Hello all! I’m sorry it’s been so long since my last post. Assignments all started piling up on top of each other. But now that a bunch are done, I can finally get back to blogging. Since last speaking, I have officially hiked. I hiked in the Comeragh mountains. I’m not going to lie, it was actually really difficult. I had never done an actual hike before. Or, one that was that challenging. We walked through a lot of grass and mud, I learned. My timberlands went through a lot that day. The views are beautiful. The mountains overlook green pastures and see a lot of sheep. The sheep are dyed a bunch of different colors. The ones I saw were either blue or pink. Then we got to a spot for lunch. There was a pond and the mountains were in front of us, and they were covered in patches of fog. It was really cool to see, and pretty unlike anything I’d seen before coming to Ireland. By the end of the hike, I was exhausted, but I am really glad I did it. It was really hard, but I have to admit, looking back, it was rewarding.

During my first trip in Ireland, I went to many different places. I just had to sign up for it and it was on a first come first serve basis. We went to a beach that was in a cute little town. There was a surf club learning how to surf on the sand. It was big and quite beautiful. The houses in the town were small and pastel colored and I’ve always found those to be beautiful. We also went to the Barrens, which is a national park. There’s a bunch of cliffs overlooking the water. That’s a really fun place to just climb on rocks and take in the scenery. The big trip of the day was to the Cliffs of Moher. This is a very famous place to visit in Ireland, and it has the reputation of being beautiful. The cliffs are 702 feet at their highest point. While walking around, there’s some areas where you have to step over a jagged wall to get to the next part and while doing this, you’re between the wall and an electric fence. We went to the cliffs on a foggy day, so at first the fog essentially blanketed everything. But the fog did clear a bit, and the cliffs and water were in view and the scenery is breathtaking. There’s also flowers that grow by the cliffs and those make it even more pretty. There’s also a tower on the cliffs, and it’s foggy when you’re far away from it but as you walk closer to it the fog clears and that’s really cool to see. The cliffs overlook a bunch of different counties that you can see across from the cliffs. The cliffs are definitely worth going to, as they’re beautiful as well as very well-known. On the bus, we had a tour guide who was very informative and engaging. We drove past areas in the country where Gaelic is the primary language. This is really cool because people in Ireland now learn Gaelic in school, but it’s typically not spoken as a first language and many people in Ireland still don’t speak it very often or very well. These areas are in the deep country and the houses are surrounded by pastures as far as the eye can see. The houses are so isolated and it would seem you’d need a car to get everywhere because there is literally nothing but land surrounding you. That was a really fun day and definitely a great start to my Ireland adventures!

I am taking four classes for my psych major and one class just for fun. I am taking psych of personality, psych of work, psych and everyday life, empirical psych 1 and Irish Traditional Music. The classes are taught by lecturers, not professors/ The lecturers use powerpoints and put them online, so in that sense they are similar to professors at New Paltz. Some lectures also require tutorials once a week, and they are taught by TAs or matriculated students. Classes are also called modules. The classes are generally pretty similar to the classes at New Paltz. They’re basically typical college classes. However, one big difference  actually deals with the registration process. As an international student, I was allowed two weeks to try numerous classes. You don’t meet your advisor right off the bat. You make up your schedule on your own and you have to do it manually, unlike at New Paltz where it’s done online and your schedule is essentially generated for you. Another main difference is the classes seem to be less personal. I have only one class where the professor knows my name. The coolest class is Irish Traditional Music. That module has two lectures a week and then one hour of learning Irish dance. It’s really fun. It’s a very unique class and I’m glad I had the opportunity to take it. There is going to be a performance at the end of the semester. I am looking forward to it. I think it will be really fun. Irish dance is very unique and it’s an integral part of Irish culture and this was such a rare opportunity to take this kind of class and I’m really glad I decided to do it. That class and Empirical Psych are my most hands-on classes. In empirical psych, we do research by conducting experiments. In a lot of my classes, there are concepts discussed that I remember learning about in my classes at New Paltz.

If you live in on-campus accommodation, you live in a village. These are a bunch of houses that each come with their own kitchen/living room, two bathrooms and multiple single rooms. You don’t have a roommate. Dorming is very different here. It feels to me like you have a lot more freedom and just more room in general. You really are living in your own house.  Having your own kitchen  is important because the norm is to make your own food. That was hard to get used to at first, but I enjoy cooking so I didn’t mind once I got used to it. It’s also really nice to have your own room. I also notice a huge difference in social interactions. It seems like people in Ireland are just generally so much nicer. You can strike up a conversation with people sitting at the table next to you at the pub and it doesn’t feel weird. People just seem generally more at ease with talking to people and getting to know them and it’s just really nice and really fun. People also dress so much more nicely when going to class. A lot of guys wear Adidas pants, but the girls can get pretty fancy with makeup done and nice clothes. I have yet to see a single person wear actual sweatpants to class. It’s a very different atmosphere. I feel like students are slightly more mature here, partly because of the way they carry themselves and the way they interact with others. But they also really know how to have fun. I have really enjoyed getting to meet new people here and observe how this culture differs from culture in the US. The international students here come from a wide range of countries