I'm still not used to being called an 'international student' around here on campus. For me, the term still reminds me of the seemingly abandoned buildings of the hidden international center at UCSD, making me feel like a rare specimen instead of the normal student I still view myself as. During orientation, one of the international student managers talked about the cycle of disintegration and reintegration when introduced to a new country, and later leaving the new country and returning to the home country. At the time I couldn't find myself on the graph, I didn't know if I was still afraid of all these changes or I was starting to embrace them. This was yesterday. Today at dinner, I suddenly realized that I had become reintegrated into living life in Ireland! From the cute blue polka dot dinner table to the odd habit of making banquet-like dinners, I have come to enjoy the way of life and my new niche here in Cork, Ireland. I'm excited to go to the English market to get fresh farm produce and meat from different butchers, fresh bread loaves and fillets of all sorts of scrumptious seafood. Sure, there are problems here and there, but that exists with anything and everything. I won't get to be here very long and maybe I will never be able to experience anything quite like this ever again, so I might as well take advantage of it now instead of swimming against the current of change. I want to look back later in life at this period and have no regrets.
I made the following tuna sandwich as a dinner at the house I live in in Cork. It was actually the first tuna sandwich I've ever made and it turned out pretty delicious. Quite proud of myself for not screwing it up! :) I also drink orange juice with everything it seems...not just at breakfast.
I have decided after much debate that I want to base my series of posts around one of my most favorite hobbies, and probably many people's actually....that is, of FOOD! There is no specific category of food I will be focusing on, but I will attempt to post as many interesting and delicious foods I've had while I'm abroad as possible. The following picture was taken at a pub while I was in Dublin. I went in because they advertised sangria in jugfuls outside, but apparently they don't offer it in pint-sized-fuls so I ended up getting a cider that tasted like sugar water and costed more than the Guinness...
To start things off, upon arrival at Cork, Jason and I went to a student-atmosphered pub called Sober Lane near the city centre for the first night. We didn't have time to get food or get settled into the apartments yet, so we headed to a good yelp-reviewed (yes there is yelp for Ireland) pub and spent the evening there. It was a nice place, casual but very crowded. I ordered bbq wings with a pint of Carlsberg, a light beer and Jason ordered a burger with a pint of Guinness. I think out of the beers here, I prefer a lighter brew rather than stout. Now don't get me wrong, Guinness is amazing when I'm in the mood for a darker brew but I don't think I can drink that stuff all the time. Jason and I had our first Guinness back in Dublin at a quaint little pub called Ha'Penny Bridge Inn. It wasn't until I was at The Barge with the other UC orientees that I actually was able to finish my first pint of Guinness, however. Back to the wings at Sober Lane...to be honest, I've always run into the problem of not getting enough wings for my money back in the US. If I pay ten dollars, that usually gets me about eight wings. EIGHT wings!? Here, I paid nine euros and it came in a giant bowl with approximately what must have been at least twenty wings! They weren't the crappy rubbery ones either. These were prepared with lots of love and needless to say, I was a very happy girl that night at the bar. The place wasn't too pricey, so I think I will definitely go back sometime if I get another wing craving.
Another good place that I greatly enjoyed was a cafe named Serendipidy, a cute cafe right outside of the UCC campus. A few good friends and I enjoyed some coffee and lunch there, and I ordered a smoked salmon with scrambled eggs for ~9 euros. When the food came, it looked so pretty I almost didn't want to eat it! At first I thought the fish was raw and was a little confused on how I would go about eating it without making faces in front of the others, but soon I discovered that the fish had a very good smoked flavor and was indeed not raw at all! The scrambled eggs added a nice texture and the dill on top completed the flavors. The dish, as you can see, also came with butter and toast, which I ate heartily and happily (yay for butter!). Not sure if I've mentioned this previously, but I've noticed that nearly everything here in Ireland boasts of being made as 100% Irish rather than from imports. I think this is a novel idea to support local farmers as well as reduce dependability and expenses by importing from other nations.
Orientation was very similar to the one at UCSD, where they give us lots of free brochures (pronounced bro-sures here) and various other useless items along with tours everyday for the campus and library. I really like the UCC campus, with the river being a big part of that. The campus is very beautiful and green (as is with everything else here), the people seem very friendly, and I am very excited to start classes. In terms of classes, the first plan was to take some psychology courses for a tentative minor, but the applied psychology dept did not approve 4/5 classes that I had applied for, so I will have to resort to some anatomy and biology classes instead to fulfill some major and med school requirements.
Everyday here is so busy and packed of sights to see and things to do that they all seem to be running together now. I hope you enjoy the pictures I put up and hope they don't make you too hungry! More to come later!!
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