLIP THE MATTRESS over so that it is out of sight out of mind (but definitely not out of smell out of nose..haha ok lame, but true.) She then takes out her perfume and practically dumps the bottle over her bed so that we now have a combination of vom and flowers consuming the air. She then gets back into bed and falls asleep, happy as can be.

In the meantime, I’m pretty sure I’m going to die. A guy sleepin in a bed near me looks at me with an “are you seriousssssss” look on his face and then hides in a tent of blankets. I do the same. Things are a little better in my blanket tent, but the snoring going on the room keeps sleep from happening.

About a half hour later, around 4am, 2 American boys come stumbling into the room with a 12 pack, turn on every light, and try to start a frat party in our little hostel home. The Austrian girls, yes even the pukey one, wake up and decide this is a great idea. I hide in my tent out of sheer exhaustion and just decide to wait it out. I fell in and out of sleep for the next hour and when I woke up at 6, they had all passed out in their respective beds..the room smelling of vom, flowers, and guinness. Yummy.

That just about wraps up the wild weekend to Galway. The only hitch in the whole weekend was the hostel in Dublin but looking back I think it’s a pretty funny story about hostels can go wrong. I’ve stayed in probably 20 or so hostels in the past year, and this is the only really crappy example I can think of . The hostel itself wasn’t even bad (Barnacles in Temple Bar), just the people were a little rowdy.

All in all…awesome weekend. I loved it and am sososo glad that I went J

Now I’m trying to get massive amounts of work done before my trip to London this weekend.

I’m trying not to think abut how much I wanna be at home for Thanksgiving because it is one of my all time favorite weekends of the year. London should be killer though so I’m glad I have that to keep me busy.

Right now I’m skyping with Olga, she’ll kill me for this. CHEEESE!

And olga’s mama sent me cookies in the mail!!!

Home in 27 days. I really am loving it here, but I've really grown to appreciate what I don't have here with me

That’s all : )

um oh ya. im sure there are 10 trillion typos in this post. when i write long posts i tend to just type and not self edit whatsoever (even though i really dont do it much ever anyway). in conclusion, im not fixing it so dont judge. peeeace

OmGz. Sweet potato cookiez.

2009-11-19T13:08:00.000-08:00

short pointless post because i really don't have a lot to say. Went to the library at 830 this morning, worked on a paper all morning, went to a spinning class at lunchtime, ate lunch (veggie and chicken stir fry with rice), worked on the paper again until 6.

So yes paper is almost done now, and I feel accomplished :) I wanted to get a good amount of work done before going to GALWAY this weekend. Jenn and I leave at 5 tomorrow morning. It's a 5 hour bus ride, with a 1 hour layover in Dublin halfway through. We wanted to get there around lunchtime to have lots of time to explore. Saturday we're doing a daytrip to the Cliffs of Moher. These are the cliffs and basically the reason I wanted to come to Ireland..and thats not made up

Sweet life. Hopefully I'll have an awesome glamor shot in front of these guys by Sunday

speaking of SWEET, when i was procrastinating at the library today, I came across a recipe for SWEET POTATO OATMEAL RAISIN COOKIES. now if you know me, there are 3 foods that are the keys to my heart. sweet potatoes and oatmeal raisin cookies and seafood. now seafood cookies is pretty flipping gross, so I guess getting 2 out of 3 of my favorite things in one delicious treat isn't too bad.
I made a couple of little adjustments

1 cup oats
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1/2 cup raisins
1 cup mashed sweet potato
1/4 cup olive oil
dash of cinnamon
1-2ish spoons of flaxseed

and dennn
excuse my lack of effort in taking good photos of cookies. they're fabulous. believe me.

ooook, well i should get my stuff together and head to bed pretty soon for my 430 am wake up call.
cheers :)

Christmas time is here

2009-11-18T05:41:00.000-08:00

Good morning! err well afternoon. it's 1:42 and I finally decided to get out of bed. yesterday was Swedish Anna's 22 birthday! We went out for a fun evening that turned into morning at the Limelight club/pub and it was a great time. good music/good atmosphere/good people. anyways rewind on the day

the morning was pretty standard. classes>library>lunch>class. I FINALLY turned in my philosophy paper on utilitarianism, and I'm so glad that's its finally out of my hands. After class I hurried downtown so that French Anna and I could find Swedish Anna the perfect gift. This was no easy task. We went in store after store after store and everything was either too cheap and not good enough or crazy expensive. We were close to giving up when we finally found the PERFECT necklace at house of fraser (a store here...like Macys). We also got her a package of Lindt truffles to top it off. Job well done.
Shopping yesterday was particularly fun because ITS CHRISTMAS TIME IN EUROPE! Since they don't have Thanksgiving to break up the holiday season between Halloween and Christmas, all the festivities and decorations go into full swing in mid November. Seee
I love the holidays.
To top it off, yesterday was the kickoff of the Christmas Continental Market in Belfast! Cooooolest market ever. The square in front of the City Hall is jampacked with dozens of stalls that look like little Swiss chalets. The sell every kind of food or gift you could dream of. I'll let the pictures do the talking.
Thats the city hall with its big adorable Be Festive sign. Oh yes, and at night the city hall is decorated with the craziest lights ever.
Nuts! I got hungry and got a little sleeve of almonds to snack on. mmmmmmmm.
Santa is creeping on the macaroon man.
ahh
um yeah. this is a local brewery that has set up a bar in a tent. inside is really intimate with lots of christmas lights and dark wooden tables
havent had this yet, but apparently its a holiday favorite
and then saving the best for last
cool! they also have alligator. i am very excited. i was heading to the gym after this so i didnt eat, but i'll definitely be going back

then HAPPY BDAY ANNA! 22 YEARS!
she loved the necklace
and then we went out! but not before pregamming with some gaga in the hallway.

ooo lala.

ok now time to do some serious work. i'm going to galway for the weekend with JENN tomorrow-Sunday.
OH YA, i also booked my thanksgiving trip to london. :)

Do Work

2009-11-16T07:43:00.000-08:00

Basically my life now consists of going on wild adventures and doing massive amounts of schoolwork in between. I'm currently in that "in between" phase.

Yesterday was a Sunday. That's really the best way to describe it. Relaxing, productive, easygoing. I didn't set my alarm but still woke up pretty early, ate breakfast, and got to work on my Immunology paper. I went to the gym midafternoon for a short run followed by the core workout class. I go to this class a couple times a week and there are 3-4 instructors that rotate around. I'm at the point that I know how good or bad the class will be just by seeing the guy when i first walk in. There is one particular instructor who kicks our ass. He has one arm and I seriously think he tries to compensate for that by having the strongest core body in Ireland. Anyways, I am quite sore today from that.
After the gym I checked mail to find A PACKAGE FROM HOME!

I strongly stand by the statement that I have the greatest parents on the planet. Whenever I have an issue they're always more than willing to help me get it resolved when it's hard for me to do it on my own (like when i'm in a foreign country). And not only do they help me with that, but they go way above an beyond! I was expecting only to get my new debit card in an envelope, but they also loaded up the package with all these quirky/autumnish things because they knew I was kinda homesick a few weeks ago when I needed my new card sent over. I especially like the turkey mask (?) and glamor shot of Bode. Thanks mom and pop. :)
After getting this, I immediately went downtown to take out some much needed cash (I've been cashless for 2 weeks!) so that I could pay back a few of my debts and go grocery shopping. I always love the half hour walk to downtown Belfast. Lots to seee
I came back home and did some minor work on my paper before heading over to Patricks for dinner and a movie. We made a a bomb Chicken Tikka dish with stir fried veggies and rice. This was paired with the new Pear Magners, which is great! I'm not sure about the US, but it is really popular here in Belfast. I had been reluctant to try it because I thought it would just be fruity, sweet, and weird but it ended up being really tasty and refreshing, especially along side the flavorful Indian food. After we watched Lucky Number Sleven. It was a pretty sweet movie, just the kind that I was in the mood for.
So yep today I woke up bright and early for 7am spinning, went to my classes, and now I'm back in my room to get some serious work done. This is the current state of my desk and probably will be until i leave:

So the weather has been overall pretty good here for the past week or so but today it definitely came to an end. High speed winds and torrential freezing rain. I'm so happy to be back in my room and in sweatpants. I have no plan to leave this little jailcell for the rest of the night thank you

I'm going to Galway/Claddugh/the Cliffs of Moher this weekend on a personal Irish adventure. It was supposed to be last weekend but I put it off until I got my new debit card. yay!

Jack and Dad went to see Bob Dylan last night in Boston. jealous.

My airplane to the US leaves in 5 weeks from today. Happy Monday!

Great Scot

2009-11-15T02:01:00.000-08:00

yawwwn, good morning! So i meant to update this last night about my whirlwind of a day over in Scotland, but I was just too exhausted to string a coherent thought together. So let me try again:

Yesterday started bright and early (alarm going off a little after 5) in order for me to get dressed, get my stuff together, eat breakfast and be over in front of Laura's apartment to catch a cab to the waterfront around 6. Several days earlier, we had booked tickets for a Stena-Line day trip from Belfast to Glasgow. For 18 pounds (~ 30 bucks), I got a roundtrip ferry ride (about 2 hours each way) to Scotland, and a roundtrip bus (about 2.5 hours each way) from the port city of Stranraer to Glasgow. With the little amount of time and money I have left, This turned out being an awesome idea. I highly recommend for anyone in Belfast with a free day to get out of the city.

Anyways, we arrived at the ferry port at around quarter to 7. The ship was scheduled to board at 7 and then leave by 730. Nope. Due to crazy inclement weather in the UK, the boat ended up being delayed by over an hour and a half. Usually I'm pretty chill about delays, but this sucked! As it was only a day trip, we were supposed to have 4 hours to explore Glasgow, but now our time was shortened down to just over 2 hours. Trying to see a whole city in that amount of time is just crazy, but Laura and I were up for the challenge. They offered to give people vouchers to return again today when the weather was nicer, but neither of us could do that with our schedules.
Anyways, at around 930, we were off! The boat was sick, and that made up for a lot of our disappointment with the delay. After about a half hour of being excited on the boat, we both crashed:

The ride was smooth and before we knew it, Hark! Scotland! We arrived in Stranaur ( a verrrry cute port city), and then loaded on to a bus. Many people chose to take a day trip to Ayr instead (a much smaller town that still had decent shopping) of Glasgow because it was much closer and therefore people would have more time in the town, but we had our hearts set on the bigger city. Most people on the day trip were going to do some Christmas shopping because shopping in Scotland is incredible (a fact I did not know).

The bus ride was amazing! The first leg of it was down the rocky Scottish coast, weaving through various seaside villages. Although I was still pretty tired and had planned on napping, I was too caught up in all of the scenery to sleep at all. Scotland looked pretty similar to Ireland, but it just had a different feel to it.
The coast was one of the most incredible things I have ever seen. Out to sea were all of these rocky island that looked incredibly out of place. It reminded me of Lord of the Rings or something. I didn't take too many pictures of it because I really just wanted to take it in and completely appreciate what I was seeing. At one point I saw what could easily be the most beautiful phenomena that I've seen in nature. There was a rocky island off the coast several miles out that jetted way up out of the ocean in a crazy jagged way. A rainbow had formed so that it looked like it was shooting out from this rocky island. The rainbow only went up a little bit into the sky and then disappeared in the sunlight. I'm not sure how good that description is, but I know I'll probably remember that for the rest of my life and wanted to record it somehow. Laura saw it too and tried to take a picture but with no success. I absolutely love seeing things that I would have no way to predict seeing when waking up in the morning. This is why I love to travel and why I get restless so easily.
The busride also passed through millions of fields full of sheep. millions may not even be an exaggeration. I never got sick of them though because they were just so damn cute. HOWEVER, it one field I was looking at the sheep and noticed one that was not like the others. It was laying on its back, legs straight up in the air, completely still. DEAD. I was horrified and looked around to see if anyone on the bus had noticed, but we had driven by too fast and it seemed like I was the only one who cared about the sheep anyway.

2 hours later...Glasgow! I was severely underestimated what Glasgow would be like. I figured it would be a pretty small city, smaller than Belfast even. wrooong. It reminded me a lot of Seattle. There werent a lot of high buildings obviously, but it was very developed, with tons of modern shopping, restaurants, art, and cool architecture. We got off the bus and were informed that we only have 1 hr 45 min to see the city before being back on the bus for our trip back to the ferry. AH. Laura and I took off. I hadn't eaten anything yet that day, so I ran into a a convenient store and picked up a snickers for some essential fuel.
We had a Scotland guide and on the way we made a list of what things we wanted to see, but it was really hard to get our bearings right away. We finally decided to ask a police officer how to get to the coolest things in the city. but APPARENTLY, there was a huge demonstration going on that day around where all the biggest tourist sites were so we couldn't go near them even if we wanted to. This was kind of a blessing because I know I would've been much more disappointed if I missed out of stuff that I could have done. There were also lots of little gems a long the way that made up for it:

Laura and I took a minute to make our gameplan. We decided we had time to do 2 things, and each of us would pick one. Laura chose that we should take the subway (also known as the clockwork orange) out to the University and see some of that architecture. I chose that we should go to a pub (surprise!). It wasn't just any pub though, it was supposed to be a really good one with the longest bar in the UK.
So we were off! We got to the University in about 10 minutes, and we had plenty of time to explore and take all the necessary pictures. This place was incredible. It was founded in 1451 and probably doesn't look much different from how it did then. Pictures:

After spending time there, we hopped back on the subway to the city centre so that I could get a scottish ale in my pub of choice before the bus ride back. We ran around centre for a while, taking pictures, and being lost and we finally stumbled upon the bar. I asked directions as much as I could because I just loved hearing the Scottish accent. I couldn't get enough. As if we didn't have enough hiccups along the way, we arrived at the bar to find out that it was FULL because there was a party going on inside and that no one else could enter. w.t.f. With the time that we allotted to drinking, we decided to just slowly wander back to the bus and do some souvenir shopping along the way. I got a few gifts for some people at home and a "Baby Nessie" statue for my desk. This could be one of my favorite souvenirs of all time. seee!

We also got a dinner on the go at the "Creative food company". Basically you go in and pick a bunch of indredients from a salad bar type thing and then they chop em up and put em on in your choice of dish. Laura picked pizza and I got a cous cous bowl. They chopped up a variety of peppers, mushrooms, beans, onions, jalapenos, chicken, feta, sundried tomatoes, and put them in this delicious whole wheat couscous with a sweet and sour sauce. AND it was only 3 pounds.

After picking up the food we headed back to the bus and devoured it. Soon after, we were both fast asleep for the entire ride back. It was dark out this time so I didn't have the awesome scenery to distract me.
The ferry back was a million times more luxurious than the first one. They kept promoting it as the most luxurious, smooth, and speedy ferry on the planet. All I could think about was the Titanic (built in Belfast) and could just imagine the glorious boat sinking into the depths of the Irish Sea. I'm so positive.
But seriously, the boat ride back was through the same storm that cause our delays earlier in the day. There was some intense rocking, and a lot of the merchandise at the indoor mall (yes, it had one..) was crashing all over the place. It was pretty scary, but I also thought it was fun. I'm one of those people that enjoys turbulence on an airplane haha. is that weird?
So yes, I drank some coffee and looked at my Nessie toy while Laura went and got her nails done. Yep, luxury.
We got home at around 10 and went straight home for a hot shower and bed.
Although it was rushed and hectic, I loved the day in Scotland. I would highly recommend this as a travel destination and really hope that I have the chance to go back and spend some more time.

*******************************************************************************
Taking care of some other business:
I got my Northeastern housing assignment for the spring!
Pro: got placed in WVG! I've never lived in a West Village, but it seems nice enough and convenient. Hopefully this time I will be able to somewhat appreciate what on campus housing actually has to offer, even though obviously going back off campus is the ideal situation..oh well. It was way to hard to find an affordable, reliable, convenient, and clean sublet from 3000 miles away.
Con: not in a single?! shenme?! I put the highest emphasis on wanting a single bedroom on my housing preference form. I'm in great academic standing, have no little tiffs with OSCCR, and handed my form in minutes after they distributed them. I'm not anti social or anything, but after 2 years of living in my own bedroom, I've come to really appreciate the privacy. Anyways, I've already sent them an email of concern and hopefully they'll switch it up for me.

I've officially been here for more than 2 months. Thats longer than I've ever been away from home. 35 days left in europe :( / :)

Oh reading week...

2009-11-12T10:20:00.000-08:00

So this week is the "reading week" at Queens University. Basically everybody is off from classes except for us science majors. Most people went on glamorous vacations (Jenn&pals -> Spain, Sean&pals ->Prague, Mike & pals -> Malta). Due to my little financial hiccup, the need to get some serious work done, and the fact that I actually had some classes (a lot of professors cancelled cause they get that no ones going to show up anyway), I stayed in Belfast this week to well...read.

So yep, there's really not much to report on except that this week has been a week of intense schoolwork and intense workouts. I started the week with a 7am spinning class followed by some weights and whatnot. Tuesday and Wednesday each had a 5 mile run followed by the hour long core class that is offered at the gym. I'm pretty sure that class is only meant to be done once a week because it is insanely hard, but I've gotten so much better at it since the beginning of this trip. I always feel great the day after no matter how much it hurts. Last night every muscle in my core was dying and whenever I laughed or coughed my abs killed....in a good way. I thought my knee was holding up alright with the 2 runs, but I woke up this morning and it was pretty sore. And so today is definitely an off day.

Aside from being at the gym, the rest of my free time has pretty much been at the library. I finished my paper for philosophy on utilitarianism (well...finished enough for now), and now I've moved on to immunology. I'm in no rush to get these papers done (the final 4 papers aren't due until I leave in mid December), but I really don't want to be stressed and pulling allnighters during my final weeks here. My goal is to get these papers at least started by the end of the month. awoo.

I had today off from all my classes so Anna and I headed to the library pretty early to get some serious work done. 7 hours of researching the applications of monoclonal antibodies later, I was beat. So, I came home to bake!
I found a recipe for healthy oatmeal raisin cookies online and did work

3/4 wine glass whole wheat flour
1 1/2 wine glass oats
3/4 wine glass raisins
1/2 spoon baking powder
1/4 spoon sea salt
1/4 wine glass butter
1/4 wine glass plain yogurt
1/2 wine glass brown sugar
1 egg
1 spoon vanilla

Seeing as we are only here for 3 months and buying all new kitchen supplies would be just silly, I measured out the ingredients in the best way possible:
cheers. flour.
After using this brilliant method, voila:
I think more of that was consumed than the actual cookies.
After 7 hours in the library and 20 minutes of baking, we vegged out by snacking on these bad boys, perusing chick magazines, and watching trashy tv. basically... loving life.
ya buddy.

So tomorrow is going to be a lot like today. Waking up early for 7am spinning, followed by as many hours at the library as I can handle. I will also be checking the mail about 18 times tomorrow until Bank of America finally sends me my new debit card.

And all this work will pay off because Saturday i'm going to SCOTLAND! For 20 pounds, I get a round trip ferry from Belfast to Strenaline (a port town in scotland) and a bus from Strenaline to Glasgow. So I'll be leaving at about 6am, hopping over to Scotland for the day, exploring what Glasgow has to offer, then heading back later than night. I originally wanted to do a whole weekend in Scotland, but with time and money running short, this is really the best option. Not to mention it's an amazing deal.
Okay, that's about all for now.
:)

oh ya. and look at this. dear lord.

I get by with a little help from my friends

2009-11-09T08:28:00.001-08:00

So I’m feeling completely better. The whole stressed/homesick/tired thing happened, I acknowledged it, and now I am over it. For the first time in probably two weeks, yesterday was a gloriously sunny day in Belfast. SEE!

Seriously I think that is all that I needed. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were tough days. Between sad things going on at home that I wish I could have been there to support, a sudden realization of how much school work I have to do here (this is supposed to be a European vacation right?), and the constantly gloomy atmosphere in this city, I was just about done. Having my banking get messed up was the last straw, and I was not happy.

BUT…between Saturday night and now, my attitude about being here has done a total 360. Saturday night there was a showing of The Big Lebowski at the Queens Film Theater, the movie theatre on campus that shows lots of independent, quirky, and classic movies. It’s also super cheap for students, so it’s turned into one of my favourite things about this place. Anyways, the BL night was awesome. I had never seen the whole thing, and I’m very glad that this was the atmosphere that I saw it in. There was a big party at the theatre before the 10 pm showing of the movie. A DJ was playing Big Lebowski ish music, they were giving out free memberships to the theatre (even cheaper than it already is, woo), and free White Russians for all (I forgot about how good those were). Anyways, the movie was hilarious. I’m jumping on that cult film bandwagon about 10 years too late, but I honestly did love it. Reminds me way too much of some family members of mine. The dude abides.

So yes, after the movie I came home and had some much needed skype dates with friends from home. Although it is just a computer screen, talking to 2 of my better friends really made me feel a lot better. It’s great to know that I have been away about 6 months of this year so far, and I feel closer than ever to certain people. I’m excited to be home (42 days?), but now I can take comfort in the fact that some people will always be there no matter how far away I feel sometimes.

Anyways, I woke up on Sunday to SUNSHINE. The temperature was warm, there was not a cloud in the sky, and there was no freaking way I was about to spend my entire day at the library researching for my philosophy paper. So, I put the books aside, packed a silly little lunch (I had to really stretch my groceries out until I got money this morning), and headed out to Cave Hill:

This is the place that I hiked my first week here and thought that I would return to every day for my entire stay. That didn’t realistically work out (hiking cave hill in the rain would be fatal.) but I’m so glad that I got out there again yesterday. This time I went alone (the first time I went there was a group of 8ish of us), and it was awesome. I could go whatever pace I wanted, explore some of the other paths, and sit at the viewpoints for as long as I wanted. Here’s a few pics of the awesomeness.

That cliff was my chosen lunch spot, where I ended up just hanging out for about an hour. I’m not going to get all sentimental about how much I enjoyed being able to reflect, but it was definitely time well spent. I have been incredibly lucky with the opportunities I have been given this year and sometimes I have to stop and pinch myself to think of everything that I’ve done. I’m trying to come up with a comprehensive list of the coolest things that happened in 2009, but I’ll probably save that for a New Years post or something.

I am very aware that not everybody gets to do stuff like this, and I am going to appreciate every single day I have here until I fly home. After hearing the news about what happened in Merrimack last Saturday night, I had a pretty intense reality check about how I shouldn’t be taking any of the little things for granted. Although I only knew him through my brother, I thought about Chris and how much he would have probably loved to be sitting where I was. No one deserves to go in the way that he did. I left his name in a rock at the top of the hill. Rest in peace Chris.

On my way down, the perfect hike was wrapped up with the most incredible rainbow that I have ever seen in my life. Not only was it ridiculously bright and clear, but I could see exactly where it started and where it ended. I sat down and just looked at it for a while, and then another rainbow appeared too! Ireland really is amazing.

After the hike, I headed back home to “work on my paper”. That turned into me having a long phone conversation with dad and mom. My skype actually works this week since most of the people in my building have gone home and therefore the internet isn’t as jammed up.

THEN I went and hung out with Lindsay at Patrick’s place. We made dinner with all of the leftover crap we could find (sautéed mushrooms, peppers, cauliflower, onions, etc with boiled potatoes and pasta). It was actually a very satisfying vegetarian meal considering all we had was random leftovers sitting around. Then we decided that we are going to London for Thanksgiving. I love that I met Lindsay here. She’s doing the coolest thing right now and even though she gets worried about where she’ll go next or what she’ll do when she gets home, I know that taking the time to travel on your own can be the most rewarding experience of a lifetime. So yes, today she is off to Rome, then Athens, then France, and then on Thanksgiving day I am going to meet her in London. In Amsterdam we met a lot of very fun people from the United States and Canada who we will meet up with. It’s definitely not what a normal Thanksgiving would be, but I can’t think of a better way to make it work while I’m here. So excited : )

I’m quitting the lab. It has been an incredible experience working in it fulltime the past 6 weeks, however my schedule has gotten tremendously busier and I have to make some sort of adjustment. I’m pretty disappointed to make this decision, but I want to enjoy my final weeks here and actually explore more of Ireland while doing well in my classes instead of volunteering 30 hours of my week to a resume builder. Yep. There it is.

This morning I did the 7am spinning class again. It kicked my ass, but it feels a billion times better for my knee. I can tell that I’m getting in probably the best shape of my life. Who knew that would happen in Ireland... the land of beer, potatoes, and fish & chips.

1 month til 22. Whoa now.

Can’t stop listening to new Jack Johnson En Concert CD. Get it.

Ok, time for Genetic Manipulation class. Awoo.

Who eats a debit card...seriously.

2009-11-07T05:30:00.000-08:00

So I went downtown to the Barclays atm to try and finally get money..

AND THE EFFING THING ATE MY CARD.
The bank people were completely unhelpful and told me that there was nothing they could do. Now usually I am pretty chill in situations like these (...obviously it'll get worked out fine, there are bigger problems in the world), but I really just had a minor breakdown.
I havent' really been upset in a long time so it was about time this happened. Just the combination of being overwhelmed with schoolwork, only having 6 weeks left here, still having 6 left week here (ya there's a difference between the two..), being exhausted physically, wanting to be home to support my fam, missing home friends, and having no access to any money in a foreign country just wore me down.
Anyways, I walked back from downtown the long way and decided to skip going to the gym (at least for right now). I was not feeling the idea of being yelled at by some core-fitness instructor.
So nowww I'm at the library..the best *free* way to make use of my time right now. Getting this philosophy paper done by tomorrow is my goal. Having that out of the way will probably make a lot of things feel better.

Skype date with Olga later :) Just what I need

It's Business, It's Business Time

2009-11-07T02:26:00.000-08:00

Happy Saturday
I "slept in" today, waking up at about 10. I probably could have kept sleeping until early afternoon, but I have some stuff to get taken care of this morning. Days agenda:

Actually get out of bed and my PJs
Walk downtown, take care of some banking issues (see below)
St. George's market (because i cant not go)
Short run (maybe not, again see below)
Core Workout class 1245-145
Library alll afternoon
Make delicious dinner with some friends (spinach and ricotta cannolini or eggplant/goat cheese stuffed pepper? yummmmmm)
Big Lebowski is playing at the Queens Film Theater (woo, i've still never seen it)
Perhaps a few pubs

So things are going okay. They have definitely slowed down since Amsterdam last weekend. Belfast is a very cool city, but I could see how being here for more than the three months would get a little depressing. It has rained literally every day this month. If the sun does shine, it is usually for only an hour or so...and it's usually raining at the same time. I've been in a funky mood the past two days, and I know that has to have something to do with it.
So yeup, so last night I was in a funk. It wasn't really homesickness- I've had that before (girl scout camp when I was like 12?) This is just more of a general exhaustion. After Amsterdam, I was physically tired in every way. Then this week I realized just how much school work I have to get done in the next month, which was kind of a shock.
Schooling here is a very weird system. I have literally had zero assignments or ways of being evaluated so far this semester. Basically on the first day of each class, I was given the topics of 2 major research papers that I had to do before leaving in December. 6 papers in one whole semester? Big deal. But now that I'm starting them and realizing that each one could easily take 2 weeks of dedication to do (and do well...), I am running out of time. ALSO, I very much have the travel bug. I am in Europe for 6 more weeks, and the more things I see the more I realize I haven't seen. I still haven't explored Ireland at all (well the Giant's Causeway, and a morning in Dublin), and I really wanted this trip to be dedicated to exploring my family's past and the culture that my grandparents lived with. I was planning on doing a big road trip with my family when they came, but now I have to kind of fill in the weekends with what those plans would have been.
Also, right now is the "reading week" for the Social Sciences majors. This means that all of the political science, pysch, sociology, anthro, history, international affairs, etc (basically everyone I know) has the week off so they are doing big trips all around the place (a week in Spain, Paris, Prague, Italy..to name a few). As a science major, I don't really get a reading week though, so campus is very quiet and sad right now.
SO on that note, I'm planning a little trip for myself. I invited Anna and Anna, and I hope they come because traveling with a buddy is always best, but I'll still go even if they don't think they can.
I don't have any classes Wednesday afternoon-Sunday this week so I'm thinking of seeing a bit of Ireland. I'll take a bus from Belfast to Dublin then transfer a bus over to Galway. Galway is supposed to be the "most Irish" of the cities in Ireland, with brightly painted pubs and traditional music. I'm pretty sure that the actual Irish language is still even used there. The Cliffs of Moher is definitely at the top of my list of things to do while I'm here. I remember growing up on Marco Island and seeing pictures of my family members in front of these cliffs and just thinking that there could be no cooler place in the world. I definitely think I have seen crazier things this year, but going to this place would have a lot of sentimental and personal value for me.
So next weekend...it's happening.

On another note, what the heck BANK. Last night I tried to use my credit and debit cards , and ALL got declined. I called the bank, and they had no idea what I was talking about or why they were not being accepted. I only have about 4 pounds in my pocket right now, so I hope this all gets square away. I'm walking to the Barclays bank (bank of america's uk partner) to try and figure this out. Having no access to money in a foreign country is a annoying feeling, especially when I owe like 3 people money right now.

SooOOo, I'm not sure what a charlie horse is, but I think I got one last night. Actually, no, Google is telling me that a Charlie horse is a cramp in the thigh. BUT, last night I woke up with the most intense cramp in my calf that I have ever experienced. I actually had tears, and I could not make the pain stop for the life of me. After about five minute of rubbing my calf and trying to flex my foot, the pain subsided a little and the muscle just felt completely exhausted. Now this morning it feels like my whole calf is a big bruise. I went to a pretty intense spinning class yesterday and ran about 5 miles the day before, but I thought I did enough stretching after. Afterways, I'll try to stay off it the next day or so.

Alrighty, thats about all. Last night was kind of uneventful. It was Dominika's birthday, and she made a killllller homemade cheesecake and this strawberry shortcake thing (I stuck with the cheesecake..). Everyone indulged a little toooo much, but I did a crazy workout earlier in the day so I was starving. So good. It was cute. see.
I was thrilled to find this amazing piece hanging on the wall of Dominika's kitchen. No one knows who put it up or where it came from...but NONE of the Europeans know what it is at all. They were especially confused as to why I thought it was cool at all...or why i had a song about "business time" stuck in my head the rest of the night...
Then people went out to a party at Mount Charles (the graduate student dorms), but I ended up watching a movie with Patrick and Lindsay at his place. That was just the kind of night I needed to fix my funky mood.

***Okay this is now 20 minutes later because my computer just randomly died*** >:(

About once a day now, my computer just dies. It runs pretty much fine otherwise...Slower than it used to be, but it is about 3.5 years old now. I just backed up my philosophy paper and my Amsterdam pictures to my external before finishing this post. I will be beyond words pissed if my computer decides to go to laptop heaven before this trip is over. Really, the last thing I can afford right now. oof.

What happens in Amsterdam...

2009-11-04T13:24:00.000-08:00

I survived! And have a tshirt to prove it...

So I’ve actually been writing this entry out in segments in MS word because this week has been too crazy to sit down and just write one solid post. Ok here we go.

Amsterdam. Where to begin?

I’ll just kind of split up the post into random subheadings, as I attempt to organize all my memories/opinions/stories. I don’t want this to be a step by step account of the weekend, since obviously what happens in Amsterdam stays in Amsterdam. BUT I think a good chunk of the trip is blog worthy.

The City

Amsterdam could be my favorite city that I have ever visited. Top 3 for sure (probably with Munich and Hong Kong?). It might be that I’m still feeling the excitement from the trip, but I honestly loved it. Every person I met was friendly, it was easy to get around, the architecture was gorgeous, the food was out of this world, and it had the right balance of history and fun. I’ve been to a lot of cool places in the past year, but the vibe I felt there hit closest to my personality.

So the layout of the city was awesome. I knew that Amsterdam had canals running throughout, but I had NO idea just how many there would be. You could hardly walk down a street without seeing water somewhere. Although we never got the chance to do an actual canal boat tour, we did plenty of walking and I now probably have 200 pictures of canals alone. Unlike Venice, the city didn’t smell from the water either. Appartently there are locks down the Amstel River (main canal) that flush the water out periodically so it down’t get the chance to rot.

BIKES! If you don’t ride a bike in Amsterdam, you are not cool. Period. Every street in the city had a bike lane, with special bike traffic lights and all. As a pedestrian, this took some getting used to, and I’ll have to be honest in saying that I came pretty close to getting run over a time or two…or ten. Oops. None of the bikes were in particularly awesome condition, but so many were painted in such a groovy way (bright colors, flowers, etc etc). Because so many people in the city have bikes, there is some insane statistic about how many are stolen a year (50,000+)…but it rounded out to being that a bike was stolen once every ten minutes. There’s even a whole underground bike stealing world where you can put in special orders for a bike, and someone will go and get it for you. The police don’t do much about it because if the criminals weren’t stealing bikes then they’d be stealing cars, merchandise from stores, things from peoples’ homes, etc.

Basically a common theme that I found was that Amsterdam was a big fan of supporting the lesser of two evils. If people don’t smoke marijuana legally, then they will pursue it (and harder drugs) in an illegal way. If prostitution is not displayed in store windows, then an underground world of kidnap, rape, pimps, and exploitation would still exist. If guys weren’t stealing bikes, then they’d be stealing items of much greater value.

I’m currently writing my final philosophy paper on ethics, and this whole system just blew my mind.

If it wasn’t so touristy, I would definitely consider living some part of my life there. Who knows, nothing is ever out of the question.

Travel Companions

Patrick: American guy in my Immunology class here. Goes to Davidson in North Carolina. Halloween weekend in Amsterdam was his idea, so props to him for making it happen!

Anna: Sweden! She’s popped up quite a few times in this blog already so I guess she doesn’t need much more of an intro

Lindsay: Patrick’s swimming friend from the States. Graduated a few years back and is now doing the ultimate Eurotrip before figuring out what it is that she’s going to do with her life. Very cool

Basically, we were a great group of people to travel together. We all were up for anything, regardless of how tired we were/rainy it was. We each respected what the others wanted to do or not do…which is an important group dynamic for going somewhere like Amsterdam… to each his own :)

The Hostel

**First off, I’m so glad Bill went out his crazy Eurotrip this past summer because it’s definitely making a lot of my travels muchhhh easier.**

So as per recommendation, we booked 4 beds in a 12 bed dorm room in the Bulldog Hotel and Coffeeshop. This place was hands down one of the best hotels I’ve ever stayed in. (I guess it’s been rated top 5 in the world before as well?) I was skeptical of how a hotel in one of the chillest cities would be run, but the place was very professional, friendly, organized, laid back, and secure. The bottom floor had a loungebar fully stocked with a Wii, board games, computers, couches, and tables to mingle/eat/drink/smoke/whatever floats your boat. Next door to the hotel was a psychedelic coffee shop (where I actually only got a real coffee haha), and down the street were extensions of the same idea. The ladies at the reception were sassy and stoned (the best kind of ladies), but were more than willing to help us with anything we needed. There was also a free breakfast every morning that was out of this world for a complimentary meal. The catch was that you had to actually wake up on time (before 10am) to get a piece of that action (I made it down every day, however I did go back up for a nap after each time). Oh yes, and the beds were clutch. Very clean, comfortable, and private (even in a room with 11 other people)

Anyways, that’s about it for the hostel. If you ever find yourself in Amsterdam, I highly recommend it (no pun intended).

Red Light District

Oof, now this is a topic. I spent most of the weekend in this neighborhood actually. Noooo, not to stare at the ladies shakin their booties in the window… but because our hostel was actually conveniently located right in it. I am very conflicted about how I feel about this area. Wrong to exploit women, duh, yes. But I cannot say that I am innocent in that I didn’t enjoy walking around it as a tourist.

One of the craziest things about the area was day vs. night. At night the windows are full of toned, busty, young, porn star-ish looking girls wearing skimpy little numbers to attract as much business as possible. In the daytime however, it was a whoooole different story. In the day, the windows were full of (much much )bigger, (much much) older, (much much) less put together ladies wearing ridiculous underwear that looked like it’d been found in a dumpster. Sorry if that’s a rude description, but if you’ve been there you know it’s a fact.

From what we learned however, the red light district is actually in the process of being shut down. The government is gradually buying out all of the windows and replacing them with art and fashion displays. I can’t say I don’t disagree with this policy, however many people we talked to did make it a point that if the business going down in the red light district isn’t out in the open, it is still going to happen in a much shadier and probably dangerous way.

Food

a-m-a-z-i-n-g. Although Amsterdam isn’t known for any particular food (cheese? French fries? Anything that satisfies the munchies?), the variety and quality of food in that city was amazing. There was definitely an eclectic mix to choose from as well: middle eastern, Italian, Chinese, Brazilian, American, etc etc etc. The first night we searched up and down to find an Authentic Dutch meal, however we settled for Indonesian (close enough). The menu was complicated, but I ended up ordering a Tahoe Telor (omelette filled with tofu, bean sprouts, cabbage and topped with soy sauce) and this crazy salad of magoes, papayas, sweet potato (RAW), and cucumber.

It was fabulous to say the least. I cleaned the plate and felt full but not disgusting cause most of it was pretty light. Linsday and I split a pitcher of Dommelsch beer which we had no problem finishing (even though the waitress seriously judged us for ordering it…meh). It was good, tasty yet drinkable.

The second night we didn’t eat quite so glamorously. There was a biiiig Halloween pub crawl, and our mission was more to get something in our stomach before heading out. We settled for a pretty good (yet wayyyy overpriced) falafel joint, and it did the job. No pic, no point.

The third night we went to the greatest food court on the planet. Our walking tour had stopped by it for a break earlier in the weekend, however none of us were hungry or felt like spending

money at the time. Lindsay and I split a shrimp and veggie pizza and a roasted veggie mish mosh (eggplant, sweet potato, olives, red peppers, tomatoes, etc). SOOOOOOOO GOOD. Boston needs a “La Place” food court immediately.

The rest of our meals there were from the free breakfast at the hostel. We would load up on a heart breakfast, then shove extra sandwiches and apples in our bags for later. Hey, when you’re traveling on a budget, you make the most of what’s provided for you. :)

Tours

If you ever go to Europe, find out where the free newEurope tours are. They are informative, funny, and (as I said) FREE…with tips accepted of course. On Saturday, we decided to take part in a 3 hour walking tour of the city to get our bearings and check a lot of the more touristy stuff off our list of things to do. I thought it would be kind of lame, as I usually do with guided grou

p things, however I really enjoyed this. Our tourguide, Cameron, was animated and interactive. He had hilarious and quirky stories about a lot of the ins and outs of how Amsterdam works (especially interesting in the Red Light District and around the mushroom stores and coffeeshops). He also made the more historical aspects very fun. We roamed around the canals, markets, gardens, museums, and ended at the Anne Frank House.

The next day we did a 2 hour bike tour of the outer skirts of the city. We were apprehensive because we had heard that the weather would not be ideal, but we ended up decided that whatever…When in Amsterdam…(plus we’re from Belfast, a little rain never hurt anyone). Anyways, a little rain turned into a LOT of rain minutes after the biking adventure began. At first it was okay and only drizzled, but by about halfway through we were soaked. I was wearing 4 layers (cami, shirt, sweatshirt, and jacket) and I was soaked to the bone. My jeans were practical my second skin, and I was shaking from the cold by the end. Despite the miserable conditions, the tour was still really fun! We went outside of the city center to the museum area where we saw the Van Gogh Museum (although unfortunately didn’t go in :( ) and the infamous "I Amsterdam" sign. The Heineken Brewery, the harbor, and this bridge that a bunch of ladies peed on (ask me for more details, this is a blog, not a history lesson) were also stops on the trip. The tourguide managed to keep our spirits up, and seeing that we were freezing he squeezed a pitstop at a local brewery located in an original dutch windmill into the trip. I had some beer that I could never remember again, as the name was basically a bunch of consonants strung together which still sounded nothing like how I tried to pronounce it. But it did taste a lot like Hennpin, and it warmed me right up for the last leg of the trip.

Coffeeshops

I know what you’re all thinking, how can Casey seriously have an entry THIS LONG about Amsterdam and never talk in depth about the coffeeshops. Well here we go. PS, this is all hearsay from my tourguide…of course.

SO. Fun fact: the distribution, selling, and buying of marijuana in Amsterdam is still illegal. Decriminalized for having it on hand (wooo Massachusetts and Amsterdam are like the same place!...not), but the whole business itself is still pretty much underground (well… as underground as the police in Amsterdam care for it to be..which isn’t a lot). So yes, that is why the places are called coffeeshops. It is also illegal for the front of the store to advertise that it is selling pot, so you won’t see any cannibus leaves in the window (although the bob Marley flags, tie dye, bright colors, and cute names make it all pretty obvious). Anyways, if you really only want a coffee, you better go to a coffeehouse and not a coffeeshop (although most shops have coffee as well). So yes, in these places, there is a menu, like any other café. However the menu has a list of herb from all over the world with descriptions of how strong it is/what the affect will feel like. The “baristas” at these places are also very well informed, and will be more than happy to help a customer with any questions/concerns they may have. In addition to the actual smokable stuff, the also have any baked good you can imagine…tea…lollipops…you name it. What clever people.

So yes, we visited some of the more famous joints (ha I crack myself up). De Dampkring is known as being the most famous and many a celebrity has frequented the place. It is not allowed to advertise directly, however the place did give out free souveneir posters (I now have 5, and it made an appearance in Oceans 12…I’ll be renting that movie soon.).

HALLOWEEEEEN

How did I almost forget about the holiday that this trip was centered around. Halloween baby! I had heard that no one in Amsterdam really recognized it as a Holiday or dressed up (this is true.), so I chose to be a hippie for my costume (so I would potentially fit in whether people dress up or not). Anna had a matching hippie costume, Patrick was a vampire, and Lindsay went the budget route with wearing a headband with spiders. Our tour earlier in the day had told us about a big pub crawl going on that night for the holiday, so we decided that would be our best bet. It was insane. At the meeting point for the pub crawl, we bumped into a few other Americans, one of which was a fellow NORTHEASTERN GIRL! Jessica Manning. We have 11 friends in common on facebook. Small world. The others in the group were from other places in the States (Duke, Hahavahd, Columbia, Toronto (yes I know that’s not in the states..but close enough)). Our group of kids (minus Anna, she found better things to do hehe) had a great time. The crawl included admission to 6 different clubs, free drinks at each, and a tshirt (yessssss). Because it was a Halloween pub crawl, this was probably where the greatest concentration of people actually dressed up in the city was located also. It was wild. We ended the night chilling back at the Bulldog lounge til ehhhh 4am or so (that was the last time I saw a clock at least). Definitely nothing like any of my past conventional Halloweens, but amazing nonetheless.

Well that’s all for Amsterdam. There is tons more to say, but I’m exhausting this entry and I’ve got crazy papers to do

So people, does Utilitarianism conflict with the demands of justice?

Please answer that for me in 4000 words. Ready, Go.

Highlights of today

8 hours in the library
I lost my umbrella (usually not a blog worthy event, but when you live in Northern Ireland that’s a pretty big deal
Lots of grocery shopping
Very sore from toning class at gym yesterday
Made CURRY for dinner (with cauliflower, red and yellow peppers, chickpeas, mushrooms, sweet potatoes, celery, zucchini, red onion, carrots, and tofu.) Deeelicious.
Got a postcard from Marie todayyyyyyyyyyyyy! STAY PRETTY AND DRINK REAL BEER. heck yes :)
I love it here, but miss home more everyday. Not in a sad way, but in an “I’ll appreciate living a normal life again” kind of way

peace

I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse

2009-10-30T02:22:00.000-07:00

So there's a couple things I wanna get squared away on here before I leave for AMSTERDAM today so that when I get back that is all that I'll have to talk about

First off, GOOD MORNING. I've already been up for 3.5 hours and it's only 9:30. Yes, I actually went to the 7am cycling class at the gym. I really cant believe I did it, seeing as I was up until past 2am "packing" for the trip and therefore was running on about 4 hours of sleep. That picture is what a packing failure looks like.
Last night a couple of us went to the Godfather since it was playing on the big screen at the Queens Film Theater. I had never seen it. Well I attempted to watch it when I was about 10 years old, and lets just say I didn't make it past the horse scene. If you've seen it, you know. But ya, what an awesome movie. I'm not usually really into gangster movies, but I guess there's a reason why that is known as one of the most epic ones of all time. Anyways, I didn't sleep a whole lot last night.
Alarm went off at 6am and off I went to the gym! It doesn't really get light out here until about 8am, so it was still dark as night gets. The gym is about a mile away so I ended up running there because I was a liiiiiiittle scared. Belfast at night probably isn't the safest place in the world (even though 6am hardly is night). Anyways, Party in the USA came up on my iPod, and I was at the gym before Miley could finish doin her thang.
good morning physical education centre:7am gym classes when I don't have anywhere to be until noon. I've offically lost it. And as for the class. Holy Mother. Spinning is probably the most intense cardio I've ever done. The instructor was a screaming asshole boot camp style guy, who I thought about doing terrible things to several times throughout the workout. But at the end I felt awesome, and realized that I atually loved him. :) No hard feelings. See ya nextTuesday. (yep didn't mean for the sentence to come out that way.)

Oh, speaking of hidden messages, Arnold is quite the funny governor hahaha

So yes, now I'm home and showered and eating as delish breakfast.

>Packet oatmeal cooked w/ skim milk
>Cut up little apple
>half banana
>generous spoonful Almond butter
>1/2 cup plain greek yogurt
>flax seed
>Rooibos tea :)
>Also had a hardboiled egg, which isn't here. word.

And now I'm thinking of curling back up in bed for an hour before I have to meet Patrick and Linsday for the airport.

There are also a couple of also awesome things that happened this week that totally slipped my mind when I was updating before.

#1) Wine and Cheese Society Event
So one of the many reasons that Queens University in Belfast is cooler than Northeastern: it has a wine and cheese club. ooo lala. The first event of the year was at this African Art Gallery down the street it was a BYOwine thing, so Anna Anna and I picked out some bottle of French Pinot Noir on the way. Then at the gallery, they had a variety of French cheeses set out for a tasting. There were descriptions for each of them, but I think people mostly just indulged on whatever they thought was yummiest. Ardrahan was my personal fave. Here's the snooty description they gave us.
Ardrahan: Type: Pasteurized Cows Milk, Washed Rind, Veg. Taste: Nutty, Salty, Creamy, Pungent- need we say more! This is a cheese lover's fave.

These are my hawt friends. left to right> Antonia (Wales), Anna (France), and Anna (Sweden). Get in line fellas.

Yep, good times. From a different perspective however, it was also really weird. We were all white, financially comfortable students at an African Art Gallery, looking at pictures of children living in poverty, while sipping on expensive wine and indulging in piles of cheese.
Something is twisted with that.

Okay this is about the time in the post where I start to get bored with updating. But I'll stay strong.

#2) Belfast Arts Fest
So every year, the city of Belfast has a huge arts festival that lasts throughout the month of October. Dozens of events are held around the city: art exhibits, plays, concerts, speeches, etc. All of the events require tickets, but there is also the opportunity to sign up as a volunteer and go to the events for free. The Seamus Heaney/Ulster Orchestra thing was one of the events that I actually paid for. I also signed up to volunteer at a bunch of others and got assigned to work at a Bollywood Club Night and at the Toy Army Improv Jazz concert. Both things were realllly cool.
I don't really have any good pics from either events, but to the right is the jazz band. Both events were fun, but it would probably be worth it to just buy a ticket so that you can actually go and enjoy it with your friends. Sometimes really awesome things are hard to appreciate when you have no one to share them with.

Mmmmmmmmm Okay. there are probably more things to do and say, but my bed is calling my name. One last pic: my awesome dinner last night before the movies. All I had was really random vegetables in my locker, and I wanted to use them before going away for the weekend. Anna also had some spinach tortellini that she wanted to use up, so I stole a few pieces of that as well :)
Sweet potato and chick peas, zucchini eggplant mushroom asparagus red pepper onion in tomato sauce

And I close with a lyrics from the good old Dandy Warhols

Well I'm going to see you soon in Amsterdam
I can't believe I can get there but I can, man
I hope when I see you that you're still likin' who I am, I am
but if you don't baby well I'll still tell you that I understand
I'll tell you
I I I understand

And We'll All Float On

2009-10-28T08:16:00.001-07:00

Oh hey. Just a typical humpday here in cloudy Northern Ireland. This week has been going pretty good and super busy. I was in the lab foreverr yesterday, but I got a lot of stuff done before my trip this weekend :) I now have all my assignments for the semester here too. Since I'm going home before they have finals, I get to do a paper for each of my classes instead. Pretty good deal to me.

My running here is also improving at a crazy rate. Today I did 10k! I've done it before but with a walking interval in the middle. Oprah was on at the gym and she was interviewing Jennifer Anniston AND Beyonce (my gurlz)...so before I knew it, the hour was up, and I was 6.2 miles farther than I started (on the treadmill). It felt great, and I really wanted to keep going, but my knee is just not going for it. When I did my 10 minute walk cool down, I saw in the mirror that I was involuntarily limping. bad bad bad. So I'm going to take a few days off. I signed up for a 7am cycling class on Friday (yea..we'll see if that happens), but at least it'll give my joints a rest. And maybe there will be some remedy for joint pain in Amsterdam...

So I had a package waiting for me when I got hoooome:
icing the knee+new presents (GRE books, ugh)+food= the current story of my life

weeee GREs! I'll probably take them in the late spring sometime, but I figured now is probably the best time to start looking at it. Although Ireland is an adventure, there is still a pretty good amount of free time with little things to do that don't cost a ton of money. So study it is. Nerd.

And that's my yummy lunch. Zucchini, eggplant, red and yellow peppers, mushrooms, ren onion, asparagus, and tofu in a tomato sauce. mmmmmmmmmmm.

I'm feeling a lot better from Sunday too. Having my family cancel their trip makes me miss them a billion times more than before, but this semester is already zooming by as it is. I look forward to being home with them again, but I'm trying not to take any of this time for granted at all. And I got the best email from my dad today.

Hi Case, I'm so glad that we have normal kids who just like to see the world and be amazed and amazing too. We got an office-wide email today (we get soooo many) asking for financial contributions (some are pretty cool - like the "tequila" tulip bulbs (yeah really) that I purchased at a bargain from a grade school) this time to send a legal assistant's daughter to Rwanda this Spring. OK. Cool. But attached was a letter from her 17 yr old asking for mucho $$$ & explaining that she was going there "to spread the good word of God." Literally. I'm not kidding, nor giving her a dime. Why can't she at least say she's going to build huts or fight genocide or protect the fire ants. Is "genocide" in Rwanda one of those "bad" words of God? Uhhm. Well, I wonder how folks would react if I asked for $$$ for my pagan kids to travel the world for good ol knowledge, insight & spreading some good words to new friends & places. How much would they give me? Even scarier, how much are they giving her? Oh well, I rant. And hope all is well with you & your very, very worthwhile stay in No. Ireland. Even if the "good words" you're spreading are your own. Love, Dad

PS-What was the name of that cheapo concert ticket internet site where you got that last minute Dandy ticket last year? I'm lookin for some "cheap" Dylan tix at the Wang. If any...
Love, Dad

Right on pops :) And oh ya if you're reading this: the ticket site was Craigslist. haha

In other news:
I NEED A HALLOWEEN COSTUME.
I know I'm going to be in Amsterdam, and it is definitely not going to be as big of a deal as the US...but I still love thinking of a cool idea. I was just going to go with a hippie, since thats easy and Ill be in a pretty groovy place, but now I'm thinking I want something cooler.
I helped Bill think of the best thing ever last night. I won't give it away here, but I just want some credit. haa
Olga and I thought of our costume for next year, which will be epic. But that will remain under wraps for another year. muahaha.
HELP!
Someday I will get to finally be this:

But that someday will not be this year due to the lack of pants. and I'm usually very anti skanky Halloween costume, but sometime you just gotta say what the fuck, what your move.

Marco Island for New Years!

AAAAAAND last but not least, I'm working at this tonight. I'm really excited. I didn't listen to jazz for a really long time and am really starting to get back into it lately. I'll let you all know

:) bye

Good dog

2009-10-26T05:43:00.000-07:00

Walking to class this morning I saw a man walking his cow-sized Newfoundland. The man was mean to the big dopey pup. The man kept kicking and yelling at him whenever the cow-dog stopped to sniff something. The man slipped on a leaf and dropped his mail on the ground. The dog ate all his mail.
I laughed out loud. Good dog.

Sunday Bloody Sunday

2009-10-25T13:03:00.000-07:00

clocks changed! and that means im exhausted...and its 8pm. It's okay though, I only have a few papers to read then I can hit the hay for a good nights sleep.

Today was very cool. I'm still pretty down about all the news at home, but I'm still here and have to make the most of it. I wish I could be home with my family now, but I know my family is great at keeping their head above water and making the most of the good life. I couldn't help but think about all the things that I wish they could see while I'm actually living here during my walk downtown this morning, but it'll just have to be postponed.
This is what it's all about no matter where we are in the world :)
So anyways, today Anna (Sweden), Dominika (Germany), and I took a bus out to (London)derry. I actually have no idea what I should call it. This is the town where the troubles really went down (aside from Belfast). Today the effects of the troubles are still very obvious, as the town is decorated with passionate murals and split up by many stone walls and gates. The name of the town even depends on who you ask. Sunday Bloody Sunday was written about a shooting that occurred in this town in '72.
It's really quite eerie walking through these areas. I always feel extremely uncomfortable taking pictures of the murals since they're so emotional. However I feel they are a really good thing to capture, seeing as their purpose is to document what happened for future generations to see.
Here are a few examples:
First we went to the Derry (primarily Irish/Catholic) segment

Not only were there murals about the Northern Ireland conflict, but there were many dedicated to other struggles for peace all around the world. Even the United States was represented:

My favorite mural in the Derry area was the peace dove..mostly because of how much I like the symbol (hence my one and only tattoo). I was actually really excited to see this one because this was the design I wish I had gotten on my ankle, but thought of it too late. I do still love mine, but this one is just a really cool version
We then went onward to the other part of town. As we walked over the wind started to really pick up, and a freezing misty wet mess brought a damper to the afternoon. However, it did feel kind of appropriate to see these eerie places with such gloomy weather.
Londonderry:

Not all of L'Derry was gloominess. It was actually a very cute Irish town decorated with brightly painted doors, cozy pubs, and small local shops. Seeing as it was Sunday, the entire town was pretty much shut down, but we did do a pretty significant walking tour. Lovely day for a Guinness (even though I actually just had tea because it was freezing.) :)

In other news,
Last night I did laundry at around 11 at night. Not just a little bit of laundry but like everything. Sheets, underwear, clothes, towels, the works. Just to find out the dryers were all broken. So last night my room was somewhat of a fortress, kind of like a tent that little kids would make out of cushions and sheets during a slumber party. I took pictures and I was going to put them up...but i realized there is no picture that doesn't have my underwear hanging off some doorknob or door frame or bed post, so none of that. This is a PG blog god damn it.

Anyways, go patriots. WHY on earth did I not try harder to make it to London tonight for the game. I've never even been to a Pats game in America, so this was my chance. not only was it New England vs Tampa (hometown pride), but it was probably cheaper for me to fly to London then it would be for me to drive and park at Gillette, AND my favorite ref of all time was there. ugh. next time this happens, ill be there.

change of plans

2009-10-24T16:13:00.000-07:00

so really upsetting news tonight
long story short: they're not coming
but obviously the reasons leading up to the bottom line are the kickers
i love it here but being 3000 miles away is the last place that i feel like i should be :(

nutella and bananas and a few good friends

2009-10-24T05:47:00.000-07:00

So I know I haven't updated on this thing in a little while, and some of you may think I'm a failure...but honestly I would have updated if there was anything to update about. Aside from classes, rain, running, and making a few delicious meals...this week has been pretty blah (or I guess as blah as life in a foreign country can get). Classes are really starting to pick up, and I'm now spending about 15-20 hours a week in the lab as well.

---Tribute to this weeks food.--------
So basically this week i ate a LOT of greek quinoa salad. It was a recipe that I've been curious about for weeks cause I really had no idea what quinoa was until I bought it. Who knew it was pronounced "keen-wah"... heh. It's soooo good, super high in protein and delicious. This pic looks pretty gross cause I took it of the last of the leftovers (4 days later? ha...i'm a struggling college student, if its there ill eat it.)
Anyways. Other meal highlights: it's butternut squash season. yum-o (i really hate myself for saying that. so that was also a lot of dinners. Especially butternut squash, cottage cheese, and raisins. Some haters may not appreciate this dream meal (cough RENOIR) but I think I could eat it every day and be happy. mmm

That's about it for the meals that I ate on my own. Anna Anna and I have gotten pretty good at making excellent feasts together. After a long day of classes/working/reading it's fun to chill with friends over good food and wine (of course). French Anna always goes wayyyy above and beyond and this weeks prime example:
Chicken, Asparagus, Rice, and Cab Sav

followed byyyyy CINNAMON ROLLS :)
It's good to have friends who like to cook.

Yep.

To finish up the week of awesome food, we were going to go back to the market today for crepes again. However, the weather was looking gloomy and we wanted to save a few bucks ...so we decided to bring the crepes to us baybay.

We got all the fixings you could want: bananas, nutella, honey, ham, cheese, cream cheese, tomatoes, and lots more I can't really remember

Of course, nutella and bananas is the no fail winner, and we each had..a couple. ha.
Doesn't get any better than that suckers.
Enough food.

-----LAB!-----
So I spend a pretty significant amount of time in the lab every week without pay or credit. However, it's an awesome opportunity to work on some of my lab skills and to be a part of some real pharmaceutical genetic research.
So this is what I'm working on: warning..science....
So there is this liver parasite called Fasciola hepatica that can infect both livestock and humans (although it is a pretty big problem in the UK with cows and sheep). Anyways, this liver parasite enters the body and then causes a disease cause Fasciolus, which can ultimately kill the host. Tthere is a drug (triclabenzadole) which can treat this disease in many cases. The lab I'm working in has found that there are 5 different genetic variations of the beta-tubulin protein, which triclabenzadole is expected to react with. Our goal is to find out WHICH of these variants the drug binds to. So that is what I do.
Yesterday I was in the lab for 10 hours, trying to purify the beta-tubulin protein from some cells that I had grown last week. I literally watched this thing drip for 6 hours. (on top of the 4 other hours I was doing other stuff. Man I better somehow get some kind of credit from NU for this..)
It was not glamorous, sexy work. It was actually boring as all hell. But it is what it is.

----OTHER---
I did end up getting a lot done while watching the stuff drip away. I contacted about 80 bazillion potential sublets in Boston. I managed to find a few cheap/promising ones on the hill. Marie Awesome Defer is even going to tour one of them today for me. Hopefully I will not be homeless in January in Boston. Yay!

Speaking of Marie, I GOT A POSTCARD TODAY. Now I have a lovely reminder of the glorious Red Line zooming over the Longfellow bridge to look at everday. :)

Also- my family comes in less than a month now! I am excited beyond words...there is just too much fun that the O'Neill family can have in Europe..only good things can come from it.

Special good luck to Bill on his FE Exam today.
and special CONGRATS to ehud who finished the army this week!

Alright, well I should head to the gym. This mornings crepes were out of this world, but now I am feeling pretty ugh. My running has gotten much better, but my knee has gotten much worse. :(

Oh yes, I think I'm going on a day trip to Derry tomorrow, so maybe there will be a more exciting 'travel-esque' post by tomorrow night.

6 days until Amsterdam.
Peace

sunday mornin rain is fallin

2009-10-18T03:53:00.000-07:00

what a great weekend its been. the weather held out for another perfect day yesterday, but all good things must come to an end:It was good seeing ya sunshine. Come back again soon.
Anyways, woke up semi early this morning (930ish), and went for a run! I've had a pretty bad cough all week so I haven't been able to do much cardio without hacking up a lung since the hike last weekend. I ran the long way to the gym, about 2 miles, then did a little while longer on the treadmill and did some other stuff to finish up. Now I'm back at home in my PJs for a little bit before hitting up the library. There seems to be a lot of fuss about the brilliance of oatmeal and all the glorious things that can be done with it, so for brunch I cooked up THIS:

Packet of quaker oats, skim milk, chopped up apple, half a banana, spoonful of almond butter, and 2 tablespoons of flakseed. This could be one of the greatest breakfasts I've ever enjoyed, especially after a workout on a cold rainy Sunday morning like this. I am excited to wake up tomorrow morning just to eat it again. mm.

So yesterday was another great one. After about 11 hours of solid sleep on Friday night, the Annas and I strolled downtown to check out St. George's Market. This place is probably my favorite things about the city of Belfast. On Fridays it's a vegetable farmers market/flea market, and on Saturdays it's more of a local artisans/bakers/wineries/cheese/salads/craftsmen/farmers market. There are tons and tons of tables set up filled with both local and exotic dishes and treats. You can also find just about any cheese you could imagine.

I had heard GREAT things about what some of the guys there could do with crepes, so Anna, Anna, and I headed over to one of those stands. There was so many different kinds, that it took us a while to decide
Finally, Anna (France) ended up with an egg ham & cheese, Anna (Sweden) went for the infamous Nutella (MmmmmmmMMm) and banana, and I had the shaved chicken breast with pesto and cheese. there are no words to describe how incredibly delicious that thing was. See you next Saturday handsome crepe man.

We stuck around a little while longer, while I found the ingredients for a salad I'm gonna make later. Then the three of us went home and took long naps for the rest of the afternoong.

Last night, me Laura (Belgium) and Rachel (Australia) went to the Waterfront Hall to see the poets Seamus Heaney and Michael Longley do poetry readings while being accompanied by the Ulster Orchestra. I was overwhelmed by how beautiful it was, as I went in not knowing what to expect. The Ulster Orchestra would play a movement from a classical piece, and the Seamus and Michael would each read a poem that they had written having to do with different themes: love, nature, war, death. It was very very cool.

Being the person that I am, I lost my phone for a portion of the night. UGH I didn't even have Oktoberfest as an excuse this time. Anyways, after calling it excessively with Laura's phone, FINALLY the cab driver from earlier in the night picked up!! He ended up coming to pick us up at the end of the performance and returned my missing phone to me :) He didn't even charge us for the ride home because he thought I was a straight up idiot. Sometimes it pays to be an idiot.

Ended up the night with a party of International students. When I got home, I skyped Marie and friends at the Belgian Beerfest in Boston!!! It was so good to hear people's voices. Marie then went on to be a technological genius andtexted a bunch of pics from the beerfest to my email. It was great feeling that close to home for a bit. I miss home friends a lot despite how much fun I'm having here. Hope you all had a fun evening. :)

AH im running late, I was supposed to meet Anna and Anna 5 minutes ago for a fun filled day at the library. Peace all

hello day!

2009-10-16T06:53:00.000-07:00

Today is just one of those absolutely great days. It's almost SIXTY degrees and SUNNY here in Belfast, which is completely unheard of. It's been cold, foggy, drizzling for days now so I had pretty much given up on seeing the sun again until my return to the good ol US of A. But au contraire:

jessymcl (3:15:11 PM): today is fucking freezing. never come back to new england

jessymcl (3:15:21 PM): howling winds and fuhreezing temps

oof.

I didn't wake up this morning with expectations of it being a great day. Last night was a late one. Some of us Americans introduced some European kids to the great American sport of "beer pong". Let's just say it was a hit. I've never seen people get so riled up over the game...making up ridiculous rules, and bad mouthing each other like I've never heard. (see pic of angry irish.)
It was hilarious. However it put a lot of pressure on us American kids to hold our own since we had been talking up all of our experience in the matter for weeks. Team Casey and Adar managed to hold it down. .

So post partay, some of us peaced out and headed over to the Globe for some dancing and good craic. Sean and I had some good convos about beer, and I met a couple of new Irish kids as well. Anyways, that ended late and bedtime didn't come until post 3am. oof.

7am. I'm up again and off to work in the lab! I'll do a whole post on what I'm doing there in a few days...when I have more of a good idea of what im actually doing there. Long story short: genetics research, and it's awesome. While some of my cells were spinning down (don't ask), I took a walk downtown to check out the St. George's market. So much fresh produce/meat/cheese/spices/etc! I love that place. I grabbed some grapes then headed back down to campus for my core workout class. Holy crap, that thing is a doozey, but totally worth it. Who knew I'd be cutting down on the beer belly in Ireland instead of building it up.

Back to the lab I went to do a few more things. I'm currently on a 2 hour break, waiting for more reactions to happen in the incubator. On the walk home, I was walking and came across my greatest discovery in Belfast thus far. Okay. That's an extreme overstatement because it's nothing that out of the ordinary for the US. But I found a small mom and pop health food store, with all the goodies of whole foods and trader joes, plus some other locally grown Irish things as well. I'm in love. This cute little old man helped me pick out some homemade almond butter :) and quinoa (to make this, I'll report back when it's accomplished). He even gave me a complimentary slice of amazing spinach pie, which I'm currently devouring. I gotta head back to the lab in about 20 to transfer my samples to the big freezer, and then im done for the weekend!!!!!

I can't believe I'm still running on less than 4 hours of sleep, but this day has just turned out to be so beautiful and productive that I'm just running on good vibes. I wish I had my camera today :(
Tonight Anna, Anna, Teddy, Sean, and I are going to see Terry Gilliam's Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassius. This is the movie that Heath Ledger died in the middle of making so Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Ferrell took over the part. I'll let ya know how it is.

And tomorrow I'm going to see SEANUS HEANEY. It's really an amazing opportunity to see a living literary great.

I'm pretty sad that I'm missing out on yet another great beerfest in Boston (although Oktoberfest did fulfill my beerfest quota for a while...). I hope all you crazy kids have fun and take good pics

That's all for now, I'm headed back to the lab to be a voluntary genetics nerd for a little bit. Bye :)

still haven't done anything productive but...

2009-10-13T15:02:00.000-07:00

Sorry, I dont go on dates to Church

2009-10-13T13:22:00.000-07:00

I've come to a conclusion about why this blog will be successful: So as long as I have things I should be doing INSTEAD of writing in this, I will probably continue to write in this.
I made a to do list tonight consisting of reading about 100 pages worth of genetics papers, finishing my China presentation (yea..never really got to that last night), and be in bed early early early. So far none of those things have happened. BUT I do have pictures.

Today I woke up, and it was a typical Belfast weather day. Foggy and Freezing. This is the view from my glorious penthouse bedroom:That's basically what my building looks like too, if you want an idea. Since today was pretty uneventful besides classes (arguing about the existence of God in philosophy, jeesh.) and the gym (I ran!), I am going to give you a tour of my living quarters.
Welcome to bedroom. Look how bright and colorful it is. Doesn't my bed look cozy and inviting?
Next stop on our tour is another view of my bedroom. Welcome to my closet. This is where I keep my 90 pairs of shoes. Oh yeah, that IS my private bathroom/shower which is a pretty sweet feature that I will not be sarcastic about.
And then on our right, we have my DESK! I decided not to clean it for this picture because that would not be realistic. And this little tour is all about getting up close and personal.
Now we're going to totally leave my cozy living quarters to check out where I prepare all my delicious and nutritious meals. We each keep our food in those lockers. Some people are scared that other people are going to steal their cereal and chocolate and whatnot (who does that..) and have padlocks on their food. I have a little more faith in people.

Well that ends our tour. NOW for the main event of this post. My Dinner. Tonight I was feeling like something awesome so I cooked up a spinach, brie, and walnut stuffed portobello with half a sweet potato on the side. Please excuse all other extraneous items on my desk that make this picture more personal than it should be. If you don't know what I'm referring to then don't worry about it.

In other news, Angela and I are looking into getting an apartment together in Boston in the spring. Woo!
That's all for now. Shout out to Chris Chue who CGIU. Much love from Ireland my brotha.

Baby, Baby, Baby

2009-10-12T13:37:00.001-07:00

So I'm feeling 100000% better today! I still have a pretty gross cough, but it's not the tight dry painful cough that I had yesterday and Saturday. I also have my energy back, and may even go for a run tomorrow? We'll see, I won't push it. I slept about 31 of the 36 hours between Saturday night and Monday morning. I also drank a whole carton of this miracle --->

Today was great in other ways as well (for a Monday)... Classes were alright. I don't know how well I'm going to do in philosophy. I think having a fundamentally scientific education puts me at a disadvantage because it's hard to think in the way they want me to. Of course I wonder about the big unknowns: God, perception, knowledge, ethics...but then a lot of people go on in my class to call science man's pigheaded way of wanting to have comforting answers to everything... especially with my speciality in genetics. Whatever, I'll make up answers that they want to hear to get by, but it's not going to be as easy as I thought.

Then I had Manipulative Genetics and Immunology. In between classes I was walking through campus and saw Hillary Clinton (!) being escorted by secret service and media! She was giving a talk on America's support of the peace process in Northern Ireland on campus I guess (and rocking a black and yellow pantsuit of course). It was so weird to see an American politician with celebrity status in a foreign country. No pictures :( sorry. Patrick and I then made plans to book Amsterdam tickets later this evening..

And yep! Book those tickets we did! I'm officially going to Amsterdam October 30-November 2 (missing philosophy class..oh boo...). We're staying at the Bulldog Hotel, which I've heard great things about. That's Halloween weekend, which I'm sure isn't even celebrated there, but we'll all celebrate on our own terms ;) .

After that Anna, Anna, and I made dinner. Gnocchi, Zucchini, and Tomato Soup. mmmmmmm :)

Okay! now i need to finish my damn presentation for the China trip I went on over the summer. American girl doing a project on China in Northern Ireland. oof. But it really makes me miss it. Great times. I wonder what that little girl is doing right now.

Hmm Let's Give This a Try

2009-10-11T12:38:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been considering starting one of these puppies up for a while. With all the places I've been, people I've met, things I've seen, food I've enjoyed...a blog seemed like the most convenient and appropriate way to record everything. Not sure how diligent I'll be about updating or how long it'll last, but it's worth a shot. So here goes!

I wish there were awesome stories about my day today to update with since most of my days over here have been incredible...but today I'm sick. Like miserably sick :( I've slept 20 of the past 24 hours...fever, chills, cough, sore throat, nausea, achiness, the works. Well, I've had about half a gallon of orange juice today, so hopefully with all the rest and good ol vit C I'll be back to my old self in no time.

I can't say I had nothing to do with the onset of this though. I woke up yesterday feeling pretty terrible, but still went for an amazing hike in the Mourne Mountains! I took a bus with a bunch of people from Queens to Newcastle, then proceeded to attempt to conquer Slieve Donard. The hike was incredibly beautiful, and the view from the top of the first peak was unparalleled. Mountains. Ocean. Rolling Irish fields. After this peak, I started to feel pretty terrible. The cough got worse and I was feeling feverish so Taylor and I headed down on our own while the others proceeded to conquer the tallest peak. I hate that I didn't get the chance to finish, but hopefully there will be another opportunity to try it again before I leave.

We explored Newcastle a little before catching a Bus back to Belfast. We found a small oceanside cafe called the Seasalt Bistro. Taylor got a mushroom, cheese, and tomato relish panini, and I got a celery and chorizo soup, both with tea to drink. It was a perfect chilly day post hike meal :)

After that we found an awesome beer store downtown. The selection of beers was ridiculous, most of them were weird ones that I had never heard of in my life. The Skull Splitter was my personal favorite, and I picked up a bottle to bring home.

I'm not getting homesick in the least yet, however I am missing certain people and the fact that I'm missing New England autumn. I would also pay big bucks to get Bode shipped over here for this flu business. I've officially been here a month on Wednesday. So much has happened, who knows what the next two have in store.

Well, thats all for now! I'll probably go to sleep again in a few and hopefully not wake up until tomorrow when I have to go to class.

I'd call update #1 a success. Peace :)