Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Leaving on a jet plane..

Hey all...so the weather in southwest Ireland has roughly resembled the wind and rain of coastal Connecticut combined with the inconsistency of a sun/rain/sleet combo and anything else unpredictable of Alabama. This morning my friend Liz drove me up to Kerry Airport (just past Killarney) where although it was sunny and sort of hot, you could see the stratus rain clouds (woohoo teaching geography!) in the background and the leftover snow-covered mountains from the night before. Sure it was cold last night, but the point is combined with the on and off rain/sun/rain/overcast/rain/sun of the past couple weeks, I feel even more at home now.

I currently sit in Kerry Airport, hours early on purpose of course, before my 4:30pm flight to Luton Airport in London. There I will take a train to St. Pancras Station where my cousin of my cousin Carolyn, and her husband Matt whom live nearby, agreed to pick me up and let me crash with them for a few nights. (First of all I looked up rules of kinship and their names and I still have no idea what to call a cousin of a cousin). I am sure we'll do drinks and dinner tonight but it is of course good to have a friend in London as I would surely be lost and only wanting to find a bed to sleep in tonight. All my other exploring will be saved for tomorrow. Get ready, who knows what Goula and 10 days throughout Europe can have in store.

I will try and update as much as possible throughout the next week or two but for those of you that aren't sure, I should be alive and well and have posted again at the latest by next Saturday, April 10th.

A quick update on this past weekend. Friday night Kathryn's sister came into town and we all went out and did the usual. Fridays are increasingly becoming my favorite night in Kenmare as Saturdays tend to be overcrowded and usually more annoying than anything. Saturday I went with a group of 50 students (of all ages) and two other teachers up to see the Gaelic Football (GAA) All-Ireland Final in Ennis, Co. Clare. It was the older class of boys that played and Kenmare was celebrating Saturday night as the boys won their match. It was my first ever Gaelic Football match and it was just a great day. Gaelic Football is an Irish creation and is best described as a combination of soccer and rugby. From what I remember, it is very similar to the game Speedball we used to play in gym at Waterford High. Needless to say, the bus ride home and the bonfire and celebrations by the town for the win was amazing. I had a great time on the bus bonding with the kids, playing charades (and failing miserably) and basically just having a great time. Although I was their teacher, I definitely like just part of the Kenmare gang for the day and it was great.

Also, on Sunday the music teacher from the school, Veronica Whitehead had me over for dinner. I play soccer with her husband and have met her daughter out on the weekends (we had a long discussion on how awesome Six Flags is once), so I was familiar with the family. I sat there for a few hours and and we just talked, about everything. Veronica just went to Amsterdam with a group of students so she gave me all the good info from that country, in which I will end my journey.

Ok, so ten days and one backpack means from strategic planning. I did decide to bring my laptop for research and updating purposes as well as my ipod and camera. So obviously being very careful, the rest of the bag had to be packed as light as possible.

Roughly 5-7 black t-shirts, pairs of boxers and socks (each)
1 Towel
Toiletries
Some maps of Amsterdam
1 book
Passport and Flight info
1 thermal, 1 button down, 1 cardigan (jumper)
Jacket, jeans and sneakers all on my body at the moment

That's about it. On to the first part of the journey and as Joey from Friends would say when he went there, "it's London baby!"

MG

'Our Love' by Rhett Miller-another Scrubs soundtrack favorite. The song rocks, nuff said.

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