10/20/08 - 11/01/08

On Monday the 20th I was given a rude awakening. I had my first midterm, the midterm was for my European Business School business law class. I have taken business law classes before, but I still made sure to study for the exam. I knew going in that it would be an essay exam and that I would have 90 minutes. I thought there would be no problem and I would have no problem doing well on it because I knew the material. Well I was wrong. I knew all the material and had no problems answering the questions. It was going great until I realized that 12 questions requiring a page length answer is almost impossible to complete in 90 minutes. I was able to get down something for them all, but there were 2-4 that only had one or two sentences. It was not a good way to start off my week. Thankfully all my other classes exams are papers, so I have plenty of time and know what to expect. I guess that's the reason an 'A' in Ireland is a 70% and up. After the mental beating I took, I promptly came home and took a nap. The rest of the day was spent hanging around and planning a trip to Bray with Jake and Derrick on Tuesday. Tuesday came and went without a trip to Bray, we all slept in and were waiting to hear some news that didn't come until later that night. We moved our trip back to Wednesday.
Wednesday Jake, Derrick and I got up and headed to the DART. After getting off the LUAS and walking toward the DART station we passed through a political rally mainly composed of college students. We soon found out they were protesting a raise in college fees from 900 € to 1500 €. This isn't a tuition, but a one time fee to attend college. They need to stop whining and be thankful for what they had. If I could even pay 1500 € a semester I would be thrilled. We made it through the protest and headed to the DART. We got on and headed for Bray, it was a pretty beautiful trip along Dublin Bay. It was awesome to see the water. We were going to Bray because we wanted to play some 10 pin bowling. We got to Bray and started to aimlessly look walk around trying to find the bowling alley. We walked down to the water and looked out into the bay, it looks like it would be a hopping place in the summer months. We found a map and it seemed like the bowling alley was right next to the train station. Before we went bowling, we walked up to a restaurant where I got some amazing roast beef. The beef here is extremely tender and delicious. I guess it is all the luscious grass that the cows graze on. We walked to the bowling alley and started our night of gambling. The funny thing was we were searching for the bowling alley and couldn't find it.
When we finally did find it, it was literally right next door to the DART station. If we had turned our heads right walking out we would have saw it. Entering the bowling alley was entering a world of gambling. First we bet on our two games of bowling...Derrick won both (I think he hustled us). Next Derrick and I gambled on arcade racing, we split the two races. I should have won both, but the computer took me out going into the last turn. After our arcade experience we went upstairs and played a couple games of pool. I lost the first two and then sat out the third one because I was extremely outclassed by Jake and Derrick.
After our time was up on the pool table we headed back downstairs and played on the video gaming machines for a little bit. Playing video black jack isn't as exciting as playing it in real life. After we finished up with that and we collected our money we hopped on the DART and headed back to Dublin. We got back and headed back to Wyckham because we were leaving for Northern Ireland early the next morning. We came back and got packed for the trip, and just hung out the rest of the night before going to bed.
We woke up the next morning and headed for the train station to catch the 9:35 am train for Belfast. The train ride was the same as the last time except we had more room and no annoying people. We got into Belfast where Sarah, one of our IES advisers met us with a bus. We put our stuff on the bus and went to the Crown restaurant. I got an awesome Beef and Guinness pie that once again featured that delicious Irish beef. After our lunch we took a black cab tour of Belfast. This meant going around to some of the old trouble areas along with the peace wall and our drivers talking about what happened. It was interesting to see, but it was extremely depressing, and as the peace wall keeps getting higher. Being up there really made me wonder if there would be true peace up there in my life time and I don't think there will be. After the tour we got on the bus and took a two hour ride along a coastal road. It was one lane going each way precarious close to a slope leading into the ocean. It was freaking sweet. I was going to sleep on the ride, but once I saw what we were driving along my eyes were riveted to the window the entire time.
We got up to this town called Port Rush which is the quintessential beach town that you'd find in America, just tweaked a bit to be uniquely Irish. The reason we were there is because it is right by the Giants Causeway and the Bushmills Distillery. We got to our hotel (we stayed in hotels, not hostels, I roomed with Jake and had my own double bed. It was glorious!). After we checked in, we went down to the restaurant and bar and got dinner. After dinner we hung out, playing pool and listening to a jukebox. It was a fun night.
We woke up on Friday morning and went to the Bushmills distillery. It has been a working distillery for 400 years, which makes it the oldest legal distillery in Ireland. It was cool to see the process of making whiskey and at the end I got to taste this awesome 12 year old whiskey. I am not a whiskey person so it will probably be the most expensive whiskey I will ever drink! After the factory we went for lunch and to the Giants Causeway. The Giants Causeway was incredible it is amazing the beauty in nature. Jake, Adam, Derrick and I walked up along these cliffs that were 100m from the rocks. After walking along there, and seeing some spectacular views we went down to the coastline and walked along a beautiful coast. We got to the spot where the stones seem to make a pathway and it was incredible. I can't describe how gorgeous the area is. The waves crashing into the stones and spraying foam everywhere. It was amazing. After our adventures at the Giants Causeway we headed to a castle which was on the way back to the hotel. It was really cool to see, we went down to a grotto which had water crashing under the castle. We then climbed back up and saw the ruins of this castle. It was really cool to see, it was on a cliff, and part of it had actually collapsed into the ocean. When I think of castles this is what I think of.
We got back to the hotel and got out and went to dinner on the tab of IES. It was a 30 minute walk to get there, but it was worth it. It was absolutely delicious. I had a burger pizza, which when I ordered I thought it was a pizza with ground beef spread around it. When I got it, it was a pizza with a burger plopped in the center. I thought it was hilarious because only in Ireland would that be a burger pizza. After dinner, I was extremely full, we walked around the town and ended up at this bar, where we found our first drink special in Ireland! The night was a lot of fun and next day we got up and headed to a rope bridge. The walk was in the driving wind and rain, but when we got there it was awesome. The bridge went from the land to a small island right off the coast. Going over the bridge was really cool, but scary. Standing in the center when the wind blew, it was oddly disconcerting. After that little excursion we headed back to the bus and were on our way back to Belfast. We got into Belfast and took the train back to Dublin. After we got back we hung out and watched the Penn State game on game cast and the Phillies win on mlb.tv. The week was filled with going to class and watching the Phillies win the world series. The Phillies are world champions...world fucking champions. I went onto my balcony and had a champagne shower to celebrate on Wednesday. Friday was cool, we went to Newgrange which was interesting. It is these burial mounds that are over 5000 years old. When we got back, Derrick, Adam and I went to Bennigans for dinner. After dinner we headed back to the apartment and got ready for the night. We went out to a party and then to a bar where Derrick did some awesome karaoke. There were pockets of people dressed up, but it was not the majority, which was kind of interesting. Halloween is definately not as big of a deal here as it is in America. Today has just been spent hanging out and getting ready for a week filled with work.