Exploring

I am exploring some more! What else would anybody want to do? It all started with a short visit to Cork last weekend and, for the sake of this post, has momentarily ended last night with a play. I can't wait for my Dublin adventure to start bright and early tomorrow morning!

I visited Cork the other day with some friends. The town's center was nice and had many shops and boutiques. We visited St. Finn's Church, a gorgeous church with intense architecture. It was closed, but the outside held wonders. I hope to visit Cork again before my trip ends and intend to revisit St. Finn's.

Heading back to the center of town for some light shopping and lunch, we crossed a beautiful, little river. There was a small waterfall where the dark and light water mixed. It looked amazing and as we were shooting our photographs stories from repeat visitors circulated. Apparently, a swan almost met his end at the waterfall the other day, but miraculously flew off.

My group and I then at lunch at a pub. It was nice and was ocean themed with stories and plaques of fishing expeditions and sailing trips. The pub also had live fish in tanks around the restaurant, even including the bathroom! The owner and his staff, as well as the fish, were very friendly and the food was good!

On Tuesday, I participated with some members from Mercyhurst College in a cleanup of an old cemetery. After getting lost, which I didn't mind due to the nice weather, we walked/ran to the cemetery. After a bunch of full garbage bags and the brush taken to the back, we successfully left.
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Wednesday was filled with origami in class, errands, an Irish heritage lesson by Tom, one of our regular guides and now a good friend (I would love to adopt him as a grandfather, as I'm sure many would want as well), and a play by the Dungarvan Theater Club. We learned many things during Tom's lectures: the Kennedy family's history with Ireland, the break-up of Ireland into counties, fun facts and stories about Ireland, and much more. Tom's knowledge seems to have no boundaries and his tales (in a grandfather tone) are humorous and enjoyable. The plays, yes two, performed by the Dungarvan Theater Club were entertaining. They both were tied together and illustrated a young poet who couldn't be with his love and thus joined the army in Ireland in WWI. He died in combat and the woman he loved died pregnant in an alley. However, they ended up together and loving each other in the afterlife. It was an odd play with a lot of narration, but was enjoyable.

Many things happen each day here in Ireland and it always is beautiful and fun! The other day while taking a nice country walk, I got to see brand new lambs (the mom of course hated my group being in the same mile of them)! They were adorable! Today, we played with chalk outside with one of my professor's children! Everyone was traced and had "Shreks" made out of them! Every day brings something new and I will keep exploring as I live the next 7 weeks here!