Making conections at Aras Chois Fharraige

During my time here in Ireland I have been given the amazing opportunity to volunteer four of my afternoon at Aras Chois Fharraige, the nursing home just down the street.   They had us help with different activities each time we came.  This home has a very busy activity schedule (including: pet therapy, work out time, cards, gardening, and much, much more) and they house over 50 residents so they were happy with the extra sets of hands to help out. During our first visit the four of us split into two groups. One group played cards with the residents who chose to play cards while the other two just sat and talked with some of the residents who chose not to.  I was one who did not play cards.  I got to meet a lovely lady named Ann.  Ann has lived in Ireland her whole life and we spent the entire hour comparing my life in Nebraska to hers here in Ireland.  The next visit we helped with their work outs.  They call this Spree.  We would call it chair aerobics.  Some of the residents have a hard time lifting their arms above their heads so we would hold their hand and help them stretch out their muscles.  The final activity we helped with was catch.  This activity is simply just tossing a beach ball around with the residents.  This helps them work on their coordination and always involves a lot of laughter.  Our final visit we just talked to the residents and said our goodbyes.

            I really enjoyed my time at the nursing home.  Experiencing how passionate the employees were about top of the line care for each resident has secured my future plans of going into occupational therapy.  This was truly and eye opening experience.

Westport Field Trip

This last weekend we took a field trip up to Westport.  The town of Westport was relatively quiet, especially since our free day in the town was a Sunday so all but a few shops were closed.  This did not stop me from having an amazing weekend though. 

            On our way to Westport we made a quick stop at Kylemore Abbey.  This is a beautiful castle that was originally built as an estate, and then later converted into an abbey.  From the outside the building is stunning with its detailed stonework nestled into the side of a mountain.  In front of the abbey is a lake that on a still day perfectly reflects the building.  Unfortunately we could not get any closer because we were on a tight time schedule.

            Our next stop was an experience I will never forget.  I knew we were going to be going on a hike and that I need to wear comfortable shoes.  I was not prepared for when our bus driver pointed to the top of a mountain with its peak hidden among the clouds and said, “that’s Crough Patrick.” The first section of the hike was exhausting.  It was a steady up hill that made every muscle in your legs burn.  The middle was a little easier.  It was a mostly level section that wrapped around to a better side of the mountain.  The last trek was where things got interesting.  It was the steepest incline I have ever climbed.  The burn was intense but the desire for the top won out.  When we finally reached the top we all looked over the side, proud of ourselves for what we had done.  One of the girls in the group with me had been wearing her Fitbit.  According to it we walked 6 miles and up 273 flights of stairs. I can honestly say my legs have never burned so bad.

            When we arrived in Westport we were all exhausted and went to be early. The next day was Sunday and we were disappointed to find most of the stores closed.  Since the stores were closed and there was not much else to do a large group of us took a 5K walk out to the Westport House and back into town.  The walk was beautiful.  It was in a heavily forested area and winded around a river.  When we made it to the Westport house we decided it was too expensive to get a tour and instead opted to just walk around the outside.  After we took in the beautiful house we continued on back into town and before we knew it, it was time to load the bus up and head back to the cottages!

Making Friends in a New Place

The program I am a part of here in Ireland is a little different than other study abroad programs.  We are not bases out of a college here in Ireland and do not take classes with other students.  Rather, the 17 of us UNK students live, eat, sleep, study, and every other part of out daily lives, together.  We are housed in four cottages with most of us sharing rooms with one other person, we are all taking the same four classes together and we all go on the same field trips, at the same time.   This means you don’t have a choice but make some really great friends.

            Part of the fun and adventure of this semester has been getting to know the people sharing this experience with me.  After arriving here that first day we quickly started to form new friendships and these ties have continued to grow every day since then.  At this point in the trip you never really know where people are.  For example if you need to find some one that lives in cottage #3, you probably won’t find them in cottage #3.  They could be in #4 hanging out with that group, or maybe #6 with those people.  They could even be in your cottage, because more than likely; you are in someone else’s. Everyone is welcome to spend an afternoon in any cottage they feel like spending it in.

            At some point in this trip each of us has felt some varying degree of homesick in our own way. To counteract these feelings of loneliness we do a lot in groups.  If I need to go into town and don’t feel like walking alone I just go from cottage to cottage until I find someone to walk with. These friendships I have made with my fellow UNK students here in Ireland with me are friendships I plan to carry with me for the rest of my life.

Spring Break 2016

My spring break in Europe was only ten days, but it felt like two months.  We wanted to experience as much as we could so we woke up early, walked all day and went to bed when we couldn’t stand any longer. 

            It started with celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland.  Staying here for the holiday gave us one less day to travel around mainland Europe, but we knew we couldn’t say no to the chance to celebrate the most famous Irish holiday in Ireland.  The weather was also amazing.  The sun was shinning bright with only a few, couple minute rain showers throughout the day.  We chose to go to the bigger of the two towns we are located between, so that we could see the larger of the two parades.  The parade lasted for nearly an hour.  The sidewalks were overflowing onto the road for as far down the road as you could see.  Everyone was excited and enjoying the holiday.  After the parade we walked around the streets where street artists were playing different kinds of instruments.

            The following day a group of four of us (Carly, Kellie, Zayne and I) hopped onto a plane and headed to Budapest, Hungary.  Budapest had amazing history and a lost of character.   The currency that Hungary uses is very different from our US dollar.  The exchange rate for US dollar to Hungarian Forint is about 1: 274.  An average meal would cost us between 2,000 and 2,500.  This was nearly as hard to get used to as looking in your wallet and finding a 1,000 forint bill.  One of the highlights of our stay in Budapest was the Terror House.  This building was the headquarters for Hungary when they joined the Axis powers.  The top floors of the building were where the highest ranking officers were housed.  After touring the top floors they take you into the basement where Jewish people were housed and tortured.  Standing in the rooms where these things happened made us all sick to our stomachs.  After this we decided we deserved to relax so we went to the Szecngs to do, the city was beautiful and I could have spent a few more days there just walking the streets.  My favorite activity we did in Vienna was visiting the catacombs under St. Stephen’s Cathedral.  In one room alone is estimated to have nearly 10,000 human skeletons.  The experience cannot be put into words.

            Much too soon, spring break was over and we headed back to Ireland.  When we got back here we only had one month left.  Time is flying by now.

The Irish Language

There is not a language barrier here in Ireland because everyone speaks English. Over my spring break to Budapest and Vienna I learned to appreciate this lack of a barrier.  If we needed to ask for directs our first question was, “Do you speak English?” About half the time, the answer was no.  I now fully appreciate that the Irish teach English to all of their school children.

            Children growing up in Ireland must learn English and Gaelic.  Depending on where you live determines if your school will teach in English or in Gaelic.  In most of Ireland everything is done in English.  Most adults only remember a few phrases of Gaelic and it is only taught in school as a required subject.  In other parts of Ireland, known as the Gaeltacht Irish is the main language.  When meeting someone on the sidewalk, or a cashier at a store people speak in Gaelic first, then when they realize we are visitors they switch to English.  The Gaeltachts are used as a way to preserve the fading Irish culture.  They are found mostly along the west coast.   In these Gaeltachts schools are taught entirely in Gaelic.  Kids are punished if they are heard speaking any English at any time of the school day.  English is taught as a subject.  Here in Spiddal we are actually in a Gaeltacht.  This means we are able to hear the Irish language more and see more of the old Irish culture.    

            The Irish language is no easy language to learn.  In our Monday class we have been learning some basic conversation pieces.  We have learned how to say hello, introduce ourselves and discus the weather.  Gaelic is very hard to learn because the pronunciation of each letter is not similar to how we pronounce them. This makes sounding things out impossible.  When spoken by a fluent speaker it is a beautiful, flowing language, when spoken by me it is a serious struggle and no one knows what I am trying to say!

Culture

At first I did not notice too much of a difference in the culture here in Ireland compared to at home.  I did not experience a big culture shock.  However, the longer I stay here the more I am picking up on the differences between the cultures. 

The thing that has been the hardest for me to get used to is how tightly packed everything is.  The cars do drive on the other side of the road, but that is not as strange to see as I thought it would be.  It is, however, very strange how narrow and windy the roads are. They are not wide enough for two buses or large vehicles to cross each other.  One has to pull over to the side of the road so that the other can pass.  There are also no shoulders. The sidewalks start right where the roads end.  I have not gotten used to the feeling of the vehicles zooming by so close.

Restaurants here are also small.  The tables in restaurants are not usually any larger than just a simple square table set for four people.  Also, tipping is not expected and can even be seen as offensive to some.  The only time tips are accepted is if there is a tip jar.

Grocery stores are also very different than what I am used to.  I am used to buying everything in bulk.  Here things do not come in such bulk.  Which is understandable, because people cannot just wheel the cart out to their car, load up their groceries and drive off.  They have to carry everything they buy out of the store and either walk home or to their car, which is usually a ways away. They also do not have plastic bags.  You have to supply your own bag.   When we go shopping we take our book bags and reusable bags.  Book bags are good for carrying the heavy things and allow us to get more at one time. Seeing how the people here work around not having plastic bags has made me realize how much we waste in getting new bags every time we go to stores.

Edinburgh (not for a grade)

Edinburgh is my favorite place I have been to yet.  This place is not only a beautiful, historic city; it is also the birthplace of Harry Potter. I had a hot chocolate in JK Rowling’s favorite café. This café is where she spent most of her time while she was writing Harry Potter.  It over looks a 400 year old cemetery. This cemetery is where she came up with the names for some of her characters.  One of the graves she picked a name off of was Thomas Riedel.  I touched Tom Riedel’s grave! Another piece of inspiration was a school just past the cemetery.  In this school the kids are split into 4 house and they compete for a house cup each year.  (Sound familiar??)  Even just walking through the streets you can see inspirations for the series all around you. 

Besides everything Harry Potter Edinburgh also has an amazing 10K hiking trail up to Author’s Seat.  At the top of the hike you get to see a stunning panoramic view of the city.  The local mythology is that this is where one of King Author’s castles once stood.  Archeologist, however, have never found any evidence of any castles standing on the top of this hill.

Edinburgh also has an amazing art gallery.  They have nearly 30,000 works of art and over 50,000 books, journals, and slides.  They have works from Vincent van Gogh, Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, and many others.  I have never been to an art museum with such famous artists.  We had to rush through the museum so we could catch our flight back to Ireland.  I could have stayed another week in Edinburgh and not ran out of things to do.

Yes! We really do have to go to class!

Between all of these field trips, adventures, and sighseeing we do actually go to class, sometimes.  In theory we have class Monday through Thursday from 10 till 2.  This rarely actually happens. When field trips fall on weekdays we do not have that class that week, or we move it to another time. We have four classes: culture, literature, history, and a general study abroad class.

For the culture class we have been learning some basic phrases in Irish.  Irish is not an easy language to learn because they use multiple sounds that the English language does not have.   This makes even repeating after the professor difficult. 

Irish literature is a homework intensive class.  We are assigned multiple readings that are due the following week.  Everything we read comes from Irish authors set on Irish lands.  We look into the lives of some of the more famous authors like James Joyce.  Joyce’s short stories were controversial at the time they were published because they did not sugar coat the lives of people in Dublin at the time.  The people of Dublin wanted to make others believe they had the ideal lives, but Joyce showed the truth behind these masks.  Reading his stories now give us an insight to the true lives of the people that lived in Dublin in the 1900s.

Irish history has some hard concepts to fully understand.  There are many historical figures that are celebrated in England, but seen as a criminal in Ireland.  One of these people is Oliver Cromwell.  In England he is seen as the father of their democracy whereas in Ireland he is seen as the man that used ethnic cleansing ideals to murder or enslave 25% of the population. Seeing how different Cromwell is viewed by different groups of people opened my eyes to the power of perception.

Our final class in the week is our general study abroad class.  In this class we work on our blogs, watch movies, or talk about upcoming field trips.  It is amazing to be given the opportunity to learn about something, watch a movie about it then actually get to travel there.  It makes the history and the stories of what happened at these places seem much more real than just learning facts out of a book.

Aran Islands Trip

The Aran Islands consist of three islands: Inis Mor, Inis Mean, and Inis Oirr.  Inis Mor, the largest island, is where we spent our weekend.  This island was like nothing I have ever seen before; it is just a big rock. The weather was not ideal for our stay. It was cold and rainy, nothing new there, but our hostel did not have much heat.  This made drying our very wet clothes for the next day nearly impossible. We were also unable to do the bike tours we were planning on. Instead we took a bus tour.  I would have preferred to do the bike tour, but taking the bus meant we got to see more of island.  The cold, rainy weather opened my eyes to what it would have been like to live on this island just 60 years ago.  They did not have power until more recently and the only soil they have is hand made.  The whole island is solid limestone.  This means any soil that the locals needed to grow their food had to be made.  They would start by making an even field. The rocks that they removed from their ground were then used for the hundreds of miles of stonewalls that trace along the land.  These walls are used as property markers and as fences for their livestock.  After they had a flat surface they would bring seaweed from the ocean and layer it on the rocks.  They would also dig into the cracks of the rock for any dirt that might have gotten trapped. This life style, paired with the cold, was not for the weak hearted. The people we met on the Islands were some of the nicest people I have met yet. Everyone we met was extremely proud of the history of their island and wanted to share their story with anyone that would listen. 

Finding a new routine

I have now been in Ireland for 17 days.  It doesn’t seem possible that so many days have already passed.  It seems more like a single week.  I have fallen into a new routine of day-to-day life here.  I live in cottage #5 with 2 other girls.  Which mean I get my own room!  All of the cottages are right next door to each other so we are always visiting our neighbors whenever we got bored of the conversation in our own. On a normal school day I am up around 9 to get ready and eat breakfast.  Then we have class from 10 till 2 with a lunch break in the middle.  When we are done with class we are free to do as we please.  Most days Sydney and I take a walk.  Spiddal is the nearest town so if we need anything, like milk or bread we head there.  The only groceries they have in Spiddal is at a gas station, so we go to Galway if we have too large of list.  We have to pay for the taxi into Galway though, so usually we stay in Spiddal.  If we do not need to pick anything up we explore somewhere we haven’t seen yet, or just go down to the ocean.  It is hard to get used to being only a five minute walk to the ocean.  On Monday of this week we found a beautiful little beach that was covered in seashells.  My seashell collection is starting to get out of hand!  When the weekend comes around we are free to travel if there is not a set field trip planned. We have only four weekends open to travel out of the 12 weekends we are here.  Two of them have already passed.  This past weekend we went to Kilkenny.   On our next weekend we have off four of us are going to go to London. This weekend we are taking our first field trip to the Aran Islands. The field trips are packed in tight now.  We hardly have time to get back before we are off to the next one.

Weekend in Kilkenny (not for a grade)

I learned three things from my weekend in Kilkenny:


1. Hostels  aren’t as sketchy as they seem, well kind of.

Staying in a hostel was a new experience for me. I was nervous about having to sleep in a room with other people who I have never met and who were from an entirely different side of the world than I am, but traveling with good friends that I trust helped put some of my worries at ease.  Also, never leaving sight my belongings and cuddling with my book bag as I slept assured I had nothing stolen.

2. How to get your group back together and to your hostel on time when a member of your group gets on the wrong train and ends up a town down the line in the opposite direction you need to be going.

Not to name names.. (Zayne)


3. Hiking a 5K trail that ends at the ruin of a 13th century mill at 7am is a great way to start a day.

We got a tip from one of the locals that there was a beautiful trail that goes through the woods following the river and decided it would be a great way to spend our last morning in Kilkenny.  We were shocked when at the end of the trail we found some 13th century ruins.  The roofs of the building had long ago collapsed allowing trees to over take the insides.  One of them even had part of the river flowing through it.

Getting used to the new home.

This past week has passed in a blur of cold wind, new chocolate bars, and an endless list of other new things. In the beginning of the week, the weather was cold, windy and the rain never seemed to stop. This weather did not slow us down though! We faced the wind and rain and walked the two miles into Spiddal. The walk was well worth it as soon as I had my first bite of the fish and chip special. This fish was by far the best I have ever had. 

The next day, we again, faced the weather and went into Galway.  This time however, we got took a taxi ride. In Galway we walked through the beautiful crowded walkways.  I enjoy walking around town, because it is very different from what I am used to.  Everything is much more crowded here.  The stores are about the size of a walk-in in closet.  I always get the feeling that I am in someone’s way, and usually I am.

Galways is the bigger city of the two towns we are between.  It is a 20-minute taxi ride to Galway and a 20-minute walk to Spiddal.  For every trip we make, into either town, Sydney and I have to stop in a store and get a chocolate bar that we have never seen before. So far, European chocolate has far exceeded even the best of American chocolate.  

Wednesday morning we woke up to an amazing surprise! The sun was shining bright and not a cloud in sight. I spent the afternoon at the rocky beach climbing the rocks and I even found a sea star and a hermit crab.  Sydney and I watched the waves crash on the rocks and explored the little pools for two hours, taking in the fresh air.

Leaving Home to Make a New Home

 Leaving home for three months is not an easy thing to do.  I
had some last minute regrets about missing family, packing the wrong things, and just simply what it would be like to be on the other side of the world.  In the end, the plane tickets were already purchased and there was no backing out.  I boarded the planes and said goodbye to the snow covered plains for the next 84 days.   
Flying into the Newark airport I received a pleasant surprise of seeing not only New York City, but also getting a bird’s eye view of the Statue of Liberty.  She may have been smaller than my pinky fingernail, but it still counts!   
And before I knew it I was “across the pond” and landing in Ireland.  Time change was a kick in the face when we landed at 7am and had to be ready to start our day even though we had lost an entire six hours of sleep.  I’ve been in Ireland for only four days and am already in love with the beautiful landscape and the powerful Atlantic.  I’m excited to see what next week will hold!