Come Dance With Me In Ireland...: Mine is not a new story...

November 29, 2010

Mine is not a new story…

Well, here we are again…another week has gone by and I still find myself falling in love with this country. And yet again this week brought me another incredible adventure. So here it goes…

I will start with Thanksgiving, or maybe I should say “Thanksgiving”. All of last week I kept forgetting that it was the week of Thanksgiving. So Thursday came and I woke up and….it felt just like any other Thursday. Stacie and I headed into the city centre for our internship and went on with our work. It was so bizarre. When the ladies that we work with found out/remembered it was Thanksgiving they bought Stacie and I Christmas cupcakes and a card that everyone in the office signed. If you know me, then you know that I LOVE LOVE LOVE cupcakes. I was happy to say the least. For dinner that night one of the American girls in my program offered her apartment for us all to have dinner at. We all brought a Thanksgiving dish to share. There was about twenty people total so we definitely had a feast. It was a pretty big success. Thanksgiving dinner and day were not nearly the same as at home but for being in a country that does not celebrate the holiday it was a good day.

Saturday, Jackie and I rose early to catch our plane to London. Yes, I did go to London for just a small weekend trip. J Our plane was due to leave at eight in the morning. When we woke up there was about a half of an inch of snow on the ground. Which does not sound like anything to me (or anyone else from Colorado) but for Ireland it was a big deal. Our plane ended up being delayed about three and a half hours. Awesome start to the trip right? When we finally made it to London and checked into the hostel it was about 4:30p.m. From there we decided to go try to find platform 9 ¾ at Kings Cross. This is a Harry Potter reference; it is the platform that gets you to the Hogwarts Express. It took a while but we found it! There is actually a luggage cart going through the wall. Naturally, we took several pictures there. By now it was dinner time and we ended up going to the Hard Rock Café London. Jackie did some work in school with one of the founders of the Hard Rock Café, so she has a slight connection to go to as many as she can; especially the original. It was so cool to be the original Hard Rock Café. While we were waiting for our table we looked at the gift shop and took a free tour of the vault that holds several pieces of memorabilia. It was so cool.

Sunday ended up being our only full day in London, we had a lot to do in one day. I am just going to list what we did so you get the effect of how much we did. Here goes….Buckingham Palace, Princess Diana Memorial Park, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Parliament buildings, London Eye, City Hall, Abbey Road Studios and Crossing, London Bridge, Tower Bridge, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, a Christmas fair, Piccadilly Circus (London’s equivalent to Time Square) and of course a few cups of tea mixed in there. Whew. We were literally all over London. I loved every minute of it, I really liked the city. I would love to go back and see some things in more depth. It was all wonderful but one of my favorite parts was Abbey Road. It was so cool to see it and all of the people who signed the wall outside the studio. Also it was so fun and entertaining to try and get pictures crossing the road like The Beatles. Hilarious. It was so great to see so many famous buildings and places. Jackie and I continued our tradition of finding “Mexican” food in every country we go to. The restaurant we found in Piccadilly Circus and was so good. I was pleasantly surprised. We are now four for four on finding Mexican food. It was one long fantastic day.

This morning our plane left at six a.m., this means we had to catch the airport bus at three a.m. thus we woke up this morning at one thirty a.m. That means that I am running on about three and a half hours of restless sleep. Today has been a long day. It was all very well worth it.

Like I said before I really enjoyed London, it is a fun, busy lively city. I would love to go back there one day. But still the best country I have been to is Ireland. I am not sure anything can beat this. When we returned today it was snowy still. I love it; it reminds me somewhat of home. It is also hilarious to watch people try and deal with it.

It is starting to become a reality that this dream I am living will soon come to an end. It is such a bitter sweet idea. I absolutely love Ireland and am so grateful for this semester. On the other hand, I miss my family so much and cannot wait to see them again. This experience is changing my life and I will never forget any of it. But also at this point I am not trying to look too far ahead. Something I really believe in is living in the present. Sounds obvious but I think a lot of people (including myself) get lost in what they have done or what they think they will do. I have three weeks left and I fully intend on soaking in and enjoying every minute of them. Today I will leave you with a quote:

“Hence, nearly all vices are rooted in the future. Gratitude looks for the past and love to the present; fear avarice, lust and ambition look ahead” C.S. Lewis Screwtape Letters

Have an incredible week!

Cheers,

Keely