Valentine's, Arts Ball, and Castles

Hey everyone! Sorry it’s been a while since my last update, but I will do my best to keep you up to date on my life for the past 2 weeks.

Last week, I went to the NUI Galway musical production of Disco Inferno. I went with my roommates because they knew a girl in it. The storyline was horrible and it wasn’t done very well, but there were a few talented people in the cast. It was not quite up to how our college shows are, but it was fun to see.

For Valentine’s Day, a bunch of my American friends and I had a dessert potluck. I made rice krispy bars, and there were chocolate covered strawberries, key lime pie, puppy chow, cupcakes, cookies, chocolate biscuit cake, and we had some sparkling wine. It was a wonderful dinner of sweets ☺

This week has been pretty low key. Classes are all going really well and I’m actually starting to have some homework for them. It’s hard to get readjusted and find the motivation to get assignments done. It’s strange how back home, I would love if I had these small assignments and here I dread them! But I’m getting back into the swing of things and my classes are pretty good. I had my first final on Friday for my Medieval Castle class. That class has been meeting four times a week instead of the normal two for every other class, so it gets done early. The professor kept telling us that no one has ever failed the test and they even had a chimp take it and he passed. I looked over my notes a few times and I thought I was well prepared, but the questions were very specific. I think I did well and we still have a final paper due, so I’ll be fine. It’s so strange to be done with a class already. I feel like I just got here!

On Wednesday, a few of my American friends and I went to the Arts Ball. They have balls throughout the year for the specific departments that the students major in. My roommates went to the Engineering Ball a couple weeks ago because their friends are in that department. We got all dressed up and went to a pub, then to a hotel in Salt Hill and there was a live band for the first part, followed by a DJ. It was so much fun. It was a lot like prom for us. Here’s a link to my pictures from Valentine’s and the dance.

http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=254546209/a=157881010_157881010/t_=157881010

Today, I went on my field trip for my Castle class. We took a bus and went to four different castles throughout Ireland. The first one was Portumna Castle, the second was Pallace Castle, then Loughnea and Clonmacnoise. I explain more about them in the captions of the pictures, so I’m not going to go into detail here. It was very interesting and cool to see the castles that we were studying in class. Here’s the link to those pictures:

http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=254551405/a=157881010_157881010/t_=157881010

I hope you are all doing great and I love to hear about everything, so send me e-mails. I leave for London on Thursday and I come back on Monday, so there will be a new blog update shortly after that. I love you and miss you all so much!!!