Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow

This is my last blog post from Ireland

As I type this post I’m sitting in my living room, where I’ve wined, dined, laughed, talked and enjoyed my life for the past five months. I’m still slightly feeling the alcohol from one of my last wild nights out in Dublin, and it’s oddly fitting that I should be typing up my last blog post as such. I think the Irish would be proud.

The time has come to say goodbye. I cannot believe how the past five months have flown. Literally flown. To Barcelona, to London, to Brussels, Amsterdam, Paris, Prague, Italy, and Budapest. I hadn’t even been out of the country before I came here. Now I’ve been to nine. I have friends, not only from all over the US, but from all over the world. I can’t believe how much I’ve grown in a short five months. Even though you might not notice it, I will come back the United States a much different person than when I left.

This last week here has been amazing. Our day trip to Dun Laoghaire and Bray was so much fun. The market in Dun Laoghaire was very cool and Harbor Bar, the number one coolest pub in the world, indeed lived up to its title. Our last trip to the west coast could not have been a more perfect way to end our stay here in Ireland. The Irish country side is one of the most beautiful landscapes I have ever laid my eyes upon. I wish I could let you see it through my eyes and share the experience with you. It is one of the most incredible feelings to look out over the rolling greens, the handmade stone walls, the sheep and the cows, and just feel alive. No pretense. No technology. No modernization at all. Just pure, simple, beautiful Ireland. We went to The Cliffs of Moher which are just as heart stopping the second time around. We went to the Aran Islands and biked through the farm lands, stood at the edge of the cliffs, and marveled at the lives of the Irish who get to live on that gorgeous island. We saw the amazingly impressive Kylemore Abbey that was built on a foundation of rock and a lot of love. We drank pints and listened to Irish music in Galway with the locals who love their fair city like their own family. We stared for hours at the countryside. Our last view of it. I can only hope that I’ll lay my eyes on something so beautiful again in my life.

My things are nearly all packed. It’s going to be interesting trying to lug all my things through Dublin, the airport, the tram to the train, the train itself, and back home to 44 Euclid. Coming home will be the oddest mix of happiness and sadness I’ve ever felt. I am very very excited to see you all again! I think many of you have gotten to know me in a much different capacity through reading these blogs posts. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading them as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them. But I will never really be ready to leave this country. It definitely has to be of the greatest places on earth.  The people here are so full of wit and Guinness and love, I’ve felt welcomed from the second I stepped off the plane. I hope I come back to see them one day.

Ending this blog post means ending some of the happiest times of my life. But I’ll get to take the memories and the lessons with me for the rest of my life. Luckily, those don’t weigh anything because I don’t think my suitcase can take much more.

I’m wishing this last post didn’t feel so rushed, but time has never been more of the essence than it is right now, and I’ve got a lot more to do before I depart. This time tomorrow I will be on American soil. I hope it remembers me.

It’s been an amazing five months. I can’t wait to talk you ears off about all of it. You’re going to so sick of me you’ll probably just want to send me back.

See you all stateside! Cheers friends!

The Final Countdown

Surprisingly, I had more time to write up blog posts when I was traveling around Europe than I have this past week while studying for finals. I’ve been suffering from eternal library damnation. It’s the price I’m paying for traipsing around Europe instead of being a student this semester. I am so not sorry about it.

Luckily my friends and I have been able to cross some activities off our Dublin bucket list between benders in the library. Last week we went to the Cake Café for breakfast. It’s this awesome little café tucked away in a courtyard behind a bunch of stores. You have to walk through a crafts store to get there. So cool! They bake all their cakes and pastries right there in front of you in their very tiny kitchen. It’s very cute and very colorful! We had a hard time dragging ourselves out of there. We’ve also crossed a rugby game off our bucket list! Just the other night we went to see Leinster duke it out with Glasgow. Leinster is an Irish team (I know, I didn’t know either) and they’re playing in the championship match this Saturday. If the Northern Ireland team wins this week in the semi finals, there could be TWO Irish teams playing each other for the title. Dublin will be on fire! Saturday will be the day after we’re done with finals so we’re planning on parking ourselves in a pub for the day and getting friendly with some locals. It’ll be great craic.

Speaking of which, this time next week I will be done with Trinity College Dublin forever ……. I’m going to need a minute to let that sentence sink in …… I cannot believe my time here is running so short. I’ll be honest and say that this past week in the library has been a bit of a drag. But in a way it’s a great thing, because by slowing down my last few weeks here in Dublin it’s given me time to appreciate my last moments in the homeland. We’ve got a lot of cool stuff planned for our last, post-final, pre-departure week here in Dublin. On Sunday we’re taking a train to Dun Laoghaire, where there’s rumored to be a great farmers market, and to Bray, where there’s rumored to be the #1 coolest pub in the world (I know. Bray?  I said the same thing.)That Monday we’re doing a three day bus tour that will take us to the Cliffs of Moher, the Aran Islands, Connemara, and Cong with two a two night stay in Galway. We’ve been waiting all semester for our Galway trip! And we’re all really excited to take in the countryside one last time before we ship ourselves back home. I may very well never see grass this green again. I hope I’m wrong. Once we get back to Dublin I think the general consensus is to spend our last few days and our last few dollars in our favorite places, having pints, and reminiscing about the most memorable five months of our lives to date.

Speaking of coming home, I have absolutely no idea how I’m going to manage to lug all of my stuff back to America. It was enough of a project to get it here, and now there’s MORE of it. I sense overweight baggage fees in my future. 

Two exams down and three to go! I’ve got one on Wednesday and my toughest two on Friday. I initially had an exam conflict, and apparently they felt like the best option was to reschedule the exam for later that same day. So my last day of finals will consist of me taking a three hour exam, waiting for an “invigilator” to “collect” me from the exam hall and stay with me while I have a “supervised” lunch (in case I decide to call everyone I know and tell them the answers, or ya know maybe jump off a building or something) and then sit through my next three hour exam at 2:00. Needless to say, it’s going to be a long one. But to celebrate my friends and I plan on heading straight to campus pub afterwards for drinks. They will be MUCH needed.

So that’s all I got for ya this time around. I’m thinking my next post will be sometime after finals and before our Galway trip. I don’t have many more posts left before heading home! I got to make them count!

Until next time, cheers friends!

LESSONS LEARNED Part 3: Get Some Perspective

Hello again, friends! And happy Cinco de Mayo! It’s been a while since my last post, but I’ve finally got the time to sit down and unleash a few words onto paper (or, ya know, the internet). I’ve been spending my days holed up in the library on facebook … I mean studying … for my five finals I have to take before departure. I had my first final this past Wednesday, and let’s just say it won’t exactly be best friends with my GPA. But that’s all water under the bridge!

I’ve been waiting to write up this installment of my Lesson’s Learned saga since getting back from my euro trip which is now two weeks in my past. I can’t believe how the time is flying. I’ve got some great knowledge to throw at you so let’s get started, shall we?

Lesson 1: Check, re-check, double re-check, and quadruple check. Now, this is something that I know to do, but it’s those tiny instances when you forget to check the smallest thing and end up paying through the nose that drill this lesson into your brain. We had two instances of this on our trip. The first was in Prague when Lindsay realized at 11pm that her 2:00 flight to Istanbul was actually for 2:00 am, not pm. Whoops. We all helped book flights and connecting flights and trains and trams until a few hours, some stressed phone calls to mom, and a good bit of money later, we had her all set to go to Istanbul. What airline schedules flights at 2:00am anyway?? Such a small mistake, and yet so stressful and costly. But even so, everything turned out just fine! The second unfortunate instance happened as we were leaving Budapest. For whatever reason, my friends and I ended up with different flights home – theirs in the morning and mine in the late afternoon. I was sitting and enjoying a leisurely breakfast as my friends scrambled around packing up their things when I had the nagging feeling that I should check my boarding pass. Sure enough, my flight home from Budapest was schedule for April 8^th, an entire two weeks earlier. I started at the page in disbelief for about five minutes, and when the number still hadn’t changed from an eight to a twenty one I decided to pack up my things and head to the airport with my friends to see if I could catch their flight back to Dublin. Luckily, there were still spots left on the flight. When the lady who booked my ticket handed me the calculator to show me the price in euros I had to white knuckle the counter to stop myself from keeling over and bleating like a goat. I’d say it cost me an arm and a leg, but really it was more like an arm, a leg, a few organs, and a kneecap. All because I forgot to double check the date. Needless to say, it’s a mistake I will remember forever, and hopefully never make again. But even these financially agonizing setbacks weren’t enough to spoil the trip of a lifetime. I would do it all over again in a heartbeat, mistakes included.

                 

Lesson 2: Hindsight is 20-20. Looking back at this semester there are only a few things I would have done differently. For instance, I could have branched out and taken a few general electives and possibly had a few less exams instead of taking an unnecessary five sociology classes. I don’t regret taking the classes I did at all though. It would have been nice not studying for five exams, but I really liked most of the classes I took, and have made some really cool friends because of it. I also wish I had had some insight about the small money waters that catch you before you realize they were completely unnecessary purchases.  For example: a €14 discount travel card that I used once (for a few cents off a large mocha latte), a €24 euro textbook that I didn’t even glance at (oops), a €10 lock that was supposed to be “the best for the gym lockers” but ended up getting cut off with a bolt cutter because it got stuck (I got another perfectly fine lock for €1), and a few other small items that proved to be unnecessary. That’s already €48 euro! That’s almost 10 pints of Guinness! But, you live and you learn, right? In the future I’ll be more careful about making sure something will be useful before I spend money on it.

Lesson 3: Do the things you’ll remember when you’re forty. I’m not entirely sure why, when I think of my future self remembering my youth, I think of myself as being forty. Maybe I subconsciously think I won’t make it past forty. Or maybe forty is just so inconceivably old to me that I can’t picture myself being older than that (my sincerest apologies to those of you who are now not speaking with me). But nevertheless, it’s my philosophy to do the things I’ll remember when I’m forty. When I’m forty I won’t remember how much money I spent here, I won’t remember what I got on my exams, I won’t remember the hours spent in the library, I won’t remember reading article after tedious sociology article, I probably won’t even remember my GPA. What I will remember is Paris, Prague, Rome, Florence, and Budapest. I’ll remember seeing original Van Gogh’s in Amsterdam. I’ll remember the best waffle I’ve ever had in Brussels. I’ll remember going out with my friends for pints and live music on school nights. I’ll (sort of) remember doing Irish car bombs on St. Patrick’s Day. I’ll remember the time spent hanging out and exploring Dublin with my friends when I “should have” been studying for finals. These are the things that really matter in life. Not the money and the grades, but the friends and the memories. I may not have been a star pupil this semester, but when I’m forty, I’ll be able to look back on and very happily remember the semester that has forever altered my life.

So there’s the lesson for today: always put things in perspective, whether foresight or hindsight. As I finish up this blog post I’m sitting on my bed in a stream of sunlight, sipping coffee, and looking out my window at the passerby. It’s even the small memories like this one, the image of Dublin from my bedroom window, that I’ll keep with me forever. I can’t believe how fast the time has gone by. In just twenty one days I’ll be back on American soil. WILD. I am incredibly excited to see all of you again! But I will be a little brokenhearted to leave the place that has so easily become my second home. Twenty one days means I’ve got a lot of memory making to squeeze in. I’ll be sure to keep you posted on how I spend my last few weeks in Ireland!

 

Until next time, cheers friends!

Bitten By the Travel Bug

I’m safely back in Dublin and it’s great to be back! I had forgotten how awesome it is to sleep in my own bed. I’ve been spending the day uploading the massive amounts of photos I took on my euro trip and it’s been fun to relive the experience. Since neither of my Flickr accounts can handle the picture onslaught that’s been occurring on my computer, I’ve decided to save myself some trouble and make the photo albums on my facebook open to the public. This way, I can link them all right here for your viewing pleasure! Let’s take a look, shall we?

Paris – Where they like their Eiffel’s tall, their statues naked, and their baguettes long.

Prague – A city that should be on par with Rome in terms of being a travel destination. Every square inch of this city is ripe with beauty and history. 

Rome – It’s like all the major artists and architects got together and said “Hey, let’s cram as much awesome incredible unbelievable stuff in to one city and call it a day”. I think the most amazing thing about Rome is that the people have taken such care to preserve the historical ruins that exists in the city right alongside all the modern hustle and bustle. It’s a constant reminder of Rome’s incredible history.

Florence– The perfect city for wandering and eating and wandering and eating. And that’s exactly what we did. 

Budapest – Another city that’s yet to be discovered as an awesome place for traveling. It’s an amazing place to explore and relax.

So now that I’m done traipsing around Europe, it’s back to the books.  So exciting. But in between the painfully long library binges I’ll hopefully be exploring the parts of Dublin that I have yet to see. Here’s our Dublin bucket list:

The Bar With No Name – It’s a pub we have yet to visit yet in Dublin but we’ve heard it’s great! It actually doesn’t have a name, The only sign outside is a tiny one of a snail. Should be great craic!

A Hurling Game – Apparently hurling is like lacrosse gone wild. The European sports make American sports look childish.

The Cake Café – This is a little hidden café that you can only get to by walking through a paper store. It apparently is situated in a little courtyard, hidden by all the tall buildings.

That’s all I can remember for now. I’ll keep you posted on other Dublin adventures!

This has seriously been the experience of a lifetime. It’s crazy to know that I’m constantly in the process of making life long memories. I’ve only got 5 weeks left here, and I know they’re going to fly by. I’ve got a lot of memory making to squeeze in!

I think my next post will probably be another installment of my Lessons Learned saga. I’ve got a lot of knowledge to share about traveling around Europe!

Until next time, cheers friends!

Bathing in Budapest

Once again, I'm sitting in an airport reflecting on my trip and typing up a blog post on my iPod. But this time, I'm not anywhere near where I had planned to be while typing this. Originally, I had a later flight home than my friends, and had planned on passing the time by going back to my favorite place in Budapest to reflect and write before leaving for Dublin. That was until I had realized I booked my flight for April 8th, not April 21st. Yeah. Ouch. Everything turned out okay, except for having to pay an excruciating amount of money to get a new flight home. So to ease the strain of this minor fiasco, I'm going to pretend I'm in my favorite place, and go about reflecting and writing as I had planned. Here we go.

For the first time this trip, I'm not sitting in an airport as I type my blog post. Instead, I've decided on a much more serene place for reflection. It is by far my favorite place in Budapest: Margaret Island. It's a park situated right in the middle of the Danube river, and it is one of the most peaceful places I have ever been. The other day my friends and I barely said a word to each other as we strolled through and laid in the grass because we were so absorbed by it's serenity.You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love Margaret Island (points for recognizing the literary reference). It is so beautiful here that I just want to curl up in the blankets of grass beneath the lilacs and the trees and let time and the clouds pass me by. I could easily spend the rest of my days with Margaret Island. Do I sound like a lush? I'm just crazy about Margaret.

Budapest has been amazing. We have had so much fun roaming around this city. Our first day we rented bikes and peddled all over town. It was an awesome way to explore! We saw Hero's Square, Buda Castle, the Parliament Building, and the Market where we gorged ourselves on traditional Hungarian food. At night we strolled along the Danube, admiring all the beautifully illuminated buildings, and enjoyed an amazing view of the city from the front of St. Matthias which is perched on top of a huge hill. The entire experience was mesmerizing.

On day two we climbed to the top of St. Stephen's Basilica for another amazing aerial view of Budapest. We also saw the preserved hand of St. Stephen. (People are so bizarre. Let the poor dead man keep his hand!) For lunch we met up with a friend of a friend whose studying in Budapest and got the low down on Hungarian life. It was great to make a new friend and hang with a semi-local! In the afternoon we treated ourselves to a spa day in a traditional Hungarian bathhouse - something that Budapest is known for. We hung out in the different hot tubs, enjoyed the sun from the heated outdoor pool, relaxed in the sauna, and got aroma therapy massages. I was so relaxed I could have melted right into Budapest. It was wonderful.

That night we wet to a pub called Szimpla which is allegedly the third coolest pub in the world, and I'm not disagreeing. Its called a "ruin pub" because its in a huge broken down old building that basically has really cool and colorful decorations plastered all over it to hide the fact that the building is an abandoned factory. It's a lot cooler than it sounds. You'll just have to trust me.

By the time we got to Budapest I was a bit picture pooped out, so unfortunately (for you, mostly ... sorry) I didn't take as many pictures as I could have. But I do have some! And can always steal some from my friends.

I often wondered on this trip what I'm going to think when I look back on this part of my life years from now. I wonder in what ways this experience will affect my life. I'm just so thankful for every second I spend in Europe because I know how lucky I am to have these life changing experiences. I'll be saving every single penny of my kids' money so they can do the same one day. I never realized how important it is to travel the world and see it with your own eyes, your own heart, and your own mind. I wish I could give this experience to everyone.

I'll soon be back in Dublin and will no longer be able to pretend that I don't have to take exams. Hello, reality. I really have to crack down on my studying because I don't think I've ever been this unprepared for finals. But hey, if I fail all my classes it'll at least make a good story one day, am I right? 

Once I'm back in Dublin, the next plane I get on will be heading back to the states. But until then, I've got a lot of drinking, I mean studying, to do between now and then, and I'll be very busy squeezing every last ounce of enjoyment out of Ireland. My friend and I have compiled a bucket list of things to accomplish in Ireland before we leave. I'll be sure to tell you all about it in a future post.

Until next time, cheers friends!

Italia

As I type this I am once again in an airport. This time I'm in Milan eagerly awaiting my flight to Budapest! We didn't end up on park benches last night, thankfully, although we were pretty damn close. At the last minute a friend of a friend (whose also a friar) let us crash at his place. Not only did he let us stay, but set up an extra bed, gave us great directions, and was just the absolute nicest guy ever. I will buy him beers for the rest of our PC lives.

I'm sad to be leaving Italy. It has been such an amazing experience, I'm afraid one blog post will never do it justice. I could write a novel just on two days in Rome, and I could have taken a picture of every step I took.

Rome was amazing. There is so much to see it makes me dizzy. We "romed" around (ha!) from sun up to sun down and ran into piazzas, churches, and obelisks with every turn. We saw San Maggiore Basilica, the Colleseum, the Parthenon, Piazza de Vienza, Piazza de Popolo, Trevi Fountain, and so many more beautiful buildings and statues I can't keep them all straight. I barely know if I'm getting the names of these right. And everything was SO beautiful. The marbles, the gold, the sculptures, the molding, the architecture, the colors, the enormity of it all. My jaw is sore from being dragged on the ground. I'm still processing all of it. To our immense dismay the Sistine Chapel was closed. We drowned our sorrows in a huge tub of gelato (as if we needed an excuse). But on the plus side, it was "culture week" in Italy so we got into a lot of the major landmarks for free!!

I do have to dedicate a separate paragraph to St. Peter's Basilica. Words cannot describe a place so beautiful. I've never been in a church so reverent, so solemn, and so breath-takingly beautiful. It's impossible not to be humbled by the immensity of it's structure and it's reverence. Even as I think back on it now, I feel incredibly humbled. Mass was starting as we were leaving and I regret not taking a quick video for those of you who would be especially interested. I guess you'll just have to go see it for yourselves! It's so worth it.

We got to Florence Sunday night and it was great to see my friends! They showed us all around Florence and it was so crazy to be hanging out in Italy with my PC ladies. We spent a lot of time aimlessly wandering the streets and it was a great way to relax after the insanity that was Rome. We climbed the Duomo and got an amazing view of Florence. I've never in my life seen a building like the Duomo. They white, green, and red marble makes for an in incredibly unique and impressive church. You can't help but wonder how in the world someone designed such a facade. It was awesome. We also went to see the David. He sends his regards to everyone! A quiet one though, that David. We spent a solid 45 minutes just staring at him in all his awesomeness. Not only is he enormous, but so detailed, so fluid, and SO good looking. I wish they made then like that in real life!

Now, I would be remiss if I didn't dedicate a substantial portion of this post to the amazing and other worldly experience that is Italian food. My mouth is watering just thinking about all the brick oven baked pizza, the paninis with fresh sliced meat, the pasta with tomato sauce that god himself made, and the unbearably delicious gelato. So. Much. Gelato. We had it after almost every meal. Including breakfast. Which was sometimes pizza. I came to Italy with the intention of spending most of my money on food and I definitely succeeded. I'm not leaving Rome with any souvenirs except for these extra pounds I picked up. I now have so suck in my stomach just to zip my jacket. I'm not even going to talk about my pants. Or the new notches on my belt I'm now using.  But when else am I going to eat real Italian food IN ITALY? I think I might grab one last slice of pizza just for the hell of it. It my be airport pizza, but it's Italian airport pizza!

Although they're going to have to drag me onto the plane, I'm really excited for Budapest! Each of the cities we've been to so far have been so different and unique, and I know Budapest will be no exception. Like Prague, I really don't know what's there other than traditional bath houses and let me tell you I could certainly use one. The one thing I really hope to do in Budapest is laundry. Two weeks of wearing the same clothes feels less than sanitary. I think I've worn each pair of socks at least twice. Yeah. I know. But smelly or not, I've been having the trip of a lifetime! I can't wait to find out what Budapest has to offer. I'm sure that whatever it is, it's incredible!  My next post will probably be from the Budapest airport and I'll be crying about this trip being over.

Ciao!

Pretty in Prague

(As of right now I'm waking up in Florence but have only just had the chance to post anything. Rome post coming soon! Also please forgive any typos, I've been using my iPod to type these)



Apparently it's my new M.O. to type blog posts while I sit in airports because as I write this I'm awaiting my departure to Rome.


Before I begin this post I'd just like to clear something up. Some odd years ago czechlslyvakis split into the Czech Republic and Slyvakia. I know. They forgot to tell me, too. I was only made aware of this when some kindly informed me Fte reading my last post where I mentioned my travels to a place that apparently decided to not exist anymore. Who'da thunk.


Prague has been amazing! It's so full of beautiful buildings and towers and spires it's enough to make your head spin. We spent most of our days getting lost, wandering aimlessly down interesting looking streets, stumbling upon markets and parks and art, and only using a map when it was time to find out way home. Prauge was awesome because it was so relaxing. We did most of our sight seeing just by wandering around. We saw Prague Castle, the Charles Bridge, the Jewish Quarter, Old Town Square, and the Astronomical Clock (the third oldest in the world and only one still functioning!) not to mention all the incredible views of the entire city from a hill top park near our apartment. Prague is really just an incredibly beautiful city. There's nit a single lac luster street in town. Luckily, the EAster market was still going on while we were there so we got to try a bunch of really awesome food for cheap! We tried Trdla, a cylinder of heated dough sprinkled with cinnomen sugar almonds and heaven. We also tried they're version of a grilled cheese which was so different from American grilled cheese I can't even describe it. You'll just have to wait for the picture.

PrAuge has a really interesting history tied to World War II. The Jewish quarter has  Jewish cemetery that has hundreds of graves literally piled on top of one another that the Germans were preserving as a memorial to a "extinct race". Communism was only kicked in 1989, and traces of it can still be detected in the general conduct of people. The trams are militant about running on time (I saw an old lazy get shut out because she was 3 seconds too late) and smiling isn't really part of the Czech persona. Even so, everyone was friendly enough and we had an amazing time.

Our laid back trip to Prague was perfectly placed before what is sure to be a jam packed trip to Italy. We only have two days each in Rome and Florence. I'm pretty sure I could spend a month of both of these places and still not see all there is to  lay eyes upon, so packing it in to two days will be interesting to say the least. My converse are in for a work out. Good thing I've got my insoles! (Sometimes I think I might be an old person on the inside). In Rome we'll actuAlly be couch surfing for the first time (don't freak out yet Mom and Dad). Couch surfing is this network of people who LOVE the city they live in and open up they're home to travelers and show them around the city ... FOR FREE. The idea is that you'll rerun the favor some day to someone traveling in your town. There's a whole network where hosts are vouched for and credited and you can read reviews of hosts and surfers. Our roommate Holly stayed with our host a few weeks ago and had an amazing experience! It should be great! (Okay, now you can freak out).

Milan however is another story. We're only there for one night because it's where we found the cheapest flight out of Italy. We still don't have a place to stay despite scouring the Internet. Everything that available is wildly outside our budget. We get to Milan at 11:30 pm, a half hour after the airport buses stop running and a half hour before the train station closes. The Airport is N hour away and the earliest bus is at 4 am. We're scrambling. But something WILL be worked out! But ya know if you feel like sending some prayers or positive thoughts or money or good karma our way, I'm sure it wouldn't hurt. It's going to be an adventure!!

That's all for now. Next stop: Rome!