Ireland in one word/one picture

I was thinking how to describe Ireland in one word. It is really not difficult but I prefer to post a picture so you can find the right word yourselves :)
If somebody still needs a help let me know I will describe it more clearly!

The Grand Wicklow Tour

This Sunday me and my friend Anastasia took the Grand Wicklow Tour. With other many foreigners in too small bus we went outside of Dublin to Wicklow County.

First we visited the Powerscourt Estate,originally 13th century castle.
What is making this place really wonderful are the unique 47 acres of gardens designed as Italian or Japanese gardens with beautiful Triton lake in between. It was very relaxing walking and enjoying the gardens but we didn´t miss the tipical Irish rain :).

Later we went to a village of Avoca where is the oldest weaving mill in Ireland and also a tipical craft shop. Well do not expact too much, it is a very small village :) but just in case - if you´ve ever heard about Ballykissangel TV show - it was filmed here.

The last stop was the 6th century monastic settlement in Glendalough.
Glendalough is situated in the heart of County Wicklow. You can find more about the history here. We had sun as the weather changed again however walking in the cemetery didn´t make me feel comfortable at all. :)

To see pictures from my trip click here or use the link Ireland pictures on the right side.

How the readings drived me crazy

Readings, readings, readings. When the teachers told us that the biggest part of our learning will take part outside of the class I didn´t know they will give us such a quantity of readings.
They are using the same electronical journals as we have in VSE but to be honest their library is very bad :( Can you believe they do not have books for present readers? So you can either take book home for a short term = 1 week or for a long term = 2 weeks if you are lucky or to make online reservation and wait (since there are usually just 3 examples of one book), also you can buy the book but as everything is coming from UK you must count at leat around 80 Euros per book. I would never say that Dublin might be so unadvanced in some cases.

Sweets

The more I hated this shitty stuff in Bolivia the more I like it here in Dublin.
No comments why, who was in Dublin understands, who not won´t believe :)

First week at UCD

Finally have the classes started. We could change them after the first week so I spent a lot of time thinking about which courses to take. Honestly there were not so many to choose from and my final selection was more on exclusionary than interest basis.
I have 4 subjects now and I spend at school just 3 days per week. Class takes 2,5 hours!!! which drives me crazy, especially when some of the teachers do not understand that we need a break in between.
But do not think that the rest of the days I just can sit at home, it is impossible due to an excessive teamwork we got.
I had my Spanish Exam this Thursday - well only the written part - almost 4 hours exam! I am not really sure about the result since economical content is evaluated as well as language and may be even more. Our exams are going to Spain (to ESADE) where they will be corrected and sent back so it will take some time to get the results. Oral part will be in 2 weeks and we will be examined by people coming from ESADE.
Sunday I had some time finally to enjoy a bit from Dublin´s culture, I went to the National Museum. Museum was fine and as most of the museums in Dublin it was for free as well as a small guided tour.
About the weather - I was trying to avoid this topic BUT I have to admit that it is probably one of the most annoying things here. May be it wouldn´t be if Irish could start to use a heater..may be it wouldn´t be if my landlady would start to use the heater or at least plan to do so. :-(

Thinking about the summer

More pictures from Dublin

I took a bus city tour today, it was fantastic - especially because I didn´t have to walk :) Pictures are here (link is also on the right side of the blog). The first picture shows my new house (the big upper window is mine).

Some pictures

Here are some of my new friends -well not all of them are friends but I couldn´t delete them from the pic :) It is so strange, classes haven´t started yet, I am not studing at all, not even making my homework from last week neither prepairing for the spanish exam for next week but still there is not time to put all the pictures to internet..

Today I walked 45 minutes to the university so I hope I will find some bus soon :)

Getting to know

This is my second week in the city. I have to knock on all the wood around - the weather is still fine, I wish it might stay like this at least the next 3 months :)
Blocked Seminar was very exhausting and boring at the same time but at least we got some time get to know each other. On Sunday I moved to Goatstown. I have a nice room and on the map it doesn´t seem to be so far from Blackrock where UCD Business School is. Also my landlord told me it takes around 30 minutes to get there. BUT believe me, it is far and I guess I will need at least around 45 minutes. Actually here is everything FAR and also everything looks the same so it is very easy to get lost. And assuming these two facts with the fact that there is not reliable bus service it means you walk a lot.