Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Happy New Year's!

Happy New Year's to all! It is officially 2014 in Ireland!

I spent New Year's Eve exploring Cork and UCC with my mom. We purposefully wandered through the UCC campus, found my apartment complex, found St. Finbarr's Cathedral, and accidentally stumbled upon a convent, a fort, and a few other smaller cathedrals all within the span of a few miles. Literally, we saw a tall stone wall, walked along it, and came to a heavy stone arch in the wall with a sign telling us that this is Ireland's most important fort. So we walked into the courtyard and what do we find but what looks like several charming Irish residences? I mean, what would your address be like? 18 Elizabeth Fort, Most Important Fort in Ireland, Cork, Ireland? Later, we found out that it is actually Ireland's Garda (the Irish police) headquarters. A very charming headquarters, I think. But honestly, today most everywhere was closed because of the holiday. The English market, fortunately, was open.

Today, I had my first experience with pig's head. No, I did not eat it. But I saw more types of meat than I have ever seen in my life. I saw for sale pig's trotters (crubeens), drisheen (Irish black pudding consisting of beef and sheep's blood), and tripe (which comes from the stomach of various animals). I saw an entire pig's head, still with eyes and a few spots of hair. I saw liver and pig hearts and chicken hearts and just about every type of organ you can imagine. Never have I seen so many different varieties of sausage and meat. On first encounter, the exotic cuts of meat were enough to set my stomach churning. But really cool. The English market is an indoor market with narrow lanes between stands selling meat or vegetables or chocolate or various local products. And it looks like somewhere I might be able to do a lot of my grocery shopping during the school year.

On the way out, we headed down Cork's main shopping street. Cork has many, many shopping venues along this street, which always seems packed with people. Larger than anything I am used to. My mom and I ended up stopping in one of the main department stores, Dennehy's, along the way. It is very much like a Nordstrom, but the clothes were actually cheaper than what you can get at a typical US department store. This was very surprising, and may have something to do with the time of year. Food, however, is more expensive.

Additionally, today I was able to go out for a drink with my mom on New Year's. After dinner, we went to a little pub near our B & B (most pubs here don't actually serve food). She ordered the obligatory Guinness; I had a shandy (half lemonade, half ale). And we talked to the bartender for nigh on 2 hours. People here seem very friendly. The pace of life appears more relaxed--or at least, people seem genuinely happy to help you out. Also there is no dearth of pubs: you can find them on every corner, at all times of day.

Happy 2014, everyone!


First Day in Cork

I don't think I've ever eaten more for breakfast in my life. I'm also fairly certain that I just had the most alcohol I've ever had in my life...at breakfast. Because I can't move into my apartment until January 2nd, my mom and I are staying at a B & B across from the university which, as we discovered this morning, serves a super (and super-sized) breakfast.  You go downstairs and sit down and they bring you tea or coffee with a little pitcher for milk, a couple bowls of sugar, a basket of baked goods, and a tray with jam and butter. They ask you what type of porridge you would like for starters. Starters? Porridge is already more than I usually have for breakfast. My mom and I just kind of stared at them with blank faces, so they decided we would very much like the Bailey's Irish cream porridge.  Which was excellent--and drowned in quite a lot of Bailey's Irish cream. Then they came around again and asked us what we'd actually like for breakfast. Well, by that time I was pretty happy and both of us a little dizzy from Bailey but we both decide to try the traditional Irish breakfast. Which is huge. Two eggs, two turkey sausages, two pieces of bacon, two types of potatoes, half a tomato, two types of Irish sausage, and a cup of mushrooms. It was great. There was a family speaking French two tables down, and a very Irish guy right next to us who took some food to go for "elevensies", and a family from Chicago here for a wedding. We stuck around and eavesdropped on other conversations for a while. But when we left, we took a couple scones to go...for elevensies, obviously.

Made it to Ireland!

Hello all,

After three plane rides, 5 airport trains, and the scariest driving experience I've ever had in my life, we made it to Cork! We started our day at the PDX airport with a short 10:30 flight out to Seattle, then took a couple airport trains to the international terminal and found our gate nestled between a flight to Frankfurt and a flight to Korea. Wymana, however, didn't stick around too long because she was intent on finding the second Game of Thrones book for in-flight reading and realized that she only had 2 hours to do so. You'd think that wouldn't be a problem at an airport bookstore, but oh, it was. Thus it followed: Wymana begins single-mindedly stalking book-prey. She sets her 2-hour timer, and 3 airport trains and 4 bookstores later, Wymana finds her Game of Thrones book (3 bookstores had every book in the series except the 2nd. Hmmmm.). But Wymana is pleased. She returns to the gate via airport train and eats her last meal in the United States: a bowl of delicious udon noodles. We took a total of 5 Seattle airport trains that day. Best layover, ever.

Our flight to London Heathrow was 9 hours via British Airways. We got on and immediately walked through an area with seating pods that have leg rests and divider windows and room to nearly lie down. WHAT. This actually exists? Well, this was obviously first-class (but the airline has some nice club name for it) and we were flying economy, so we plowed through to the normal airline seats. In normal airline seats, generally people don't have much room to move around. Being relatively tall, my knees tend to brush the back of the seat in front of me. I don't really mind, except (cue rant): I feel like it's kind of a social expectation that you do not, no matter how tired you are, lean your seat back. Honey, there is not room enough to do that on an airline and not piss the person behind you off. But the person sitting in front of me did not know that. Please, please do not lean your seats back on modern airlines, unless you are flying first class. But we had a relatively good 9 hours. Each seat had its own little TV, with some pretty cool programming that included introductory German and a good selection of Bollywood films. This occupied the last 2 hours of the flight.

I was pretty excited about the Bollywood, but the real excitement happened when we arrived in Cork (via Aer Lingus airline) and drove in to the city centre. Yes, you heard that correctly. My mom rented a car and she drove. I am not allowed to drive in Ireland, which is a very, very fortunate thing, because I did not feel guilty about relinquishing the task to her. Neither of us had slept in 36 hours, the only rental cars available were stickshift, we didn't know our way around, the streets aren't well-marked, and the big one: people drive on the opposite side of the road. Mom was swearing, I was hyperventilating, and the 15 minutes projected by Google turned into 2 hours. Also we kept thinking the car was in reverse when it was really just in another forward gear. But all considered, we got to our B & B in one piece, with no damage to the car--and only got honked at 5 times. Do not drive in Irish cities as a newbie. The same street might change names like 10 times. Real-life example: N22 turns into Western Road which turns into Lancaster Quay which turns into Washington Street which turns into Grand Parade which turns into Saint Patrick's Street which turns into Saint Patrick's Bridge which turns into St. Patrick's Hill which turns into Audley Place, all within the space of a few miles. Not to mention the street names appear in Irish first, and maybe once per mile. Seriously, driving was scarier than the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland by about 50 times, and just as jerky. But definitely an adventure. When we got to the B & B (and only by directions from some nice man at the gas station), they offered us tea. It was wonderful. Also my suitcase got delivered to the B & B shortly after, because it got lost and subsequently found at the Heathrow Airport and some nice Irish woman at baggage services tracked it down for a nearly hysterical Wymana, who was pretty sure that it wouldn't be coming through Carousel 4 with the golf bags.

Major surprise: Cork was sunny when we landed. Apparently, the UK and Ireland have been experiencing some extreme weather lately with gale force winds and above average rain. Landing in London didn't disprove this. But Cork, despite evidence of flooding, was beautiful. We were able to walk around the city a little bit in the evening to observe some of the early nightlife before dropping our jetlagged selves into bed around 9 pm. The beds were like cloud 9. Also I slept for 11 hours straight, which never happens except for the day after finals week.

Packing

Let me start this off by saying that I am a professional procrastinator (dear mother sitting next to me notes that this is true). I convinced myself that I was ABSOLUTELY UNABLE to pack until two days before leaving. Granted, I only had two days at home before leaving, but still. Instead, I convinced myself that it was more important to get an early start on looking for housing next term. Because I am absolutely determined not to live in the dorms or the same apartment complex I'm in this year next year, I spent my time researching other near-campus apartments. I even called them. Wait, what? Yeah. Those of you who know me know that I just love (not) talking on the phone with people I don't know. But this here Wymana ACTUALLY CALLED 10 different apartment complexes about their rooms and leases, she was so bent on procrastinating. I had the speech down. I was getting the information I needed like there was no tomorrow, and to be honest, I was pretty proud of myself for being that proactive. So much so that I ironically managed to push off the packing for another day.

Don't do it guys. Don't wait until the day before. Packing is an overwhelming endeavor when you have one suitcase, one backpack, and 9 months that you have to think about. Not to mention I still hadn't really unpacked from after fall term, so my room was a disaster. And when my living area is a disaster, I can't think. Well, I made it more of a disaster. I got out literally all my clothes, tossed them on my bed and divided them into piles. The bare bones necessities, the really important, the useful, the comfort food. I tried to stuff what I thought I needed into my suitcase. The situation soon devolved: Ha, Wymana. You're funny. You thought this would all fit in your suitcase? That's cute.

The suitcase was having none of it.

It turns out that Wymana is relatively bad at judging volumes. So she took out everything from the suitcase, discarded a few "really important" items, and repacked. Almost but not quite. So I did what most normal, lost and overwhelmed college students in a quandary would do: I called my mom. And The Expert Travel Packer answered. She helped me decide what I really needed and gave me some good Packing Efficiency guidelines. Namely, she put me through the harsh process of "how much do you really use this at home?" and "what would be cheap to get overseas?". The brutal honesty of realizing when I confused the "really important" with the comfort food was striking. There is a balance you have to strike: I think some comfort food can be near-necessary (like pictures). But pictures are flat and take up relatively little room. My bright yellow shock blanket, loved as it is, takes up more space. A good tip that actually gave me some extra room is to not overly fold things when placing them in your suitcase. Make them flatter by unfolding them to cover as much of the suitcase as possible.

Needless to say, I got what I needed in (at least I think so). Unfortunately, my shock blanket didn't make it. Nor, as some of you will be interested to know, did my fashion poncho (not that this was really even considered in the first place). They will be with me in spirit.

Another convenient thing to know is that some US flights, if you are connecting to an international flight, don't charge for a checked bag. At least, on a trip of Alaska (PDX to Seattle), British Airways (Seattle to London Heathrow), and Aer Lingus (Heathrow to Cork), my mother and I had zero baggage fee. Ka-ching.

Ah, that's the other thing. My mom decided to fly out to Ireland with me, which is awesome. We'll be travelling about Ireland a bit before my classes start.

Introductions

Hello all,

I imagine that most of you reading this blog already know me. For those who don't, well, I'm glad you found your way here.

Currently, I am a second-year student studying computer science at Oregon State University. I will be studying abroad at University College Cork in (surprise) Cork, Ireland these coming two terms (Winter/Spring 2013-2014)--and I've decided to document my experiences! Two reasons: 1) monologues are relaxing; and 2) to connect with the people I care about and let them know that I am still alive and breathing. Also, blogging, my friends, allows me to NOT blow up your Facebook news feed with interesting facts pertaining to gingers and Ireland and other tidbits you can't live without. Also it allows me to monologue more effectively. I am excited about this and will do my best to post regularly/ attempt to say something in 500 words.

So why Cork, you ask? Well, I wanted to go to Ireland through the Oregon University System. It is less expensive than many other programs and doesn't come with all the bells and whistles attached.

OUS offers two programs in Ireland: one in Limerick and one in Cork. I decided blindly on which one really, and afterwards found out Cork is supposedly the arts capital of Ireland. Ka-ching. That was a happy coincidence. I didn't really have time to wallow over which one I should choose anyways because I didn't actually decide that I wanted to go abroad until six months before my departure date--which was cutting it a bit close. Moral of the story: start as early as you can. That's all I'm going to say about that now.

Other than that, a little bit more about myself:
I enjoy painting and playing piano and investigating public transportation systems--because let's face it, metros and subways and Tubes are pretty cool. Also I am a part-time student at Hogwarts, studying related pop-culture fandoms that don't include vampire romance novels or any supernatural love triangles whatsoever. Because that's not really my thing.

Alright, thanks guys. I'm off to pack (or maybe just take a nap).