The Place Where Everybody Knows Your Name

This is kind of an I love you letter to the place I get to call home for the next 5 months--but a letter that has a lot of random pictures included in it.

Before leaving on this adventure, I was confident-- I mean like absolutely certain-- that I would be homesick my first week in Ireland. To my own surprise after wandering around Dublin, and spending my first full week abroad I can say that Ireland feels like home.

 

I have never been to a place--besides my actual home--where everyone is so willing to go out of their way to be nice. It is probably more than just being nice as I have been in several circumstances, where people have gone above and beyond.

 

 

The first time I used my bus pass I was not swiping the card correctly, and a stranger actually came up to me and showed me how to swipe it and then explained the bus pass system to me.

 

While in Howth, another stranger saw that we were looking for the information desk and pointed us in the right direction--without us even asking. I know these seem like small things, but they are actually a big deal when you are trying to find your way around in a new place.

 

I have always kind of had this dream--it is a silly dream, and I'll be the first to admit it--but I always desperately wanted to be a regular somewhere. I wanted to come into a diner, coffee shop, restaurant, or whatever and have the owner or waiter know exactly what I wanted to eat and drink, because I was a regular and they knew me that well. I am completely aware that this is ridiculous. So I am not a regular yet, but everywhere I have gone it has felt like I was a regular due to the kindness everyone has expressed towards my friends and I.

 

 



So when people ask me if I experienced culture shock my first few weeks in Dublin, I can say I did, but it was a shock to the generosity of the people who live in this beautiful place.

 

 

Ireland,

I love you

 

xoxo Hannah 





"Howth goes it?"

Howth is a village outside of Dublin and takes about an hour to get to via the bus. Upon arrival, I felt like I was on Cape Cod during the off-season due to the wind and beautiful view of the ocean. It was pretty muddy so we decided to complete one of the shorter trails.

The hike provides an amazing view and we only stopped once when we were asked by a fellow hiker what part of North America we were from. When I replied Boston, Massachusetts, the man said "is that close to Houston". Immediately, I kindly explained no, and fumbled with my words. He started laughing and replied "I only be joking with ya!"

 

On second thought, we actually stopped twice...and that was of course to take pictures.

 



 We found our way back to town, and after receiving a recommendation from the travel information center, we went to Crabby Joe's for lunch. It was by far the best meal I've had since my arrival.

After finishing our meal, we walked through the Howth Market and town.



Until tomorrow's adventure,
Hannah

"I'm here to see Mr. Darcy"

Today I ventured outside of Dublin to visit Powerscourt Estate which is located in Enniskerry of County Wicklow. After waiting 45 minutes for the second bus to arrive, we caught our 2nd bus that would take us right to the Enniskerry. We arrived in the quaint town center, that had a few small shops and beautiful houses with perfect front doors--I have quite the obsession with front doors so you are going to be seeing a lot of those.

 After a walk uphill, we finally arrived at the Powerscourt Estate and all we could think about was Pemberley from Pride and Prejudice. The estate was breathtaking and could be from a movie and it actually is from a movie--Ella Enchanted, anyone?

We started on the garden tour and we were not disappointed. I'll let the pictures speak mostly for themselves. 

 

Shown below is where one of the scenes from Ella Enchanted was filmed. 



 

 

If you are wondering if it really was warm enough not to wear a jacket, it wasn't. I was a little too excited about the 55 degree day to consider the wind and I left without a jacket. The wind is very present in this picture, because that volume is not all natural. For the entire day my hair was ready to be filmed for a Pantene commercial. 



 

The rain came and I saw my first rainbow while in Ireland. The moment had to be documented.

After running across the street to catch the bus, and then running back across the street because we were in the right place in the first place, we headed back to campus.

 

 

Until tomorrow's adventure,

Hannah

 







"We're new here"

 

 

After exploring the city yesterday morning, a few of us decided that enough was enough and it was time that we actually started acting like real people by buying real groceries as opposed to just eating bagels and cream cheese. We went to a Tesco and we were relieved by the warmth of the store, but immediately were concerned when the shopping carts were locked up--scary, right? We looked around cautiously as we figured out how to unlock the cart making it very obvious that we were very new to Ireland.

Luckily, a lovely woman was there to show us how to unlock the cart by inserting a euro. 

We then cautiously set out into the store on our first food shopping adventure in Ireland. No real shocks in the store, except that I spent 10 minutes looking at cheese only to realize there was no sharp cheddar--oh how I miss you Vermont Cheddar--and there was also no pretzels which was equally upsetting.

 

I thought my first successful food shopping experience was worthy of a photo--how embarrassing am I--and note that this picture was taken before I realized I needed to walk 20 minutes to the next bus stop. 

 

 

 



Is it Karaoke or Live Music?

Out of all the places I thought I would be on my first full day in Ireland, IKEA was not one of them, but there I was walking around IKEA with a broken cart buying the essentials to set up my living space. The scene of the train of American students trolling through IKEA holding the signature IKEA yellow bags would be enough for me to actually laugh out loud, except I was one of those American students.


After surviving the IKEA trip and putting my room together with the essentials I headed out with a few friends to get dinner. We walked around a shopping area in Dublin Centre. Of course, we found the legendary Temple Bar.

 

We had dinner at a casual place called Fitzsimmons and a lesson to be learned is that there are not really any hostesses in a lot of pubs in Dublin--so don't just stand there awkwardly. After we went to this bar called The Quay--pronounced key. Now in my head, I'm thinking that it is a Tuesday night so not that many people are going to be out. I have never been so wrong; the pub was packed and not only was there live music, but everyone was singing along with the performer. It was my kind of scene with covers of Justin Beiber, U2, and a few good 80s and 90s throwbacks.

 

 

The night only got better when the guitarist began to mash-up Disney movie songs like "Let it go", "A Whole New World", and my personal favorite "The Circle of Life". If you have not heard an entire bar sing "The Circle of Life" including the introduction that has words like Nants ingonyama bagithi Baba  Sithi uhm ingonyama--and yes I had to look up how to spell the sounds that are made in the beginning of the song--then you have not lived.

 

 

 

 

 



Next Adventure: Ireland

I left for my semester abroad in Dublin, Ireland this past Sunday so I will not be back in Boston until June! Before leaving, my family and I had brunch at one of my favorite brunch spots, it's called Barcelona and is located in Brookline, MA. They have all different types of tapas--my favorite is the French toast!

 

I decided to take the group flight to Ireland which takes off from JFK so my adventure began on a 5:00 flight to JFK from Logan. You would think that it would be the shortest flight, but we ended up running late and stuck on the plane for an hour because the gate at JFK was not ready for us. In the end, the plane got "ramped" which means we had to step off the plane into the snow--because of course it started snowing--and then take a bus to the gate. Stepping off the plane stairs is usually a cool thing to do when lets say you are stepping off into warm weather and ready to begin a tropical vacation in the Bahamas. Not so much when you are in NYC in January, and are greeted by a cool breeze that slaps you with snow. 

My layover was meant to be 3 hours, but that turned into a 4 hour delay due to the back-up of planes that needed to be de-iced. The plane had already been delayed by an hour or so when a slew of airplane snacks--the signature pretzels and peanuts-- and water was delivered and then another 20 minutes went by and more snacks were delivered, but this time the airline really went all out with Pirate's Booty, Kettle Corn, Goldfish, and candy. At that point, I turned to my friend and whispered "Does this mean we are not boarding our plane in 20 minutes?" Sure enough, a mere 10 minutes later our flight was delayed another hour! Eventually, we did board the plane at which point, the plane began the de-icing process which took another 2 hours. Our flight took off at 1:30am instead of the original 9:30 pm takeoff time.

We did arrive safely in Ireland and this was the first view of Ireland I saw from the plane.

 

To get to the University College of Dublin we took an Air Coach that was supposed to drop us off right near the building where check-in was. Unfortunately for us, we got dropped off at the main road and had to take quite a long walk with all of our luggage. Just imagine,  8 jet-lagged girls with luggage packed for their 6 month stay in Europe walking across a campus where we have never been before. Oh yes..it was quite a scene. Every Irishman we walked past gave us a casual smirk as our suitcases continued to fall over and we took the occasional stop to adjust our bags. By the time we arrived, I was a sweaty little mess. I had enough time to get settled, do some grocery shopping, and unpack before my jetlag eventually caught up with me and I passed out.

 

 

Hopefully, the actual adventure of exploring Dublin starts tomorrow!

 

 

 



Cupcakes, Wreaths, and Doorways.

Nothing says Christmas like S'more Cupcakes.

I spotted this window display in the North End of Boston on the way to an early dinner. I fell in love with the window frames.

 

 

 

 

The Taj was decked out in white twinkle lights and set the scene for a winter wonderland.

 

I spotted this scene straight from a postcard as I was walking through Beacon Hill.

Cheers to a great New Year!