I'm glad I brought my Wellies!!

I guess it's about time I write on here! But where to start?

Ireland is definitely rainy and damp, highlighted by some days/hours which are sunny, mild, and very pleasant. This is the winter though, so by half way through February they say this will clear up and it will start to get warmer and a tad drier.

The city of Galway is beautiful-- the main street in the city is an incredibly long pedestrian street with tons of shops, pubs, restaurants, clubs, etc. on it Every single building is a different color, so its' really bright and pretty and charming. The Corrib River runs through the city, and its really beautiful, but incredibly powerful! I haven't spent much time in the actual city yet, but I plan to. One of these days I'm going to go into the city and buy a bike-- things are pretty spread out here, so a bike should help me get around to more places. I'm thinking there's definitely more to the city than I've seen, and hopefully I'll get to explore that one of these days. Once the weather gets better, I'm sure I'll spend more time outside.

I started classes yesterday, and since nothing I'm taking here counts towards my major in school, I can take anything I want. As of now the classes I'm taking are :

Celts, Vikings, and Normans (Archeology)
Problems in the History of Ireland, 1850-1700
Celtic Religion, Mythology, and Folklore
Geography of Cyberspace
Women in Irish Society
and either James Joyce's Early Fiction or Post-War British Fiction

I'm pretty much going to be a genius on the subject of Ireland when I come home.... and well-rounded one at that.

Tomorrow is societies day which means you sign up for clubs-- I'm hoping to do Hiking/Mountaineering, International Students Society, and I don't know what else. I'm just hoping to end up with some fun stuff to do, and some cool Irish students to do it with.

Adapting hasn't been too bad-- Irish culture is similar to American cultures in a lot of ways-- food is good, people are friendly and mostly easy to understand. Making new friends wasn't too hard-- I bonded with a group of people the first night i was here and we're all still really close!

Things will probably start to get more exciting pretty soon with classes starting and having the chance to meet Irish students. More to come soon!