Phases A Student Goes Through Each And Every Day Of Graduate School

Dear Family and Friends,

I have survived my first week of lectures....barely!!  I have already killed a few trees with all my note card making and I have lost tremendous amounts of sleep.  You will be happy to know though, I have made lots of friends.  Their names are:

Tea
Coffee
Starbucks
Library
Chocolate
Local Pub
Derivatives
Econometrics
Capital markets

We have spent so many hours together and are learning so much about each other.  We have become fast friends in the week that we have been introduced.  It is hard to describe the emotions myself and others have gone through over the past week and the emotions we will go through in the weeks to come.  The best way to describe my emotions can be best depicted in the picture below.

Love Always,
Amanda

Immigration and Fire Alarms

     I have been very busy with preparing for school.  I have already started studying for my classes and lectures have not even begun yet.  How crazy is that!! Last Friday I went to immigration in Dublin so that I could obtain a study visa.  After waiting in line for 3 1/2 hours my passport was finally stamped and my picture taken.  The reason I am telling you this information is so that you can experience it with me.  When they first swiped my passport all my information came up on their system.  The first question the officer asked me was if I was married.  I kindly told him no, that I was a student.  Then he asked me if I was a solicitor (attorney).  Again I told him no, that I was a student studying for my master's in finance.  Now, people who know me know I love to ask questions.  So I started to ask questions.  I asked the officer if he could please tell me what information the computer system was giving him about me.  Apparently, they had me down as being married, but abandoned, and a solicitor.  How is that for a shocker?  Not to worry though, everything is cleared up and I am back to being a student once again.  Talk about a perfect way to end a week.
     This morning around 4:30am I was awoke to a VERY LOUD fire alarm. I actually thought I was dreaming at first.  I quickly put on my robe and stumbled out of my room into the hallway where all my other housemates were gathering.  Many of us were half dressed and a bit disoriented.  The fire alarm was going off in our house, but then it spread to the whole entire building.  We were debating what to do (leave or not) when the alarm went off. I have heard a few fire alarms in my lifetime, but this one topped them all.  This alarm could wake the dead!!  When the alarm went off there were a few curse words and some sighing coming from our house.  Then, as we were going back into our rooms, someone came banging on our door asking if anyone was hurt or if there was a fire.  We then realized it was a false alarm and also that the alarm had started in our house before triggering the whole building.  This morning I went down to the front desk to ask what could have tripped the alarm and they said it could have been anything from a spider to dust.  Maybe this was payback for killing the spider few days ago.  Who knows!

Love Always,
Amanda

Castletown House

Yesterday I spent the day sightseeing.  I went to Castletown House where my friend Kieran is a tour guide.  Castletown House was built between 1722 and 1729 for William Conolly who was a speaker of the Irish Parliament.  Castletown House was kept in the family until 1965 when the Irish Georgian Society obtained it.  The house is now owned by the state and is open to the public with daily tours.  Castletown House is beautiful with lavish decorations and stunning wood and plaster work inside and out.  The central staircase inside is something to awwww over with it sweeping down from the second story to the first spreading out for all to see. Unfortunately pictures could not be taken inside due to the original oil paintings and statues.  If a flash were to go off from a camera the artwork would start to deteriorate.  For more information on this lovely house go the website  http://www.castletownhouse.ie/

Love Always,
Amanda

Whole picture of Castletown House from the website http://ireland.archiseek.com/buildings_ireland/kildare/celbridge/castletown/introduction.html

The Only American and The "Onion" Story

Yes my friends and family, I am the only American in my finance programme of over 100 students.  In the past years the finance programme was only about 60 students big.  With the economy down though they have opened it up to more students.  Today was orientation and part of the orientation was attending a Cultural Diversity lecture.  We had to stand up and introduce ourselves and then say where we were from.  Over 30 percent of the students at UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School are international students and I am very proud to be representing America in the Finance Programme.  Since there are so many cultures represented in the programme we had to attend a lecture on diversity.  This is where the "onion" comes into my blog.  According to the lecturer we are all onions and have many layers that must be peeled back to get to our core.  I instantly thought of the movie "Shrek" and had to smile.  The lecturer was right though, each culture is different and we need to understand each person/culture in order to work with each other for group projects.  I am also the only American in my house at Proby Residences.  In our house there are 2 Canadians (boy and girl), an Irishman, a Frenchman, a girl from Germany, and then there is me.  Do you have any idea how many holidays we are going to celebrate with all these countries represented?  Too many to count!!  This year is going to be so exciting!!

Love Always,
Amanda

P.S. You will be so proud of me.  I killed a  BIG spider (not a daddy longlegs) in my room this evening.  Granted, I threw a shoe at it because I was getting nowhere near the thing, but I did it.  :)   And I know there is a saying about if you kill a spider it will rain.  I am in Ireland, it rains here almost all the time.  I do not think me killing one spider will make that big a difference.  I will tell you this though, any spider I see in my room is a dead spider.  I do not care how harmless the little critter might be.  :)    :)

An Experience

     What is the best thing about Ireland?  The rain of course!!  The past two weeks have been beautiful.  There has been no rain, hail, or even cloudy skies.  And what happens when I move to Dublin?  It rains!  This morning when I woke up the skies were lovely, but I was not fooled.  The weatherman said cloudy skies for today, but I knew he meant rain so I brought my umbrella to go shopping for accessories for my room.  The bus stop is about a 10 minute walk from campus so I caught the bus and headed into Dublin.  I was able to find bathroom towels and different odds and ends to make the room look a bit better.   Now that the bathroom has color it looks so much better. 
     I never thought I would be so happy to find hangers in a store.  Don't get me wrong, I have have plenty of storage for my clothes.  I just have quite a few shirts that must get hung up or they will rumple.  And I cannot be wearing rumply shirts now can I?  So after a wonderful morning of shopping, what happens?  It rains!  Oh,  and it gets so much better!!  At first it was just a light rain, but as soon as I got off the bus to walk back to campus it started to pour.  Now let me ask you, is it possible to carry two big bags plus an umbrella?  You bet it is!  Especially when one bag rips and everything falls out (all the bags are paper) and you are left in the rain holding one bag in one hand and an umbrella in the other.  So I did the only thing possible, I laughed.  :)  I kept on laughing too, know why?  When I was less than 400 yards from my housing, the rain just stopped.  That's it!  It just stopped and the sun came out.  So after drying off and relaxing a bit I decided to go shopping again, this time for food.  I found almost everything I needed, but it was hard because there is no oven in my house.  It is very difficult to find recipes where you do not need an oven.  Especially with all the baking I do! 
     Now I am back in my room, totally and physically exhausted.  After catching so many buses, walking in the rain, and trying to navigate crosswalks today I will sooooooo sleep good tonight.  Tomorrow is the start of orientation for my program.  I cannot wait to see where everyone is from!!

Love Always,
Amanda

Getting Moved In.....

Well, I have finally moved into my place of residence.  I have 5 other housemates, but I have only met two.  They are both from different parts of Canada.  My room is a bit small, but livable.  According to Kieran, my big brother :), I am living in a cell.  All I can say is hey, I am only in the room to sleep.  Before I put up pictures for you I will describe my room.  When you first walk in, there is a bathroom on the right and shelving on the left with a place to hang my clothes.  Walk four steps forward (seriously) and the room becomes a little wider.  On my left is a desk and chair and to my right is my bed.  Right in front of me is a window.  The room is very similar to a hotel room, except cut in half and then in half again for size.  I love it!!  There is a kitchen area with plenty of fridge and cupboard space along with a TV and kitchen table.  The down side..... there is no oven.   The good news.....one of my housemates likes to cook too so we are going to go in for a convection oven.  Oh wait!!  I forgot to tell you about my bathroom!  Think of the smallest closet you have ever seen and that is my bathroom.  And the shower?!?!?! My favorite feature!  All I have is a shower curtain that hangs down to the floor, there is no stopper on the floor to catch the water so I cannot keep anything in the bathroom while I shower or it will get soaked.  I have to admit, I am loving every bit of this.  These are all things one must experience in life and now it my turn.

Love Always,
Amanda


Before

Bed and Window

Desk, Window, and Part of Bed

My Long Mirror

Main Door and Shelving

The Bathroom!!! From left to right you have sink, toilet, and shower

After

Sadly, there was nothing I could do for the bathroom.  Tomorrow I am going shopping to see if I can find some towels and such to make it look a bit more lived in.  I do not know if that is possible, but I am definitely going to give it a try.

Kitchen

The Kitchen! 

Sitting Area

Another View of the Kitchen

The Burren Photos

Caherconnell Stone Fort

Caherconnell Stone Fort

A knife found by archaeologist at the fort

Poulnabrone Dolmen

That's me in front of Poulnabrone Dolmen

The ground surrounding Poulnabrone Dolmen

Burren Birds of Prey Center and Aillwee Cave

Sea Eagle

A close-up shot of a Sea Eagle

A Falcon

A close-up shot of a falcon

A Snow Owl

The Burren

Late last week, Kate and I took a trip to The Burren in Co. Clare Ireland. To quote from Wikipedia "The Burren is a karst-landscape region in northwest County Clare, in Ireland. It is one of the largest karst landscapes in Europe. The region measures approximately 250 square kilometres and is enclosed roughly within the circle made by the six villages. The rolling hills of The Burren are composed of limestone pavements with crisscrossing cracks known as "grikes", leaving isolated rocks called "clints". The region supports arctic, Mediterranean and alpine plants side-by-side, due to the unusual environment. The Burren is renowned for its remarkable assemblage of plants and animals. The region supports many rare Irish species, some of which are only found in this area."


This trip was an adventure for us because we had no idea where we were going until about halfway there. All we had was a map and a car. Once in the vicinity of The Burren, we decided to see Caherconnell Stone Fort, Poulnabrone Dolmen, The Aillwee Cave, and The Burren Birds of Prey Center. We also decided to go for a "mountain walk" which was NOT a gentle walk like we had anticipated. It was actually a mountain hike. We made it though!!  Also, because this website is being a pain, I am posting the pictures in a blog following this one.  Enjoy!

Love Always,
Amanda

The above educational information can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Burren