wow! I can't believe its been so long since I last posted on here. March has been a truly busy month not only with just schoolwork but it also marked the beginning of families starting to visit Ireland!!! Leigh and Amy (two friends that went to Mary Washington but we met in Ireland) had four of their friends come visit for a week and we all ended up going to Dublin together! We saw the infamous Temple Bar area and went sightseeing for a weekend before saying goodbye. While the rest of the group went on a bus tour all day Saturday, two of my friends from Cork and I went souvenir shopping! I've been in Ireland for three months already and had yet to shop! (A fact I'm pretty proud of by the way!) While we were shopping we saw so many street performers, some sand artists, the people that stand really still (don't know what they're called), and musicians! Dublin was such a fun city to make a quick weekend getaway.
Unfortunately, after the Dublin weekend came two weeks of non-stop schoolwork. I lived in the library franticly trying to finish my 3 papers, marketing project and study for my three tests. March seems to be the month where everything for all of my classes are due! Thankfully I got it all finished (except for one paper due Friday)! Ireland has a very interesting way of scheduling schoolwork. There is usually only two grades for an entire corse. One is the final which is generally worth 70-80% of the total grade. The other part is call "continuous assessment" which I naively took to be homework assignments and tests throughout the semester. But Ireland likes having its own unique way of doing things. This continuous assessment really mean a 2,000 word research paper for each and every class. So, needless to say I've had my hands full the past two weeks getting all my schoolwork done. I can't really complain though because January and February equated to literally no work except looking over notes, so I guess it was time to put in a little elbow grease and knock out a few papers and study.
Another exciting event that happened in March to make this busy month even more chaotic (but still even more fun!) was............
ST. PATRICKS DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I still can't believe I spent St. Patty's Day in Ireland. Not only was every single person decked out head to toe in green there was such a sense of pride in everyone in the streets. Of course, supporting my Irish heritage (i am kelly o'dolan :) ) i was decked out in green along with the rest of my friends and even wore some Kanye shamrock shades, had a shamrock milkshakes and some green food! It was a day where everyone was each other's best friend and the city transformed itself into a manifestation of all things stereotypical Irish! Here's some pictures of St. Patty's!
After these past two weeks of nothing but library time, I realized that this means traveling month is ALMOST HERE!!!! My friend's aunt just got Taylor Swift tickets in Dublin this Sunday. For those of you who don't know, Taylor Swift is my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE singer and I've wanted to go to one of her concerts for years! Another dream of mine is coming true! So Sunday I'm off to Dublin with some friends to see Taylor Swift then heading off to Scotland Tuesday for our 5 day trip to Edinburgh! After Edinburgh starts the month of April which is a "studying month" in UCC. Students take all their finals from fall and spring semesters in May here, so many people have up to 12 finals in May. Luckily for study abroad students this means a month to travel Europe! And that is exactly what I'm planning on doing! After Scotland we have a two week trip planned to Germany and Spain. The day after we get home from Barcelona my parents, sister, and two cousins are coming to spend 9 days in Ireland and see all the gorgeous sights that I can't stop talking about. After the family trip the six of us "traveling buddies" will end our trips together by going to Greece! First we're going to Athens then Santorini (where Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 was shot!)! I can't even describe how excited I am for the next 5 weeks. This whole experience of living in Europe has literally been a dream come true, wish it would never end! Hopefully I'll be better about posting things more frequently, but I'll only be home a few days in April so bear with me!
