Arrival and Orientation...

Its about 8pm here in Dublin and I am killing sometime before I go out. Matter of fact I think im going to grab a beer for myself. Gran Tuborg. That was my favorite beer when I was in Copenhagen 2 years ago at Roskilde. Pretty Delicious I must say. But anyway… Yesterday I arrived and today we had orientation. When I arrived yesterday I was met outside the baggage claim by 2 guys from DCU who just happened to be meeting us at the airport. Really cool dudes. Ones gf played ultimate Frisbee and the other was the president of the poker club. (they have poker games ever Monday…10Euro buy in and you can win like 2000Euro…..would be nice) We herded onto a bus and they drove us over to our apartments about a 15 minute drive from the airport. Our accommodations are pretty nice. There is a Spar right outside (irish 7-11) our complex gate so that is pretty nice. After we got here I spent some time getting the internet all set up (that took way longer than it should have) and unpacking. I also did some rearranging around my room. I have a single room with a bathroom but I share a kitchen with the other guys that will be moving in any minute now. Got my fingers crossed there as awesome as my first roommate… My shower is miniscule…think like half the size of emmanuels –literally. My room is pretty cool actually. I made a nice little addition to out apt when I took the door to my half closet half shelf thing off and realized that it is a perfect size for a Beirut table. It’s too bad I’m going to have to study so much. Anyway, after I was all set up I went out to explore. I dint have a phone and I didn’t know where anyone was so I took the opportunity to just go out on my own for a bit. We are very much in suburban Dublin…Nothing at all like boston. Probably more like a Jamaica Plain or a Brighton with nothing except the occasional Spar (remember 7-11) or hairdresser(there’s a bunch of those) I walked in giant circles checking everything out…a few pubs…a few liquor stores…a few spars….a few delis…that’s about it. When I finally found out from a local bank employee (where i got to cash in my 180 bucks for a 130Euros) She directed me to a large grocery store and small little shopping mall. I made it fine there and bought some stuff to hold me over for a few days. 40Euro doesn’t go very far lemme tell you. When I was walking back I actually saw a girl from Emmanuel who is in the same program and we tentatively decided to go out to a pub later on that night. I took a nap from about5=7 and had less than any desire to get out of bed into my heat absent room and go to the bar. Turns out her and her roommates felt the same way and we never met up with each other. So my first night ended with me eating some cheese and a loaf of bread. Not quite how I had pictured but I had been up for 2.5 days and that was exactly what I wanted to do. I set my alarm on the computer and went to bed.

Fast Forward the next day. Paul surprisingly sleeps through the first session of orientation. Woops. Nothing important. Its not like im in a foreign country or anything. Anyway our program head Sylvia is incredibly nice and basically told me it was no big deal and not to worry. After our next session, I met up with Megan and this other girl Sarah (whose computer we tried to dix over break…no success) After a few more sessions were had some lunch. I walked back with Megan and her roommates and we decided to just grab some pasta that I had bought the day before. So her and her two friends came over to the apt and I put my chef hat on. (Incredibly small world….two of the went to high school with Landry!) I think all in all my first irish cooking (even though I made pasta) went well.

After lunch we went back for more sessions were they told us all about safety and being a better student and the best part, all the different clubs we could potentially join. Ultimate Frisbee, texas hold-em, intramural basketball….definitely….maybe cycling or hiking…..should be fun….we’ll see….. Anyway after some more orientations sessions we picked our classes.
While we were picking classes I made a facebook group for all of us. That was cool. Anyway…my classes…pending approval are pretty sick….nothing on Fridays, late on Mondays, and nothing before 1300 ….nice……Everyone in the room made plans to communicate via that and were probably gonna all go ut later on tonight…. When we left the computer lab there was free food outside another room. Everyone looked at me funny when I loaded up my plate and stole some bottles of water (those run you about 3 Euro) and walked away with a giant grin on my face.

Right now im talking to mike and nate dogg drinking a tuborg, getting ready to go out. Ill let you know how it goes. You’re my blog. I tell you everything. PPPEEEAACCEE


Random Note I: I really want toi find out who I’m living with….Hope their awesome.
Random Note II. It snowed here about 2 inches….they say that rarely happens.
Random Note III. Im listening to Make Yourself right now…great album.
Random Note IV. Internet connection sucks here.
Random Note V. My room is currently 12 degrees Celsius.
Random Note VI. That’s about 55 degrees my friends.
Random Note VII. Im heading out now…..wish me luck!