On the reg

Warning, a bit lengthy..
Wednesday I don’t have class so some friends and I went down to Trinity and just started walking around Dublin. Trinity is soooo beautiful and I love Dublin. We went ahead and saw the Book of Kells exhibit and that was fantastic as well. Look for some photos. You can never get lost in Dublin because the big pointy sphere thingamabob (Millennium Spire) can be seen from anywhere and really helps orient you. The river Liffey is growing on me, as are the bridges.

Matt (my friend from E. Connecticut, who looks and behaves very similarly to Master Gastineau strangely enough) and I made the Leinster League Senior Team and we will be playing for them on the weekends this Spring. It’s the equivalent of college club ball, but these guys are real good. This will be a great way to explore Ireland and hang out with the real guys. Check out the league here: http://www.lsl.ie/. And it will be a good reason to stay sober at least one night a week, since that has happened once since being on this island.

The party never stops here. Monday Big Tree, Toxic Tuesdays at nuBar, Wednesdays at Krash, Thursdays the roommates want to go out, Friday is Friday of course, Saturday is the day before Sunday so why not?, and Sunday is like the biggest night here which is a 180 from the US. I’m also getting a nice yellow glow to my skin which is encouraging me to go out (I’m kidding).

NuBar is a bar on campus, well, more like a small club, and this was like a school party. So everything was cheap, and this was a paint party, so everyone was running around throwing paint on each other. A real mess. Been there done that. Still fun, but not awesome. The pre/post games back at Shanowen are the real deal. The morning after looked ridiculous. Paint, trash, shopping carts, at least one guy passed out, all in the center lawn. Everyone opens their windows and yells. It’s a very cool site to walk up on, and very cool to be a part of.

I am meeting so many new people. Our crew is getting deep and is diverse covering Australia, America, Germany, France, Sweden, Finland, Ireland, and Italy. This place is so diverse, and I guess that’s something DCU prides itself on.

I actually started watching an Irish TV series at night on Ireland, a kind of identity show. Ireland as I’ve mentioned has some real tensions with immigrants and acceptance, which after chatting with many of my friends just seems to be such an important issue worldwide. It’s like everyone understands one another on this point. I really never took the time to look at immigration and bigotry so macroscopically, but it does change my perspective on it and some other economic issues and it’s nice to hear the personal anecdotes and homeland stories that really make our US problems less unique. But back to the main point, Ireland is clearly going about dealing with immigration differently than the US. There is a real national media, academic, etc effort to promote understanding and surprisingly, to redefine Ireland as a whole. Ireland it almost literally rewriting its own history, and it is certainly reinterpreting its identity. It’s almost in a conspiring way, like it’s not real because the direction they’re going is very globalization oriented, as if to make Ireland a diversity hub, and that seems trendy and convenient. And don’t even get me started on what’s real. I’ve heard the “well what is truth” joke here more than in my entire prior existence.

Last night, one of the coolest things was going down to the restrooms in the basement and the Nigerian bathroom attendants were just chillin and smiling and singing Bob Marley songs. So I just started singing with them and soon the whole restroom was singing or trying to sing. I tipped him, which felt cool, so every time I came back down he started up again with something fresh. Awesome detail to an awesome Pillow fight party at Krash!

Another detail from last night I keep thinking about- We were all walking down O’Connell Street and I had bought a hamburger and I threw the pickles on a shop window so they’d slide down. Ya, it sounds immature, and it’s the first time I’ve done it actually. Some of the Australian girls were just dumbfounded that I would do something like that. It was like I’d drowned a kitten. Preston (from W. Va) and I vigorously defended this action as acceptable foul play and in the deeper conversation which followed and obviously went beyond pickles, I think both sides got a real eye-opener. I made sure not to represent all of America this way, though apparently I shoulder that burden as an ambassador. I think that is only true to an extent, so shenanigans will continue.

Tonight we have soccer practice. Should be another good session. On the downside though, the nature of the school clubs here is not as exciting as I thought. They’re all legit. They had made it seem like you could join the sailing club and automatically try sailing, join the soccer club and play. And maybe you could, but the people who are in these clubs are dedicated, so there is no room for a greenhorn.

School so far. My 10 credit culture course meets approximately once a week. But my Inorganic chemistry, quantum mechanics course, yes, the same course, meets five times a week and is only 5 credits….The classes are all good right now. Positives include free textbooks in the library, very knowledgeable professors, good demonstrations and they have a good young vibe to it all. Unexpected things are that at this 10,000 person school, everyone in the classes know each other, no doubt because they’re the same course(major). So those of us who are foreign are already kind of excluded. But the people you sit next to are nice and I could see friendships forming in the future.

Final word-Ireland, you need to bathe more often, try anti-perspirant because you guys are pretty icky even by my low standards. I have also learned not that even though the Irish say bastard very casually, Scottish rugby fans don’t appreciate it. I’m glad I am fast.
Thanks to everyone who has written me. I enjoy hearing from you and wish you all well.