Language Barrier

         The Irish language is a very difficult language to learn if you have never seen, or heard it before. When the language is spoken the sounds of the words are very different than English, and you also have to use your throat to be able to say certain words that require that. In addition how the words are spelled are COMPLETELY different from what they sound like it is crazy! For example Dia Dhuit that is how you would say ‘hello’ in Gaelic, another easier kind of word that we first learned is Agus which means ‘and’. Those are some examples of easier words that we learned from our first week of being here, but as time has gone on now we have learned about saying other things like the weather, counting, and more however the more we learn the harder the words are to pronounce and remember. Some examples of this are; Tá sé grianmhar inniu- can you imagine what this says?? It is hard isn’t it? Well what this says is ‘it is sunny today’ it’s kind of difficult isn’t it? Here’s another hard word/phrase; Tá mē naoi mbliana deag d’aois- this one is long as well, you think you can guess what it means? This says ‘I am 19 years old’ so this is how to say my age, see what I mean when I say what the word/phrase looks like it is difficult oh and it is harder to actually say it too (I always have difficulty remembering how to speak Gaelic). Alright I am going to give you one more word/phrase for you to guess, are you ready? Go Raibh Mo Leithscéal- you think you got this? It is kind of difficult, alright this phrase means ‘excuse me’ now I know what you must be wondering all of those words to have to say in order for it to translate to these two words? Yeah this language is definitely something else. Now of course we have been learning how to say other things, however I did not want to keep going on, and on because I am sure that would get boring, but these were just some examples from much of what I have been learning since I have been here.

 This sign means 'Yield'

 Like in the picture this means 'Slow'

 Like in the picture this means 'Public Defibrillator'

This sign translates to saying 'Children are Crossing Over'

         Even though, I talked about how Gaelic is a hard, and difficult language it really is a unique language it is definitely something I have never heard before coming to Ireland. Although, it has been a while since I have learned a new language I am glad that this is a language that I am being taught because it is interesting, and new to me. I certainly am excited to learn more about this language, and hope that I can retain what I am learning because it would be awesome to somewhat know another language besides Spanish I cannot wait to learn much more about the Irish language.  

Cultural Differences

              Coming to Ireland I did not know what to expect. I did not know if it was going to be different compared to the States. Turns out there is a lot of things that Ireland does differently than back home. One difference I noticed very quickly was the fact that vehicles are driven on the wrong side of the road (left side of street) compared to back at home we drive on the right side of the road. Over my time here I have finally adapted to that difference, it took me a little while to get into the habit of looking both ways before crossing the street (so I don’t get hit by a car or anything).

Here is a picture of a road in Ireland. Cars drive on the left side going to somewhere and coming back they drive on the right side.

 

          When my cottage-mates and I first went to a grocery store our professors had advised us to bring reusable bags to carry our groceries in, because Ireland doesn’t use plastic bags, or paper bags to sack your groceries in. But we did not listen to the advice, and instead we brought our backpacks not thinking how much groceries we would need (but we were able to stuff it all in our bags). We all learned after that experience that we should always bring our reusable bags with us for groceries, however you can also buy reusable bags at the check-out for a small price if we had forgotten our bags, or needed more but we don’t want to do that so we will just remember our bags unless we absolutely needed more.

Here is a reusable bag that was given to us when we first got here.

       Another thing that is different from the States is it’s relatively budget friendly to eat better here in Ireland, because they have amazing deals that you could definitely not find in stores back at home. Just to list a few examples: we can get three packages of meat of choice for ten euros, so that is a really good deal we always get some kind of meat every time we go to the grocery store. We also can get two bags of certain fruit of choice (like apples for example) for three euros, three!! That’s amazing because we go through a lot of fruit, so it is great that it is cheap for how much we can get. Lastly we can get two half gallon milks for four euros, which is great for all the milk lovers here.

Here is an example of meat that we can get 3 for 10 euros. This picture has chicken, beef, and salmon.

            Over time I have had to get used to different sayings that Irish people say that I would not usually hear back in America. For instance, when I would say ‘thank you’ instead of them saying ‘you’re welcome’ they say ‘cheers’, or it can also mean ‘thank you’ when they say it to you first. Another thing they say is ‘good on you’ which I assume is supposed to mean ‘good for you’ or something like that. Along with getting used to different sayings I also had to get used to different vocab that Irish people use. For example, ‘take away’ is the same thing as ‘to go’, ‘crisps’ is really chips, and ‘chips’ is another word for fries, so I easily confuse those two all the time. I could go on, and on about different sayings/vocab possibly write a whole book I’m sure but I won’t bore you.

Here are some delicious chips! Very good with salt and vinegar with it!

 

                  One last difference I wanted to touch on that I thought was interesting was when I talked to some students from a high school, and I had asked them about how their schooling system works. Basically how it works is when kids start going to school what we consider elementary school is what they call primary school, and during this stage in a child’s life it was fascinating to find out that children must talk to their teachers in Irish (Gaelic) only they cannot speak English to their teachers, but I think they can speak English to their peers. Primary schools are very strict on having students speak only in Irish because their trying to preserve the language because from what I understand a majority of people in Ireland like to speak English rather than Irish, so because of that primary schools are forcing students to speak the language to preserve their culture. After primary school then there’s secondary school, and from what I understand secondary school is like a middle school and high school I believe compared to us. Then after secondary school people can choose to go to college kind of like in America after high school people normally go to college. Also when I talked the students they told me about practicing religion in schools, like in primary school students had to do communion in school every day which I thought that was very intriguing since in America we don’t do that in schools.          

            Even though I have experienced so many differences it’s made me appreciate this country even more for how long I’ve been here so far. And it’s also made me appreciate for what I have back at home in the U.S. This experience has been nothing but amazing, and has really opened my eyes to see how different everything is compared to America, and has made me look at things from a different perspective.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gettin Down to Study

This past month I have been learning a lot from my classes about Ireland, such as history, culture, and other topics. The classes I have been taking so far I think are challenging in their own ways. Classes start at 10 am, and they last to 2 pm usually (sometimes we get out early depending on the day). Mondays are my Irish language and culture class. Jane Marie who happens to run the Park Lodge Hotel teaches us Irish (just beginner’s things like greetings, weather and much more). After our language portion is done Janie Marie’s sister teaches us the culture of Ireland, such as different folklores (which folklore is just another word for a tale), she also has talked about St. Patrick (history about him), as well as many other topics. This past Monday we had an exciting class, because someone came in to teach us how to play an Irish penny whistle (or what looks like a recorder). We learned simple songs, like ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ and ‘Mary had a Little Lamb’ before we were taught some complex songs that are polka style music like ‘Rattling Bog’ and ‘Britches Full of Stitches’. Learning the penny whistle reminded so much of when I used to play the Clarinet, because the fingering of the notes is very similar to a Clarinet’s, so the penny whistle wasn’t too hard for me to learn since I have previously played an instrument (though that was ages ago). After our penny whistle session we had our usual Irish language class, but the penny whistle instructor is going to come next Monday as well (which I can’t wait for!).

 My own Irish penny whistle out of the box.

Irish penny whistle in the box.

 

Tuesdays is my Irish literature class, so far what we have done in the class is read poems, short stories, as well as plays and talk about what ever our assigned reading was (like what did we think of the reading, answer some questions our professor asks us about the reading and so on). I have enjoyed the poems and plays that we’ve read so far. For this class we also have to read two books by our eighth week of being here (we have to choose a books from a pile that are his books), and so far I’m working on my first book, however I am almost done with it (but the book has been very interesting, so I think I’ll get it done soon then start on my second book).

 

 This is my first book that I am reading for literature. It's very interesting!

This is one of my favorite poems from literature so far.

 

 

 Wednesdays is my Irish history class and that class is usually entertaining. Because our class loves to debate each other and express their opinions. Just last week we went to The King’s Head pub for class we went there to learn about the history of the pub, and how it got its name. After we acquired knowledge about the pub our class moved upstairs to the highest point of the pub called the Ruby Room. While up there our class had a debate about Oliver Cromwell and that was very interesting to watch, because everyone really got into the debate and trying to get their view across. That was a fun class since we were able to get out of the classroom and do something different to actively learn about Irish history. There’s so much history in Ireland everywhere you go. I can’t wait to gain more knowledge about Ireland with the help of these classes.

Here's the fireplace in The King's Head. This is a shield representing a husband (left hand side) and wife (right hand side) in marriage.

 

 

 

Experiences on an Island and a New City

Hello, hello everyone who are you all doing? How has your week been for you guys? It is that time of the week where you get to find out new adventures of mine!! I’m very excited about the topic I will talking about in this blog, so let us get started!

So about a week and a half ago we had our first field trip which was to the Aran Islands! We traveled there by bus from where we are staying at, then we took a ferry ride (or otherwise known as a boat ride) to the island itself. It was my first time traveling by a ferry, and boy was it kind of rough (but a very interesting experience). But when we actually got onto the island we took a bus to a little grocery shop to purchase anything to eat, drink, or go to the bathroom etc. Afterwards we went to our hostel to drop off our bags before our tour around the island. The tour was very interesting such as, going into a graveyard (which was actually pretty neat to be able to walk around that, and see all the different kinds of tombstones). We also learned about how people on the island built their houses (which the foundation is made from limestone) and their fences (which is made from stone), and the people would build their fences their selves, which is intriguing because if they had to lift and build their fence that would be a lot of hard work to get done. After our bus tour we got off the bus, and hiked about 7 (or so) miles on a rocky, muddy path to get up to Dun Aonghasa, and the long, slippery hike was worth it by the time we got up to the top. When I reached the top I went over to the edge of the cliff to take a gander of the ocean below us. The view was absolutely breathtakingly beautiful! The way the waves violently crashed against the rocks was amazing! Every time the waves would crash it would be like listening to thunder like back at home, I have never seen the ocean like that before, and I honestly loved it so much! Then we hiked back down where we were at (it was more slippery going down!), and went down to the village. Fun fact about the Aran Islands there are three islands that make up the entire Aran Islands, but the one we had gone to was the largest island out of the three of them, and I did not know that until we were informed before our trip. Anyway when we left the island we used the same transportation back as we used when we came (so ferry ride and bus ride).

After that excursion we had one day to rest and had class then we had to pack up and leave again for another field trip, in which we went to Dublin! The capital city of Ireland. When we traveled to Dublin before we got into the city we had stopped at a Monastery museum, and that was really cool to see all of the crosses (and the meaning on them, like there were symbols on a cross that described death of Christ and other symbols) around in the graveyard, and to be able to explore the grounds that was fun. But when we finally reached the city of Dublin we first went to Kilmainham Gaol (jail) museum. Kilmainham was an old Irish jail, and its structure was different from jails back in the day in the jail they believed in silence and separation. Back then they had everyone in a cell by themselves, and it was always quiet. The jail had a lot of people that were Irish revolutionaries that were involved in the 1916 Easter Rising. When those people were taken to the jail many of them were executed. After being killed their bodies were taken away to be thrown somewhere and decompose, which made people angry back then. This jail was one of the most striking things that I had seen in Dublin, because it had so much history within it and the story of the jail was so compelling it never got boring. On the day we were leaving Dublin our class was able to visit the Parliament which was empty (because it was voting day for Ireland), but we got to learn about how Ireland’s government works and toured around the building which was interesting to see. It is also fascinating that Ireland’s government structure is almost like America’s but they do a lot of things differently (for example voting). Before we got back to Galway we stopped in Trim and went to trim’s castle. That castle was so awesome to look at, and we also got to tour inside of it (while listening to the history of it). I found that castle to be very historical (it also looked kind of old which I love old places) it has not been used in a very long time but it still had a medieval look to it which looked pretty cool. I have to say the view from the top was quite amazing how it overlooked the city of Trim definitely loved that part of the tour.

In the end looking back at both field trips I loved both of them so much! They both were a lot of fun (though I think I liked Dublin a little more because of the big city feel) as well as had a lot to learn from, I love how much I am learning so far. It is crazy to think that I have been here for a little over a month! That is so mind-boggling because it feels like we have done/seen so much in a short amount of time. Soon enough (like in a couple of weeks) will be spring break, and that’s crazy but I’m excited for the break. Thank you all for reading my blog! Until next time slán! (Goodbye!)            

 Graveyard on the Aran Islands

 These waves on the Aran Island are so crazy! I love them!

  Kilmainham Gaol. Loved it!

 Outside look of Trim castle.

 Some of the inside of Trim castle from above. (we were going to the top, so many stairs we had to climb)

The overlook of Trim city.

Making Connections

Hello everyone! Conas Atá Tú? That means how are you? In Gaelic. I have been doing very well, I also have been very busy this past week. I have experienced a lot of fun times this past week and can’t wait to share with you all what I have been up to.

Daily Life:

            Last week there were two days where we had beautiful weather, like it was sunny out and not really windy and it just felt good to be outside. So I took advantage of those two days, and I went down to the ocean both days since the weather was too good to pass up (and got to make sure I get that vitamin D since most days are pretty dreary). When I went down to the ocean I say this a lot but it was so relaxing being by the ocean. Especially by myself I can just let go of my mind, and just stare out at the waves as they crash onto the rocks and feel how calming it is. I will never ever get tired of the ocean I know I talk a lot about being by the ocean, and how mind-numbing it is. However if only you could be here with me, and just feel what I feel you would definitely understand that some days you just need to have a time when you don’t have to think about anything important, and just let go of everything in your mind for a little bit until you reality sets in and you have to go about your day.

Also last week three girls, and I went to a retirement home and spent some time there for a service project we are doing for one of our classes. So that day was our first day of being there, and two girls went upstairs to put lotion on elders hands and massage them and just talk with them to get to know some people. While another girl, and I stayed downstairs and played a card game with a couple of gentlemen Patty (who is a resident there), and Mick (who comes in from Spiddal, and interacts with the residents). We also got to know them a little bit, and they asked about us like where we’re from, and other questions to get to know us. I felt a little awkward, and I had no idea what I was doing (for the card game even when they sort of not really explained it, so I just winged it) at the start of us being there, but then by the time we were leaving I felt a little at ease (probably more because I had someone I knew right next to me, and not just by myself I probably wouldn’t have done good by myself). It takes me a while to warm up to people that I don’t really know, so that works against me greatly but I hope that my shyness gets better as we go to the retirement home more often. Because I believe we will be doing things with residents one-on-one so I need to not be so shy and awkward around people (but in due time I am sure it will be okay). That was an easy day for us, because we plan on all going every Wednesday then the four of us would switch every Thursday of going there (so essentially plan on going once-twice a week and two go on one Thursday and the other two go on the next Thursday). The more we keep going the harder of things we’re going to have to do to make connections with the residents. So it is not like we’re going to go there and get to play cards and not do too much it is not going to be like that I am sure of it. But I can’t wait to keep going back, because everyone is so nice, as well as the atmosphere of the place is so friendly, and I can’t wait to get to know the residents a little better. And most residents speak Irish (Gaelic), but I think they can also speak English but since they more than likely grew up speaking Irish they may speak that more, so that will be a challenge since I am still learning Irish, but I will get through that.


One last thing I wanted to talk about is how I do laundry. Now over here I do laundry differently than I would do it at home (at home I would use my handy washer and dryer machines). But here I have two options to do my laundry; Option one use the washer and dryer machines that are here, but you have to pay to use them and one of my friend’s said that she paid £9 (in coins) to wash and dry her clothes (granted she did it by herself) also you can combine your clothes with other people so it would be cheaper (but I don’t want to do that) for most people this is the quick and easy option. Option two is hand wash my clothes in my cottage, in which it takes a lot longer to do, as well as it takes a long time to dry (like a day and a half most times) but this option is mostly free (I mean I have buy my own detergent so that is not free) this option is not quick and easy. How I do my laundry is option two I hand wash all of my clothes, and I am not sure if it actually cleans my clothes but that is okay because I am saving money, and I do not have coins most times to do my laundry by machines. When I wash my clothes it takes 45 min-1 hour to get all of it done (I usually only have two loads but I have to wash and rinse every single item) then I have to hang them up to dry, and if it is nice out I hang on a clothes-line my lighter clothes and hang the heavy clothes in the cottage. But for my clothes to fully dry is about a day and/or a half (long time it seems doesn’t it) which is unfortunate, but then again it is a cheaper way to clean clothes, so that’s how I do laundry and needless to say I miss my machine washer and dryer at home.   
 Well thank you all for reading my blog today, next week’s blog will be very interesting I will get to tell you all about the past couple of field trips that we just had. Until next week talk to you then!

 At the ocean, perfect way to spend the day!

 It is like a community of shells right in front of my eyes! It looks so fascinating!

 This is the perfect scenery for anything.

This wave though! Looks so pretty! Took me forever to get the perfect wave photo, the waves move too fast to take the right picture.

Week 3: New Places

Hello everybody, how are all of you guys doing? I’m doing pretty awesome this past week has been crazy fun, and have some pretty interesting things to talk about. Going back to last week last Tuesday was Shrove Tuesday (for some if you’re not sure what this is Shrove Tuesday is it’s a catholic tradition that it’s the day before Ash Wednesday, and typically people feast on pancakes because they try to use up all their dairy products to make them before their Lenten fast. This is my understanding from one of my classes). So in spite of Shrove Tuesday half of our group of students went to Galway to get pancakes for the occasion. When my friends, and I got to Galway we walked around for a while then after a little bit we tried finding a place that was serving pancakes, but we unfortunately couldn’t find one so we ended up not being able to eat pancakes which was kind of sad, but oh well. Instead we ate at a chicken place called Hillbilly’s (we laughed too hard at the name of the place since we come from Nebraska so it was pretty fitting) but it was a really tasty place, and for cheap as well which is always a plus. Later in the week was the most eventful part of my week, last weekend (Thursday afternoon-Saturday evening) a group of friends, and I went to explore a city called Kilkenny! It was exciting to go somewhere different besides Galway, and Spiddal. So we traveled the Thursday afternoon we took a train (a train! That was a pretty awesome experience to be on a train!) From Galway to Kildare then from there to Kilkenny. The adventure was going great until our stop in Kildare we had a problem when me, and the girls in my group went to the bathroom and when we came back the guy in our group had accidentally got onto a different train, and left us so that was crazy trying to contact him only by Wi-Fi (in order to do that we had to go into the city of Kildare into a pub to contact him) after we were able to get a hold of him we waited for him at the train station, and were able to get onto the correct train to Kilkenny so we got to our hostel a little late but we were just glad to have everyone in our group together. The next day we got up at 7 in the morning to go explore the city we were actually able to go see a lot of things since we got up so early. We had toured a castle called Kilkenny Castle (which that was amazing there was so much history!) we also saw 3 different churches (all of them were catholic I believe) the inside of the 3 of them were similar yet different in their own way, but oh so beautiful they all were. We also did some shopping, and went to different stores, as well as a big outlet mall that they had there. We also walked all over the city, and I took so many pictures it was great! It was very astonishing that we saw pretty much almost all of the city in that one day which was pretty good to get accomplished. The day after the girls, and I got up at 7 again to go on a morning walk we went on a walking trail, and that lead us to see some intriguing things! We saw an old abandoned mill, and oh my goodness the inside was so fascinating! It looked like a rainforest inside a building, like it was breathtaking. I also noticed the graffiti that we had seen, and this may be weird to say but the graffiti here looks stunning! I’m not sure why I feel this way, but I think it just looks better than any graffiti I’ve seen in America. Anyway that afternoon we left Kilkenny to go back to the cottages, and it was a struggle coming back because we weren’t sure which connecting train to get on and it just took a while to get back, but we eventually did. That evening I was able to Skype everyone at home for my niece Emaleigh’s birthday party, and it was incredible to be able to see everyone’s face when I talked to them, it helped my homesickness to be able to talk to everyone, but at the same time I still miss everyone however it gets better every day. Looking back to our time in Kilkenny whenever we talked to locals about politics in the United States mostly with the election that’s going on, and who they think will win in the end, it always surprises me that people say they want Donald Trump to win and their explanation for why. I just can’t fathom why anyone would want him to be president, but it certainly is interesting to hear the perspective of someone who doesn’t live in the United States on this topic. Also one last thing this past week I have planned everything for my spring break!! I’ve booked hostels, and bought tickets for everything I am so relieved to finally have all of that done! But in order to know where I’m going for spring break you’ll have to wait a while I can’t spoil that quite just yet, even though a lot of people already know where I’m going. Thank you all for reading my blogs it means a lot to me! I’m glad I can bring my Ireland adventures to everyone back home! I’m excited for my next post because I have a lot of field trips that are coming up, so can’t wait to tell you all about those!! Well until the next blog post I will talk to you all then! Bye!

 

 Kilkenny Castle

 Sculpture that's close by Kilkenny Castle when we were walking down a walking trail, it's dedicated to all missing people of their hand prints.

 This is the most beautiful graffiti I have ever seen!! Saw this while on a morning walk.

 An outside shot of the abandoned old mill we saw

 The inside of one of the catholic churches we saw

Inside shot of the abandoned mill, it looks so beautiful and it was drizzling a little so it felt like a rainforest.

 

 

Round Two! Week Two!

 A river leading to the ocean at Galway at night

 Rainbow after rain! Do you think there was a pot of gold?

Starfish photo credit: Sydney Norris

 

Dia Dhut! That’s hello in Gaelic. It’s been week two of my journey, and boy do I have some fun stories to tell you! Going back to last week, on last Friday our class went to Galway at night to see the nightlife, and what was there to do. My group of friends and I started off our night by going to a little Italian restaurant, in which it was a really good place with great food we all liked it a lot. After we had food we walked around for a little bit until we found other people in our group, and we walked with them. We all eventually went into a pub, and hung out there was a live band playing so we just stood by the front, and listened the band was pretty good. Then a random guy asked one of our friend’s to dance, and she danced with him that guy would keep coming up to ask her to dance with her. As well as another guy kept asking girls in our group to dance with him, including me (which surprised me but I danced with him) but those guys were entertaining to dance with, and they were nice. Soon after we were all done with dancing our group left to go to another pub, and that was a quite eventful pub to go to it was called the King’s Head. That pub also had a live band, and the songs that they played were quite familiar (for all us American’s that were there) such as, ‘Sweet Home Alabama’, ‘Highway to Hell’, ‘Wake Me Up’ and plenty of countless songs that my friends, and I danced to. We all agreed that we really liked that pub, Galway on Friday nights, and the music that the band played that is definitely a place to go to again! The next day we went back to Galway for grocery shopping since we badly needed to get groceries. Before we got those we went to other stores first, and I got a pair of waterproof hiking shoes, and I’m so glad that I got them because they’re so comfy, actually waterproof, and they are good when I go to the ocean and go climbing over rocks. Anyway grocery shopping went better this time since we had a list, and knew what we had to get which was less stressful, and we had more time to complete our shopping too. The next morning I was able to break in my new shoes when some friends and I went to the ocean to see the low tide. Seeing the low tide was the most amazing sight I’ve seen so far on this trip, I just love the ocean so much! Although it was so windy which made climbing on rocks very difficult, but I managed and just watching the tide looked calming like it normal makes me feel, and there’s nowhere I’d rather be than watching the waves crash onto rocks so peacefully. We also explored the rocks, and I was surprised to see that there were so many barnacles all over the rocks, and they were sharp too so that was interesting. On our way back one of my friends was able to see a live starfish! I’ve wanted to see a live, moving starfish all my life, and I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it, it looked so adorable. This week has been a pretty eventful week, but this week I’ve also very homesick actually, and I didn’t think I would be homesick but I guess when I just think about home, or friends etc. it just makes me miss home, so that’s been a struggle this week that I’m still working on getting through that. But in better news this week I’ve been working on my spring break plans and I plan on going to different countries over the break, and I can’t wait to be done with buying everything for it, and can just relax when it’s all said and done. You’ll have to stay tune to see which countries I go to for the break which isn’t until March so a while away. To conclude that’s all for this week join me next week for some exciting adventures, and places that I’ll be going to so you’ll get to hear about that next week. Until then slán! (Goodbye!)