I openly admit that many times having a blog and writing about your weekly adventures/thoughts feels a little...pretentious? But this is a way for a few members of my family and a couple friends to keep connected with me, and more likely keep them entertained for a few minutes on their lunch break. So for the next 4 months I will continue to give this little muse of a blog some attention. Thats my justification, take it or leave it :)
Right now I am in the basement of my hostel in Dublin with my buddy Curt. It has only been 2 days and so far luck has followed us. Our flight attendant was Irish, and a sweet lil ol lady. She gave us extra attention (and food) and warm conversation the entire flight over. When we arrived at customs, the officer noticed that we both had musical instruments and he had me pull out my Charango and play a few tunes for him. What luck that he was in such a great mood, because he stamped our passports with our brand spanking new work visas and waived the 150 Euro registration fee!!! An excellent start indeed.
We have already enjoyed a few Guinness's (Guinni?) and enjoyed our fair share of cold rain. Yesterday we went through our brief orientation, learning mostly about the paperwork that follows working abroad, and left feeling surprisingly optimistic about finding an apartment and a job in Galway. We visited an art museum and a history museum and then got lost for an hour in a half around dusk in the pouring rain. Hal and Curt, the wet rat brigade, returned to the hostel and settled in for the night with a few beers, a couple instruments (I realized that I cannot event attempt to play with Curt, he's too good!) and a lot of good conversation and interesting people. Oh yeah, and lots of cribbage. Curt won the first 4 games and I have won the last 5 in a row.
Today's plan is to buy a sim card for our cell phone, get Curt a towel, and see a few sights before trying to figure out how to spend the new year. We have asked around and it seems there is no big event in Dublin for new years. The common response is "Oh, I reckon any pub 'round will be a craic." We know that we don't want to go to Temple Bar, maybe we can create a giant mixed group with the French, Spanish, and other Americans here at the hostel for an eventful evening.
Wish us luck on the job front!
Luvin from Dublin :)
Halbury