First two weeks in the Emerald Isle!

Hello and greetings from the emerald isle! I’m starting this blog so I can keep all my family and friends updated on the happenings while I am studying abroad in Cork, Ireland. Especially because I know some of you still don’t have facebook… ;) A lot has happened since I arrived on Wednesday August 19th, so I have to get started!

So far, I love Ireland. I have been really lucky with my living arrangements—my apartment is so adorable, clean, and fairly quiet. I had three roommates, until one just moved out because she wanted to live with Irish students, so now I have two. The Irish students have yet to arrive, but they will be here soon as the regular semester starts around September 21st, I believe. Hopefully we get an Irish student as our forth roommate! As far as convenience goes, I am about a 15 minute walk to campus (which feels like MUCH longer in the rain, might I add) and about a 30 minute walk into the city centre. Although I often wish it was closer, I think my apartment complex is one of the nicer ones, so I still feel lucky. It is nice too, that we have a convenience store that really isn’t much more expensive than Tesco, the “Wal-Mart” of Ireland (kind of) so if I need something small like bread or orange juice, I can just pick it up on my way home from school.

Speaking of school, my school is absolutely BEAUTIFUL! I cannot believe that I am actually attending such an amazing school with such a rich history and beauteous campus. Although it definitely isn’t as large as UMaine’s campus, there are more students… around 18,000 I think, so that’s definitely going to make campus jam-packed once everyone gets here. University College Cork has a wonderful international student office, and they are always willing to help and answer my questions. UCC also has a great student union, or group of students representing the student body. When we had our orientation the first week, they put on an event for all 200 of us international early start students, which included a tour of campus, a movie in town (I Love You Beth Cooper), finger food, karaoke, snooker (pool, haha), and bowling at Mardyke which as you can guess is like a sports/entertainment bar. After that they took us to this random nightclub, but I only went to check it out, and then went home to bed because we had been going since 9am that day, and it was only my 3rd day in Ireland sooo major jet-lag!

Two weeks ago this Monday, was the start of my early-start class, and it’s called Irish Archaeology. I take like 8+ pages of notes a day on legal sized paper, and the subject is not exactly my favorite, but the professor—or “lecturer” as they title them here—is amazing. He is so interested in what he’s teaching that he actually makes me enjoy learning about archaeology. If only all professors were that successful at their jobs… My class goes from 9:30-12:30 M-F, but we have four field trips, which breaks up the four weeks.

The first week, we took a field trip to west Cork to see several sites, including Garranes Ringfort, Ballinacarriga Tower House, Coppinger’s Court (from afar), and lastly Drombeg: Stone Circle and Fulachta Fiadh. A ringfort is basically an early settlement that consists of ditches, hills, and trenches (for defensive purposes), and one that we saw is said to be a royal ringfort in that a king, Rath Raithleann, occupied it. Our next stop was the tower house, which dates back to the mid 1500s and may be home to a branch of the Hurley family. It was like a small castle, and the view from it was phenomenal! We learned about several defensive features, and I took many pictures (obviously!). After this we took a lunch break in Clonakilty, an adorable and colorful town. All of our meals are included on the field trips, so that’s nice! Our last stop was at Drombeg Stone Circle, which was a much smaller, less famous version of Stonehenge. Still very interesting, however, and on the winter solstice, the sun set’s over the axial stone. The circle is made up of 17 stones, and was thought to be used for primarily ritualistic purposes. Other sites at Drombeg included a Fulachta Fiadh (pronounced “FOL-ACK FEE-AH”) which is basically a place where people cooked meat. It contains a hearth, a well and stone-built water trough. After seeing all these sites, we headed back to Cork City.

This past week (week 2 of class) on Wednesday and Thursday we took our first overnight trip to the counties of Dublin, Meath and Louth. We left Cork at 7am and headed to Dublin to see the National Museum of Ireland, which was very interesting. And they don’t even have an entrance fee to the museum, how odd is that?! We checked out a lot of things that related to our class during the Neolithic period, Bronze Age, Iron Age, and Medieval Age. We saw pottery, tools, jewelry, and even a cross that is said to contain particles of the actual cross Jesus was crucified on. The most crazy thing we saw were “bog bodies”, which are people who were buried in bogs and therefore their bodies were preserved… so yes, I saw parts of bodies from the 5th century. After the museum, we quickly went to lunch in the pouring rain and then scooted over to Viking Dublin (the original and first settled part of Dublin) and went in to Christ Church Cathedral. This was a beautiful church that was originally founded in 1030, and my professor said was Ireland’s best example of Gothic architecture. We went down to the crypt and also saw the tomb of Strongbow, who initiated the Anglo-Normal colonization in Ireland. Once we left the church, we headed out of Dublin and towards our hostel in Slane. On the way we took a really quick stop at Monasterboice, where we saw the beautiful round tower and high crosses, part of an early medieval monastery founded in the 5th century. The high crosses depicted scenes from the Old and New Testaments and they were beautiful! It was literally down pouring, so we only stayed for about 10 minutes, but it was definitely worth it. Once there we dropped off our stuff and headed for our amazing dinner. We had bread, a choice of salad or soup, a choice of lasagna or salmon, and then dessert. It was the biggest meal I have had yet in Ireland, and it was sooo good. That night, 13 of us stayed in one of three dormitory rooms in the hostel… that was interesting, haha. Sadly, one girl was really sick with a flu, but that is a different story. The next morning we departed pretty early to head over to my favorite site yet, Newgrange. Newgrange is the most famous of three Neolithic passage tombs in the Bend of the Boyne region, and it is actually 500 years older than the great pyramids, and 1,000 years older than Stonehenge! It is named one of three World Heritage sites in Ireland, so it is very big deal! Our class was lucky enough to go inside the tomb (our professor had to book this excursion 18 MONTHS in advance!) and it was a very cool experience. The passage was pretty narrow, at some points it was only 15 inches wide, but at the end of the passage there is a chamber where the remains of bodies were found. Inside there was beautiful stone artwork… but I sadly couldn’t take pictures, so just imagine it! Our tour guide told us that while we were in the chamber, there was over 200,000 TONS of rock over us! That was calming… The neatest part about Newgrange is a roof-box that is located about the main entrance and allows the sun to enter the passage and chamber when it rises over the horizon on the winter solstice. They did a re-creation of the sun rising for us, and it was beautiful. In the past, only prestigious persons from Ireland were allowed to enter the tomb on December 21st to see the real thing, but now they have a lottery, so anyone has the change to experience the sunrise in the passage! It was really incredible to think that people were able to build such amazing structures so long ago. It’s over 5,000 years old, and the roof has yet to leak a drop of water. The outside of the front of the tomb is decorated with quartz rock which helps reflect the sun. These people definitely loved the sun. Probably because Ireland barely gets any, ha. Anyways, our last stop after Newgrange was Trim Castle, Ireland’s largest Anglo-Norman medieval castle. The castle was huge, and instead of restoring it to its original condition like most castles in Ireland are, it stands today without any major renovations. Pretty impressive since it was built in the late 12th century! We walked the grounds, and went to the top of the castle—what a beautiful view that was. And if you are familiar with the movie Braveheart, this is where that movie was filmed. I even got my picture taken in the window that someone was thrown out of in the movie! It was a glorious site. After the castle, we finally headed home. It was a busy and TIRING two days, but it was also awesome to see so much.

This week we head up to Rock of Cashel, and our last week, we go the Burren and see the Cliffs of Moher. So excited for that trip! Plus I’ll be in County Clare, where the Brady’s are from, so that’s always a plus :)

Other that that I’m definitely trying to keep busy here because I know the second I slow down, I start thinking about missing home and everyone there. School obviously keeps me pretty occupied, plus between various 21st birthdays (most of my friends here are all juniors) and continuing to explore the city I am being successful at the busy thing! For the record, I still do not like beer, but I am now a fan of the cider here, known as Bulmers, which tastes more like beer than a vodka cranberry, so I’m coming up in the world. Also if you are interested in knowing some frequent Irish terms, here you go:

Craic (“CRACK”) = fun
Ye = you. Yeah, I’m not really sure about that one.
I’ll have a think about it = I’ll think about it
Touch wood = Knock on wood
How’s your form? or, How are you keeping? = How are you doing?
And also, they say “CHEERS” allllllllllll the time. I love it.

I hope you are all doing well, and please know I think about you all, all the time! I will try to write on here at least once a week (if not more!) and shorter entries than this, so make sure to check it often! Love you all, and if you want my address here it is:

Danielle Brady
83A, Room 1
Victoria Lodge Apartments
Victoria Cross
Cork, Ireland

I love mail...!

Here are some pics! The first 5 are of my apartment, the next two are of school, and the rest are just around the city! Enjoy :)















♥ Danielle Lynn