left behind

one of many...
public trash cans are literally brimming with broken umbrellas. the wind here is crazy. I am watching my own umbrella die a long and painful death. It has been flipped and pulled in so many directions that one of its bones pokes through its flesh. But we keep a good sense of humor about it-- despite its frequency of occurrence, I still laugh every time the wind flips my umbrella inside out.


the ruins that I pass every time I walk to campus. apparently it was an old castle, strategically located just a few yards from the river




basically the only pretty building on campus.

cool sculpture between campus and downtown, entitled "equality emerging".
















this weekend I'm headed to Cork, which will hopefully prove a good time. every weekend the whole way through March is full, either with trips or with visitors. time is going to fly by.


and now, a random list of comparisons:

1. the stalls in public restrooms have doors that extend from the ceiling to the floor. one Irish student who had visited the US told my friend that she felt so exposed in US public bathrooms that she just learned to hold it until she was back at her apartment

2. pedestrians do not have the right of way

3. "score" means "make out with", not "have sex with". still, it can be fairly disconcerting to hear someone talking about scoring with 4 people in one night. similarly, craic (pronounced "crack") means something akin to "good fun"-- so "are you goin' to have some craic?" means something far different than it would in the US

4. very few people use shopping carts in the grocery stores. this is perhaps because you have to pay 1 euro to do so (it's refunded to you when/if you return the cart)

5. I did not realize just how much I take a large variety of choice for granted. take, for example, the grocery stores: you will find far fewer brand options to choose from than you would in the US. for some items, you may only have one choice: shocking!

6. I've been keeping a whole long list in my head, but now I'm blanking (likely due at least in part to tiredness)

7. oh, I remembered one other thing-- packaging is at a minimum, as is processing: foods are contained by a minimum of packaging, and they go bad fairly quickly because they aren't injected with bizarre chemical preservatives