steaaamroller! and other adventures :)

Written 23/10/08

My time in Belfast is absolutely flying by – it has been six weeks since I arrived although I am starting to feel like I have lived here forever! Here are some highlights from the past three weeks:

• At the Fresher’s Bazaar the first week of classes, Cathy and I signed up for the Belfast Giants Fan Club just for the heck of it. The Belfast Giants are the ice hockey team that came to Belfast a few years ago. On student night, we convinced our flat mates to come out with us to the game. I am ashamed to say that despite living next door to the Washington Capitals, I had never actually seen an ice hockey game before (other than Miracle – the second greatest movie of all time J). We had a blast watching the game, getting into the cheers and chants, and enjoying the overall atmosphere. The icing on the cake was that Belfast scored with 1:18 left in the third period to beat Cardiff 1-0!

With Cathy at the game

GOOOOAL!!

• A few Sundays ago I woke up to absolutely gorgeous weather. The sun was out in full force (an extreme rarity in Ireland) and the day was warm with a nice breeze. My friend Ally and I quickly made plans to go on a trip we had been discussing for a few weeks. We took the train 30 minutes outside of Belfast to Bangor and planned to walk back the 8 miles to city center. It was so nice and relaxing to head out of the city and into suburbia with adorable little towns and neighborhoods. After a long detour to stroll through a Boot Sale in Bangor, we picked up the Coastal Footpath and headed back toward Belfast. The path was an easy walk right along the coast and was beautiful! We leisurely strolled along the path, stopping to take lots of pictures, play in the pebbly sand, and bask in the sunlight. It was really refreshing to take a step back from the city just for the day and enjoy the incredible day!!




Hiking the Coastal Path with Ally




• My Uncle Hugh has been involved with Washington Ireland Program for a number of years and it gave me the chance to meet a number of students from Ireland this summer in D.C. It has absolutely blown me away the hospitality that those involved in WIP have shown me since I have set down in Belfast. In addition to spending time with the students from the program, it has been amazing to have the families reach out to me to make sure I feel cared for while I am studying abroad. The past two Tuesdays I have had dinner with WIP families and after six weeks at university, it has been so nice to spend time with non-students and in homes! I am so, so thankful for all Uncle Hugh’s connections; they have made this experience even more rewarding!
• Last weekend a friend of mine from UVA came to visit! He graduated last May and is spending the year teaching in Wales. It was really nice to have a part of home and of UVA here in Belfast and was a really fun weekend. We spent Saturday doing the touristy thing in Belfast with a couple of my friends from Queen’s. Even though we’ve lived here for a while, most of us still hadn’t seen the sights of Belfast so together a bunch of us went on the Belfast Eye, took a Black Taxi tour, and had Guiness in the Crown Liquor Saloon. It was a really enjoyable day and gave Evan a great chance to see the Belfast sights!
  
• The Sunday Evan was here was one of the best days I have had in Northern Ireland! Lexie, Evan and I took the train to Derry, a walled city about two and a half hours from Belfast. When we first arrived, we were pretty disappointed to realize that absolutely everything seemed to be closed because it was a Sunday. We decided to make the best of it and took my guidebook’s walking tour around the city walls – it was an absolute blast!! Derry/Londonderry has an incredibly rich history with the Siege of Derry in 1688, the Apprentice Boys rebellion in 1689, the heightened tension during the Troubles and Bloody Sunday in 1972 (U2’s song Sunday Bloody Sunday). But obviously it wasn’t just the history of the city that I enjoyed on our walk; we just joked and laughed and had fun the whole way through. After our city wall walk, we ducked into a little pub to listen to traditional Irish music before heading home. Lexie and I loved Derry so much that we are returning for their huge Halloween festival on Thursday!

Playing in the leaves in Derry :)

The Legend of Finn McCool

I can not believe I have been in Belfast for three weeks now! I have been writing a lot of e-mails to people so I am going to try and touch upon the topics that keep coming up :)

Classes: I think my parents were starting to wonder whether I was actually going to be taking any classes this semester! Universities in the UK run on a schedule that is very different from back home so I just started my classes this past Tuesday - over a month after UVA started! I decided that I really needed a break from being pre-med so all three "modules" that I am taking are at Union Theological College. UTC is an absolutely amazing place! It is a small school and they are really big into fostering relationships student-student and student-lecturer so I feel like it is a little family and it is much easier to meet people that way. I was absolutely blown away last Tuesday when my first day of class included 3 breaks for tea, a worship service, and a free hot lunch. I only have 8 hours of class a week and although I have so much more independent study to do than at home, it is a nice feeling to able to structure my own day!

Living Situation: I live in university housing in a 10 person apartment. I have my own room with a bathroom and then share a kitchen and living room. The dorms are a lot nicer than at UVA though I am not used to living alone! I find myself longing for the insanity of the Quad almost everyday :) The two other Americans on my program are also on my hall but the other 7 kids are Irish first year students. The freshers are so much fun to hang out with and incredibly sweet! It is such an awesome and unique experience to be living with Irish students!

Friends: Believe it or not, I have actually made friends :) It was a bit of a catch-22 at first because the students my age already have their friend circles while the first years are scrambling to make friends for three years so why would they waste their time on someone who is only going to be here three months? I had an idylic idea that I would instantly have 150 best friends and feel so close to them which obviously wasn't realistic. I had to take a step back to remember that the best friendships take time (my closest UVA friendships weren't instantaneous!). Putting things into perspective made things a lot easier and as soon as I stopped fretting about it, things started to fall into place. I have met some really, really great people and have three awesome girls that I spend a lot of time with and who have been a huge blessing!

Church: I have found a really great church in Belfast that I am really excited about! It reminds me a lot of my church at UVA which is comforting :) There is an awesome 7 pm student service that is more contemporary and I have really liked in the past three Sundays.

Giants Causeway: Last weekend the international students were taken to the Giants Causeway which is probably the "must-see" site of the North. It is a beautiful coastline of 40,000 hexagonal rock stepping stones who's origin is a mystery! Legend has it that the Irish giant Finn McCool built the causeway to walk to Scotland to fight the Scottish giant Benandonner. It was absolutely beautiful scenery and was a really fun opportunity to get to hang out with the other international students.

A beautiful coastline shot!

At the Causeway with my incredible friend Cathy!

Gorgeous!

Family Visit: This weekend was our program organized family visit to Navan in County Meath, in the Republic of Ireland. The three Queen's students were all staying together with Collette and Ian Craig and their 7-year old daughter Emma (every other person you meet is named Emma!). I had an incredible weekend with their family! I loved sitting by the fire, drinking tea and chatting all day with Collette or playing jumprope for hours with Emma. It was so nice to be in a house, eating homecooked meals, in the presence of a family. Last night, under direct orders from Collette, Esther and I took each took a bubble bath, changed into our pjs and curled up in front of the fire with a glass of wine to watch a movie. What a relaxing weekend!

Beautiful Ireland!!

While visiting Trim Castle, Esther and I decided to re-inact Braveheart! (which was filmed at the castle)

Collette insisted we take a picture with the donkeys! :)