Olivia's Visit, Galway, and the End of Study Abroad

My Berlin and Prague trip flowed right into my last week in Ireland, and I flew back on that Friday to meet my best friend, Olivia, who had just landed in Dublin for the visit of a lifetime! Only three weeks before we had been really missing each other, and she decided on a whim to see how much it would cost to visit me, thinking it was impossible. Well, it turned out to be about $340 dollars, and before we knew it she had arrived in Dublin! Liv studied in Galway for four weeks during the summer but hadn’t gotten a chance to really tour Dublin. We ate fish and chips, drank pints at a pub, walked around the Temple Bar neighborhood, listened to live music, and ate pizza in Ireland that came recommended, oddly enough, by my Brazilian friend from the pub crawl in Prague (writing that all down made it sound so crazy and international to me, and I love it). Of course, she was super worn out and jet lagged, so we decided to call it a relatively early night and rest up for the rest of her visit.

The next morning we claimed our free breakfasts at our hostel and then walked over to tour the Guinness Factory. I had done the tour before, but it was wayyy more fun to do it with my best friend! It had been a year at this point since I had seen Olivia, and I think it’s possible that the only times we weren’t talking and rapidly catching up were when we both passed out from exhaustion at night.

After walking back into Dublin and taking a quick look at Trinity College, it began to rain. Of course, it’s always raining in Ireland, but this was miserable, pouring rain and 40 degrees type of whether, so we decided to take an early bus back to Cork so that we could get warm.

We decided to just relax and continue catching up that night, stopping for burritos and baking supplies and heading back to my house to make cookies, and we ended up staying up until 3:00 am talking.

Sadly, we both had school work left, and the next day we spent a few hours holed up in a coffee shop studying. By the time we emerged we were hungry, and I took her to an amazing frozen yogurt and bubble waffle place that I had become obsessed with during my time in Cork. While we ate, we noticed there were some small but nice Christmas festivities happening in the City Centre and we stuck around to walk through the stands and view the lights display. It was so wonderful to get to show her this city that I had come to love so much! It's weird, I don't have a lot to write about my time with Liv because it wasn't anything we did that made it so special; it was just being together.

The next day was a long one of touring the town and watching Gilmore Girls in my tiny bed once it got late. Liv had to take the 3:30 am bus in order to make her flight in Dublin, so we decided to pull an all-nighter. Unfortunately we weren’t able to just travel up and stay in Dublin that night because I had a final exam in the morning in Cork. This was my first all-nighter before an exam, and it wasn’t even for academic reasons!

After an emotional goodbye with Liv AND Alyssa and a surprisingly successful test, I spent the next couple of days packing and studying for and taking my Irish Dancing exam (oddly turned out to be my hardest one). I knew I would feel really alone those last few days in Ireland while I waited to come home, so I decided to take a final solo trip up to Galway for a long weekend before my last exam. This turned out to be a great decision! Overall, this trip was the icing on the cake of my study abroad experience. Something happened on this trip where I was able to reflect on my experiences and realize how much I’ve grown and matured in one semester.

After arriving in Galway, I had the afternoon and evening to wander around and experience the town. I headed through the center of town and to the Long Walk, which features a well-known row of colorful houses. There was practically no one out this far since it was super windy and cold, but I passed a group of girls, one of which looked familiar. Through Instagram stalking and a super awkward message, I figured out it was a girl I'd known from high school who was on a two-week trip with her university, and we ended up meeting up that evening. The phrase "it's a small world" is pretty much required here.

After chatting with her and her friends for a bit, I wandered around the Christmas market in Eyre Square. Galway was rumored to have the best Christmas market in Ireland, which is part of the reason I chose to visit so last minute. While I have to say it didn't exactly live up to the ones I experienced in other European cities, I thoroughly enjoyed strolling through and checking out all of the stands.

I wanted to get a last major dose of Irish landscape in on this trip, so I signed up for two tours on two consecutive days. The first was a tour of the Burren ( a region in County Clare) and the Cliffs of Moher. Basically I knew I couldn’t say I had spent four months in Ireland without having seen the Cliffs, and they really were as spectacular as everyone makes them out to be. The tour took us to multiple churches and historical land marks along the way as well as to a fabulous pub for lunch before ending the day with two hours of time to walk around independently at the cliffs. In truth, I probably could have done without the other stops and the constant blabbering of our tour guide, but taking this tour allowed me to make some friends that turned out to be staying at my hostel. We ended up all cooking dinner together and going out to a pub that night, and I convinced the others to join me on the second tour the next day.

The second tour was of the Connemara region, which I expected to be the lesser of the two, but it turned out to be my favorite. We traveled through little villages that only spoke Irish, visited old Abbeys, saw the only fjord in Ireland, and visited the Kylemore Abbey. My friends and I were too cheap to actually pay to go inside the Kylemore Abbey, which was the main stop of the day, but the region was breathtaking and we spent the time just walking along the road and looking up at the misty hills. Rain was drenching us, the wind was howling, umbrellas were breaking, and everything just felt wonderful and Irish. I was so happy.

Half of our little friend group (an Australian and an LA native) departed for Dublin that night, so my remaining companion (a guy from Rhode Island) and I decided to just make dinner and watch a movie. Everyone but me was on 6 month backpacking trips around the world, and it was amazing to hear about their adventures and to take part in just a tiny piece of their journeys.

The next day I headed back to Cork, and the following morning I took my final exam and left for Dublin! I made it a quick turn around on purpose, as I was finally staying in a real hotel in Dublin that night (instead of a hostel or a room resembling a small cell) and planned to soak in every moment of feeling pampered. I ordered an incredible Italian meal and drank Prosecco in a bubble bath, and it felt totally lush and amazing. I was Bubblin’ in Dublin, I told my parents like the true dork I am :)

On that last night in Ireland, I pulled out my devotional and read the entry for the following day (that's my usual system). The entry was one about travel and change, but the punch line read "In a world full of changing places, changing views, and changing circumstances, Jesus is a constant, joining us in each place we journey and living in and through us." We were then encouraged to recall some places we had traveled and to think about our experiences. It's true that I was more alone this semester than I've probably ever been in my life, yet most of the time I was surprisingly content. It turns out this little devotional entry packed some major truth, at least in my case.

By the time I left Ireland I was crazy homesick and eager to head back, but this semester was wonderful beyond words. I learned to be independent in a way I truly didn’t think was possible for me. I was brave in ways I never would have expected of myself. I got in amazing shape. I checked so many stunning places off of my bucket list. I learned to focus on the good things when looking at pictures of myself. I experienced a huge amount of culture and met so many interesting people. I learned that what matters in friendship is quality over quantity. I learned how to budget, how to travel, and how to watch out for myself. I learned how to make friends quickly with strangers. I learned how to let friendships be temporary. I learned how to handle hostels, how to avoid currency and ATM fees, and how to deal with my fear of public transportation. I learned how to communicate with people who don’t speak my language, and I also learned how to speak English in a way that helps those who are less fluent to understand. I learned what a SIM card is and what it does. I learned that something intimidating can still be worth doing. And most of all, I learned how to automatically assume I CAN do something, rather than automatically assuming I'm inept or incapable.

After this semester I feel more competent, confident, strong, independent, healthy, and beautiful than I ever have. While I couldn’t pack up all of Ireland and take it home with me (though my suitcases were almost that big), I hope to bring those traits back with me to my normal life.