Weekend Retreat=)

At the moment, I am sitting in a room in a gorgeous old manor house that used to serve as an orphanage. It is huge, lovely, old, amazing. I am here (about an hour south of Coolnagreina, my home) with my roommate's church, Greystones Presbyterian Church, for the weekend. We are watching kids and listening to sessions with a guest speaker from Wales! It will be a fun two days (including the mandatory table tennis tournament). There are 5 girls and 4 guys from Taylor. The girls are all staying in the same room with an Irish lass named Sarah. She's great fun-She and I hit it off immediately, which we found out tonight when we were sitting next to each-other. We were trying to harmonize together without even knowing it! After a quick laugh about that, we figured out we both loved dancing and photography.

Speaking of dancing, we had our first Irish dance class today. SO much fun! It was quite the workout. I can teach you all steps when I get back=) Just know, it's not Riverdance and it's harder than it looks. Sarah said she'd teach us some more steps tomorrow!

This week has been incredibly busy with homework, which is why I haven't written about our trip to Galway. I'll try to sum it up as quickly as possible. Dr. Maloney and Dr. Jones where with us, teaching Contemporary Ireland and Irish History, respectively.

If I could live anywhere in Ireland, it'd be Galway. Without a doubt. All the way on the other side of the country (which was kind of like driving to VA Tech), is the most beautiful landscape and most relaxed city. Galway city itself has the infamous "Claddaugh River" running through it, which inspired the ring. It's obviously near the ocean, so it is very "sea port" friendly and all of the shops and restaurants had a "sailor and ship" feel to them. The "downtown" King's Street had the most simplistic, refreshing aura about it. We had one day to just explore the shops and museums around town and it was great fun! One night we went to a "Culture and Arts Experience" on King's and then had dinner at Roberta's, Dr. Maloney's favorite Italian restaurant. Some of us went to a rugby game and others just walked the pier and "kicked the wall", a Galway must.

Connemara National Park was beautiful, in the most raw, rugged of ways. It's easy to see why the horses are so hardy-it was rocky, mountainous, and dangerous, because of hidden bogs. We also visited Kylemore Abbey, Clonmacnoise Abbey, and some random castles on side roads. Beautiful countryside.

Well, I need to begin working on my biography now; a 7-ish page paper for our history class. We were allowed to pick anyone who had influence on Ireland, so I chose Bono.

No-I'm just kidding. I am really doing it on Harry Boland, originally Michael Collins' right-hand man, then Eamon de Valera's most trusted advisor. If you don't know those names, look them up.

Have a good one!