Time is flying by way too quickly for my liking. How is it already October?? I try not to think about how much time is left, focusing instead on each day.
The last week or so has been kind of mleh, taking care of a few business items and getting into the swing of classes. I finally registered with the Garda. It only took, oh, 3 hours of my life. The plus was I got some reading done for my first paper for my film class (we have to compare a book version and movie version of a story... she gave us a list to choose from and nearly all of them looked terribly depressing. Hooray for Irish literature.)
I'm still kind of confused on how to refer to my teachers. I guess professor is higher than doctor here, though that seems strange. I guess "lecturer" is the safest bet, but that seems so weird and kind of like I'm glossing over their true status. Whatever. The same thing goes for the way they talk about the bathroom. They (they being Irish people) say 'toilet' and make fun of us if we say 'restroom'... toilet seems almost vulgar to me, but when in Rome...
Cork is really awesome, there is always something going on. Last weekend (i think...?) was Culture Night with tons of free tours and activities. We went on a walking food history tour of Cork (chosen because we thought there'd be free food in it for us. There wasn't.) I think I was the only one of our group that really enjoyed the tour, though. After the food tour, we went in a "culture cab" similar to the TV show Cash Cab...what a BLAST. Everyone who knows me knows that I would do almost anything to go on that show (I plan to take a long weekend trip to NYC next year and spend the whole time hunting for Ben Bailey and his Cash Cab), so this was by far my favorite part of the night. They put five of us at a time into a vancab and it was every man for himself in terms of points, so the guide lady would ask a question and we'd have to yell out our names as a buzzer, whoever yelled first got to answer, etc. Most of the questions were easy enough, though there were some that were quite tricky for Americans and other non-Irish (i.e. what year did Samuel Beckett die, who won the Booker prize twice, etc).
This weekend the Beamish Folk Festival is on, so there's lots of live music in all the pubs and a Ceili Mor down on one of the main streets downtown tomorrow. I'm not sure what to expect from that, but the music has been good so far. We saw an old man bluesy number the other night at this place called The Corner House. They were awesome, the guitarist soloed for like, a full five minutes and dude was definitely pushing 60. They played some original stuff and some covers... all in all, a pretty good night.
Next weekend the kids from BC have to go up to Dublin to visit Fr. Leahy, who is coming to visit for some reason or another. I think I'll head up Thursday night or Friday morning (I don't have classes on Fridays) and do a bit of exploring, see some of the things I didn't get to when I was there last (i.e. The Book of Kells). I hadn't really planned on visiting Dublin again, just because I've already been there and ... well, why pay to go somewhere I've been and miss out on some place I haven't seen? Seeing as it is a BC sponsored trip, though, I don't have a problem going up.
My two papers for Folklore are due soon and I really need to get cracking on them, so my goal for the day is to finish the one I've started before I go out to enjoy the music, or, as they say here, the craic.
The last week or so has been kind of mleh, taking care of a few business items and getting into the swing of classes. I finally registered with the Garda. It only took, oh, 3 hours of my life. The plus was I got some reading done for my first paper for my film class (we have to compare a book version and movie version of a story... she gave us a list to choose from and nearly all of them looked terribly depressing. Hooray for Irish literature.)
I'm still kind of confused on how to refer to my teachers. I guess professor is higher than doctor here, though that seems strange. I guess "lecturer" is the safest bet, but that seems so weird and kind of like I'm glossing over their true status. Whatever. The same thing goes for the way they talk about the bathroom. They (they being Irish people) say 'toilet' and make fun of us if we say 'restroom'... toilet seems almost vulgar to me, but when in Rome...
Cork is really awesome, there is always something going on. Last weekend (i think...?) was Culture Night with tons of free tours and activities. We went on a walking food history tour of Cork (chosen because we thought there'd be free food in it for us. There wasn't.) I think I was the only one of our group that really enjoyed the tour, though. After the food tour, we went in a "culture cab" similar to the TV show Cash Cab...what a BLAST. Everyone who knows me knows that I would do almost anything to go on that show (I plan to take a long weekend trip to NYC next year and spend the whole time hunting for Ben Bailey and his Cash Cab), so this was by far my favorite part of the night. They put five of us at a time into a vancab and it was every man for himself in terms of points, so the guide lady would ask a question and we'd have to yell out our names as a buzzer, whoever yelled first got to answer, etc. Most of the questions were easy enough, though there were some that were quite tricky for Americans and other non-Irish (i.e. what year did Samuel Beckett die, who won the Booker prize twice, etc).
This weekend the Beamish Folk Festival is on, so there's lots of live music in all the pubs and a Ceili Mor down on one of the main streets downtown tomorrow. I'm not sure what to expect from that, but the music has been good so far. We saw an old man bluesy number the other night at this place called The Corner House. They were awesome, the guitarist soloed for like, a full five minutes and dude was definitely pushing 60. They played some original stuff and some covers... all in all, a pretty good night.
Next weekend the kids from BC have to go up to Dublin to visit Fr. Leahy, who is coming to visit for some reason or another. I think I'll head up Thursday night or Friday morning (I don't have classes on Fridays) and do a bit of exploring, see some of the things I didn't get to when I was there last (i.e. The Book of Kells). I hadn't really planned on visiting Dublin again, just because I've already been there and ... well, why pay to go somewhere I've been and miss out on some place I haven't seen? Seeing as it is a BC sponsored trip, though, I don't have a problem going up.
My two papers for Folklore are due soon and I really need to get cracking on them, so my goal for the day is to finish the one I've started before I go out to enjoy the music, or, as they say here, the craic.
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