Corrie's Birthday:
It went so well! Despite the fact that we were all so worried about it being a bust. Emily and Erin made her a homemade chocolate cake, which was really good, Erin made this beer, cream cheese and cheddar cheese dip (so good), and we all pitched in some for drinks. We met a lot of new people in our apartment building (even though some of them decided it was ok to steal our bowl of dip..Which we later found on the hall stairs, bowl shattered, dip everywhere) and Corrie and I had invited an Irish guy that we met at a pub, who brought some of his friends. In all, we met lots of new people, and had a lot of fun.
The hostesses:
The birthday girl:
Pub Crawl:
The night after Corrie's birthday, Erin, Kelsea, Emily and I all went on our first student pub crawl. It was really fun! We're friends with the guys that run it(Eoin, Tim, and Mikey), so they talked to us for a while and we hung out with them some. They're really nice. The first place that we went was the New Bar, which is on campus. Then it was off to The Rock, which was this teeny bar that's usually dead...Not that night. They had about 170 loud college kids, and the bartenders looked pretty stressed...I felt pretty bad for them. The last place we went was called An Realt Dearg. They had a cool beer garden outside, but it was pretty packed. In all, it was a fun experience.
Dublin:
Friday we all left for Dublin. And let me tell you, even though I'm used to being in Seattle, Dublin was super overwhelming. It could have just been because we had to walk everywhere though. Friday night we went out some and met up with some friends that we met in Cork who are studying in Dublin...If that made sense. They're from Notre Dam. Our Hostel was really nice. The rooms that we had were in a wing that had just been opened. Seriously. We were the first ones to sleep in them, and they still smelled like paint. I have a feeling we got spoiled by those though...Saturday morning we all got up early, got our free breakfast from the hostel (that's right, new room AND free food!) and then set out on an adventure. The first thing we found (and one of the coolest I think) was this band:
I'm in that video too...So see if you can find me. It's like Where's Waldo (or Wally, as they call him here).
After that, we went and saw the Trinity College library and the book of Kells, and let me tell you, that library was amazing. We weren't allowed to take pictures in there, but I googled one, because you HAVE to see what it was like.
Grafton Street, the main shopping street in Dublin. Where we found the band:
After that, we vetured out and found Dublin castle...Let me tell you, it was a pretty big let down...We all thought it was going to be so much cooler...
Sunday was our last day in Dublin, and we did some pretty cool stuff. We went and found St. Patrick's Cathedral. It was AWESOME.
Then we wandered around for a little bit, got lunch at this little Irish place, and finally ended at the Guiness Factory. Where, I discovered, I actually don't HATE all beer. Guiness was tolerable. I wouldn't choose to drink it unless it was free, but it didn't make me want to puke, so eh.
