Who says they don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Ireland?

The Gang eating!

So being away from family and friends is extremely hard, but it really hits when a holiday comes around and the holiday that hit me was Thanksgiving! I am a homebody anyways, but to not have a turkey on Thanksgiving was crazy, but totally worth it! I think that I will appreciate the time I get to spend with family on Christmas soo much more, probably because they will be cooking lol, but still I will appreciate it! 

Some of the decorations

Now beyond the sad mushy stuff, our Thanksgiving rocked! I had wonderfully people, great decorations (brought to us by one of my roommates aunts) and a huge feast. It is true that turkey in Ireland is like finding the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, it just doesn't happen! It was okay, we made due and just had chicken breasts instead from our local butcher Sean! My roommates and I made the chicken and a bunch of sides including glazed carrots, corn, mashed potatoes, cornflake potatoes (yes, two kinds of potatoes), bread, gravy and who knows what else! We also had friends over who brought deliciousness in addition to themselves including the most important thing of all, pie! It was also a disappointment to discover that Ireland does not know what pumpkin pie is, but I got over because they have the American classic, apple pie! 

Oh, I almost forgot, we had a special guest... It was the night before Thanksgiving that we had a random request from a friend to bring someone along with them, and it being Thanksgiving, we said of course! As it turns out, it was a friend of our friend's roommate (the roommate happened to be going to London, hence her absence at our festivities) who missed her flight back to The States the day before, so it was only right to have another fellow American over! She ended up being super cool and brought more pie, so it was a win-win situation! 

What the typical first-round plate looked like

So the moral of this post is: Just because you are not home does not mean you cannot bring home to you! I highly advise you to bring pumpkin if you want pumpkin pie and be prepared to have the best non-traditional Thanksgiving ever while studying abroad! It is crazy how one common thread such as Thanksgiving can bring you and your friends together and make you realize how luck you are to not only be having Thanksgiving in another country, but to have each other! 

Until my next post... Slàinte!

Munich, why did I not study here?!

So to start off, I absolutely LOVED Munich! It is by far the best place that I have been, but getting there was not the easiest task in the world, but it is okay because without a little struggle, no great story can come to be!

Glockenspiel in Munich at Night

So we (two of my friends that went and myself) left early Friday morning, 4am wakeup to be exact with a 5am departure from my apartment. We journeyed on down to the bus stop, about 15 min. walk, which is much closer than the actual bus station! About 5 minutes before the bus is suppose to arrive, a taxi driver pulls up and says that this route is no longer running for the season. Now i secretly think that he was lying and just wanted to make more money and since he was going to the airport anyways, he said that, but we got in the taxi with the lady that he was already taking and got a ride to the airport. Because of this we were there at like 5:40am and had like an hour and a half to kill!

The Fabulous butcher where we ate lunch

We get to the gate only to realize that our boarding passes are printed back to back and of course they have to rip some shit off the bottom, meaning we need to find some place in Munich where we can reprint our boarding passes to come home. Luckily our hostel was extremely nice and they printed it for us! Anywho, so we get on the plane from Cork to Dublin and right back off. Since it is like a 20 minute flight, it doesn't even seem like you are flying! Prior to getting on the plane, I ask the flight attendant if we will be able to make our connection since we only had like an hour. She didn't know, and sadly enough, she was not the only person.

The May Pole... all in the name of beer 

So we get off and start casually jogging through the airport because we have to go through security, passport control, etc. We get to passport control where the line is pretty long and takes awhile to get through since half of the people do not speak English, UGH! Taking a step back, one of my friends has an EU passport, so she just has to show it to the people and walk through while my other friend and I have to go through the "all other passport" line. So the EU friend decided to just go ahead of us and left us to fend for ourselves. I finally approach the guy and he decides to start chatting me up since I have a temp residence card, when I am like buddy I have a flight to make, am I going to make it?! He told me to proceed straight up the escalator at the end of baggage claim and I would be close. So with 30min. to make the connection, we jog over there only to find out that they cannot scan our ticket until we go to the Ryanair desk to get a stamp. So we have to exit the airport, come back into the airport, get our ticket stamped, go through security and then we can get to our connection. So off we go outside and back in only to be cutoff by the old hag who cut to the front of the line to get her ticket stamped! I was like F@!$, are you kidding me, and to top it off, she was waving her husband over because she did not have her passport. I was like no way, so I think the guy in front of me must have heard me cussing this lady out and let me cut in front of him to have the desk lady stamp our thing really quickly. So I ask her where security is and of course she points us in the wrong direction, of course, so we go to this restaurant area only to have to run back to the opposite end of the airport to go through security. With about 15-20mins until our plane is suppose to leave, we book it through the airport and eventually reach our gate in time to line up and board!!!

River in the English Garden

2 hours later, we reach Memmimgan the airport that is in the middle of nowhere Germany that of course only Ryanair flies into, so we make a connecting bus, which was 10 times nicer than the airplane! About an hour and a half later we reach Munich, get to our hostels, drop our stuff off and hit the town. Not knowing where we are going, we just started walking. We walked to the main part of town, had a pretzel, some nuts and plenty of picture taking time! After walking as far as we could in the rain, we headed back to the hostel and hit up the bar. Might I say that the Euro Youth Hostel in Munich makes a mean cocktail. Don't fear I also had a German beer! That night's was delightful, but the one that I had the following day was not so hot! Since we had a long day of travel, I called it quits around 11:30 and headed back to my bed. It is a good thing that I am a sound sleeper considering my bed was against the wall that backed karaoke!

Surfing in the English Garden

So the next day came to be and we decided to go on a Free walking tour of the city (By free, it means that you tip according to how you feel the tour went). Now if you are ever in Munich and have 3 hours to kill and really want to learn what the city is all about, hit up Wombat's hostel's Free walking tour with Ozzie! He is amazing and truly makes you feel like you are citizen of Munich, or at least want to become one! So we headed off around 11 and learned some vital information. Do not "J-walk," it is a 40 euro ticket and increases with each violation. Even at 1am, they have cameras and you will get a ticket. Luckily when we did this on multiple occasions the previous day, we did not get caught. Do not cross the tram tracks and traffic while trying to enter the west side of the city, you will be fined. Good thing we only did that going one direction the day before. Finally, do not vomit in public, nor at a restaurant, you will be fined for that! Bet you thought we did that too?? No, we were good little girls =)

Anyways, so on our walking tour we did it all, saw it all and learned it all! We learned that in the Bavarian constitution it states that you can drink a litre of beer at work a day without getting fired. We drank a German beer (the bad one) and ate a bratwurst (delicious). We discussed the birth of Nazism and how it actually started at the Hofbrauhaus. We saw the Glockenspiel do its thing. We learned that most of Munich is under 60 years old since the majority of it was bombed in WWII. The 3 things that remain from prior to this time only do so because they were the tallest landmarks and therefore were used as points to navigate off of for pilots of WWII. Man, the day just kept going on and on and it was sooo amazing! I highly, highly recommend a walking tour for anyone in any city!!

Crematory

So after our walking tour we headed back into town, did some powerhouse shopping before all the stores closed considering the fact that nothing would be opened on Sunday since the majority of the city is Catholic... This again is another fine example of why you should avoid traveling on Sundays! Anywho, after we walked the city, basically twice that day, we headed back to our hostel and just sat around talking the night away. This was probably a good idea considering we were heading off to Dachau concentration camp the following day.

Early to bed meant early to rise. We were up around 9:30am since we thought that our tour began at 10:15. After wondering over to the train station, to the tourist office, back to the hostel and then back to the train station to figure out where we were suppose to meet, we found a nice lady, giving different tours, who informed that the Dachau tour guide was sick and not giving tours today. Just our luck, but since we were determined, we went and figured out how to get there by train, because after all, we were in the train station! So we ended up getting tickets for like 4 euro each, sweet, already saving 11 euro! We get to the concentration camp to find out that it is free, so the best thing that could have happened to us was that guy being sick because we saved some money!

Work is Freedom

I would have to say that if you get the chance to go to a concentration camp, do it! I am so fascinated with what Hitler was able to do and to be in the heart of it is so eerie and amazing at the same time. Dachau is the first concentration camp that Hitler started and was originally used to house those who were against his political ideologies and was later used for those who were not a part of his superior race... It was really interesting walking through a building that so many prisoners walked through, showered in, were beaten in, ate in, lived in... They did not have as much memorabilia as I would have hoped, but they had dishes, clothing, beds, and different items that they were forced to give over when entering the camp. The museum part was very fascinating, but it wasn't until we entered the crematory that things got real. To see a place where so many people died and be the rooms that dead bodies were stored in, now that gets you.

The Chinese Tower/ Beer Garden

After we left the concentration camp, we headed back to town where we just finalized what little shopping we could since most every place was closed (Sunday and Catholic), secured my appetite with my desire to eat in McDonalds in every country I go to and wondered through the streets and parks for one last look. We went to this park called the English Garden. It was beautiful and had a lot going on. The two cool things that were going down were the surfer's wave and the Chinese Tower. At one end of the park there is a part of the river that gets enough wave type action that people actually take their boards out there and surf the waves! I wouldn't believe it unless I saw it! There is also a beer garden that is host to a Chinese Tower which is cool, but would probably be better to visit in the summer or not on a Sunday when people are actually out! It was also rumored that there is a naked beach, but it was way too cold for anyone to be out there, so we didn't go. We eventually called it, rather early again, due to our early departure from the city to the airport.

The final noteworthy thing I experienced on this trip was in the Dublin airport. We were so excited to see food since we had not eaten since breakfast, so I snatched up the last Margarita panini this little shop had only to have some guy take it thinking it was his. He took a huge bite and then said sorry, this isnt mine. Since I was sooo hungry I did not even care, I had them cut his bite off and I finished the sandwich. Needless to say, the hospitality in the Dublin airport is not very good considering they did not offer me a refund after they discovered that there were no more of the sandwich I ordered!


Oh well, the over all trip to Munich was amazing and I advise anyone and everyone to go if you get the chance!

The Devil's Footprint

I do have a couple of side notes for those who are planning on doing a little traveling in Munich, or really anywhere in Europe, but other then that, I think that is all for now, but until my next adventure.... Slàinte!




Side Notes:

- Ryanair may be cheap, but there is a reason for that!
   *If you expect a 2 hour long sale's pitch, fly Ryanair
   *If you do NOT want to know where you need to be, fly Ryanair
   *If you expect nothing more than to get from point a to point b, fly Ryanair
   *If you want no leg room, fly Ryanair
   *If you don't mind not getting those fun little peanut packages, fly Ryanair
   *If you want a good laugh every time your flight arrives on time, fly Ryanair

-Go to Munich (or anywhere) in the off season!
   *Cheap hostel
   *Don't get to attend a beer festival, but there are tons of beer gardens to drink at year around
   *People wear lederhosen (literally, leather pants) year around
   *Less people
   *Everything is cheaper!!

Halloween in Dublin

Background information. Ireland is the birthplace to our beloved candy consuming holiday of Halloween. It was originally a celebration of harvest as well as the beginning of the new season! So any fear of not being able to celebrate this holiday while studying abroad in Ireland can be put aside because it is huge here!

So this year I opted to venture to Dublin, mainly because I thought there was a Halloween parade, but it turns out that there isn't. No worries though, there were plenty of adventures that made up for the internet's lies!

We need to take it back a couple of steps to preparing for this fabulous holiday. So about a week before Halloween we, the 5 of us who went to Dublin, realized that we needed costumes, but could not figure out what 5 girls could be... We, being girls, decided to head out on a shopping spree to find something amazing and amazing we did, we found adult sized onsies and what makes a better Halloween costume than quintuplet babies?!?!?! So it was a must buy, not only was it super cute, it was super warm which worked in our favor when we had to walk around in the rain!!

Sexy Babies! 

                                              

So Saturday came around and we woke up bright and early as usual! I thought that I woke up a little earlier than I really did. It was 7:15 when I started to heat up my pan to cook eggs when my roommate asked what I was doing and I said, "Making breakfast, what are you doing?" She responded, "Okay, but we are leaving in 5 minutes." I took a second look at the clock, threw the pan in the sick, brushed my teeth and took a piece of toast for the road!

Needless to say, I did not make us late, we got onto the bus to make our 4 hour long journey to the lovely city of Dublin! Once we got in the city we took the scenic route, stopping to do a little window shopping and street performer watching before heading to our hostel. 

Our Room- 3-0-3

We finally made it to our hostel, a little before check-in time, so we had to wait, but it was okay, because we had to eat lunch at some point! After a quick bite, we went back and got our key to the room. I had really good vibes about the room since the number was 303, repin' the home zip code, but it turns out that the number carries no luck. We walk down these creepy long hallways, which eventually lead us to the chapel, which we walk through to the back only to discover that our room is in the furthest corn of this hostel-chapel. Just excited to see a bed, we quickly open the door to find an older gentleman, naked (thankfully under his covers, but clearly naked) lying in his bed sleeping. He wakes up, greets us by saying, and I quote, "Hi, this room is haunted." We were like umm, get us out of here, but we stayed anyways, because it is all about the adventure. As we settled in he continued to talk to us while lying there naked about how he is a spiritual healer  and that he would ward off the evil spirits for us. He also said that he had stayed in another hostel where this girl's credit cards were stolen, and although he was the only person in the room when it happened, he knew that it was her really good friend, who obviously was not a really good friend. So we made sure to grab our stuff to leave at the front desk when we left the room.

At the Guinness Factory

Since we were only going to be in Dublin for a day and a half or so, we figured that we better start seeing the town and what better way to do that then visit the Guinness Factory! After figuring out that the bus driver was a jerk and didn't inform us that we missed our stop, we got off and backtracked to the storehouse. I guess it ended up being okay because we got to see a whole different side to the factory. So we finally made it in, paid our 9 euro and headed off on our self-guided tour. It was basically a Guinness museum, which was not what I expected, I expected to see them actually making the Guinness, but in the end, it was actually pretty interesting to see the history and whatnot. It was unfortunate that we got there so late, because we did not have time to actually learn to pour our own Guinness, but no fear we did get a pint at the Galaxy bar which overlooked all of Dublin. If there is anything you must do in Dublin, it is to go here!!

The Bouncer and I with his mustache on!

We then headed back towards our hostel, because everything closes rather early, nothing new to the Irish culture. It was close to dinner time, so we stopped at the pub across from the hostel to have a bite. Although the lady did not understand really anything we asked for, the food was overall satisfying. After finishing, we popped back over to our hostel and thankfully discovered that our old man roommate was not in the room. Just as we all laid down to take a nap, a younger gentleman walked in our room and made us all feel a little bit more at ease. We became completely comfortable when he started talking to us with his Australian accent! He began to tell us about the old naked guy that was staying in our room. Apparently he has lived in the hostel for the past 4 months and basically lives off of the government. We later discovered why... he is just sooo stupid and cannot even back up his weird beliefs...  Anywho, our Aussie roomie told us that he was going to head out with some other American's he had met the night prior to us arriving and that we were welcome to join, so of course we said yes. We did our makeup and hair and headed out. As soon as we got to the pub, the bouncer was like, why are you not dressed up, and we said that we were waiting to Halloween and he said no one will be dressed up since they have to go to work Monday, so we ran back to the hostel (conveniently located across the street), slapped on our onsies and headed back to the pub! 

The man with our onesie on

From here came a fabulous night out on the town! We had our first and only pint of the night across the street from the hostel! There were tons of people dressed up, we were stopped every two seconds to be asked what we were, we got stuck in the pouring rain, we walked to Temple Bar, were called sexy babies, walked back towards our hostel, saw a major 10 minute long cat fight (found chunks of hair in the same area the next day), found a man wearing the same outfit that we were and then called it a night. Although it was not super exciting, it was soo much fun! 

The rest of the trip was just shy of the bullseye. We made it to soo many place, but were just not able to fully experience where we were. We headed out early Sunday morning, starting at St. Patrick's Cathedral, only to get there 15 minutes past visiting hours. We walked to the Dublin castle to discover that you can only take a tour if you pay for it and we could not even find where you would pay. We went to Trinity College and could not find the library, apparently you can trace your genealogy or something there... We were on a mission to find Jen a jacket, failure. I did find a watch and a cute top and plenty of souvenirs!

Overall, I liked Dublin, but was glad to go home to my own room where there was not a creepy naked man sleeping! If you have the chance to go to Dublin, most definitely do go, just allow yourself to have enough time!! 

Lessons learned:

*Just because it says it is a youth hostel, does not mean that it is

*You get what you pay for

*If you can avoid going on a Sunday somewhere and have longer than 2 days to go, take the extra time!

Next I am off to Munich for what else than more adventures, but until then....Slàinte!

The Cliffs of Moher and Moher and Moher

The Cliffs

Oh boy, never is a trip complete without an unexpected adventure, and might I say that this has been the most epic adventure so far...

Okay, so about a week prior to our trip, we went to the bus station to find out how we could get to the Cliffs of Moher. The lady handed me two time tables for the two buses that connected to get us to the the cliffs. I said okay, looked them over and planned our trip out, or so I thought...

Saturday morning comes bright and early, 6am to be exact. I make breakfast, brush my teeth, and get the gang together to head to the bus station. A long, cold, 30 min. walk later, we reach the bus station, buy our tickets and get on the bus for the long, cold, 4 hour bus ride to the cliffs.

O'Brien's Castle

We get to the cliffs and since we are obviously extremely exhausted from all that hard work it took to get there, we opted to take a nice long lunch break prior to setting out on our journey. Per usual I had some cheese and some ham placed between bread and heated on a grill, since that seems to be the only thing that they serve here!

Don't Do It!

After lunch, we walked off to begin our picture taking, and picture taking we did! I think I got to 120 or so before my camera died =(, but lets face the facts, 119/120 were pretty much the same thing, so I cannot complain too much!

We first walked towards O'Brien's Castle, a tiny little tower that gives you no greater view than the steps in front of it, but since we didn't know that, we paid the 2 euro each to walk to the top to take some more pictures! Might I say, we were one lucky group of girls, because it was as clear as clear could be with not a drop of rain in sight! It was amazing how far you cold see out into the ocean!

Anywho, we were done taking pictures of the cliffs, we wanted to take pictures from the cliffs, so we hiked down and up to the other side where the cliffs actually are and proceeded pasted the "Please Do Not Go Beyond This Point" sign. I mean everyone does it, it is just used more as a precaution to warn people that you could slip and die, luckily we all survived!

"Shep" The 3-Legged Dog

Since we did not think that the bus came until 6:10pm, we decided to walk and walk and walk and walk until we just couldn't walk no more, or at least until we decided that it was pretty repetitive and that we needed some time to shop in the gift shop prior to our departure. Along the walk, once it got to a point where the path began to diminish, we came across a 3-legged dog that guided us further and further towards to end of the cliffs. We named him Shep. He guided us back to the same point that we met him at where he then picked up the next group of people who wanted to continue down the unbeaten path. 

So after like 3 hours, we decided to head back and do what everyone must do, eat again! Do not get the ice cream, totally not like ice cream back home!! Since it was only like 4:30, we sat around and chatted before we saw they were closing down, so we ran downstairs to the gift shop, made a quick purchase and then sat around waiting for the bus to come at 6:10. 

It got to be 5:50, so we moved towards the door. 6:00, we walked out to make sure we could actually see where the buses pick up at. 6:10, we walked to the bus stop. 6:20, we ran inside to see why the bus wasn't there since the cliffs closed at 6:30. 6:21 we discover the last bus picked up at 1:30. Shit, so they were extremely nice and called a taxi for us. In order for us to make the last connection to Cork, we had to drive to the next town of Ennis which was about 45 minutes away. Tony, the taxi driver, got to us around 6:50 and our bus left at 7:20 so we had roughly 30 minutes, otherwise we were sleeping in a sketch bus station with who knows what!

My absolute Favorite Picture... The Irish Countryside

So we hop in the taxi, buckle up and start flying like a bat out of hell! I was right up front with Tony cussing up a storm at the idiots in front of us that would not slow down so we could pass. We made it to the bus station at 7:19, and thank god that bus was late, otherwise we would have been shit out of luck! 

In the middle of trying to figure out if we just missed the bus or if it was late, I some how left my awesome t-shirt that I bought in Tony's taxi. Luckily he thought that us not catching a bus was bloody crazy, so he gave me a receipt and his business card so that way I could have someone to back me up when I went to talk to the bus station and try get a refund for having to pay for a taxi when their time table was wrong.  So I called him up on the bus and told him that I left my stuff and he told me that it would be no problem and that he would mail it to me... He still has not mailed me it, but I still have faith, because he was a really nice guy!! 

Have to get the Roommate Picture

So we hopped on the bus for our long 4 hour bus ride to Cork. So frustrated and tired, I power walked as fast as I could up that damn hill and straight into my bed. After a good long night sleep, I woke up and looked over the bus time tables to make sure that it as not my fault for misreading them, only to discover that it was. A weird little number 9 at the top of the schedule denoted that the route we were planning on taking back only ran from May to Sept. 

Moral of the story, read your time tables throughly so you do not have to spend an extra 65 euro on a taxi that may, or may not get you to your connection home! 

So although it was an adventure, it was well worth seeing the Cliffs of Moher, for they are one beautiful sight to see! If ever in Ireland, I would highly recommend them and cross my fingers that you make your connecting bus home!

Until my next adventure....Slàinte!