Visiting my family in Northern Ireland

My 4th cousin Liam!



First off, this blog is going to be very confusing so attempt to keep up. I stayed in Strabane Co Tyrone, which is outside of Derry with my 4th cousin Liam and his wife Pat. Liams grandma Matilda Gene, and my great great grandma Rachel Mary Dunn Fleming were sisters. Liam and his wife pat taught me so much about my family! They showed me where they used to live, the land that we used to own, as well as how living was like for my great great grandmother and my great grandmother Kathleen. Liam, Pat, and other relatives were all so nice to me. They helped me so much with attempting to gather information about my family. I could spell out the entire timeline of my family over a blog, but that could become very confusing as well as very long. I hope that someday I get to go back to Northern Ireland and see them again. The next time I got I hope I go with my mom! I know she would have absolutely loved everything there! Meeting family, and having home cooked meals really made me miss home for one of the first times since I have been abroad. You never really realize all the things you take for granted in the states until you are abroad, food is a big one, but I think family is the biggest. I am so grateful for my mom and stepdad for helping me out with money and allowing me to experience all these amazing things! I hope someday they get to experience things like I am! Love you both so much!

My last week in Dublin

Our last night out with everyone and our teacher!


2 weeks ago was my last week in Dublin studying at Dublin City University. Going into this program I knew I would make friends, but I had no idea how close I could become to the people I met. I really made life long friends during my month in Dublin and saying bye to all of them was one of the hardest things I think I am going to have to do this entire trip. The last weekend we were in Ireland we took a trip up to Northern Ireland. We learned more about the was to Independence as well as all the war that is still happening in Northern Ireland between the protestants and the catholics. This whole month in school we have been learning about the war, and what Ireland was and is like. The one thing that I didn't realize until I was in Northern Ireland is how recent all of these wars, happened. We went to a museum about Bloody Sunday, and our tour guides brother died during Bloody Sunday. When I heard our tour guide say that it really set in how extremely recent all of these travesties happened.
Our last week in Dublin we didn't have class. Our teacher gave us the days to work on our final paper that was due on thursday. He told us to write our paper on something in Irish culture that we were interested in. So I obviously picked children and teaching. Ireland is in a recession just like we are, so I wrote about how the recession is affecting schools, families, and other people in the community. Though my days should have been spent writing my paper most of them were spent with my friends attempting to soak up every last bit of Dublin! Our nights were then filled with going to every last bar we wanted to check out, and then going back to all of our favorite bars for the last time. We finally made it to Whalens bar which is were a part of P.S. I Love You was filmed, and a little bar called snail. We aslo went back to a few of our favorite bars, Flanneries, The Globe, and Coppers. Our last night we were all getting ready and the song My Last by Big Sean came on and a group of girls started crying because we were all so sad that it was our last night in Dublin.
The last day in Dublin I said goodbye to all my new friends, maybe cried a little, and then got on my bus to Northern Ireland to visit my distant relatives and learn more about where my family came from.

Just an ordinary weekend in Dublin!

all of us girls at the football match!


Dun Laoghaire!


I promise this blog post will be shorter!!!

Saturday was my laziest day in Dublin! I literally did not leave my apartment until we went out that night. All of us girls relaxed worked on our blogs. I attempted to start working on our homework assignment, but if you thought I procrastinated in the states...well its even harder to get homework done over here! Saturday night we just did a little bar hopping to some of the pubs we haven't gone to yet, and then called it an early night because the next day we had to be ready for our first Gaelic football match!

The Gaelic football match was absolutely amazing! The fans got really rowdy, and it sort of reminded me of being back home at a duck football game! In Gaelic football you can hit the ball like a volleyball, kick it like a soccer ball, or bounce it like a football....confused? After the game we went to a pub right next to the stadium called the Big Tree! Right when we walked in we spotted our teacher Martin! It was pretty adorable because Martin was a little tipsy and you could tell he was trying to hide it from us! Like we care though...! The pub scene at The Big Tree was especially fun this evening because Dublin had just won the football match, so all the fans where there celebrating! Us girls ended up making good friends with the manager, bouncer and bar tenders, and they let us all stay after closing for a few free drinks! Tony the bouncer turns to us and says "am I your guys best friends in Ireland?". Yup! I finally made a friend in Ireland.

Monday we didn't have class, so Tricia and I went into Dun Laoghaire. Dun Laughaire is where my friend Jenny has her internship. It is about a 15 min Dart ride from City Centre in Dublin! In Dun Laughaire, Tricia and I walked the peer, and then met Jenny for some dinner on the peer! This little town is so adorable, and filled with sail boats. Dun Laoghaire is also where James Joyces Ulysses starts at! Once we got home from Dun Laoghaire I finally got started on my homework assignment which was due the next day! Thank God I work well under pressure...

My second week in Dublin

Sorry I have been so terrible at blogging this week! I have no idea where the time has gone. Iv been here for almost two weeks now, and it feels like i've been here for years! This week was filled with class, field trips, and great craic! Monday was the 4th of July as all of you back in the states know. The Irish don't really care to much about other countries national holidays, like the Americans do. In America, or in college to be more specific we use any countries holidays as an excuse to drink, whether it be St. Patrick's Day, or Cinco de Mayo. The Irish on the other hand don't need an excuse to drink, for the Irish Monday night is an excuse itself. All of us girls got dressed up in our best red white and blue, went out and bought American beer, and played American drinking games to celebrate the 4th! The 4th was the first day I felt a little homesick, missing out on all the great traditions, celebrating with friends, and watching fireworks. Fireworks are illegal in Ireland so we didn't get to see any on the 4th, which really sucked. On Tuesday we had class again with Don, who is our study abroad director here, and one of our teachers. He is a cute old man, who tends to say inappropriate things. For example he told us a story about how when he was a teenager, condoms were illegal in Ireland, so him and his friends took a train to Northern Ireland and attempted to smuggle condoms back and sell them on the black market. As well as "Girly Magazines", when he said girly I turned to Tricia and asked if he was talking about Cosmo...I was very wrong. Don was definitely talking about Porn magazines.

Tuesday out field trip was to the writers museum, which was a little boring, but I did learn a few things. And then Tuesday night we all had lazy night to rest up, and Tricia and I went to go see Bridesmaids! At the end of the movie one of the characters says to another your ride is here, and the entire theater starts cracking up. Tricia and I look at each other with puzzled expressions and then look around the theater at everyone laughing, and then look back at the screen to see if we can figure out what is so funny. Finally a light bulb went off in my head and I remembered that Martin had told us a ride means sex....so in the movie she basically said "hey your sex is here". I definitely felt like an America when it took me so long to catch onto an Irish joke.
Wednesday we had class again. Today class was on myth and theories of Northern Ireland, which I actually found really interesting. Our field trip in the afternoon was to The national Gallery. There was a Jack Yeats Exhibit there, and I fell in love with one of his paintings titled Morning in the City. After the Museum 5 of us girls decided to take our own little field trip to the Guinness Store house. We learned all about how to make Guinness and we even learned how to poor our own Guinness. All of us girls are trying to save money in any way that we can. So today we decided we would save money by walking all the way to the guinness factory instead of taking the bus. It ended up being an hour long walk, but we made the walk go by faster by singing every Disney song we could think of! If we didn't look like Americans before, we definitely did when we were belting out Disney songs in Dublin. Wednesday night we went to the bar here right on campus called nu bar, and played beer pong against some Irish guys, and it got pretty heated when we realized we were losing at our own game! But we turned it around and ended up winning!

Thursday Morning we all woke up early and went into Dublin City Centre and went to Dublin Castle. Dublin Castle is my second favorite field trip so far right behind Kilmainham Jain. It was so beautiful, and full of history! After Dublin Castle all of us went to Eddie Rockets, which is Irelands version of Johnny Rockets. I ordered a salad, and realized that it was one of the first times I had eaten vegetables since I've been here...needless say I went out and bought carrots later on. On thursday we had class from 2 to 5 since we did out field trip in the morning. Our class on Thursday was my favorite class thus far. We talked about Irish stereotypes and american stereotypes, and what the Irish culture is like compared to the states. Thursday night we went to a local bar, which was a good change of pace from the bars in City Centre. It was cheeper and had more locals in it. Bars in City Centre are crawling with tourist, and a lot of American Music!

Friday we didn't have class, but we still had a little field trip to Glasnevin Cemetery. There are so many famous men and women buried here that fought in Irelands many wars to gain their Independence. After our field trip we all walk to go buy our tickets to the Gaelic football match we are going to this sunday! Then we all came back to our dorms and rested up before our friday night festivities! Friday night we went to a few different bars. We went to my favorite bar which is Stags head, and then we bar hopped to a few others. Once the bars started closing we went to Ricks, which is a late night burger joint, and we all got some drunk munchies. Two irish men, who where rather attractive, came up and started talking to us. When we are talking to guys Tricia always finds a way to turn the topic to sports and then continues to get into arguments with the guys about which sports team is better. After a short banter with these attractive Irish men about the Florida Gators, we got into our cab and got on our way!

Saturday was a lazy day, we woke up late, ate breakfast together in our lounge, uploaded pictures, and wrote this blog!! Sorry its so long! I hope everyone in the states is enjoying themselves!

Galway Girls

The Cliffs of Moher and O'brien Tower!!

Going to Galway was quite the trip needless to say. It started out by me being startled awake at 7:30 because we had to leave at 8 to catch our bus. After only two hours of sleep I was literally a walking zombie attempting to navigate our way to Bus Eireann, and make it on time. We somehow got to our bus with just 5 minutes to spare. We are found our seats and I was instantly asleep. After about an hour Tricia and I traded seats because she had the back row, which was 5 seats all together so I was able to spread out and take a real nap. I definitely got some dirty looks from passengers who walked to the back to have a seat, and realized some obnoxious american was taking up all 5...oops.We finally arrived into Galway 4 1/2 hours later, got a bite to eat, and found a cab to take us to our Hostel. We gave the cab driver our address which we were told was about 15 miles outside the city, and the cab driver looked at us and said "you know this is about 40 minutes away".....uh no, we had no idea. After a 40 minute cab ride of what we like to call the scenic tour of the Irish country side, and 50 euro's later we arrived in a small town called Oughterard where out Hostel was. Our hostel was very cute and country like, and had a cute little old man running it. After getting settled in we walked into the small town of Oughterard and went to one of the 5 bars there called the Boat Inn. A live band started setting up, and we all became very excited. We thought "oh were in a small rural town way outside of a big city, maybe they will place actual Irish music for once". We were totally wrong. They played all the same American song we have heard at every other bar here and Galway Girl. We still enjoyed our time and sang along with every song.

One thing we found very surprising about this small town is how ostracized we felt. Most places we go to in Dublin when people hear that we are American they want to come up and talk to us. We figured it would be the same in Oughterard but it was the complete opposite. People would point at us, and we continuously heard peoples muffled voices saying "americans"...I have never felt so completely out of place in my life! After the band stopped playing we decided to move to another bar, in hopes that people might actually talk to us, and that there might be more people there our age. We were right about one thing. There were a lot more people there our age, but they too continued to point and whisper about the Americans in the corner. It wasn't until all the locals had plenty of drinks in them before they actually approached us. This very nice and cute soccer player named patty invited us back to the Boat Inn, because he said there was a really fun party going on over there. We weren't in the Boat Inn for more than 2 minutes, when we all started to look around and see signs and balloons that say 21 on them. We had just crashed some girls 21st birthday party. Oughterard, being a small town, everyone knows everyone! We stuck out like sore thumbs. Needless to say we didn't stay long. We made our way back to our hostel which was about a mile down an unlit road...so terrifying. We all got into our bed, which I'm pretty sure was made out of bricks and fell asleep.

The next morning we took another 50 euro cab ride back in to Galway to get on our tour bus to the Cliffs of Moher. As soon as the engine of the bus started Tricia and I fell asleep. We would then wake up every time the bus slowed down, because that probably meant we were either stopping to get off somewhere, or we were slowing down to take a picture of some historical sight. Our last stop was the Cliffs of Moher. The Cliffs of Moher were one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. We spent over and hour there just taking pictures and marveling at them. After about two hours we got back on the tour bus, Tricia and I assumed the position and fell back asleep until we arrived back in Galway. After getting of the tour bus which stated at 10am, and it was now 6:30, we waited to get back on our bus to Dublin which was another 4 hour long bus ride. It felt so nice to be back in Dublin. Riding the bus back to Dublin I started to feel like I was actually going home. Tricia and I needed a full nights sleep because tomorrow is the 4th of July....and that only means 1 thing :]....Stupid Americans!

The weekend starts on Thursday night in Dublin too!

This is shirt I legitimately saw someone wearing in the City Centre. This is just one of the examples of shirts I've seen, along with post cards that have Obama's face on them. The Irish really do love Obama, and hate Bush.


After four long days I think I finally got my bearings in Dublin. We had our third class, and it was on Religion. Not exactly my forte, but I actually really enjoyed it. After class Martin took us on our next field trip. We went to the National museum of Ireland. We visited the exhibits on Ireland gaining their Independence, and Martin has repeated the same story to us on Irelands Independence I could now teach a course on it. Then, of course, we visited the exhibit on Fashion in Ireland over the last thousand years. On our way home from the museum we met a guy who went to Auburn. Tricia was excited because it was someone else from the south, but me on the other hand, I had some not so nice things to say. He did inform us of a bar called the woolshed that was having a karaoke night. When Tricia and I heard the world karaoke, our faces lit up like little kids on Christmas Morning. When us girls got to the karaoke bar later that night, Tricia and I marched right up to the DJ and requested to see Sweet Caroline. We were so anxious for it to be our turn we continued to be annoying americans and check in every 10 minutes to see if we were up yet. After 2 hours of checking in we moved on to bigger and better things....the gay bar. The gay bar was fabulous, obviously, but it had way too many straight men in it. Men would come up and talk to us, we would assume they were gay, and then they would be offended that we made that assumption. Straight guys, should not go to gay bars to hit on women....doesn't work like that.

Friday morning came and went, because all of us took that time to catch up on some sleep. We met Martin in the afternoon to go to Kilmainham Jail, which has by far been our best field trip yet. I think I learned the most history about Ireland while on the tour of the jail, than I have on all of our other field trips combined. After the jail us girls wanted to find out for ourselves what this Obama burger was all about. This thing was Huge! loaded with bacon, cheese, and all of that good stuff. I was surprised how good it was, since we were at an Irish fast food joint. After we all came back to our dorms, and relaxed for a little before going out with everyone in our program. My friend Jenny, who is in my sorority, is doing an internship in Dun Laoghaire, which is right outside of Dublin. She took the bus up to DCU to go out with all of us for the night. It was so nice to see a familiar face in a new city. The huge group of 16 of us went to Stags Head, which was really fun, and then to Flannary's, which was full of old smelly men, and bad music. We all ignored the smell and the men, and managed to have a great tim with all of our friends. At the end of the night we found a great late night kabob restaurant, for some late night munchies. It was definitely not taco bell status, but it will do. Going to bed after another long day felt so nice, but I wouldn't get to sleep long, because we need to be up early in the morning to catch our bus to Galway for the weekend!