cristiona9

I'm home - today I flew home to California.

The plane ride wasn't too bad at all.  When I flew to Dublin in September I left out of San Jose and took the layover in Chicago, as I thought the direct flight would leave me cramped and stir-crazy.  But, as it turns out I didn't like having to switch planes, that ended up being too crazy for me.  So, this time I took a direct flight to San Francisco.  I handled it just fine.  I got 2 hours sleep the night before (tried to stay up all night, but couldn't make it past 4am) so I was tired enough that I slept a bit off and on (I mean, as much as you can sleep on a plane, ya know).  They also showed a few TV shows and three movies.  The first one, Fool's Gold, I didn't watch cause when I saw the trailer in the theatres it looked pretty bad - so I tried to sleep.  The second one, The Spiderwick Chronicles: watched the first half hour while eating lunch and then decided it was not my cup of tea, so again, tried to sleep.  The third movie was P.S., I Love You, which I LOVE and saw in the theatres twice, so I forced myself to stay awake for that.

When I landed I got off the plane and went through immigration very quickly.  The part that took forever was waiting at baggage claim!!  There was another flight come in from Amsterdam and they put both flights on the same carrousel and, my gosh, I must have been there a half an hour trying to get my luggage!  Plus, my stomach was bothering me a bit, which made it seem like an eternity.  Nevertheless they finally came and I was ready to walk out to the lobby.

Mom and Dad were waiting right there for me.  It was so good to see them!  8 months is a long time!  And Mr. Miles, world's cutest beagle, was also waiting in the car for me.

We decided that we would have lunch at Chili's down in Mountain View in route back home to Gonzales.  And guess who was there - Aunt Nan and Uncle Phil!  More family to see, it was so wonderful!  We had a very nice lunch and I enjoyed some chicken soft tacos, something I hadn't had in 8 months.  You can find Mexican food in Dublin, it's just not that common and the selection is more scarce than here.  They were very yummy.  Dad asked me what I really want food wise that I've missed cause I couldn't get it in Ireland and I said, well, at some point I will definately need to "run for the border" to Taco Bell and I also want some Kraft Maccaroni and Cheese.  The later choice made both Dad and Mom laugh (but hey, Bridge forgot to give me the box she brought back with her, so I've still been without it).

When we got home I took a look around the house and noted a few minor changes here and there.  It felt good to be in the house again.  The rest of the day I just relaxed on the couch (stomach was still achy) and settled back in.

It really does feel nice to be home.  Still there is a part of me that wishes the experience in Ireland and Europe could have lasted longer - it truly was 8 of the most amazing months of my life!  But, I know I can always go back.  And when I settle in to permanent teaching work and have regular scheduled holidays off, I will most assuredly make regular trips back to visit.  I already have possible opportunities at Napa Valley College and Foothill College, so here's hoping they work out.  And I'm keeping fingers crossed that I can apply for the December commensement ceremony so I can return in 6 months to graduate in person.  Until then I have my beautiful memories - of my college and campus living experience, my flatemates, my classmates, my fellow society members, my close friends and people who became like second family to me.  I'll always have them with me and Ireland will always be my second home!

As my jacket says......Ireland - The Craic Was Mighty!

So, today was the "get ready to go home day."  I started over at Bank of Ireland to close my account.  Then I went to Peter Mark and got my hair cut.  I requested Diane, the girl I got last time, and as was the case last time, she did a FANtastic job on the layering and styling.  She is a hair goddess - I have never had such a great hairdresser in my life!!!  I even broke down at the end and asked her if I could take her on the plane with me.

After receiving "the works" I met with Bridge and we had our last lunch at Quizno's together.  I'm really going to miss that girl.  She just cracks me up, she is SO funny!

The rest of the afternoon was spent doing all the packing.  I managed to get it all done in 3 and a half hours - not too shabby.  In the background I played episodes from Season 1 of WKRP In Cinncinati (which I got from Chris when he was here visiting).  That was really fun!  ;)

In the evening I went to my last film club in Dublin.  I coordinated and we showed the film The Pursuit of Happyness with the Benefitting From Life's Tests.  The discussion afterwards went very well and everyone got to see clips of where I'll be flying home to.  ;)

The last stop for the night was meeting the gang for my last pub night in Ireland.  I met up with them at Lord Edwards off of Dame St.  I had never been there before and really enjoyed the atmosphere (although it felt more French then Irish, which was weird).  But, anyway....I had a chance to see everyone one last time for a final goodbye.  Then I walked Stephany home and saw her new apartment.  We had an initial goodbye, but not a final one.  I finally got her gift all ready to go, so I'm going to drop by her work tomorrow to give it to her and then we can say one last goodbye.  That is going to be so hard - I'm just going to miss her so much!!!

I started the afternoon in the Buttery having my last annual Wed. lunch with the gang (Laura, Alessio and Steph were there).  That was nice to enjoy one last meal with them.  Then I headed off campus for some more sight-seeing and decided to make it a "writers" day.  I went to the James Joyce Cultural Centre and the Dublin Writers Museum - both very interesting!

In the late afternoon I was invited by Bridge to join her and her new flatmate at Cineworld to see the Sex and the City movie.  I've never seen a single episode of that show, nevertheless I thought it would be fun to see it.  I thought it was good, but not great.  I'm sure I would have appreciated it more had I been a fan of the show.

Next stop - O'Neill's for my final Wed. GSU pub night.  It was a small group this week which actually made it perfect.  Everyone wanted to see the poster that Steph made for me and they just loved it.  And then (this is so awesome) Alessio said he wished he could sign it and then came up with the idea to have everyone take 1 coaster from the pub and write me a farewell!  They all know that I love the coasters cause every week when we're there I build houses out of them.  ha ha ha ha....  Now when I'm sitting in front of my laptop working on my thesis and I decide to take a break, I can build a "house of friends"!  I mean, how cool is that!!!  ;)

The final event of the night was the holy day celebration at the National Baha'i Centre.  We had SO much fun together!  The commemoration was of the Ascension of Baha'u'llah at 3:00am in the morning.  So, we met at 11:30pm and had a nice beginning program.  Then we went down to the kitchen for tea and snacks and Sarah played guitar for us as we all sang and taught each other different songs we know.  Then at 3am we said the Tablet of Visitation.  It was such a lovely evening and in the course of our songfest we just laughed and smiled over the sillest of things.  It was wonderful - absolutely and truly wonderful!


      

James Joyce Cultural Museum




Dublin Writer's Museum

I started the morning at the cinemas.  I went to Cineworld to see Nim's Island.  It was definately hokey, but cute.  And I'll see anything with Gerard Butler!  ;)

Afterwards I decided to get in some more Dublin sight-seeing while I still have a chance.  There are still places I've always meant to go and hadn't made it over yet.  So, this afternoon I went to St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublinia: The Viking & Midievil Heritage Centre, Christ Church Cathedral and Dublin Castle.  They were all very nice places.  I also stopped at the Mexican restaurant on Georges St. that I've always been meaning to try.  It was FANtastic!!!  ;)

On Georges St. I stopped into a Kodak store to make a print out of 4 photos of me and Steph that I'm framing as a goodbye gift for her.  But, one of the photos didn't turn out, so I'll need to fix it and then go back and do it again.

In the evening I got together with my friend Pat and he took me for a goodbye dinner at a Japanese restaurant, also on Georges St. that I've also always wanted to try.  It was really really good food.  And Pat had his first Bento Box which he really enjoyed.  We had a good time.

Before bed I put some more photos of my recent trips onto my online photo albums and watched a couple episodes of the show Eli Stone.  My parents love this show and recommended I try it.  I've seen 3 so far, but am not sold.  Right now I think it's just okay... We'll see!  ;)  I also found out from yahoo news about Sydney Pollack passing away.  He was in the movie I saw last night and last night is when he died!!!  So sad!!!

Oh and I got a great e-mail message from the Chair of the Video Arts Dept. at Foothill College!  They are expanding the dept. and she might have some teaching work for me in the winter/spring of next year!  AND she loved hearing about the Worldview Film Club and wants to talk to me about starting a screening series at the Foothill campus!  Whoot!!!!!  ;)  She wants to meet with me in Sept. when she is back from sabbatical - I CAN'T WAIT!!!  ;)

St. Patrick's Cathedral




Dublinia




Christ Church Cathedral




Dublin Castle

As silly as this sounds - I wanted one last day of being a student in Dublin (plus I wanted to get a jump start on my intro reading for my thesis).  So, I put the readings in my bag - went to Nude, one of my favorite eateries and enjoyed a delicious lunch while I read.  Then I migrated over to my favorite Starbucks on Grafton St., got my cushioned seat right in front of the big window that overlooks Grafton and continued reading while enjoying a nice Venti Peppermint Mocha Frappacino.  It was nice!  ;)

Afterwards I headed across the River Liffey and was on my way to the Jarvis Centre because I needed to look for a new purse (the strap on the one I was using broke).  But, before I even made it there, I came across this other shop and found an adorable one in there!  Score!  ;)  So, then I went straight on to the Savoy cinemas to get a ticket to see the film Made of Honor.  But, I still had an hour to kill before the film started, so I went to the small cafe right next door and read the last of the reading I wanted to get done for the day.

The film was really cute.  Then I went back to my room and watched the season finales of The Office, Shark and Women's Murder Club.  All good finales!

I spent most of today staying in and doing stuff on the computer.  I updated my itunes library and imported new songs from CDs I've purchsed here over the last few months.  I also made the presentation for the film club this coming Friday night.  I've decided to show the film The Pursuit of Happyness with the theme: Benefitting Fom Life's Tests.  The film is set in San Francisco, so I thought it would be a nice homage for my last film night in Dublin, since SF is where I'm flying back to.

I also updated my list of films that i want to try and see before i leave.  Have to enjoy these Dublin cinemas one last time!  ;)

Before going to bed, I watched the season finales of Desperate Housewives and Brothers & Sisters.  WHOA - did they both leave some intriguing cliffhangers!!!!

I started out the day at the Carrol's store (the big Irish suvineer store).  I wanted to make sure that I bring back home with me anything and everything I can possible want to bring back home with me.  Let me put it this way - I spent so much money they gave me a free CD as a thank you!  ha ha ha...  I had fun and got a lot of great stuff to bring back with me, including the COOLEST t-shirt that has three leprechauns and the text reads: "I See Green People!"  I mean, how perfect is that!  That is totally me!!!!!  ;)  Then I went to the Trinity Collehe shop and got what I wanted out of there.  Don't even ask me how my packing is all going to work out and how the suicases will all magically get filled with everything.  Right now I'm just trying not to even think about it.  Not packing till Friday!

When I got back I couldn't wait any longer to watch the finale of American Idol!  I knew it was the battle of the David's and was dying to know which one took the top prize.  I managed to get through the first episode where they had their sing-off.  Then I took a break and went to the Baha'i Centre for film club (last night was a holy day celebration, so we did Film Club tonight instead).  We watched The Story of Us and had a discussion about the theme of Marriage.  I had never seen that film and thought it was really good!  Then I raced back home (okay not literally) and started to watch the 2 hour results show.  oohhh... Okay, so everything was going fine and I got through the first hour on alluc.org.  Then suddenly I saw that the video only ran for that first hour - they didn't post hour 2.  So, I go to fanpop.com and they don't have the full episode, just you tube cips of specific parts.  And right at the top was a link for the results and the winner was mentioned in the link!  So, I found out who won before I got to actually watch it!  AHHH - now why'd they go and ruin it for me - how annoying!!!  So, that's how it ended for me.  I got to see the moment when the results were revealed and I also watched some other clips of  moments from the second hour so at least I didn't miss the whole second half.  The good news is that my favorite David won!  whoo hoo!!!!  ;)

After that, I called Mom to wish her a happy birthday!

It's all about finding the right dress right?

So, this evening was the end of the year GSU dinner in Commons.  Laura, our Events Coordinator, tried so hard to re-schedule a ball for us, but unfortunately it just didn't work out.  So, the dinner was going to be the official way to celebrate the end of the school year.  Like with the ball, I wanted to look really nice.  So, I got up early this morning, filled myself with a Peppermint Mocha and then hit the stores to find a nice dress.  I went to Dunnes first since that's my favorite store here and I always seem to hit gold.  Well, sure enough I found a great dress that seemed perfect - not to fancy, but classy and elegant (and it stopped me from having to look elsewhere and I was so pooped from just coming home from France all I could think about was relaxing in my room and catching up on American Idol and all my other primetime TV shows).  So, I got the dress and came back to my room and did just that until it was time to get ready for the dinner.

At 5:45pm I walk to the steps of the dining hall where we're all to meet.  And everyone is in jeans and a TV shirt!  ahhhhh....  Apparently the dinner wasn't formal and I was clueless as to that fact (hey I was away and never asked Laura what to wear).  Yikes..  Well, again while I was overdressed in comparsion, I wasn't overdone - my dress was causal enough that I didn't look completely out of place (plus I got nice comments from the girls on how good they thought I looked - God bless good hair days)!  ;)

The dinner was very nice.  The food was fantastic, especially the soup!  It was all much better than the Christmas Commons dinner.  And afterwards we went to Messer Maguires for drinks.  It was there that I got to know a new friend better - Andrea  from Germany.  She is so delightful - very radiant, funny and sweet!  Steph, Andrea and I had a great time chatting the time away!

At the end of the night after Steph and I walked back to our rooms, Steph decided to give me an early going away present.  She presented me with a poster that she created online of different pictures of me and all of my friends at Trinity College.  We were both almost in tears (trying to keep it together)...  I was so touched that she made that for me.  Now when I go home to write my thesis, I can hang the poster on the wall and my friends can all be right there with me!  ;)

I had a great time back in England!  The GSU trip to Oxford was great fun!  We were hosted by our sister school, Oriel College and got to walk around and tour several of the different college campuses.  I especially got giddy when told that the opening to The Golden Compass was filmed all right there.  And Harry Potter was filmed at Christ Cathedral which we also toured (I even bought suvineers - just couldn't resist).  Friday night we had a formal dinner in the dinning hall which was lovely.  Saturday we did lawn bowling and also went punting.  SO much fun!  And Sat. night we went to a pub for dinner - THE pub where C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien used to meet with their writing group (I mean, how freakin' cool is that)!!!  ;)  We later ended the night in the Junior Common Room playing pool.  It was such a fun trip and I'm so happy that I got to be one of the GSU Reps to go!  ;)

After Oxford I said farewell to my classmates at the bus station and I went on to Cambridge to visit my friend Dan who is there studying Computer Science.  I haven't seen him for 5 years or so, so it was really nice to catch up with him.  We spent to half days walking around Cambridge and he showed me the campuses there as well.  Very nice, I thought, but not as majestic as Oxford was.  We also went to a formal dinner in the dinning hall of his college, Trinity Hall (how cool is that - we both go to Trinity.  ha ha....).  Then he took me to a pub called The Castle that he goes to a lot and I got to meet some of his friends.

My last stop before heading back home was London - the capital!  I only got one day really to see it.  Monday night I went to Notting Hill.  I didn't find Hugh Grant, but I think I may have found the park with the black fence where Hugh tries to climb it, slips and then says "wups-c-daisy."  ;)  Then yesterday I walked all around town and saw:
- The Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace
- The Royal Mews
- Kensington Palace
- Westminster Abbey
- Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament
- The Globe Theatre
- St. Paul's Cathedral
- The Millenium Bridge and London Bridge
And since I was in London I knew I just had to see a Broadway show!  So, I chose Wicked and JUST LOVED IT!!!  It was so fantastic!  The leads were INCREDIBLE!  The perfect way to end a great trip!  ;)

I flew back in to Dublin this afternoon (where the weather is WAY warmer - finally, whoo hoo) and had a whole to do list of things to try and get done before heading to my next destination - back to Hungary to visit Chris (this time I'll be seeing where he lives out in the countryside which will be fun - when I was there in December, we were in Budapest the whole time).  Anywho, one of my stops was to Penny's to try and find some summer clothes.  A friend recommended that store to me - huge mistake!  The store was over-crowded and when you try on clothes, you can only take in 4 things at a time - then they make you re-queue!!!  It was crazy and I'll never go back there again.  I should have stuck with Dunnes, I always have great success there!  oh well...live and learn.  Come evening though the day got better.  I went to Sahba's for my last Baha'i devotional here in Dublin.  It was so nice.  And sentimental because that is where I first met some of the Baha'is here (on my 2nd day in Dublin).  They even got me a card and all signed it, it was SO sweet!  I actually prepared the program for the evening and made the theme love and family to thank all of them for being my Irish family!  ;)  After the devotional I then went to O'Neill's for GSU pub night and caught up with everyone about their trip back and told them about the rest of my time in England.  They all want to see the pics I took in Oxford, so I need to get those up on Facebook pronto!  ;)

To view photos go to:  http://cristiona9.myphotoalbum.com