Guinness Hearing Aids (Dublin Excursion)

So, I know this is WAY overdue and for that I apologize. In order to keep it from getting any more overdue, I'm just going to jump in then:

A street in Dublin.

Our excursion to Dublin began before the sun rose on January 13, 2011. For the first little bit of the trip, I just watched the countryside fly by. In the pre-dawn darkness, it was almost like being back in Oregon. The famous low stone walls were the only reminder that I was in Ireland. After just a little while, I ended up falling asleep. I woke up again to our stop at a gas station. We all got out to use the bathroom and look around. Some people bought breakfast food in the attached store. It was probably the biggest and nicest gas station store I've ever been in. I only looked around though.

Back on the bus, I looked out the window and listened to my headphones until we were coming into Dublin itself. Then I pulled out my camera and started taking pictures of the city through the bus windows.

The first place we were going was listed on our itinerary as the GAA. I had no clue what that was and so I was really confused when we pulled up outside of a big building that had Ulster Bank and Guinness ads on it.

The entrance to Croke Park

We got off the bus and went inside. It pretty quickly became obvious we were at Croke Park, which is probably the most famous stadium in Ireland. It's there that traditional GAA (or Gaelic
Athletic Association) games are played, like hurling and gaelic football. Other events go on there too, but those are what it's known for. We got to spend a little while exploring the museum inside the stadium before our tour was due to start. The exhibits are mostly about the history of traditional Irish sports and the GAA. Basically, Irish sports, like their culture in general, were disappearing because Ireland had been occupied (first by the Vikings, then the Normans and finally the English) for so long. The GAA was started to keep them from disappearing completely.

One of the "magic" blue curtains

The first part of our tour was watching a video. It showed what hurling and gaelic football actually look like when played. It was so cool! Most of you know, I'm not much of one for sports, watching or playing. But this was so neat! They both looked super exciting. I really want to see a game in Croke Park now. Hopefully I'll get the chance before I have go back to the US. If not, then it's just another reason to come back.

Our guide and what might be the
 Muhammad Ali Tunnel someday.

Our guide took us around the stadium. We started by going down underneath the stadium. There we learned about all sorts of things like the magic blue curtains that are used to keep the tour buses separated so the teams never see their opponents until they're all on the field. We saw a tunnel that Muhammad Ali has used to enter the stadium twice. Apparently, the second time he came back he requested the same tunnel and he was all upset when he got down there to find that there wasn't a plaque or anything up in his honor. I don't envy the person that had to tell him that the Irish only put statues and plaques up for dead people. Although when he does die, he very well might get a plaque or something.

Galway's jerseys

We went into one of the dressing rooms. They had the official county jerseys of all the teams hung up on the walls with the ones who won last year's national tournaments above the others. There we learned that Croke Park is a neutral stadium. It's home to no team and so all the dressing rooms are exactly the same. Then the guide let us look around and take pictures with the jerseys. I got a picture of me with one of the Galway jerseys. Turns out that Galway is the only county that has a different jersey for hurling and gaelic football. I'm not sure which I had my picture taken with though. It was also neat to see that London and New York had jerseys up too. Apparently there are big enough Irish populations in both places to merit teams of their own. After the dressing room we stopped off in a practice room and then headed out to the pitch itself.

We weren't allowed to walk on the field but we stood on the edge. We also sat in several different locations around the pitch. The place where the cup is awarded to the champions was easily visible and our guide told us that acceptance speeches are supposed to be in Irish. Unfortunately most people can't speak enough Irish to give even half a speech in it so they'll say a token few words and give the rest in English. One year a coach was determined that his team was going to win and when they did, his team captain was going to give a real speech in Irish. Problem was, the guy didn't speak any Irish. So the coach wrote out the speech in Irish phonetically and coached the captain on how to say it. Lo and behold his team did win the championship that year. The captain went up to the podium to make his speech, the papers were all there for and whoosh! A gust of wind blew them away. Moral of the story: always use blue tape.

We went up and around, stopped to look at the view of Dublin, which is fantastic by the by, and went into a corporate box. It wasn't as fancy as it could have been nor was it as cushy as I remember the ones in the Seahawks Stadium being, but it was still pretty nice. An interesting note about gaelic football and hurling: both are amateur sports. No one plays them professionally and none of the athletes get paid. While we were in the corporate box our guide told us this great story about a one of the guys who won the national championships a few years back. He was from a county that hadn't won in a while so it was a big deal. He went home and spent some time with his family and just kind of enjoyed things for a bit. When he went back to work at the bank, you would've expected him to be greeted like a hero, except for the fact that he actually worked in the county he helped beat. Oops...

After that the tour was pretty much over and we went back to the museum. I finished wandering through it and then got some food at the little attached cafe. Our whole group got back on the bus and we left for our next stop: The Guinness Storehouse.

The zoo animal Guinness mascots

The Guinness Storehouse is a built on what used to be a Guinness Brewery at St James' Gate. The building that's there now is seven stories and is shaped like a giant pint glass. Inside is a museum all about Guinness. It's self guided so you can go as fast or as slow as you like. The bottom floors are all about how Guinness is made. As you get higher you get into how Guinness was made the first time and the Guinness family legacy. There are exhibits about its distribution in Ireland and around the world. Included in your ticket into the museum is a free pint. The fourth floor is your first chance to take advantage of that generous offer. There you can learn to pour your own pint. (I took a picture of the directions and kept wandering) I think my favorite part might have been the exhibits about Guinness paraphernalia. It seems like Guinness has been advertised on everything at some point or another: from tiny harps to posters of Irish celebrities to playing cards to tiny toy cars. The most famous Guinness mascots are zoo animals like the toucan, turtle and bear.

 

The Gravity Bar

Finally I got to the top floor, the Gravity Bar. I didn't have a lot of time so I went straight over and got my free pint. A kindly stranger took a picture of me with it. As I looked out over Dublin I really did try to drink it, but it just didn't taste good. The foam on top, or head, is just awful and the Guinness isn't that much better. I only ended up managing to drink about a fifth of it before I had to run back down seven flights of stairs. I sprinted through the store and got in line to buy my stuff. I made it so I was only a couple of minutes late, but in the end it may have been a good thing I didn't drink my whole pint. Can you imagine running down seven flights of stairs with that much alcohol in your stomach?

Kilmainham Gaol

Our last stop of the day was Kilmainham Gaol. This was another place I didn't really know anything about before I got there. Kilmainham Gaol is historically significant for a number of reasons. It's where people were put during the Famine. It was actually better to be inside the Gaol than out on the streets because at least inside you were guaranteed food. It's also where political prisoners, like those involved in the 1916 Rebellion were held and executed. I stood where people like Patrick Pearse, Eamon de Valera, and Countess Markievicz stood. It was more than a little surreal. It was especially eerie to see where some of them had been executed. Our guide was really good, but unfortunately I don't remember any of the particular stories he told us. All I can say is that you really need to see Kilmainham Gaol for yourself. It's an amazing piece of living history.

The hostel we were staying in was called Kinlay House. I shared a room with Minn and Angela. After we all dropped our things off, all of the girls decided to go out to get food. We ended up at an overpriced Mexican place. The food was only okay. After that we went looking for a pub. We ended up in a little smoky place that had really good desserts (I didn't try one, but I have it on good authority). I stayed for a little while and watched everyone else drink before deciding to head back to the hostel. That was pretty much the end of my night. I was going to see if I could find some Irish dancing to go to, but there wasn't any that was anywhere near enough.

The St George stained glass window from Christ Church

The next morning I got up and tried to make the shower work. We were apparently on the other end of the building from the water heater, so a little sign posted in our bathroom said to leave the water running until it got warm. Well, you know how in some public bathrooms they have those sinks where you push down on the  handle and water comes out for as long as the handle stays down? Our shower was like that. There is no way to leave a shower like that running. Which means that I took an icy cold shower. Unfortunately I wasn't destined to warm up at all that day either. The first thing we did was take a walking tour of Dublin. We started at Trinity College and made our way around downtown Dublin. Our guide, Donal, was adorable and obviously very passionate about what he was telling us. He made the tour fun and interesting. What made it less fun and interesting, was the fact that it was cold, windy and half-way raining on us. It wasn't actually coming down consistently, but neither was it misting. It would just send a couple drops your way whenever it was most inconvenient or uncomfortable. After the walking tour we all went into Christ Church, a huge Protestant church right near our hostel. It was really pretty. I spent a long time wandering around inside and taking pictures. I found my favorite single piece of stained glass ever in there: a window with St George and his dragon that had really nice detail. It was really cold in the upper part of the church though so it was kind of a relief to go down into the crypts. I know crypts have a reputation for being chilly and drafty, but these were actually a lot warmer and friendlier feeling than the upper part of the church. I wandered around down there until I got too hungry.

My authentic Irish food. It's beef in a
Guinness sauce underneath a pastry
with some chips. It was yummy. 

I went to the Temple Bar district and found a restaurant (The Shack) that served authentic Irish food. I ate there and then kept wandering. I was kind of waiting to hear from Wendy or someone about going to see the Book of Kells. I never did hear anything (turns out it was a cell phone or network glitch) so a little before the Book of Kells was due to close I took myself off to see it. It was really cool and I did manage to see the Book itself, but I got kicked out of the library above it so they could close. Oh well. I'll go back eventually. Maybe I'll even get to see a different page of the Book of Kells.

I went back to the hostel and started getting ready for the play. We were all going to see Jane Eyre at the Gate that night. I thought it was a pretty good show, but then I kind of liked Jane Eyre as a book and they did a really good adaptation. I was pleased. Rita and Wendy were less impressed, but I'm still not sure if it was because of the acting or because of the story in general. After the play, I went back to the hostel and just hung out until I went to bed.

The next morning we got up early and I took another icy cold shower. We all piled back onto the bus and headed to Newgrange. Newgrange is a Neolithic passage tomb that was on my list of things to see well before I got to Ireland. We went in the Visitor's Centre first. It's quite large and there's a lot of information there. After a little while we walked out to another small bus and from there we were driven out to where Newgrange actually is. A guide took us into the tomb itself and told us what little they think they know about everything in there. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, which was really disappointing, but it was still magical and surreal to actually be there. It's another thing you all should go see for yourself. After the quick tour inside we were given 15 minutes to wander around and take pictures outside the tomb. It wasn't very much, but apparently it was a lot better than we would have gotten were we there during high tourist season.

Newgrange

Back in the Visitor's Centre, we all got some lunch. On my way out I put my name in the drawing for a chance to be at Newgrange during the next winter solstice (you should really look Newgrange up if you don't know what I'm talking about, it's really cool). I hope I get it. We all got back on our bus and I settled in for a nap.

When I woke up again we were almost to Clonmacnoise. I had never heard of Clonmacnoise before I came to Ireland, but it's probably my favorite thing (though by a very narrow margin) we did on any of our excursions. Clonmacnoise is a monastic site that was founded on an important crossroads. It was quite rich at one point. There are several churches (apparently they didn't used to expand their buildings, they just built more), some high crosses and a graveyard. There are ruins of a Norman castle right nearby and two big towers on the river side of the site. The weather was beautiful when we got there. The sun was out and the sky was a bright blue with just a few fluffy white clouds. It was still rather cold, but then it was January so that was to be expected it. We watched a quick and cheesy video and then we got to go outside and wander around. It was wonderful. I can't really describe why I liked it so much except to say that it was what I needed right then.

Part of Clonmacnoise

The Old Woman's Chapel or Teampall na gCailleach

Another really cool thing is that there's a nun's chapel nearby. I don't think any of us really understood that it wasn't within the bounds of the main site. Rita wanted to see it though so she asked the lady manning the desk and got directions. She happened to walk past me on her way to go find it and so I got to tag along. We did end up finding it and I took a whole bunch of pictures for her. It's probably a bit petty, but regardless, it was still cool to get to be one of two people in our group to see the Teampall na gCailleach.

Once Rita and I got back, I managed to take a few more pictures and then I ran out of time and space (again! I forgot to take an extra memory card with me, a mistake I did not repeat) on my camera. I got back on the bus and we all headed back to Galway as the sun set.

I forget who exactly said it, but at some point after the Guinness Storehouse someone was talking about beer goggles and another person in our group jokingly said that Guinness gave you hearing aids instead. I thought it was a really entertaining phrase so I wrote it down and saved it for the title of this post. ^_^

Also, one other thing. I mentioned last time that I would upload my pictures on the internet so that anyone who wanted to could see all of them and not just the ones I post here or on facebook. I've been working on that, but it's kind of a problem because none of the free sites give me enough storage for all of my pictures. So  a large portion of my pictures from Galway are all I can offer you right now. I'm working on getting the rest of the Galway ones up another site but I honestly don't know what I'll do about the excursions. Any ways, here's what I've got so far: https://picasaweb.google.com/101144792375307557663/Galway#

New Country, New You (part 2)

I started walking up Headford Road and just kept going. I found the Town Hall Theatre by accident. I also found a really neat store called Enchanted Vintage Clothing that really is all vintage women's clothing. It's all very expensive, but I like to stick my head in there sometimes and just look. Eventually I did actually find Shop Street. It's the main center of "town," or downtown as we would call it, Galway. It's a walking only street that's lined by shops with little alleys branching off of it. There's all kinds of stuff on Shop Street, everything from bakeries to pubs to McDonald's to clothing stores to a thrift store to tourist trap-type shops. It's really fun to wander up and down it which is all I did for a little while. I was looking for the bank or Carphone Warehouse or somewhere to eat. I found Carphone Warehouse first. I went it and looked around. This one did have a bigger selection so maybe that would help. They were also kind of busy so I eavesdropped on the sales guy that was helping a couple of American girls. The girls were asking questions I needed answers to as well like where was the best place to get cheap groceries and where to go out to eat. I only kind of caught the answer to the question about grocery stores. Turns out he meant Aldi and Lidl. I had explored Aldi earlier, and I had seen Lidl.

After it became apparent that they were going to be busy for a while I decided it was okay to go eat. I wandered a little further down Shop Street and saw some musicians playing while standing on top of poles. A little farther on I encountered Griffin's Bakery. It made me smile so I went in. I was thinking maybe I'd get a roll and some coffee or something, but they took me upstairs and gave me a table and a menu. I ended up ordering the 'mini Irish' which is the smaller version of an Irish breakfast. It was a pot of tea, which at that point I had yet to figure out how to make palatable (I'm not really a tea person), a sausage, potatoes, beans, a fried tomato, toast, a rasher and an egg. I ate all of it. Even the sausage. Not only was I hungry, but it was good. The sausage was better than any restaurant one I've had. Still not my favorite though. The rasher is, for those who don't know, kind of like bacon. It's usually a wider piece of meat, but not any thicker and it's floppier. They don't do crispy rashers here. The egg was over easy or medium. The fried tomato was interesting, it would never have occurred to me that people would eat that. It's not like it was breaded, it had just been tossed in a hot skillet. It doesn't do much to the inside, it mostly just made it warm and caused the skin to bubble in an icky way. The bean reminded me really strongly of Bush's baked beans, which I really like. The taste was a bit different in an undefinable way, but other than that, they're pretty much the same.

Any ways, I ate my food, paid and kept wandering down Shop Street. I found the bank (Bank of Ireland) and went inside. Apparently the place to open a new account was on the first floor. That's the floor I thought I was on, but the sign was pointing up. I only found out later that the ground floor is the one you enter on and then the first floor is always what we would call the second floor. It's rather confusing. The lady behind the new accounts desk gave me some paperwork and told me to go to the bank on the NUIG campus because they'd be better equipped to help me. I went back to Carphone Warehouse and got in line. I explained what I wanted to one of the guys and he gave me a couple of phone models and sent me up the street to check with another guy to see if they would work. See, cell phones are really complicated and to make a lot of technical stuff simple, you can't use a cell phone out of the country you buy it in without changing some programming. Here it's called unlocking, in the US it's called jailbreaking and it's not entirely legal. So, this guy's shop was supposed to be near the joke shop that was a couple doors up. I didn't know near could mean above so I wandered around for a bit, getting frustrated and then I noticed a small sign about cell phones near a stairway. I went up and finally found the place on the second (third to Americans) floor. I checked the model numbers with the guy and he said he could break the first one.

It was just about 3 when I left the cell phone breaker guy's shop. I had promised myself I would head back at 3 because the whole group was supposed to meet outside reception at 3:30 to walk over to the school. I started to head back towards the school, but I didn't take the exact same route back I took getting to Shop Street and so, as happens a lot, I got lost. I came out of some unfamiliar streets by a TK Maxx which made me laugh out loud. Dunno why the name is different, but inside it's exactly like a TJ Maxx. I decided to do a quick walk through because after one night I knew I'd need more than a duvet and a sheet. It is cold here. I found a nice and decently sized Columbia blanket, bought it and left. All of that took a while though because the check out line was quite long. I hurried out of the store and kept going in the general direction of Gort na Coiribe. Pretty soon, I was walking up a much steeper hill than I remembered walking down. I knew I was off to the side of Gort na Coiribe, but that was it. Eventually I found my way down the hill and ended up near the Galway Shopping Center. Unfortunately, it was after 3:30 at that point. Back at Gort na Coiribe, I was still trying to decide what to do when I was hailed by the group. They hadn't left yet even though it was 3:50 or so. I ran inside, dropped my hangers and we left for the school. Rita O'Donoghue was our guide. She's fantastic. She was really nice about me being late too.

The school, National University of Ireland, Galway, is about a 20 minute walk from Gort na Coiribe. We walked through campus to get to the Quadrangle which is probably the most famous building. It's old and castle-esque. I think it's 17th century or something like that. Apparently students don't have classes in there anymore, but it's still really cool to look at. We went in one end and met Maeve Cuffe and Fiona Dwyer who organize our program from this end. This was also the first time we officially met Professor Petersen's family. Her daughter, Emily, her son, Aaron, and her husband, Matt. Everyone was very nice. There was a dinner waiting for us. It was chicken and mushrooms and rice and a roll and our choice of beers or water. All of us opted for water as the beers were all American. It was kind of them to try and make us feel at home, but those who actually drink didn't come to Ireland for American alcohol. We ate our dinners and got a packet of information that included our student ID cards. Dessert was cheesecake and fruit. All of it was really yummy. While we ate we shared some travel stories. At some point during the whole thing it came out that Brian's bags had been lost by the airlines. People were talking about letting him borrow stuff and someone mentioned (since he's the only boy in our group) loaning him dresses as a joke. Someone else quipped back something along the lines of, "Ha, yeah, new country, new you." Hence the title of my posts (although I don't mean it quite the same way).

It wasn't that late but it was already fully dark. The sun rises really late and sets early here. Rita walked everyone home because we hadn't wandered in the dark yet. We walked to the Petersen's apartment first and then she took us most of the way back to Gort na Coiribe. I ran over to Curry's and bought the hair dryer I had been looking at. I don't remember what time it was when I got back, but I fell asleep pretty soon after.

And there you have the second half of my first day in Ireland. Now I'm more than a month in and so I'm thinking I'll try to do one post to get you all caught up and then try to update more regularly and less painfully detailed.

Also, fair warning, the internet at Gort na Coiribe is really slow and not very consistent, so I'll upload pictures to this post when I get the chance (probably at the school on Monday because their internet is at least a little better). On the pictures note, as a lot of you've probably seen, a lot of my pictures are on facebook. Not all of them are though and for those of you who want to see everything I'm working on making an online album. Once I've finished, I'll put a link here and on facebook.

New Country, New You (pt 1)

I woke up at 5 am on my second day in Ireland to find the light still on. I got up and turned it off and then went back to sleep. I woke up again around 8:30 am and decided to get up. It was still dark outside and it was really cold. I fiddled with the heaters, of which there are about 5, each of them with a different operating system, and the water heater, again with a different system. I was going to go explore, get a cell phone and open a bank account. The problem was that I didn't know where to go to do these things. I spent a couple hours dithering at my computer and reading the student info book about the apartment. I had to reset all the heaters because I'd messed them up. They're not terribly effective unfortunately. Unlike American heaters they don't blow hot air, they raidate warmth. So, if you're sitting about two feet away, you'll feel it, but any farther and it's as if it's not on. The water heater is also really weird. It only heats water from about 4am to 8am and that's all the apartment has for the day. There's a boost dial that can heat up more water for up to two hours, but it's supposedly realy expensive to use. And while I'm on the subject of technical stuff, the internet at Gort na Coiribe is all wired, but it's still very slow and not reliable. It was okay the first couple days because it was only some of the international students, but as more people have arrived it's slowed to a crawl. Some days my computer can't even find the networks even though the cable is plugged in. It's a pain. There's supposed to be something I reconfigure on my laptop to make it like Irish internet better, but I can't find whatever it is so it's a toss up whether or not I'll actually have internet. Any ways, back to my second morning: I was still trying to find places I was going to need to go when my roommate showed up. See, I live in a three person apartment. There's a room with a single bed in it and a room with two beds in it. The single room is the Irish girl's room (she was here last semester so she gets to keep her room). I was assigned to the double room. Since I got there first, I got to pick which bed and desk I wanted. I picked the ones closer to the window, which is probably the colder area, but I wanted to be able to look out the window from my desk. There's one bathroom we all share, a semi-equipped kitchen, a living room and dining room combination and a closet where the water heater lives. (I'll photograph all of this eventually) So, I knew it was likely I'd be living with a girl who's part of my particular program, but I didn't know who. All of the students on my program, but one, are from Willamette because it's technically WU's program. The girl who isn't from Willamette is my roommate. Her name is Jamie Mullett and she's from Kentucky. Her school, Bellarmine, has a partnership with Willamette so she got attached to our group. She's nice. : ) 

The view out my window

Embarrassed at being caught in my pajamas, I decided it was probably time to go out and see what I could find, my internet research having yielded nothing useful. By 11:30 I was leaving the apartment. I was going to get food, but I wanted to save my money until I had opened a bank account (just in case there was a minimum amount needed to open one) and had a cell phone.

One of the arches into Gort na Coiribe. My apartment is on the ground floor on the other side of the staircase near the car.

Looking towards Cuirt na Coiribe (more expensive apartments) and Dun na Coiribe (townhouses). This is also the way to the school, although I didn't know that when I took this. It may look lovely and warm, but it wasn't. I was wearing a wool coat, a hat, gloves and a scarf to stay warm.

The Dunnes that's right across the street from Gort na Coiribe. That's where I got my bedding and towel.

Since I had kind of already seen what was in the immediate area around Dunnes and in the Galway Shopping Center, I decided to investigate the stores across the street from the Galway Shopping Center, starting with Curry's.

Outside Curry's

Inside Curry's #1

Inside Curry's #2

So basically Curry's equals Best Buy. It's the same sort of idea. Mostly electronics and some music, movies and video games. I found a hair dryer there for 13 Euros that looked like it might not just fry my hair and I made a mental note to come back and get it later (I didn't want to carry it with me while I explored).


Next door was Aldi.

The outside of Aldi (obviously)

Inside Aldi

Also inside Aldi.

Aldi is a gorcery store for the most part. There's also, as you can see in the picture directly above there are these metal things set up in teh middle of the shop where they put random other stuff. There's everything from clothes to rain boots to speakers and CD players to toys and cookware. All of the random stuff is much cheaper here than it would be elsewhere but it's a gamble what'll be there. And I don't know how good the quality is either...

After Aldi, I went in Woodie's just out of curiosity.

The inside of Woodie's

Woodie's was kind of an odd experience for me. It smelled, in part, like Home Depot, which smells like boredom. But it also smelled like other things. And there were tea sets and aprons and other more houseware-ish things for sale there. For example, this was the first and only place I found pants hangers at all like the ones I'm used to. I couldn't find more than the one pack so I got those. The lady I bought them from was kind of hard to understand when I asked her if there were more, so I just left it at that.

Harry Corry is a designer furniture/bedding/towel place as far as I can tell. I wandered through really fast looking for an extra blanket, but I didn't have any luck so I kept going down the line.

Smyth's, a toy store

The Mickey and Minnie section!

The next place I went in was Smyth's. I was so pleased to see and old fashioned toy store with blocks and books and games and stuffed animals. They're a dying breed in the US and more's the pity. I liked the Disney section a lot. Didn't buy anything here though.

The movie theatre!

The movie theatre is also in this complex. I didn't go in it, but I took a picture to help me remember where it was. I was at once disappointed and kind of pleased that it was pretty much all American movies. I mean, there are a bunch I wanted to see and didn't get to, but at the same time, it would've been cool to see Irish movies you couldn't see in the U.S.

I went back across the street to the Galway Shopping Center, thinking of heading to the Car Phone Warehouse to get a cell phone. On the way there I explored the shops at the end farther from me that I hadn't looked at the night before. I found a Subway attached to an arcade.

DDR!

I found a DDR machine! I was ecstatic so I stopped to play a round. Didn't do too bad for not having played in months. Now I've played DDR in three different countries (US, Japan and Ireland)!! I'm ridiculously proud of myself for that.   

Spongebob paintings on the wall of the arcade. ^_^

A butcher shop

Inside the Galway Shopping Center I decided to wander around now that the stores were actually open. I took a picture of the butchers because you see them a lot here, but you don't really in the U.S. anymore and I thought it was interesting. I went in and out of the bookstore, Eason's and some of the other places before I went in Car Phone Warehouse. I explained to the guy behind the counter what I wanted and he said some stuff too fast for me to follow (in my defense his accent was kind of thick) about going to town because they couldn't help me there. So I wandered around some more and finally went in an outdoor wear shop and asked the man for directions to get into town. He was really nice about it. He could tell I was American. He went to NUIG too and so we talked about Gort na Coiribe for a bit and then he gave me directions.

I think I'm going to have to cut this day into two posts. I think blogger doesn't like this many pictures in one post... Sorry it's taking me so long to put stuff up. I know I'm way behind. The internet was broken for a couple days and then I was out in Connemara learning Irish all weekend and I've got school during the days... Any ways just bear with me and know that I'm working on it.