TiKi'sphotoBar & Blog

Well its been a solid month since I’ve been living and studying abroad out here in beautiful Galway, Ireland, and I’m happy to say that I’m loving every minute of it! I cannot believe its already been a month, kinda sad, as I feel that I have just settled in to this new environment! I guess it plays true, time flies when you’re having fun!

My past two weeks here have been quite busy and jam packed with fun and friends. Last weekend was probably one of the best weekends of my life, as I embarked on an EPIC surf trip. Heading North up the Irish coast, I rode up with some friends I met through the Surf club, to a really cool surf county called Bundoran. After a short 3 hour drive, we were amongst the first to arrive of the Surf club, thus we were given the option of which house, of the 5, we wanted to stay in and ‘first dibs’ on everything there. The Surf club had rent out 5 massive, mansion like, beautiful houses for the 60 kids that all went up that weekend. One of the craziest parts to the weekend was that we had one of these giant houses all to ourselves, the 4 of us. We all picked our own rooms, had our own bathrooms/showers and lived like kings the whole weekend!

Having the place to ourselves was so nice because we didn’t have to worry about anyone stealing or messing with our stuff/boards, and we were able to get in and outta there without any drama or problems. It was so convenient too because we were just next to the designated “party house.” It seemed like the Surf trip, for some, turned into a party weekend instead of a surf weekend. I did both. It was so nice driving up with these guys I met because they were pretty committed to surfing and we were able to drive and check out every spot before we surfed.

Another great part to the weekend was that I went there with no gear, no wetsuit or board or any surf gear. I actually got hooked up with everything there, and was able to bring it all back and KEEP it for the semester! I was able to borrow/have this kid oisheen’s old wetsuit, a 5mil xcel suit, with a built in hood, and I ended up buying booties and gloves. The surf club had ghetto foamy boards, which I ended up surfing on for the weekend, and am holding on to for now. We were able to surf 3 times, 2 decent sessions, while the other session was probably the worst surf I’ve been in. This storm session was almost scary, with strong winds, currents, onshore, rainy, stormy, surf. Haha it doesn’t sound too fun, but we made the best of it, and it ended up being fun as I realized how fortunate I was to be surfing. The water was freezing, but with the boots, gloves, hood, and 5mil suit, only your face went numb!

The whole Bundoran Surf Trip weekend was filled with surf, partying, friends, and good vibes all around. I met a bunch of friends and they are the kids I am now hanging out with and going out with. I’m getting pretty excited for next weekends surf trip to Strandhill down in County Clare. This surf trip should be a little more serious, as it is the intervarsities universities surf competition! I am stoked to say that I will be competing in the Longboarding division and Expression session representing and riding for my Irish university NUIG. I’m really looking forward to this, and have been praying to the Surf gods that they will bring us nice waves, weather, and conditions.

Hockey has been going good as well, I’ve met a bunch of people from the club and have been out with a few from them. I put my order in for my NUIG hockey club jersey that should say BEAR #50. I may also order the Galway Bay lightning, club city hockey jersey, as I’ve been playing a bunch with them. I finally got my hands on a decent pair of skates that don’t tear my feet apart, and with these I plan to get out and play more. There is a hockey tournament up north, Belfast I believe, coming in March, which I will have to take part in! Pretty excited for that!

School has been going well, I have only missed 1 lecture so far, due to the surf trip, but that is really good considering how many kids miss/skip there lectures. All my housemates can’t believe that! My macroeconomics class is probably the hardest, my professor speaks and lectures in a whole different level than the rest of the class. Gerard Turley, my prof., has written and published multiple economic books and articles, that its second nature to him. While the rest of us are just trying to follow him, one concept at a time, he goes off on all these wild economic tangents that few can comprehend!

As with school, the gym has been treating me well also. I’ve been going literally 5 days a week, I think these past 2 days have been ones that I’ve missed, but other than that, I’ve been pretty good about working out and swimming. In between classes and while I am over on campus monday thru friday, I figure I can get some sort of workout in! Although, I don’t know if I’m helping my workouts by going out every other night! I’ve been going out a bunch, best place to meet people, to the pubs and clubs. I still cannot believe how expensive EVERYTHING is. It’s been a good reminder that I will be needing a job when I get back to the states!

Last night I went over to a friends from the surf club, where she cooked up some good ol’ traditional irish stew with potatoes! I then convinced her to play the fiddle and I felt like we were in a pub with live music! It was great, and of course, we ended up in a pub, the Roishin Dub, afterwards.

Well I am off to watch the Six Nations rugby championship here on t.v. I think it’s like the superbowl of Ireland, Ireland and Italy are facing off as I write this. I best be off!

First surf in Sligo, Ireland, beautiful!

Although my feet went numb, it was a blast! Check on the crazy/heavy fog on the water!

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, dramatist, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. (1865-1939) Here his grave lay, Drumcliff Churchyard, Sligo, Ireland

Surfing in the snow in Bundoran!

Everything is going well here, time is flying and I am having a blast. I need to start looking at what I really want to do and see while I am over here! There are cheap flights everywhere throughout europe, so I really need to start planning some weekend trips and/or trips over easter break and at the end of the year! I am thinking I would like to see, within reason, scotland, wales, england, france, italy, belgium, netherlands,germany, switzerland, and hopefully get a cheap flight down to portugal to visit jesse! Today I went to the immigration office in galway, that was a pretty interesting experience, it was really busy, smelly, and stressful. I wasn’t able to get in and register in time because we had arrived too late and they had given out all their tickets, maybe tomorrow.

Last night, around 10:30pm, I went over to two friends house that I met from the Surf club. Why so late? Well they were hosting a Superbowl kickoff party, kick off was at 11pm here! I ended up watching the whole game, between the Saints and Colts, and was let down around 2:30 a.m. to see that the Colts had lost. Luckily I could care less between the teams, and I found that watching the big game with 9 other Irish lads was the most interesting part. Being the only American of the group, it was real interesting and awkward at times to see and hear their perspectives of the big game and the American culture. They had me rolling with a few laughs, as they cracked innocent and clever jokes about the whole ordeal. It was so funny to see how they viewed the Superbowl through their eyes and how different it was to us fellow Americans. Even the Irish announcers covering the game were pretty clueless as to what the game entitled and how it was played. I was glad I made it over to their place for the game, because I have never been in a situation like that and it was a great example of how one culture can differ from another.

Today, February the 11th, I finally registered with the Garda, or police, and no longer became an illegal immigrant. It had been almost 2 weeks since I was suppose to register, but never got around to it. I am quite relieved to get that done and over with. I woke up at 5:30am this morning and was out of the immigration office by 9am. That was an experience in itself, the first person I tried talking to and meeting was a quiet and scary looking guy. I asked him where he was from, pakistan he replied, and our conversation quickly ended, I am glad he didn’t ask where I was from! An hour and a half later, when the office actually opened, there was a nice que of people, probably about 20, all waiting in hopes of registering. Probably about half of them we not able to be seen because it is a long process and the office is only open tell 2pm. When it was my turn, everything went smoothly and I was brought into a back room. In the room there was a fax/scanner machine for finger prints, etc. Here the immigration officer took scans of all 11 of my fingers and was pretty strict and serious about it. I have never had my fingerprints taken that seriously! It was nice to get out of there by 9am, just in time for my 11am lecture.

After my lecture, I went to the campus bank, Bank of Ireland, to do some currency exchange…
This was another experience, as I witnessed a few kids, dressed in suits and tyes, drinking beers inside of the bank. It had looked like they were hung over from a ball, and later I had found that they were, and the Engineering/Nurses ball was the other night, and it’s tradition to continue the party and drinking into the next day at the college bar. I assumed that some of the students had run out of cash from the bar and made a quick trip to the bank for more. It was so weird to see these kids, going up to the tellers with beers in their hands and making transactions. It was quite funny really.

I ended up exchanging 100 US dollars, and got a mere 70 euros back. Everytime I walk in there, I leave with less money, and start to question why and how it all works. I figured it’s the price you pay for living and traveling abroad in another country, esp. one of the wealthiest, with high inflation rates, government taxes, and small economies of scale. Known as the 4th most expensive country in the world, ever since their switch to the Euro, they have been in a constant economic struggle. However, the Irish have began to realize and understand their financial struggles and they have slowed their spending, thus have brought down inflation rates, causing businesses to compete and drop overall prices and costs. Everyone is saying Ireland is getting better, but it’s been a slow process, esp. with their current recession in place.