Right now I am in my apartment at Gort na Coiribe (our village with about 8 apartment buildings) in Galway. Our orientation began on December 29th, when my friend Jenni and I arrived in Dublin after a long flight filled with excitement and nerves. We met our group of about 40 Arcadia students spent our first 3 days in Dublin sightseeing and getting past our jetlag. We arrived around 9am and ended up staying up all day because we were so excited about everything! Jenni and I explored Dublin as soon as we checked into the Abbey Court Hostel and got smoothies and walked around in awe of the beautiful buildings and intriguing accents. We had a welcome lunch with the other students and it was fun to meet them. Jenni and I immediately bonded with some of the girls in our program and have been hanging out with them a lot which has been fun! Our first night we spent out on the town - enjoying the fact that we are all of age here! The pub atmosphere is unlike anything I've experienced in America. People of all ages gather to listen to live music, converse, and have a good time.
Our second day in Dublin was more of an informative day - we packed into a room and listened to an Arcadia representative speak to us about life in Ireland, classes, and other important things about studying abroad. We were all pretty tired so we went out for dinner and to one pub to listen to some music but then came home and crashed early which was very needed.
Our third day was New Years eve and we woke up early to pack up our things and eat a quick hostel breakfast before we were ushered onto a coach bus so that we could go to a GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) club to learn Gaelic games! We tried hurling (my personal favorite), handball, gaelic football, and dancing. Surprisingly, these didn't come very naturally to me.. I was hoping to be a secret gaelic games prodigy but I may have to give up on that - each game was very complicated and I'm sure takes a lot of skill and practice! I can't wait to start following gaelic football and hurling here though, both will be very fun to watch!
We got to Galway around 4 and were so excited to unpack and stop living out of a suitcase that everyone kind of locked themselves in their apartments for a few hours. Most of the friends that we met through Arcadia live close by in Gort na Coiribe so we really lucked out. On New Years Eve we spent most of the night at a pub called The King's Head which was packed and there was a live band. We met lots of people from all over and I was shocked to find that many Irish people knew so much about Minnesota! They were asking me about the Vikings and if I lived close to Minneapolis. Something I've found about Irish students is that they are very informed about the world around them. It's cool that they are so connected with politics and society in other nations.
We had the next day off, so five or six of us grocery shopped and walked into town to get familiar with our new home. Shop Street is the main street and it is full of cute little restaurants, shops, and pubs and there are always musical street performers. We walked out to the ocean which is very close to town and marveled at the beauty surrounding the pier.
The last two days have been a bit stressful - we are figuring out classes and where everything is located on campus. Campus is home to about 26,000 students so much bigger than I am used to! I've kind of accepted the fact that I'm going to be wandering around aimlessly with a map the first few days of classes but people are helpful so I'm sure I'll be able to ask for directions to certain buildings. We had an NUI Galway orientation yesterday which was entertaining and informative. Last night, we got free dinner at McDonaghs which is a popular fish and chips restaurant that we got vouchers for over orientation. We were on a mission to find live Irish music and finally came across a pub that had some! We walked in right as they were playing "Galway Girl" and I felt like I was in a movie (P.S. I Love You, anyone?!). We chatted with some people in the pub and listened to the music for a while then explored town a bit more and came back early since we had to go back to campus this morning for academic advisory sessions. I can't believe classes start Monday! We have a two-week trial period where we can go to classes to see if we are interested in them which is nice, and classes don't officially begin until January 21st. I'll post pictures soon!
I am so excited to see where this semester takes me!
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