I'm a part time firefighter... and a part time secret agent.

I've never blogged before. But in order to keep family and friends informed of my thoughts and experiences without mass emails... here we go.
I've been in Dublin, Ireland on a CIEE study abroad program for about 4 weeks now. Maybe I'll do retrospective blogs about the first three weeks, but we'll see. For now, though, just jumping right in. Near the end of the 4th week, we had one of our required field trips to the west of Ireland. It was absolutely beautiful. We stayed for three nights in a hotel in the small town of Westport. Very cute, with pubs literally every two storefronts downtown. Matt Malloy's is the famous one - owned by Matt Malloy of The Chieftains and Grammy winning fame. We saw Matt himself play a set Friday night, our last night there. But perhaps this is best done chronologically.

Wednesday the 14th of October we left Dublin on private coach to the west of the Emerald Isle. Along the way, we stopped at Strokestown House, the Famine Museum, and the Museum of Country Life. All designed (and indeed the purpose of this trip) to make the importance of the Famine (An Gorta Mor = The Great Hunger) in Irish history, culture, politics, and collective memory come alive for us. Pulled into Westport about 5pm, checked in, found rooms, etc. And then came dinner. Technically, we all paid CIEE for this, but dinners were free, which was very exciting. And they didn't joke around. 3 courses and all delicious. Except for the apple cake thing. I got excited about the Apple pie on the menu... and it was not apple pie. So disappointing. Headed out to Matt Malloy's after dinner for some chill times with the peeps. Very very crowded bar, but met up with our two program directors, and proceeded to have some very interesting and epically hilarious conversations involving mating rituals, serious drunken talks about taking care of drunken friends, and dancing. Among others.

Don (program director head honcho): Oh geez, would ya look at that?!" (referring to guys meeting girls at the bar behind us). "It's all the same. Ooo I'm Allison. Hey I'm Bill. Wanna see my pecs?" (and so on)
Tom, a guy in our group: "It's really hot in here!"
Me, sweating (it really was sweltering): "Yeah!"
Don: "Oh I'm a part time firefighter. (doing the voice of 'Allison') Oh really, I'm a neurologist!"

Thursday. Head out to Croagh Patrick and a famine memorial. There's a pilgrimage every year up the entire mountain (hill for west coasters) in remembrance of the people who suffered during the famine. Then onto Connemara (and another Famine memorial), a region inbetween County Galway and County Mayo, sometimes referred to as the 33rd county of Ireland. Indescribably beautiful countryside. Just one sweeping panoramic vista of epicness after another... and someday soon I'll be productive enough to upload pictures. Thursday night dinner was a choice of lamb, steak or chicken. Never had lamb before so I had that, but everyone else got really excited about the steak... and the fact they didn't have to pay the extra charge. Excellent stuff. Head out to hoppin' downtown Westport again, this time to Cosy Joe's, a pub turned dance club that was open til the wee hours of the morn. Had a grand time, involving copious amounts of alcohol and showing off mad dance skills. The thing I love so far are the awesome people in my group. None of us really knew each other, save for a few, before we arrived. We're from all over the U.S., different personalities and interests, but we all have a great group dynamic, which makes this experience that much more fantastic. I feel like some of these people I've known for years - maybe simply an effect of us all being thrown together so often and in such close quarters, but I choose to think not - that some people in this group I will keep in touch with for years after our three months together.

Friday. Pile onto the bus at 9:30 to head to Galway. Don on the bus microphone is singing and laughing creepily... his payback for us coming in late last night and being loud in the halls. Could we help our natural giddyness?? Certain people who experienced the situation would say no. You know who you are :)

Anyways, Galway was great. We had a few hours of free time, so we split off to do some shopping and get lunch. I end up spending far too much money, but on the plus side, Christmas shopping is done done done. Walk around the main part of downtown for a while, then pile back on the bus to head back to Westport. Is it sad that the best part of our days there was racing downstairs promptly at 7pm just to see what was on the dinner menu? Maybe not for some, but it definitely was one of the best parts of my trip. That night, we all head out to Matt Malloy's for our last night there, saw Matt Malloy himself, and when he stopped playing, we headed to Cosy Joe's again for some dancing.

Saturday, head home to Dublin.

So that's that for my first ever blog post! Feel free to leave comments, I think everyone should be able to. And thanks for reading :)