Sept 7th – 14th

Sorry about the lack of updates! I’ve been rather busy the last weed(or tired), so posting was put on the back burner! I hope to be more consistent in the future. This took quite a while to write – it is longer than many papers I have had to write.

Monday was a free day, so I, in true Emma fashion, hopped on a bus to Kinsale for the day. Kinsale is a lovely harbour town, full of history dating back to (before) the 13th century, with a castle, two forts, and a glorious view.

It was sunny for most of the day (shocker!), and so when I arrived, I made my way to James Fort first thing. It was a lovely walk, but not too exciting at the end.

James Fort

Along the road to and from Kinsale to James Fort, there were wonderful, glorious road cuts into some shale – my geology side came through quite strong, as I would stop in awe while examining some of the bedding. One couple stopped me as I was examining a chunk of it with my handy-dandy hand lense, and they gave me a rather funny look when I explained that I was studying geology, and that this was what I loved to do. However, I didn’t mind, and I continued to study some great things – hummocky-swaley cross bedding, perfectly strata, and an occasion gastropod snail hiding out in between.

Snale in some Shale

I got back into town, and decided to tag along on a guided tour of the city. Our tourguide was named Dan – originally from Ireland, he moved to Boston when he was very young, and then returned after his children were grown on request of his wife. He was truely delightful, and knew everything there was to know about the small, but mighty, town of Kinsale.

Our knowledgable tourguide!

The history of the town relates entirely to its remarkable location on the coast, combined with the natural harbour. Kinsale has been the center of wars between Spain, Portugal, Ireland, and Britain – the rich history shines throughout. The very structure of the city can be related to the various coastlines over time, a medieval walling in of the city by England, and the formation of two forts (James Fort and Charles Fort). Culture (especially culinary culture) from all parts of the known world were brought to Kinsale, and to this day, Kinsale remains the ‘Culinary Capital of Ireland’. Unfortunately, I was unable to sample any culinary delight, as all of the vegetarian friendly restaurants were closed for lunch. Sad.

The end of the original, medieval town

After the tour, I meandered over to Charles Fort – a wonderful star fort from the 1690′s. In the 250 years of operation, the fort fell only once to outsiders. The fort was built in conjunction with James Fort to secure the harbour for Britain – because of this, it was built on the edge of the sea, BELOW the hills. In the 1700′s, the Spanish invaded from the overlooking hills, but the fort was once again reclaimed in Britain’s name not too long afterward. Due to Ireland’s mild climate, the fort is relatively well preserved – from the fort walls to the barracks (built about 30 years after the fort itself).

The enterance to Charles Fort

By the time I returned to Kinsale from Charles Fort, the beautifully sunny weather had turned sour, and it began to spit a little. I meandered around town a little bit, and found a sale. A shoe sale. I wandered in, optimistic but not expecting to have any luck, and walked out with two beautiful pairs of shoes: a pair of Birkenstocks in a style that isn’t sold in my size in the US, and pair of boots. Due to my mysterious foot problems, I was forced to give up all heels, including the boots I found in England my freshman year. Since then, I have been on a quest for boots – I was thrilled to find these! I promise pictures soon!

After shoe shopping, I caught the next bus to Cork, and returned. Hmmm… I forgot what I did when I got back. Probably cooked some dinner and just hung out.

Class on Tuesday was cancelled, so I decided to explore the north edge of Cork City – by now, I’ve seen quite a bit of east Cork (my side) and west Cork (UCC area), but I haven’t seen much of the north edge. I wandered around for several hours, admiring the views from the hills overlooking both the city and the surrounding country – I would love to show you pictures, but my camera’s batteries died, and I, being a terrible blogger, didn’t have any extra batteries. Sorry!

I had class on Wednesday and Thursday. Wednesday’s lecture was a continuation of popular music in Ireland, this time with a focus on U2 and Enya and what they mean to Irish popular culture and Irish identity. In the afternoon, we had a rockin’ Javanese Gamelan Workshop – it was great fun. I played a number of the instruments, and did much better this time that my prior experiences with the gamelan.  Jazz in Ireland was the topic for Thursday, and our lecturer was very entertaining. The Jazz Festival is coming up at the end of October, and I’m excited to hear everything we learned in ‘action’!

We went to a concert on Thursday at the Pavillion, a club downtown – for class! Woo! From 10 – 11, a band called Silta played. An intiguing mix of Norwegian, Finnish, and Irish folk musics, they were layed back and great to listen to. There were some songs, sung in Norwegian, and also some purely insturmentals. The second band, Lasik, was a great eastern-European band, and they played everything from Klezmer and Macedonian folk music to Bulgarian and Roma (Gypsy) tunes. The violinist was Stella, one of our programme’s main tutors. She is basically the coolest person I’ve ever met.

Silta

Lasik

We didn’t have class on Friday, so I hopped on a bus to Galway to see my good friend Julia. It was a very long 4 and half hour ride, which I spent asleep for the most part. I got to Galway, checked into the Sleepzone hostel (awesome place!), and wnadered around for a bit while I waited for Ms. JB to get out of her class. I found a new wallet, for which I’ve been looking for a while. It isn’t perfect, but its the closest thing I’ve seen to what I want for a very long time. I’m not quite as creative as my dear friend Anna, so I’m going to let it stay the way it is, but I’m okay with that.

Galway is a lovely city – full of pedestrian streets and beautiful river views. In comparison to Cork, I think that galway is a little more tourist oriented, as I ran into many smaller ‘Irish’ shops, obvious tourist traps, and travel booths to the Aran Islands, the Burren and Connemara along purely pedestian, photogenic, and …’cute’ streets. Cork is much more of a city, full of higher-end fashion shops, specialized stores, and vehicle traffic. This is not to say that Cork is not a photogenic city – it truly is, with things like St. Finbarre’s Cathedral, UCC, and lovely neighborhoods. They are just different. Different is not bad – they have two very different personalities, souls if you will, and I thoroughly enjoy both.

Shop Street in Galway

The flags of the clans in Galway's City Centre

Julie called me when she was ready, and we had a little bit of an adventure finding each other, but we finally met up with many hugs and laughs. We continued to walk around for a bit, and then she showed me her campus, and we made our way over to her apartment. I met her flat-mates, Cassie and Clare, and we hung out for a while. Julie and I walked back to the City Center, making sure I could find my way back, and then we said good-night for the evening.

I returned to my hostel, and talked with the girls I was sharing a room with. I learned from my last hostel experience – travelling alone, I would rather pay a few extra euro to have an all-girls room than end up with… disruptions during the night! At this hostel, I shared a room with 5 girls -  two Australians, a German, and a Japanese. Our room was en-suite, which was very convinient for getting ready in the morning! I had a good night’s sleep, and then woke up at 6:45, at some breakfast, and heded over to Julie’s apartment at about 7:15.

I got to her apartment, and then met the two other people who were joining us on our day trip to the Aran Islands – Stephen and Gonzalo. Stephen is another US student (Haverford) and Gonzalo is from Jalapo, Mexico. The four of walked to the bus station, caught a bus and a ferry, and finally made it to Inis Mor, the largest of the Aran Islands, around 11.

On the ferry - SUPER windy and sunny!

We walked the entire length of the island for about 3 hours, stopping to admire the gorgeous coast, lovely ruins, and the rocks. Okay, only I admired the rocks, but I did so with gusto. We all talked with each other in ‘shifts’ – both Stephen and Gonzalo were very nice, and I greatly enjoyed their company. Of course, Julie and I talked much of the time, singing and laughing while the boys were confused, but we had a jolly old time. I’ve missed her so much – and its only been a few weeks!

One of the views

Near the fossiliferous beach

We made it back to the Harbour for lunch, and then headed in the other direction. After about an hour of walking, we meandered down to beach, and I had a blast finding all sorts of fossils! I won’t show any of the pictures now, as I’m sure none of you are all that interested, but if you are, you can check out the ‘Geology’ photo album in the right hand side bar! I saw corals, mollusks, brachiopods… it was a gold mine to me! I could have spent hours on my hands and knees just looking at things, but due to the ferry schedules (and my friends’ attenion spans!), I limited myself to about 20 minutes.

Perfectly preserved mollusks - these are fossils!

We caught the ferry back, and then the bus – we got back to Galway around 6:45. By the time we returned to the apartment it was about 7:30. We freshened up, ate some dinner, and then went to a ‘Vivo Mexico Fiesta’. Julie’s friends Rodrigo (from Spain) and Ricardo (also from Jalapo) were the hosts, and it was a great time. We began by playing some card games, and then some unexpected guests arrived, and it just turned into what I consider a ‘chilling’ party: everyone just hung around and talked. Most people were having beer, and some fancy-shmancy shots were made (a hollowed-out jalapeño with lemon juice inside was placed in a shot glass, rimmed with salt, and tequila filled the glass to the rim), but I decided not to partake. It just isn’t my thing. Besides, by this point it was far past my ~10:30 bedtime, and by sheer exhaustion, I was a little loopy anyway. I did meet some great people though, and if I go back to Galway again, I hope to see them!

After most of the party went out clubbing, Julie, Stephen, and I returned to here apartment to chill some more, and eat chocolate chip pancakes. we were a little dissapointed by the pancakes, as they turned out to be more crepe like than pancake like, but they were tasty nonetheless. At about 1:30, Stephen left, and Julia and I went to sleep. I fell asleep almost immediately!

The non-cakes.

I woke up and got ready, said a slightly sad but lovely good bye, and went back out to the bus station. I caved and bought a puzzle book and magazine for the bus ride. I wasn’t able to sleep on this one, so that was a good idea!

I returned to Cork around 2:30, got back to the apartment, and took a shower. I think I am coming down with a cold – its been going around both my apartment complex and my programme. I’ve made it this far, but I finally caught something. Sad. I’ll be drinking lots of tea and trying to stave it off, but if its what many of my friends have/had, I’ll be a little down for a couple days.

This afternoon, I’m just chilling, uploading photos, and watching bad TV – the best medicine for a cold!

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