Ireland!: 40 shades of green:)

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Wow, where to start... Ireland was BEAUTIFUL! It definitely was my favorite country out of all the places we visited throughout this trip, and I definitely will go back again in my lifetime.

We caught a plane Thursday night and got to our hostel by like midnight-ish, which was pretty late but we just went straight to bed so we could get an early start the next morning. Our hostel was actually pretty nice and it was in an AMAZING location! (I have to add here that I was the one who actually found and booked the hostel- as well as the 60 pound airfare lol... i was pretty proud of myself) But anyways, our hostel was a 6 person female room with 3 bunk beds, and since there were 5 of us in the room, we had a random person stay there 2 of the 3 nights, which was kind of weird/awkward at first but it really wasn't so bad.

So the first day we were there, Friday, wasn't the greatest weather - it was pretty rainy and cold. But it ended up working out okay because we were just touring around the city of Dublin and we were saving the tour of the countryside for the next day, which ended up being beautiful weather. So along the “hop-on-hop-off” bus tour we did around the city we stopped/got off at several places including Trinity College (where there were actually students graduating that day!), St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Christ Church, Temple Bar, and the Guiness Factory! Although I do not really like Guiness beer, touring around the brewery was pretty cool. It was 5 floors and we were able to see all the ingredients and manufacturing that goes into making the beer. The tour ended at the very top floor, the Gravity Bar, a place that was sort of like the Seattle Needle – it was a tall, large, circular room completely surrounded by windows that looked over the entire city of Dublin. It was really cool and so pretty. There, we also received a free pint of Guiness which was included in our admission price – since I didn’t really like the taste I gave my beer away lol but it was cool because they drew a little shamrock shape in the foam at the top of the beer.

Anyways the rest of the day we just shopped around for touristy things and then checked out the Temple Bar area, which is one skinny long cobblestone street lined with a bunch of unique little bars (and right near our hostel). The one we went into was playing live Irish music and was so crowded, but everyone was singing along and it was so much fun! It reminded me of the movie P.S. I love you if (you’ve ever seen it).

Speaking of which, the tour of the countryside we went on the next day took us to spots in the Wicklow Mountains of Glendalough where that movie (P.S. I Love You) was filmed!! Along with other movies such as Saving Private Ryan and Braveheart. I honestly can’t even begin to describe how beautiful our tour around the countryside, mountains, and glacier lakes was. It was absolutely stunning, and breathtaking. I almost wanted to cry! Haha It was just sooo green and so naturally beautiful. If you’re friends with me on facebook, I’ll be putting my pictures up soon and you HAVE to check them out. You will be amazed to how Ireland really holds true to its motto, “40 shades of Green.” Our tour lasted all day from about 9am-5pm so afterwards we finished up our touristy shopping and then ended up heading over to another part of town to check out the bar they filmed at in the movie P.S. I Love You (i know, we were a little obsessed haha) and it was funny because as soon as we walked in they were playing the song the guy sings at the bar in the film.

Anyways, that was our trip! We left the next morning verrrry early and got back to our apartment in London around 11. All in all, Ireland was absolutely gorgeous – I loved everything about it and I cannot wait to visit again!! Although next time I think I’d venture over to the west and south sides of the island to check out places like Galway and Cork, because I heard it’s even more beautiful there!

If you ever get the chance to go, I would highly recommend it! I’d also recommend that you take me with you as well!:)

Weeks 4-5: this trip is flying by!

Sorry I've fallen behind, this trip is just going by so fast I'm losing track of time! Anyways, i'll try to sum up what i've done in the past week or so since I've been back from Scotland. Last week we went on a Jack the Ripper tour, which took us to an area in London near the Liverpool station and we walked around the area where Jack the Ripper (the old serial killer) used to kill people. It was pretty cool but very gruesome! Last week was also Allison's birthday, so on Wednesday, the day before her birthday, we wen to Harrod's (a huge fancy department store where they have EVERYTHING) and we got these huge delicious sundaes at their ice cream bar. They were so good! After that we tried to go to the local pub, O'niell's to celebrate her being 21 at midnight but the pub closed at 11. So we went home instead and surprised her with a chocolate cake and sparkler candles that my one roommate got?! It ended being really nice and Allison was so surpised- she loved it.
The next day, the day of her birthday, we went to Brick Lane for a free curry dinner with the CAPA program. Brick Lane is an area in London that is basically a street lined with a bunch of different curry restaruants, and people stand outside and haggle you for good dinner deals. Curry is an indian food and a very popular dish in London (because of the large Indian population) but I actually really liked it! I'm going to try and go back for one more meal before I leave! After dinner we went to this night club/bar called the Virve which ended up being really fun- so fun that we went back friday night and monday night for $2 drink night! The place is so fun and the music's really good too!
Friday, Ashley, Melda, and I decided to go to the British museum since it was yet another rainy day in London. There we saw the Rosetta Stone, the Parthenon reliefs (originally from Greece), Egyptian mummies, and a bunch of other cool stuff. We headed over to Trafalgar Square afterwards to check out the festivities going on.
The weekend was filled with a lot of touristy things- I went on a tour of Westminster Abbey, which was beautiful, and I got to see the exhibit on the Royal Wedding. I also attended a church service at St. Paul's which was breath-takingly beautiful on the inside.We went to Spiddlefield market where I finally found a fancy british hat! (i was determined to get one while i was here) and we also went out to dinner with Allison's family who was visiting for a few days.
Monday, Ashley and I went to see Dirty Dancing, the show, and it was SO GOOD! The choreography, the set, the music- everthing was amazing! So much like the movie which I loved even more!
Tuesday I went on a Beatles tour where I got to get a picture of myself strolling across Abbey Road! We also saw a bunch of other memorable Beatles landmarks which was cool.

And tonight we're leaving for Ireland for our last weekend of the trip! Can't wait!

Day 26: Greetings from Edinburgh, Scotland!

Today we took an hour train ride from Glasgow to Edinburgh. The fair ended up being really cheap [thankfully] and we arrived in Edinburgh around 11. Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland, and its actually pronounced Edinboro. What I found really interesting is that supposedly, one of the founders/origin of the name, Pittsburgh, came from Scottish root, and it was actually meant to be pronounced like how Edinburgh is pronounced, "Pittsboro", but eventually got "Americanized" into just "Pittsburgh" Interesting little fun fact!

Anyways, our day in Edinburgh ended up being a little shorter than we expected, since we had to catch a train back to Glasgow at 4, in order to catch our train back to London at 5:30. But we were still able to fit in a touristy activity and rode around on a "hop-on-hop-off" bus that took us around the [small] city of Edinburgh, and its outskirts. Although we mostly stayed within the city scene, we were still able to catch glimpses of Scotland's countryside in parts of Edinburgh, as well as on the train ride! In fact, the train ride was the best part! I'm actually really happy we decided to take a train instead of a plane because we were able to see the beautiful rural hills and plains of Scotland and the UK! It got me even more excited for our trip to Ireland in a couple of weeks!
Final thoughts about Scotland: very green, lots of sheep, lots of bagpipes, and lots of kilts!! (and a not so "wee bit of whiskey") :)

Day 25: Royal Family sighting and Scotland!

Today we woke up early to get down to the Buckingham Palace/Mall St. area to watch the Trouping of the Colors parade. We actually got to see a lot more than I expected! And much more closer than I expected too! We first saw them all leave the Palace, first the carriage of Prince Harry, Camilla, and Kate, then the carriage of the Queen followed by Prince Charles, Princess Margaret, and Prince William riding on horse!:) It was so exciting to see them! It was even more exciting when we got to see them later on coming back down the other way on the Mall. We were SO close!! And we got some great pictures and videos! We also got to catch the Royal Family wave from the Buckingham Palace balcony as the planes flew over. It was really quite a sight- so neat!

After the parade, we headed home and got our things together for our trip to Scotland! We left by train at 5:30 and got to Glasgow, Scotland at 10pm. From there we headed to our [kinda shady/creepy] hostel and settled in. We ventured over to the pub across the street from our hostel to have a pint of beer and try to really experience the Scottish pub culture. It was pretty fun, and our hostel ended up not being so bad! We were served free breakfast in the morning, which was nice for us to be able to save money!

Day 24: Icebar!!

Today I had the day off from work and from class which was VERY nice!:) My friend Ashley and I took another trip down to Camden Market to get more souvenirs and gifts for people, as well as ourselves lol I was able to bargain my way to 2 dresses for £30 among some other good finds. Although I spent a little too much money, I was still excited about all that I got, and all the souvenirs I got out of the way for others.
Later that night we went down to the Icebar! Its located between Picadilly Circus (Times Square of NYC) and Leicester Square (pronounced Lester). It was SO much fun! Everything was made of ice! Because the bar is always so busy and high in demand, they are reservation only, and you only get to stay in the Icebar itself for 45 minutes. It was kind of a bummer, but it was so much fun we didn't care. The admission fee included a free drink out of an ice glass as well! We also got big thermal parkas with attached gloves when we entered inside.
It was a pretty cool experience (no pun intended) and I'm so glad we did it that night! Tomorrow is the Trouping of the Colors- the Royal parade in celebration of The Queen's birthday! We're going down to the Parade and then we're leaving for Scotland at 5!
Can't wait!

Days 20-22: Back to the 'ol grind in London!

I never thought I would appreciate being in another country, other than home in the states, more than coming back to London after Paris! lol Its such a nice feeling, knowing how to get places, and interacting with friendlier people! Nothing too much has been going on this week so far, just working everyday and going to class. I had to write a paper for my European Gov't & Politics class today which wasn't too bad. Last night we went to this American Sports Bar down in Picadilly Circus (central London) since we hardly ever go out-we thought we should try it out, expecially since Tuesdays are Student Nights there and there's no cover charge, and drinks start from £1.50 which is like nothing here! It was pretty fun, but I didn't really like that it was literally ALL Americans. Like it was fun, but I almost felt like I was at a school dance or something. I guess I just wasn't really in the mood to go out or something. It was cool though how they large TV screens everywhere broadcasting sports, even the NHL Stanley Cup Finals were on!They also had beer pong tournaments which was fun too. But we didn't want to stay out too late since we all had to get up early the next day for work/class.
Thursday we might be going to a cricket game with some British friends we met at the local pub, O'neills! I've never seen cricket before so it will be pretty different, but it should be fun!
This weekend is the Trouping of the Colors, a big parade for the Queen's birthday where we'll get to see the Royal Family! (Or at least I hope) It seems like a lot of people are going so we'll have to go early to get good viewing spots!
We might also go to Windsor on Sunday, where Windsor Castle is (another royal estate that the Royal Family owns)
That's all for now! Happy Wednesday!

Day 19 (Day 2 in Paris- "are we back in London yet?!")

Today started off miserably. We didn't get a lot of sleep the night before so we woke up rather late and didn't check out of the hotel until 10am, then made our way to the airport where we waited for over an hour for the metro to take us into central Paris. (Our plan for the day was to go to the Louvre- since it was free on the first Sunday of the month, and since we didn't make it inside the day before) However, there was an issue with the metros and some lines were down, causing us to be delayed for like 2 hours, and stuck on a train with a huge crowd of rude French people!
We finally made it to the Louvre at 1pm and the line was enormous! They said it was supposed to take about 2& 1/2 hours but it really only took about 1, which was a relief. The museum was HUGE! Think Carnegie x 10, at least! It was so beautiful too and we actually managed to see the Mona Lisa!! It was so weird to see it live, in person, the real thing! After always seeing it in books and movies etc. the actual painting was amazing. I also felt like I had a better appreciation for it since I recently took an art class last semester.
We made our way around the museum to see some other exhibits, but our feet were so sore and tired (as well as ourselves) that were just too exhausted to do anything else. We headed back for the airport around 4:30 since we weren't sure how long it would take with all the delays.
We got there early and ended up settling for gross way overpriced cafeteria food since we were starving and had nothing else to eat! We made it back to London around 9 and finally got home, settled in, and passed out!
Overall thoughts about Paris: It was a great weekend that I'm very glad we were able to plan and carryout successfully. It was a beautiful city, (with great hot sunny weather too!) with its historic landmarks and amazing architecture. However, it was a lot more dirty and smelly (smelled like urine everywhere!) than I was expecting! The people were unfortunately not too friendly either, but I kind of knew that going in. I don't see myself going back to Paris anytime soon, but if I ever do, I would love to take a trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower (since we never got a chance to do that) and perhaps even take a trip to Versailles (heard its worth it).
Needless to say we had a great trip but were ready to say "Au Revoir" to Paris and "Hello again" to London!

Day 18 (Day 1 in Paris!)

Last night we arrived in Paris around 9:30 and we were informed that a shuttle from our hotel would come to pick us up. But it took us a while to actually find the terminal where we would be picked up- the language barrier immediately became a struggle for us lol but we eventually found it, got on the bus and checked into our hotel (which turned out to be right by the airport, and not right by the city like I hoped! lol) Since we didn't get to our hotel til after 1030, it was a little too late to do much of anything, so we just found a little random pub to eat down the street since we were starving.
Today we woke semi-early to get a headstart on the day, since we wanted to see everything! We took the shuttle back to the airport and got on the metro (Paris's version of the tube) which cost 30 euros for a 2-day pass (about $50 U.S. dollars). Then, we finally made it to the Eiffel Tower! It was soooo surreal to actually see it for the first time and be right next to it! It was a lot wider than I was expecting it to be, it stretched out pretty far on both sides, leaving a large open walking space underneath. Unfortunately the wait to go up to the top was 3 hours! So we decided to wait and come back to it. Side story to that was when we went up to some of the workers to ask them how long the wait would be, and they snickered something in French, laughed at us, and then yelled at us telling us that it was polite to say "Hello" first before shouting at someone (meanwhile we weren't shouting, and we asked politely)- that was definitely a wakeup call for us about the culture and how French people really are.
After that we got some French crepes (which was our breakfast at 1pm!) and they were DELICIOUS! Ah! That's definitely one thing that the French are good at. I got one with strawberries, chocolate and ice cream on top! It was amazing!
We decided to go on this boat cruise tour that took you to all the main attractions of Paris (Notre Dame, Arc de Triomphe, The Louvre etc.) and it only cost us 9 euros since we were students! It turned out to be such a great idea, and we made our way around to all the things we wanted to see! Notre Dame was absolutely beautiful! It was breath-taking almost. We shopped and ate a little cafe near Notre Dame afterwards where I tried my first French Ham 'n Cheese sandwich! (I was recommended to try it since it was a traditional dish) It definitely was different because the cheese was on the outside of the sandwich, melted on top. But it was still very good.
Another thing we reeeeally wanted to do was find this one restaurant a friend referred to me that served wine in baby bottles and had cheese fondue! Its located in Montmarte, a cute little area just outside Paris. We actually managed to find the place pretty easily after figuring how which metro stops to get off/transfer at. We were the happiest/most relieved people ever once we found it! It was truly the best ending to our day, and the highlight of our trip! It was just a cute little mom and pop restaurant and the people were very friendly! The fondue was delicious and we got a kick out of drinking from baby bottles. We also signed the wall/ceiling after we finished because the place was covered in signatures from people all over the world (there was actually even another "PITT" signature written) but we wrote "Hail To Pitt" and our initials, and then I signed it separately. The whole experience was sooo much fun and so neat! However, the experience home was not so fun!
We wanted to go to the Eiffel Tower to see it lit up at night, so we made it back all the way there and then were very disappointed when we saw it wasn't lit up, and that it was pouring down rain! In addition, the metro stops at midnight so we had to catch a cab back to our hotel which cost us 50 euros and our taxi driver was of course not very friendly as usual.
Although we had some ups and downs today, it was still pretty successful and fun since we got to see and do so many things! (not to mention we were pretty proud of ourselves that we could manage everything on our own, without guided help from planned tours n such!)
:)

Days 16 & 17: Work & Prep for Paris

Nothing too much going, just working and getting ready for my trip to Paris this weekend! Friday some of my coworkers invited me out to lunch with them to a local pub. It was a really quant little spot and we ate outside in a little grassy courtyard area. It was really pretty and the food was pretty good too! Although it was weird when everyone went up to the bar to order drinks before we sat down. They asked if I wanted anything but I said I'll just have water, and then they asked me about 3 times after that if I was sure I only wanted water lol. I explained to them how its not really in our culture to drink at lunch during work, so I wasn't really used to it (especially since i'm technically not even allowed to drink yet!). We discussed some other differences in the workplace and they were also in shock when they found out that Americans only get 2 weeks vacation, while here they get at least 5-6 weeks. They also couldn't believe that I work from 7:30-4 everyday, because they don't start until 9:15 here, and go until 5:30 (which is hard for me to get used to as well)
This weekend we leave for Paris Friday night at 7, right after work! Paris is an hour ahead of London so that'll be another adjustment i'll have to get used to quickly (shouldn't be too bad)

Days 14 &15: Start of Work!

The last couple days haven't been too eventful, but I did finally start my new internship! (And no, mom, its not paid lol unfortunately). But its still really great! The office is so large and open and nice, it reminds me of the type of office you would see in a movie, where they usually have a typical office/workplace scene. I really like it though and the coworkers are pretty friendly as well. What I like most about the job is that everything I'm learning about how to do and the things I'm seeing as I shadow different people are all things I know about and have learned through my studies, and now I'm actually able to apply all of those things to a real life experience. This may all sound corny but I've never had a job or anything that actually deals with my major directly, which is accounting. So its just neat to be able to relate and apply what I've learned to real life situations. Its also good experience to get a taste of what I'll be doing in my future career choice, and so far I like what I see which is good! (don't want to have to change my major this late!)
Wednesday was my first rather full/packed day. I worked from 9-1 and then I went straight to class (ate lunch on the tube) then had class from 2-5 and 6:30-7:30. It wasn't too bad but I was pretty tired by the day's end, which was good because I'm trying to get on a regular sleep schedule to go to bed earlier so I can wake up earlier and be awake enough for work! (and not nodding off at my desk)
I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but on Sunday night, Allison, Chrissy, Ashley and I all planned a trip to Paris THIS weekend!! We leave Friday at 7 and I am super excited! I hope the language barrier isn't too bad and we have a good trip!