Last week

Last time I already told you, how much time flies!

It flew even faster the last few weeks!

It was visitors month! Kind of wierd to recieve visitors so close for you coming home, but it is great to see everyone after such a long time and most of all show them a city you got to know so well!

Because I want to close my blogupdates on a funny note I decided to make a: You know you have been in Dublin for a while when. The idea came from a friend of mine, who posted a link with you know you have been in the Netherlands too long( you can never be on exchange for too long, hence the change) when http://www.perfectgroup.com/blog/2011/07/you-know-youve-been-in-the-netherlands-for-too-long-when/ It is in English and it's really funny.

So here we go:

You know you have been in Dublin for a while when:

1. You drink a pint of guinnes just as fast as two glasses of dutch beer

2. You randomly cross the road on places without a traffic light

3. You are disapointed when you need to cross when the traffic light is green

4. You are used to pay by exact cash in the bus

5. You are used to always see full pubs.

6. you are used to strict bouncers being strict, except when you tell them it's your 21st birthday.

7. You ate Irish breakfast at least twice

8. You are used to saying how are ya back, instead of fine and you?

9. You understand most of your fellow students when they speak a language they seem to call english, but sounds a lot like a wild person trying to speak

10. you apart from drink a lot, watch and do sports a lot.

11. you know exactly how to get free beer from guys ( whaa this sounds so bad!)

12. You are used to emailing your teacher with dear Gemma, instead of Dear docter Donnolly-Cox

13. You are used to teachers knowing all of the names of the students in their class.

14. You are used to teachers actually appreciating what you see, and I do not mean this in a condicending way towards Tilburg, but they tested a case on us! and we don't even have diploma's!

15. You start saying; ah Thats Grant or Oh it was grant!

16. or worse You start saying, Thanks a million

17. Even worse: You start saying Thanks a mil! ( guilty on all accounts)

18. your friends start saying they hear an Irish accent when talking to the waiter

19. you know that smithwicks is pronouced as smiticks

20. You are no longer surprised by the fact that when you wear gloves, scarfs and wintercoats, they Irish walk out wearing hoodies, of even worse, just pull-overs

21. You realise when you look outside and see irish walking in coats and scarfs, there is a possibillity you might freeze to death

22.You go out with your rugby team without dinner and might possibly be completely drunk before midnight, while they seem completely fine

23. You are used to just smile and nodd when old Irishmen approach you in the pub, they do not speak english anyways

24. You realise that you are going to miss the wierd chinese places such as wok in the box.

25. You get used to your teachers assuming that morningclasses are use less, because of to much alcohol before, even though its monday

26. You get used Dublin as a two sided city, with on one side good neighbourhoods and the other bad neighboorhoods.

27. you have shown stephen's green shopping centre 3 times already

28. you know what mince pie is

29. You going to miss all the cute cheap lunch places

30. You going to miss all of your friends and life here

I can go on and on!

But I am going to leave this city as I came.. in a complete party mood, with parties from now until I leave on the 20th of December! thats at least 5 parties in a row!

also I will see a the leincter vs Bath game in a stadion! and in the meantime, I am trying to pack. because I expect my last visitor the 18th, she will fly home with me:)

It has been a pleasure sharing my stories, and I hope that you will have a great exchange as well!

Only 3 weeks left!

Hey there everyone:)

It's been a while that a wrote to you! I am sorry for that. But it has been busy and when I had some time, I was tired. And everybody knows you should not write tired, because that is no fun!

I have been doing so much! but mostly when you are here for a while and made most of the trips, you just get to normal life, which is awesome!

I really got into the rugby team, making new friends. This was a really good idea since I now met Irish people, because otherwise you kind of stay stuck in your international friends. Which is also really nice, but the combination is really nice.

I also got to celebrate Halloween! which is ofcourse as american as it can be, but it was really nice to dress up and to have a good party. Since it was celebrated for real. So everybody was dressed up. Not scary though, but also that was often tried.

I also went a weekend away to Cork and apart from just visiting the city Cork, we also travelled around a bit to see a lot of the county Cork! We saw blarney castle, the town of middleton, where the orignal jameson distellery is located. and we saw Queens Town and Cobh from where the Titanic left. This is on the seaside (ofcourse) and the wether was so amazing that from the pictures we could have been in Greece:)

In this three weeks, we have a lot of friends visiting, our essays and assignments to finish and to slowly arrange our departure. If my finances would have allowed I would have stayed some weeks longer to travel, but unfortunately they don't and thats ok, because I saw everything I wanted to see and the two things that I missed: edinburg and Londen.. are reachable any time!

So I better enjoy my time I have left! Which I ofourse shall! and I hope to sent one more blog!

Pictures speak more than a 1000 words!

Ãs Promised! No words just pictures, of the life of travel, birthdays, rugby and partying!

College Life

Two weeks later! as promised an update about how my life at college is.

It's coming together, First few days I was completely lost and the only thing I could find the dining hall! But after two weeks I can find my way around quite easily.

Classes.

Because I take the two long distance courses, I only take three courses here! They have some courses they do not teach at Tilburg University, So thats cool!. I take Organisational theory, which is a follow-up of organisational behavior. I liked organisation behavior, so I thought this would be intresting, Furthermore, I take managing non-profit organisation, which I like because of the fact that non-profit organisations are not often discussed in IBA. Finally, I also take an economics course, which is in combination economics and law. Thats completely new.

But there are several other courses that are also intresting at TCD. The classes work pretty much the same however, they have a lot more focus on assignments and a lot less on exams. especially if you're here for the first term!

Rugby

I really wanted to try a new sport, so as mentioned in my last blog I chose to do rugby!

I now had three practises, because of a party tonight I am skipping the fourth, but that should be allowed. I am not playing games anyways. I am however joining as a supporter to the match on sunday! would be a nice trip as well as a nice way to get to know the girls better.

Finally classes will start

Hey everybody!

It has been a long time since I wrote to you.

I have been here for a month now and all I day did was celebrating the fact that I still have holidays. Which means, travelling, sightseeing and partying. For everybody coming to Ireland, I would recommand this. First and foremost, because finding an apartment is not always an easy task. It might take a week or two. In my case this was three days, but that was an exception. The second reason I would do this, because al your schoolmates have already started class back home, you might as well enjoy your time exploring the country and its culture you will experience. The final reason, is that it is a good way to get to know your way around the city.

Did you know?

Let's play a little game about Ireland, where I ask the question did you know and if you can answer with yes on more than half of it you win the game (honour will be your reward)

- Did you know that is western Ireland the weather can change every 10 minutes? You will leave in the sun without a coat and still be soaked at the end

- Did you know that the Irish don't really want to know how you are doing when they ask you? You're supposed to day 'How are ya" back

- Did you know that if they answer to how are you, the answer with "I'm grand' and when you're in a really really good mood, 'you're grand out '?

- Did you know that the Irish don't mind if you break traffic rules? and even the police crosses through a red light?

Dublin

Heeey everybody!

Let me introduce myself first, I am Monique, 20 years old and I study International Business Administration. Therefore, It was a logical choice to go abroad. I decided to go Dublin for a number of reasons;
1. I would like to go to Europe, because I always find that mysteries can also be found close to home. 2. I wanted to go to a city where I have never been before. 3. Trinity College looks amazing!