Global Colgate

I love Dublin

    Simply put, I love Dublin.  I can definitely see myself living there one day…hopefully sometime soon.  The city has a lively, friendly, and distinctly Irish vibe.  My favorite part of the city was the Temple Bar District, which has a bohemian feel and a vibrant nightlife.  What I really loved about it was that the nightlife seemed more oriented around meeting up with a few mates for a friendly drink and listening to live Irish music rather than getting all dressed up and going clubbing.  Though vibrant, it definitely had a laid back and friendly atmosphere.  We went to the Temple Bar one night, where we enjoyed Irish drinks and live Irish music.  We were also going to go on a musical pub crawl another night, but as the tickets were sold out, we went to O’Neill’s instead, a pub that was frequented by many of Dublin’s famous writers.

Gogarty's, a traditional Irish pub

New York Times Article

I forgot to mention in my post yesterday, that my home here was featured in the New York Times last Monday! Very exciting!!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/12/science/earth/12suburb.html?_r=2&emc=eta1 

München

Last weekend I went to München with two friends from the study group, Sarah and Tara. It was such a fun weekend! I had been to Munich before, but I didn’t remember much, so it was nice to do all of the touristy things again. We left Freiburg very early on Friday morning, and despite oversleeping, we made it to the train on time!

 

First stop when we got to Munich: lunch and then the Hofbräu Haus. Probably the most famous of Munich’s six breweries, Hofbräu Haus is a huge beer hall where one-liter beers are accompanied by a traditional Bavarian oom-pah band, and you are waited on by lederhosen and dirndl clad staff. I opted for a Radler, which is half beer and half sprite- much sweeter and lighter than the regular Helles beer.

Rugby

    Two weeks ago I went to my first rugby match in Cardiff.  It was for an event called Varsity, which is an annual two-week long sporting event between Cardiff and Swansea (a city in southwestern Wales).  Before the match, I went to a few pubs with my flatmate, and to our great surprise, the crowd was overwhelmingly from Swansea (most of the Swansea fans wore Swansea Varsity shirts and vice versa), to the point that when we walked into one of the pubs, we got booed.  It was a bit odd considering we were in Cardiff, but when we got to the stadium, there was no shortage of Cardiff fans.  (Where on earth they were hiding before the match we’ll never know)  The crowd at the stadium was composed of predominantly students and the atmosphere was really intense – everyone was really into the match.  Luckily for us, Cardiff won!

    Yesterday I went to my second rugby match in Cardiff.  My study group director had us all over for an early dinner at his house before we all headed out to Millenium Stadium (which is going to be used in the London 2012 Olympics).  It’s an enormous place and even though there were many spectators there, we didn’t even get close to filling half the stadium. (That’s why in the pictures it looks like no one’s there, but it was just that everyone was sitting on the other side of the stadium)  The match was in the Wales semipro league, Neath vs. Llanelli.  Seeing as I didn’t know either team, I chose to root for Neath because we were apparently in the Neath section, which turned out to be a good choice because they won.  It was a fun match, even though my knowledge of rugby rules is quite limited. 

The End...or the Beginning?

Two very bizarre things have happened to me recently:
    1) I finished my thesis!!!!!!!!!!!! WOW. 

    2) I flew back to New Hampshire yesterday... You can't see it, but I am making a sad face right now. My last days in London were epic.

Homeward Bound

Last week our class went to the Globe Theatre to see Romeo and Juliette.  The theatre was rebuilt in 1995 to look similar to the structure that existed in Shakespeare's day.  The theatre looks incredibly authentic with its thatched roof and wooden interior.  The top of the theatre is entirely open, so the audience is exposed to stars, rain, airplanes and everything else that is happening above the theatre.  We stood in the "yard" throughout the duration of the play (a less comfortable but more authentic experience).  The atmosphere in the theatre made the play even more enjoyable, particularly when the actors came offstage and sang to us directly!

My friends and I went to see Spring Awakening over the weekend.  We were lucky enough to get front row seats, which made our experience even more incredible.  I have never been so close to the stage that I could distinctly see the actors' facial expressions.  Spring Awakening is about teenagers considering the theme of sexuality in late nineteenth-century Germany.  The choreography was incredible and all of the roles were cast perfectly. 

Dylan Thomas

    This past weekend, I went to Swansea and St. David, both in South West Wales, with my study group.  The Welsh department organized this trip and we were accompanied by one of our Welsh professors, who gave us information about Dylan Thomas and read us some of Dylan’s poems along the way.  This trip revolved around Dylan Thomas, who we learned about in one of our Welsh literature lectures.  Dylan was a renouned Welsh poet and writer.  (Bob Dylan, born Robert Zimmerman, named himself Bob Dylan after Dylan Thomas.)

    Places we visited included the Dylan Thomas Centre, the National Waterfront Museum, Dylan’s childhood home, Fern Hill (where Professor Jones read a poem entitled “Fern Hill”), the Dylan Thomas Boathouse, and the cemetery where Dylan was buried.  We essentially took a tour of places where Dylan lived and places he wrote about.

                 

   We also had some free time in St. David, so I explored the town, which has several cathedrals.  I only saw one, St. David’s Cathedral, but didn’t go inside because it was closed.  After wandering (somewhat aimlessly) for a half hour, my friend and I found the cliffs and seashore of St. David.  The steep cliffs and the ocean crashing on the rocks were really beautiful and soothing.  There were even people climbing up the vertical cliffs, which looked like a lot of fun (and also a bit scary).  Maybe another time…

Now back to writing my paper…

Cheers,

Lea

Hüttenwochenende!

Last weekend, I went to a “Hüttenwochenende” in the Schwarzwald. It was organized by students in the English department at the Uni- they do this every semester for the first semester English majors, and any other English speakers who want to come along.

You’re probably wondering what exactly a “Hüttenwochenende” is. Before getting there on Friday, so was I… I knew it involved hiking and staying in the mountains of the Black Forest for a weekend, but I wasn’t sure if we would be staying in cabins, in tents, or even roughing it out in the open. Not being much of a camping person, I was a little bit nervous. It turns out though, I had no reason to worry. We were staying in a house, with running water, a kitchen and enough beds for about 15 people.