So today was my first "free day" as I had my last lecture yesterday from 10 to 12. I have to say I liked this day a lot for several reasons :-).
At first it was business and I handed in my essay :-) Still can't believe I actually managed to write two essays... we won't talk about the quality now as I really have no clue how they turned out... Probably acceptable, but certainly not brilliant.
I left the house at around 11 and went to town. Already the ride on the Luas (haha, yeah I know, I wrote it and then I realised what I wrote and I just left it so you can have a laugh as well) was quite eventful... Talked to two people and my ticket got checked... I had one - obviously - while others didn't and made an entertaining scene, at least I thought so... The Luas stopped and continued once those 4 people without a ticket were outside. I could describe the type now... you meet them sometimes in Dublin, always the same, but I'm not sure if this is going to be politically or whatever correct.
There's these people, you see and - ehm yeah you smell - that they do not look after themselves... Often they come in couples, both half drunk in the middle of the day and quite frequently you can observe them fighting with each other... usually about something involving money. The other day I was in the pharmacy getting some cough syrup and this couple (of the mentioned "type") wanted to purchase some baby food or something like that and lots of it... It must have cost over 50 Euro and the woman was telling the man to get out the money.... The man with his pretty drunk sounding slang said that he didn't have it... Then she said to him that he put it in his shoe or sock... So the guy starts taking off his shoes and socks and being in the state he was that proved quite difficult... The security guard was standing close-by and I eventually decided to leave and not be one of those horrible spectators ;-). And guess what? Because of all the drama I completely forgot to take my syrup with me...Bummer :-(.
Ok, back to the topic... So I was walking down Grafton Street and I decided to go into that really POSH shop Brown Thomas... Wow, I tell you, it was crazy! They have all the really posh brands in there and I saw something crazily funny... Earphone-covers with lots of bling-bling for 100.99 Euro! It was a bit after the motto "if you don't know what to do with your money anymore"... For a taste of it: http://www.brownthomas.com/ even their website is posh! LOL
So after that experience I finally went into Stephen's Green Park and it's really nice... Pictures on facebook.
After that I went for lunch at Wagamamas and then I went into the shopping center. Later on I went for a coffee and met this lady who invited me to a tea and a cake :-). We talked for at least half an hour and it was REALLY funny... Haha, she told me what she thinks about Switzerland and I have honestly never heard anything further away from the truth... She said only millionaires live in Switzerland and she'd like to see it but she could never afford it and so on :-). Well, I sure wouldn't mind being a millionaire, but well REALITY check ;). Anyway, I had a good time.
When I was walking back to the Luas after six I was really cold... And I was wearing thermal underwear, jeans, warm socks, sneakers and a very warm winter jacket with a thick hat and a scarf and gloves. I could still feel the cold everywhere ;-)... and guess what I see?! These Irish are NUTS, honestly... I saw two girls on the way back with high-heel sandals and a mini-skirt... not even tights! I saw their bare legs and feet and I saw a man with shorts and flip-flops! It's crazy! It was below zero degrees and they walk around as if it were summer!
Ok, I think there was more to say... Ah yeah right... Haha, when going back I wanted to withdraw some cash, but on every ATM on the way back from Grafton Street you have a beggar sitting next to the ATM!? I mean honestly, wtf? Why doesn't the police or anyone do anything against that, it is sooo annoying when you get money from the ATM and you are constantly being asked "any tschääinsch pleeeeeez". And they honestly are like a plague in the city, they are everywhere! Most of them are just quiet and sit there with their cardboard signs.... But this morning I saw a mother with a baby in her arm, I didn't give anything to her, it just makes me angry to see that someone could be so irresponsible and try to get more money by putting a real baby in their arms! Oh and there was this other beggar in Grafton strees, wearing a t-shirt and shorts and nothing else... barefoot and he was freezing like crazy. So I actually took pity on him and went to buy a hot tea at the shop and gave it to him :-) I seem to have a heart after all *grin*.
Ok... with this I'll say goodnight. 2.5 more days in Dublin, but with the weather and all I'll be glad if my flight will make it on Monday, today's flight was 1.5 hours late already...
Everyone at home, cu soon!!!!
Freitag, 17. Dezember 2010
Montag, 13. Dezember 2010
Snow... lots and lots of it
So I wanted to write about the snow since it started and I am finally getting aroudn to doing this :-).
For a start... Ireland and Snow just does NOT match at all! The Irish have no clue what to do with snow and there's absolutely no way of dealing with it... with enough snow, everything would just break down completely.
So where to start with this long and painful, hopefully amusing story about snow??? I guess I'll just sort of highlight some of the funny stories that happened, because I honestly can't remember everything anymore...
The first snow fell, I think, on Sunday the 28th of November or maybe it was Saturday, who knows. It was cute at first, not a lot, but during the night it just kept snowing and so the snow stayed. The Irish were completely taken aback, I mean, it does NEVER snow here in late November, NEVER :-). And so why get rid of the snow if it anyway never snows and it'll be over soon and there won't be any more of it.. Yeah right. So the snow kept on falling and falling, there were thunderstorms (yes, really), maybe even the occasional blizzard... The weather had gone completely nuts and the Irish were still too much in shock to do anything about it...
But hmm... what should they have done about it? Apparently Ireland doesn't own any snow plows and people with houses don't have snow shovels and you get it... they just had no clue how to deal with the snow. Luckily I lived on the Luas line and got to town and back faily easy, the walking was just a bit of a dangerous task, as the snow became ice.
So on Tuesday finally Johann and Jan arrived :-) Due to the snow there were many delays at Dublin Airport and it was occasionally even closed I think. The poor guys arrived into a city full of slush and snow and ice and there was no stopping it... The snow kept falling, harder than ever. Bus service broke down at certain times, Siofra's school closed because teacher living in the country couldn't get into Dublin anymore and so on. Trinity's open day on Wednesday got cancelled as it was too dangerous... a threat to the health of the visitors. I tell you... snow and slush on "polished" cobblestones is bloody dangerous.
On Thursday College was closed to all but students, staff and residents... It remained closed until Monday morning!!!
At this point (still Thursday) I still wasn't able to observe a lot of effort with regard to getting rid of the snow... And still more was falling from the sky... The funny thing... All the Irish kept saying it's a once off thing, it'll not happen again, there's no need to get winter tires for the car, no need for the city to get snow plows,... Well, I guess we'll see about that next year.
On Thursday the situation got completely out of control... At first the green Luas line stopped running because some stupid kids has apparently built a snowman on the tracks... and the police didn't seem to do anything about it, guess they were busy. Later on also the Red Luas line stopped running, there was SO much snow! So yeah, I walked a bit along the Luas tracks, only 2 stops, with a lot of other people... Some of them had to go MUCH further, basically a 1.5 hour walk with normal conditions. And while walking around in Dundrum I saw a Dublin SNOWPLOW!!! Yes honestly, there is at least 1 - probably only 1 ;-) - snowplow!!!
So after that at least the Luas kept running and because it got a bit warmer the streets weren't covered in ice during the day... But you imagine, as soon as the sun went down the slush and water turned to ice... Ice-skating with normal shoes on the Rialto Roundabout at midnight is fun :-).
At this point, I guess it was Monday last week, an effort was being made by staff to clear the college pathways... The methods implemented to get rid of the about 15cm - 20cm thick ice and snow were quite funny...
So... now all the snow has pretty much melted and the city is back to normal :-).
Only 7 more days until I am back in Switzerland :-)...
For a start... Ireland and Snow just does NOT match at all! The Irish have no clue what to do with snow and there's absolutely no way of dealing with it... with enough snow, everything would just break down completely.
So where to start with this long and painful, hopefully amusing story about snow??? I guess I'll just sort of highlight some of the funny stories that happened, because I honestly can't remember everything anymore...
The first snow fell, I think, on Sunday the 28th of November or maybe it was Saturday, who knows. It was cute at first, not a lot, but during the night it just kept snowing and so the snow stayed. The Irish were completely taken aback, I mean, it does NEVER snow here in late November, NEVER :-). And so why get rid of the snow if it anyway never snows and it'll be over soon and there won't be any more of it.. Yeah right. So the snow kept on falling and falling, there were thunderstorms (yes, really), maybe even the occasional blizzard... The weather had gone completely nuts and the Irish were still too much in shock to do anything about it...
But hmm... what should they have done about it? Apparently Ireland doesn't own any snow plows and people with houses don't have snow shovels and you get it... they just had no clue how to deal with the snow. Luckily I lived on the Luas line and got to town and back faily easy, the walking was just a bit of a dangerous task, as the snow became ice.
So on Tuesday finally Johann and Jan arrived :-) Due to the snow there were many delays at Dublin Airport and it was occasionally even closed I think. The poor guys arrived into a city full of slush and snow and ice and there was no stopping it... The snow kept falling, harder than ever. Bus service broke down at certain times, Siofra's school closed because teacher living in the country couldn't get into Dublin anymore and so on. Trinity's open day on Wednesday got cancelled as it was too dangerous... a threat to the health of the visitors. I tell you... snow and slush on "polished" cobblestones is bloody dangerous.
On Thursday College was closed to all but students, staff and residents... It remained closed until Monday morning!!!
At this point (still Thursday) I still wasn't able to observe a lot of effort with regard to getting rid of the snow... And still more was falling from the sky... The funny thing... All the Irish kept saying it's a once off thing, it'll not happen again, there's no need to get winter tires for the car, no need for the city to get snow plows,... Well, I guess we'll see about that next year.
On Thursday the situation got completely out of control... At first the green Luas line stopped running because some stupid kids has apparently built a snowman on the tracks... and the police didn't seem to do anything about it, guess they were busy. Later on also the Red Luas line stopped running, there was SO much snow! So yeah, I walked a bit along the Luas tracks, only 2 stops, with a lot of other people... Some of them had to go MUCH further, basically a 1.5 hour walk with normal conditions. And while walking around in Dundrum I saw a Dublin SNOWPLOW!!! Yes honestly, there is at least 1 - probably only 1 ;-) - snowplow!!!
So after that at least the Luas kept running and because it got a bit warmer the streets weren't covered in ice during the day... But you imagine, as soon as the sun went down the slush and water turned to ice... Ice-skating with normal shoes on the Rialto Roundabout at midnight is fun :-).
At this point, I guess it was Monday last week, an effort was being made by staff to clear the college pathways... The methods implemented to get rid of the about 15cm - 20cm thick ice and snow were quite funny...
So... now all the snow has pretty much melted and the city is back to normal :-).
Only 7 more days until I am back in Switzerland :-)...
Sonntag, 28. November 2010
Connemara - A Road Trip
Hello everyone :-) I am still alive and breathing, but just AWFULLY busy with programming my 3D game. Right now I have absolutely enough of rolling balls and square frogs and so I decided it is about high time I wrote about the absolutely awesome road trip we did a week ago on Saturday!
Two days before the trip we spontaneousely decided to go to Connemara. Grace, Jo, Cian and me, all computer science people :-). We left VERY early... at 7am Grace was picked up (lol, we had to find her first) and then we picked up Jo, who - to everyones utter astonishment - actually was at the Luas station :-). So the 4 of us headed west in Cian's car, some fell asleep ;-) and others enjoyed the sun coming out to greet us!
After about 2hours we had reached the suburbs of Galway and headed noth-west into Connemara. The road was windy and hilly and soonish some people were not feeling that great anymore (*lol*), so we made our first stop near a very scenic lake. There was a stone wall and we all - except for Grace - climbed over it, some more gracefully than others... Thanks for the gentlemen I made it to the other side unharmed ;-). We saw some sheep and Jo tried to catch one of them rather unsuccessfully... *grin*. It was really cold and so we did only take a few pictures (check out the b&w from Cian, they're awesome).
Here on of mine...
After that we continued along the twisties and came to this fjord near Leenane... Looks really nice: A Picture for you!
After a short break outside the car we were all happy to get back inside... damn, it was cold! We continued a bit inland I think towards a waterfall! When you look on the picture below, the street is towards the left side, at the back... So we set out to walk to the waterfall... It looked quite easy at first, but just have a closer look at the "path" it's not really a path and it was muddy in a lot of places or non-existant in others. Well, anyway, I luckily had two gentlemen with me and they were mostly amazingly helpful in getting me to jump from one stone to the other really close to the river :-). Grace gave up halfway through unfortunately :-(...
After the waterfalls we set out to a beach, no idea where it was or what it's called ;-). My informant has somehow vanished from facebook... *grin*. So here you see the 3 people in black, Cian, Jo and Grace... I was too bloody freezing and my "shoes" where not really suitable for sand...
After Kylemore it was already after 2pm and we were all starving... So in Letterfrack we went into a pub and ordered some lunch :-). I got a warm chicken and bacon salad with honey mustard dressing, was absolutely amazing... Don't really know if because i was starved by the time it came or because it really was great. And then we continued towards Clifden and the apparently famous sky road! When we arrived there the sun was out and it was the most amazing, stunning, breath-taking view ever! I could not stop taking pictures, until my camera battery died :-(.
The 3 exchange students on the sky road!
Two days before the trip we spontaneousely decided to go to Connemara. Grace, Jo, Cian and me, all computer science people :-). We left VERY early... at 7am Grace was picked up (lol, we had to find her first) and then we picked up Jo, who - to everyones utter astonishment - actually was at the Luas station :-). So the 4 of us headed west in Cian's car, some fell asleep ;-) and others enjoyed the sun coming out to greet us!
Here on of mine...
So here you can see Jo and me on TOP of the waterfall, perfectly safe to do that... Ehm, what did it say in the beginning... "Do not climb on the falls. To do so could result in fatality." ~ Bord Iascaigh Mhara
But I mean it's just too tempting :-). So with wet and muddy shoes and dirty pants we made it to the top of the waterfall and took some cool pictures! After that we made our way back somehow and lucky me had another set of "shoes" in the car :-). But that little mini-adventure was absolutely a highlight of the day!
Next we continued towards Letterfrack and somewhere on the way saw a sign to Kylemore Abbey... So we went and checked it out, but only from the outside, entre fees where exhorbitant even for students.
After that we drove to Galway and into the city center. After somehow having managed to find an expensive parking space we got out and walked around a bit :-). It was sometime after 5pm methinks... There was a biiig Christmas market with a lot of little stands and we had a look at it. Then went to the "main shopping road" with all the nice, but just inappropriately early hung up Christams decoration. It was quite nice! After some tiem we went back to the car and drove back to Dublin where we all had Tacos at my place :-).
So yes, that was an abolutely amazing and wonderful day!
For absolutely amazing pictures by Cian see:
Mittwoch, 17. November 2010
First Frost
So I have been extremely busy over the past 2 weeks and also quite sick, which didn't help with the busy part at all... but I'm definitely on the road of recovery, antibiotics seem to have helped or it was just time that did it :-).
It has gotten quite COLD here and the first frost has come upon us as well. It's nice, warm and really cosy inside the house :-).
I will start my internship in Galway on the 12th of January after the Unitech mid-term week. This will be an awesome opportunity and I'll stay there for 6 months at least. So I have to find somewhere to stay and move and you know, a lot of planning again and some people VERY unhappy with my decisions... Writing tons of emails to certain people and you all know how much I LOVE writing this formal suck up emails ;-). But I am getting really awesome at it and people seem to have realised that I am not fooling around and that I actually do know what I am doing...
Otherwise it's going good at uni, just wrote my second exam... Hehe, took about 20 minutes to do it and then I had to wait 10 more minutes to get out (can't leave in the first half hour of a 90 min exam)... Not that I did particularly well I guess, but I just knew some answers and with others I had absolutely no clue.. so guesswork was involved... that's the beauty of MC exams with no negative marking now, isn't it?
Also in less than 2 weeks my awesome friends from university are coming to visit for an entire WEEK, YES, it's absolutely great. I already rent a car for 3 days over the weekend and we'll be going on a Road Trip to Galway and Connemara and so on! It'll be awesome... just hope the weather will agree with that. Hehe and driving might be fun ;-)... no I have to say, I'm completely used to this "driving on the wrong side of the road" by now...
Ok, I actually have to do some work now... So I HOPE that I'll be able to write again earlier than this time...
Hope you're all well :-).
It has gotten quite COLD here and the first frost has come upon us as well. It's nice, warm and really cosy inside the house :-).
I will start my internship in Galway on the 12th of January after the Unitech mid-term week. This will be an awesome opportunity and I'll stay there for 6 months at least. So I have to find somewhere to stay and move and you know, a lot of planning again and some people VERY unhappy with my decisions... Writing tons of emails to certain people and you all know how much I LOVE writing this formal suck up emails ;-). But I am getting really awesome at it and people seem to have realised that I am not fooling around and that I actually do know what I am doing...
Otherwise it's going good at uni, just wrote my second exam... Hehe, took about 20 minutes to do it and then I had to wait 10 more minutes to get out (can't leave in the first half hour of a 90 min exam)... Not that I did particularly well I guess, but I just knew some answers and with others I had absolutely no clue.. so guesswork was involved... that's the beauty of MC exams with no negative marking now, isn't it?
Also in less than 2 weeks my awesome friends from university are coming to visit for an entire WEEK, YES, it's absolutely great. I already rent a car for 3 days over the weekend and we'll be going on a Road Trip to Galway and Connemara and so on! It'll be awesome... just hope the weather will agree with that. Hehe and driving might be fun ;-)... no I have to say, I'm completely used to this "driving on the wrong side of the road" by now...
Ok, I actually have to do some work now... So I HOPE that I'll be able to write again earlier than this time...
Hope you're all well :-).
Sonntag, 7. November 2010
Schwyzerdütsch
Ok, for all my non-Swiss-German-speaking friends sorry about this, but I got some complaints from my home country as not everyone speaks English there.
Hallo mini Liebe
Für alli vo euch wo leider nit hän chönne mitvefolge was bis jetzt alles so passiert isch do in Dublin es Chlises update.
Ich ha mich do am Afang, also vor über 6 Wuche, guet igläbt. Ich wohn ime Stadteil Rialto, dä isch an und für sich nit eso speziell und au nit grad bsunders schön, aber es isch noch bim Zentrum und ich had Luas, sone Art Tram, ganz noch bi mir. Ich wohn binere ganz liebe Familie, wobi eigentlich isches nur es Mami und e Tochter. S Huus isch us de 30er Johr, chli alt, abr sehr viel Charme und ich ha mi gli deheime gfühlt.
Bald nach däm ich acho bi hän mir am Trinity College, dört studier ich für das Semester, e sone Art Ifierigswuche gha. Es het relativ vieli Infoverastaltige geh, ich ha anderi Lüt kenneglernt und bi viel ufem Campus umegloffe. S Trinity College isch z'mitzt im Zentrum und het en riese grosse Campus. Weme dur dr "FronArch" also de Igangboge ine chunnt isches grad viel ruhiger und alles isch griener und schöner :-). Me het also so öbbe 7 minute vom einte ändi ans andere.
Jo und de e Wuche spöter het d Uni so wirklich agfange. Ich mach 4 verschiedeni Kürs, 2 in Informatik und 2 in Business. Ir erste Wuche isch alles neu gsi... am Trinity funktioniert halt alles nomol echli anders als ar ETH, abr ich ha relativ schnäll usegfunde wies lauft. Die erste Ire kenneglernt und scho die erste Kürs abgwählt (ha am Afang 6 gha).
Ir nexte Wuche bi ich im 7te Himmel gsi wägeme gwüsse Ir... Alles echli vrruckt, nach so kurzer Zyt en Fründ in Irland... Aber es isch super gsi, er isch super gsi und ich ha Irland ufsmol no besser gfunde. Na, 4 Wuche spöter isch das denn so zimli alles vrbi gsi... Zu unterschiedlich, beidi dickköpfig,... und ez sin mir gueti Kollege. Abr die 4 Wuche sin wirklich super gsi, ich ha viel erläbt, viel gseh und Wolke 7 isch doch glich toll.
Die Wuche isch chli schwieriger gsi. Ich bi sit am Mäntig zimli vrkeltet... wobi e Vrkeltig isch glaub chli untertriebe... Isch evtl au e Grippe gsi kei Ahnig. Bi uf jede Fall deheim bliebe, fuul umeghange, nit viel gmacht... Na, bim Wätter dusse isch das au nit iladend gsi.. Miserabels Wätter sit am Mäntig, Irland macht sich alli Ehr. Und d Arbet fürd Uni isch sich am uftüürme... Na, es het au paar tolli Sache geh die Wuche :-). Am Fritig Obe bini ins Kino mit mire "Gastfamilie" und de Film isch super gsi "The kids are alright" und gester Obe bini zunere andere Ustuschstudäntin Heim... mir sin vieli gsi, hän z'Nachtgässe und Kartespiel gmacht und es isch super gsi!
Suscht hani scho einigi Sache in Dublin gseh, abr es git no viel woni noni gseh ha... De hani scho 2 Usflüg gmacht, eine nach Glendalough und Kilkenny und der ander nach Killarney und ind Region Kerry. Isch beides super gsi... Ich plan spötistens de next Usflug wenn de Johann und Jan afangs dezember uf Bsuech chöme.
So und ez muessi mol los :-).
glg Sara
Hallo mini Liebe
Für alli vo euch wo leider nit hän chönne mitvefolge was bis jetzt alles so passiert isch do in Dublin es Chlises update.
Ich ha mich do am Afang, also vor über 6 Wuche, guet igläbt. Ich wohn ime Stadteil Rialto, dä isch an und für sich nit eso speziell und au nit grad bsunders schön, aber es isch noch bim Zentrum und ich had Luas, sone Art Tram, ganz noch bi mir. Ich wohn binere ganz liebe Familie, wobi eigentlich isches nur es Mami und e Tochter. S Huus isch us de 30er Johr, chli alt, abr sehr viel Charme und ich ha mi gli deheime gfühlt.
Bald nach däm ich acho bi hän mir am Trinity College, dört studier ich für das Semester, e sone Art Ifierigswuche gha. Es het relativ vieli Infoverastaltige geh, ich ha anderi Lüt kenneglernt und bi viel ufem Campus umegloffe. S Trinity College isch z'mitzt im Zentrum und het en riese grosse Campus. Weme dur dr "FronArch" also de Igangboge ine chunnt isches grad viel ruhiger und alles isch griener und schöner :-). Me het also so öbbe 7 minute vom einte ändi ans andere.
Jo und de e Wuche spöter het d Uni so wirklich agfange. Ich mach 4 verschiedeni Kürs, 2 in Informatik und 2 in Business. Ir erste Wuche isch alles neu gsi... am Trinity funktioniert halt alles nomol echli anders als ar ETH, abr ich ha relativ schnäll usegfunde wies lauft. Die erste Ire kenneglernt und scho die erste Kürs abgwählt (ha am Afang 6 gha).
Ir nexte Wuche bi ich im 7te Himmel gsi wägeme gwüsse Ir... Alles echli vrruckt, nach so kurzer Zyt en Fründ in Irland... Aber es isch super gsi, er isch super gsi und ich ha Irland ufsmol no besser gfunde. Na, 4 Wuche spöter isch das denn so zimli alles vrbi gsi... Zu unterschiedlich, beidi dickköpfig,... und ez sin mir gueti Kollege. Abr die 4 Wuche sin wirklich super gsi, ich ha viel erläbt, viel gseh und Wolke 7 isch doch glich toll.
Die Wuche isch chli schwieriger gsi. Ich bi sit am Mäntig zimli vrkeltet... wobi e Vrkeltig isch glaub chli untertriebe... Isch evtl au e Grippe gsi kei Ahnig. Bi uf jede Fall deheim bliebe, fuul umeghange, nit viel gmacht... Na, bim Wätter dusse isch das au nit iladend gsi.. Miserabels Wätter sit am Mäntig, Irland macht sich alli Ehr. Und d Arbet fürd Uni isch sich am uftüürme... Na, es het au paar tolli Sache geh die Wuche :-). Am Fritig Obe bini ins Kino mit mire "Gastfamilie" und de Film isch super gsi "The kids are alright" und gester Obe bini zunere andere Ustuschstudäntin Heim... mir sin vieli gsi, hän z'Nachtgässe und Kartespiel gmacht und es isch super gsi!
Suscht hani scho einigi Sache in Dublin gseh, abr es git no viel woni noni gseh ha... De hani scho 2 Usflüg gmacht, eine nach Glendalough und Kilkenny und der ander nach Killarney und ind Region Kerry. Isch beides super gsi... Ich plan spötistens de next Usflug wenn de Johann und Jan afangs dezember uf Bsuech chöme.
So und ez muessi mol los :-).
glg Sara
Freitag, 5. November 2010
First Exam... lol
Ok... I had my first exam... well can you really call it an exam?
Firstly it was a Multiple Choice exam... That didn't really calm me down, I mean, the MC-exams can be awfully difficult. Ok, it helps if you know that there is only 1 correct answer and NO negative marking... Already a lot more humane than ETH. So I prepared, read the book, read the slides and so on... Was quite a lot of material.
Then I sit at the exam, 45 questions and it's a joke... Like really unbelievable. Not saying I did well... I probably didn't do too good.
If you have questions like what do the letters in DMAIC stand for... YEAH, right... I can tell you that DMAIC is a method of continuous improvement and it is used as a cycle... so once you are through all the stages, you start again... First you figure out what you want to do, then you measure if this is needed, you evaluate if the desired result will be produced, you make the design even better and then you check it again...
BUT I don't know it the C stands fo Check or Control... it's like the same thing and COMPLETELY doesn't matter! So yeah... I find that a bit stupid really.
And you know... it continues like that. Definition after definition and you are supposed to pick the right thing... It's not about logic or understanding, simply about learning stupid definitions by heart.. and I didn't do that :(.
Well, at least there were some math questions in the exam and I got to use some of my brain cells and some of the stuff I actually understood... And I even managed to solve the stuff without the calculator we could have apparently brought with us, but it didn't say so anywhere...
BUT, I know that not all exams at TCD are like this... I assume this exam is the exception. I have seen exams by the other Business prof, the German Mr. Fellenz. He does MC questions as well, but they are REALLY difficult and you need to actually use your brain and have understood the concepts... Also I saw old exams of the Computer Science people and they are much much harder still.
Otherwise this week has been like the weather... sometimes crappy, sometimes awful, at times a little lighter, but usually just gloomy. Not a lot of fun having the flu and yeah, I'll leave the rest for now...
I'm in serious need of my portion of tv-series... I'll start with Grey's Anatomy, continue with Private Practice and finish with Vampires Diary... Maybe that'll make everything a bit brighter :-).
But don't worry, the flu is going away... so is my voice ;-) and the other issues, yeah, they'll get better over time. I still like it here, not the weather, but everything else and it's only like 4 more weeks until I get visitors, so yay :-).
Firstly it was a Multiple Choice exam... That didn't really calm me down, I mean, the MC-exams can be awfully difficult. Ok, it helps if you know that there is only 1 correct answer and NO negative marking... Already a lot more humane than ETH. So I prepared, read the book, read the slides and so on... Was quite a lot of material.
Then I sit at the exam, 45 questions and it's a joke... Like really unbelievable. Not saying I did well... I probably didn't do too good.
If you have questions like what do the letters in DMAIC stand for... YEAH, right... I can tell you that DMAIC is a method of continuous improvement and it is used as a cycle... so once you are through all the stages, you start again... First you figure out what you want to do, then you measure if this is needed, you evaluate if the desired result will be produced, you make the design even better and then you check it again...
BUT I don't know it the C stands fo Check or Control... it's like the same thing and COMPLETELY doesn't matter! So yeah... I find that a bit stupid really.
And you know... it continues like that. Definition after definition and you are supposed to pick the right thing... It's not about logic or understanding, simply about learning stupid definitions by heart.. and I didn't do that :(.
Well, at least there were some math questions in the exam and I got to use some of my brain cells and some of the stuff I actually understood... And I even managed to solve the stuff without the calculator we could have apparently brought with us, but it didn't say so anywhere...
BUT, I know that not all exams at TCD are like this... I assume this exam is the exception. I have seen exams by the other Business prof, the German Mr. Fellenz. He does MC questions as well, but they are REALLY difficult and you need to actually use your brain and have understood the concepts... Also I saw old exams of the Computer Science people and they are much much harder still.
Otherwise this week has been like the weather... sometimes crappy, sometimes awful, at times a little lighter, but usually just gloomy. Not a lot of fun having the flu and yeah, I'll leave the rest for now...
I'm in serious need of my portion of tv-series... I'll start with Grey's Anatomy, continue with Private Practice and finish with Vampires Diary... Maybe that'll make everything a bit brighter :-).
But don't worry, the flu is going away... so is my voice ;-) and the other issues, yeah, they'll get better over time. I still like it here, not the weather, but everything else and it's only like 4 more weeks until I get visitors, so yay :-).
Sonntag, 31. Oktober 2010
Halloween
This will be a really short post, as I am completely swamped by work for uni.
This weekend was Halloween (still is today, I know) and yesterday I went out :-). All dressed up as you can see here:
I had a lot of fun with the two other Unitech girls in Dublin, Ida and Verena. There were sooooo many people dressed up in the streets, so creative! It was an awesome night out.
Now I unfortunately have to get back to work... This Friday we had a presentation in Graphics, on tuesday the Graphics assignment is due, in Vision we got a huge assignment in Introduction to Operation Management I have a MC-exam on Friday... and in 2 weeks I have one in Organizational Behaviour. So yeah, me is very busy ;-). But I still love it here and everything is great. In 1 month I get my first visitors from Switzerland, soooo looking forward to it :-).
Enjoy your next week!
This weekend was Halloween (still is today, I know) and yesterday I went out :-). All dressed up as you can see here:
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| Halloween: witch, green goblin or Fiona from Shrek, take your pick :-) |
Now I unfortunately have to get back to work... This Friday we had a presentation in Graphics, on tuesday the Graphics assignment is due, in Vision we got a huge assignment in Introduction to Operation Management I have a MC-exam on Friday... and in 2 weeks I have one in Organizational Behaviour. So yeah, me is very busy ;-). But I still love it here and everything is great. In 1 month I get my first visitors from Switzerland, soooo looking forward to it :-).
Enjoy your next week!
Sonntag, 24. Oktober 2010
Rainbows and the Perfect Weather - Killarney
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| rainbow :-) |
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| lake in front of Muckross House and SUN :-) |
I am back from my Killarney Trip and I have to tell you, it was absolutely amazing... I totally loved it :-).
There is soooo much I would love to tell, it's already 11pm and I am pretty tired, but I guess I'll just start while my pictures are getting loaded onto the computer... I can tell you how many picture I took in a second... *waiting* It's 434, crazy and I'll have to sort them out first...
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| Celia and me in our room :-) |
We did not stay there very long... After having one pint of Guinness soak most of our clothes and having our stuff searcher by some random people,... we just didn't enjoy it that much anymore. We went back to the hostel, talked a bit and eventually fell asleep.
The next morning we woke up and first thing first... had a look out of the window... It wasn't raining, but it didn't look very promising. After a nice breakfast we eventually left towards Dingle Bay. It was a nice drive along a really scenic route and the weather made it all the more interesting... rain, sun, dribble, stormy rain, sun... and loads of RAINBOWS... I tell you, I was rainbow hunting :-) with the camera and I got soooo many! I even saw a perfect 180% one and it was even a double one! YAY, I was in paradise. But that was throughout the day.Eventually we arrived at Blasket Heritage Center... It's a museum dedicated to the people of Blasket Island... which is an island off the coast of Dingle. The amazing thing about the island is that a lot of really good (apparently) books were written by the blasket island people. But the island has been evacuated a couple of decades ago. In general the museum was rather boring to be honest and I was glad when we left again.
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| Celia, Arne and me in front of Blasket island... really windy |
Pasquale took the scenic route back to Dingle and me always sitting in the front seat (yeah, you all know why, lol) I got the best view :-). The road was pretty adventurous at times and I was glad that our bus driver was great... There was once even a stream flowing over the road :-). In Dingle, which is a pretty small village with not a lot there, I had some lunch with a couple other students and we took a few pictures of the harbour... Once we got on the bus it started pouring down again. After this we left for Tralee and the County Kerry museum.As an explanation... Killarney is the main town of couty Kerry. The museum was really good, but we only had 1 hour to look at it, which was pretty tight. So I didn't get to see everything I would have like to see. After that we drove back to Killarney.
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| Charlotte and me in front of St. Mary Church |
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| the "hiking" group |
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| the deer :-) |
Once back at the hostel some of us had the great idea to go and explore Killarney (not that it's a big city *smile*) and also walk a bit into the national park (which is huuuuge). So we had a look at St. Marys Catherdral, which was really beautiful... It was made out of stone and just looked amazing. After that we went for a great walk in the park. We hear dear and some of us, two guys, Charlotte and me went to have a closer look at the deer... Finally we found them on a big lawn and there were sooo many of them :-). It was already getting dark, so we didn't get any good pictures, but we saw them very good. There was the male deer and he had huge antlers. We also got pretty close to them. It was an amazing experience. When walking back towards town we had a great view of the night sky with the full moon and the illuminated church top.At the hostel we got some Spaghetti Carbonara cooked by some nice italian guys and after that we went to a pub where an Irish band was playing live music. It was really enjoyable. As I was really tired I went back at around midnight while some of the others went to the night club. Apart from some guys coming back to the hostel really really drunk the night was quiet.
So the next morning me and Celia got up at 8.15, had a look out of the window and there was NO cloud to be seen, then we also had the clever idea to go eat breakfast in our pyjamas while everyone else of the group was still sleeping or dressing. So we enjoyed a rather quiet breakfast and went back to dress and pack eveything (I packed in 1 min ;-)). Eager to hit the road we finally left at about 9:45 (temperature was 2°, it was freezing cold!!!) and headed towards some Caves... Ehm crac caves or something... *looking it up* Yeah Crag Caves. To be honest it was nice and sweet, but just nothing compared to some of the caves I've been to in the south of France. We drove back towards Killarney and headed to the Killarney National Park. All the way we had SUN and the view was just amazing... I took so many pictures out of the bus... just hope they look ok... At the park we left the bus and headed towards a waterfall, Torc Waterfall. It was y bit of a walk, but soooo beautiful. We walked up along the stream and through forest, it was sooo green! I'm not sure if I just notice that it's so green because I know that's what it's supposed to be in Ireland or because it really is this green... Anyways... The waterfall was really nice and we kept on walking uphill... until we reached this amazing place with this absolutely breathtaking view over the whole National Park with the big Lake (with the apparently bad monster in it, can't be bothered to look up the name). I could have stayed there the whole day! |
| stream below the Torc Waterfall |
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| Torc Waterfall |
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| view from the lower level |
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| view from the upper level |
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| nice view :-) |
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| Muckross House |
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| The lake and the SUN |
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| secret garden |
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| picture of the moon on the motorway (that's what it's supposed to be!) |
Oh, and tomorrow is Bank Holiday here, don't ask me why, don't ask me why it's called that way... I don't care, it just means I have another free day. And the best of it all, Cian will be back tomorrow :-).
So I wish you all a great next week!
Donnerstag, 21. Oktober 2010
Wicklow, Computers and Life
So it is actually nearly midnight here, but I decided that it was high time I updated my blog and gave you all some more news of how life is going here...
It is grand :-). I am happily in love (which actually does make some other things less annoying... magically) and university is going alright, home is awesome and well, in general I'm just very comfortable here.
Today both Cian and me were finished at 12 for the day... So as sensible students do we stayed about 2 more hours to get some work done... Guess the only person getting work done was Cian as I was fighting with the computer... I tell you, the computer was winning... He swallowed my program and didn't want to spit it back out no matter what I did. So I have to admit I was pretty pissed off at that (excuse the language) and as the computer kept on crashing I decided I'd go to the library and do something for my organizational behaviour course.
The funny thing about that is.. haha, I had to read the "Motivation" chapter and I felt pretty unmotivated... so unmotivated actually that I fell asleep and only woke up once I got a text from Cian. So that was that.
We went to Dundrum, got the car and drove towards Wicklow... The streets are VERY narrow and sometimes they have walls on both sides, it's a bit freaky, but I was in good hands :-). We stopped first at a place with a stunning view over Dublin, it was absolutely breath-taking... As we continued along the road the land kept getting more barren, but in a nice way and not a lot of other cars were around. The landscape all around was really nice and sometimes we'd see the Sugarloaf (that's dublin's house mountain... or rather hill... apologies to the Irish, but it really is a hill). A bit further down the road we stopped in this really boring spot and Cian wanted to show me something.
So we got out of the car... took my scarf and fleece jacket and we walked away from the road, up this little footpath... Once at the top the view was stunning :-) and so was the wind! There was this little lake, perfect colors in front of a hill and it just looked amazing. We took some quick pictures and enjoyed the view for a very little time... otherwise we just might have become part of the scenery as frozen ice status. Man that wind was something... and it was a sunny day! Don't want to know how it would be like on a stormy night ;-).
We drove on, got warm again in the car and somehow already a bit on the way back towards Dublin we stopped a third time. Got out of the car and walked a bit uphill, the wind was alright, but as soon as we walked over the top part I thought I'd actually get blown away... both by the scenery and the wind. It is this amazing lake that looks like a pint of Guinness from space. Here's a picture from google maps (just google lough tay):
So after a bit of wandering around on the hill and Cian's camera giving up on the battery (I think it might just have been frozen, lol) we drove back to Dublin. So that was about a 2.5 hour drive, very lovely!
Other news:
You might just like to go see social network, it's actually pretty good as long as you take it as a piece of fiction rather than fact.
Tomorrow afternoon I'll leave for Killarney with DUISS, which is the international student society of Trinity College. I'll be there for 2 days and I'm assuming it'll be loads of fun.
Ah, pictures from the Wicklow drive will follow as soon as I get them from the photographer with the camera.
Oh and Ireland is starting to catch uf to Switzerland regarding the hits on my blog :-). The ranking is Switzerland, Ireland... a wiiiiiide gap, then Sweden (guess that's because it'll find it until sweden and then get lost) and New Zealand :-).
And something else: Basel beat AS Roma, yay, go FCB!!!
It is grand :-). I am happily in love (which actually does make some other things less annoying... magically) and university is going alright, home is awesome and well, in general I'm just very comfortable here.
Today both Cian and me were finished at 12 for the day... So as sensible students do we stayed about 2 more hours to get some work done... Guess the only person getting work done was Cian as I was fighting with the computer... I tell you, the computer was winning... He swallowed my program and didn't want to spit it back out no matter what I did. So I have to admit I was pretty pissed off at that (excuse the language) and as the computer kept on crashing I decided I'd go to the library and do something for my organizational behaviour course.
The funny thing about that is.. haha, I had to read the "Motivation" chapter and I felt pretty unmotivated... so unmotivated actually that I fell asleep and only woke up once I got a text from Cian. So that was that.
We went to Dundrum, got the car and drove towards Wicklow... The streets are VERY narrow and sometimes they have walls on both sides, it's a bit freaky, but I was in good hands :-). We stopped first at a place with a stunning view over Dublin, it was absolutely breath-taking... As we continued along the road the land kept getting more barren, but in a nice way and not a lot of other cars were around. The landscape all around was really nice and sometimes we'd see the Sugarloaf (that's dublin's house mountain... or rather hill... apologies to the Irish, but it really is a hill). A bit further down the road we stopped in this really boring spot and Cian wanted to show me something.
So we got out of the car... took my scarf and fleece jacket and we walked away from the road, up this little footpath... Once at the top the view was stunning :-) and so was the wind! There was this little lake, perfect colors in front of a hill and it just looked amazing. We took some quick pictures and enjoyed the view for a very little time... otherwise we just might have become part of the scenery as frozen ice status. Man that wind was something... and it was a sunny day! Don't want to know how it would be like on a stormy night ;-).
We drove on, got warm again in the car and somehow already a bit on the way back towards Dublin we stopped a third time. Got out of the car and walked a bit uphill, the wind was alright, but as soon as we walked over the top part I thought I'd actually get blown away... both by the scenery and the wind. It is this amazing lake that looks like a pint of Guinness from space. Here's a picture from google maps (just google lough tay):
Other news:
You might just like to go see social network, it's actually pretty good as long as you take it as a piece of fiction rather than fact.
Tomorrow afternoon I'll leave for Killarney with DUISS, which is the international student society of Trinity College. I'll be there for 2 days and I'm assuming it'll be loads of fun.
Ah, pictures from the Wicklow drive will follow as soon as I get them from the photographer with the camera.
Oh and Ireland is starting to catch uf to Switzerland regarding the hits on my blog :-). The ranking is Switzerland, Ireland... a wiiiiiide gap, then Sweden (guess that's because it'll find it until sweden and then get lost) and New Zealand :-).
And something else: Basel beat AS Roma, yay, go FCB!!!
Samstag, 16. Oktober 2010
1916 Rising or a History Lesson
Library Online ExhibitionI would like to mention that I do not guarantee the correctness of things mentioned in the following text, also these are my personal views and don't necessarily represent the truth! At the end of my post I will add some more links for those interested. Because this is actually a crazy topic to write about in a blog entry... It's way too complex to cover everything!
In order to get an understanding of the 1916 Rising - which is something like a revolution, but it might all together be a different thing depending on how you look at it - we will first have to look at the past of Ireland's history.
Picture I took at the museum of the Easter Proclamation.
Before 1916 - A Short Irish History
The English rule over Ireland began in the 12th century when King Henry II secured lordship over the south-eastern area of Ireland, which would mostly be Dublin and its surroundings. Only the Tudors in the 16th century managed to get a hold of the entire country. From then on the Irish were more or less ruled by the English. At first the English set up in Dublin and ruled the country from there, but as the centuries progressed a system called Home Rule was put into place, which basically gave the Irish a bit more freedom in decision making (at least this is how I understood it). Also how I understood it a lot of the Irish culture and especially the language was being suppressed during those times. ***Just an aside, I think this Home Rule system was actually never really put into place as events seemed to happen in a really quick manner around that time...***
Involved Parties
What we also have to look at first is who was actually involved in the party and what were their political goals and motivations? I will sum this up very shortly:
Come August 1914 the First World War broke out and the reactions in Ireland were very different. Many men in the Ulster Volunteers were going to postpone the issue of Home Rule and actually went to fight for the British Army agaist the Germans. But the IRB thought that the British involvement in the war would be an amazing opportunity to seize power themselves, seeing that the military forces of England would be focused towards Germany and not Ireland. Also a small percentage of men in the Ulster Volunteers didn't want to help England and so the party split (those ones with England: National Volunteers, the others Irish Volunteers).
The Planning
I think the planning mostly started in 1915 with primarily men both in the IRB and the Irish Volunteers (they were in both organisations) being involved in the process. Names include: Patrick Pearse, Joseph Plunkett, Eamont Ceannt, Thomas MacDonagh, Tom Clarke and Seán MacDermott, later on also James Connolly got involved. These 7 men were going to plan the rising and had the idea that they were going to accept any help they could get from Germany... I think the main problem was that they didn't have enough weapons and so they tried to get weapons shipped into Ireland.
The 1916 Easter Rising
On Easter Monday the Rising started. Strategically important points were seized throughout the city, but they didn't succeed in taking over Trinity College (only armed with a handfull of unionist students) and Dublin Castle (also not very heavily armed).
On the first day the English forces where generally rather surprised and uncoordinated in their response.
As the rebels had failed to seize the train stations or the harbour the English just brought over reinforcements. Also they brought in a vessel called Helga on the Liffey. So together with the guns positioned inside Trinity and the support of the Helga on the river the English were able to get the situation under control. Eventually the rebells had to surrender to avoid further loss of life.
I think that over 400 people died and more than 200 of these were civilians.
Aftermath
What happened after the Easter Rising is in my view not a nice chapter of history... An enormous amount of people were arrested and the leaders were sentence to death and executed by firing squad at Kilmainham Jail in Dublin.
By 1922 the Irish Free State had been created which later became the Republic of Ireland.
Traitors or Heroes?
I guess there is two main views of the people involved in the 1916 Rising... the ones that were executed can be seen as martyrs, seeing they died for a cause they believed in. But also they - in a way - were traitors to their country, which at the time was ruled by the British.
Also opinions as to wheather the Rising was necessary to make Ireland become an independent republic are different. Some think that yes it has helped and some would argue that with the Home Rule acts and how things were going it would have happened anyway.
Seeing the exhibition at the National Museum about the 1916 Rising I personally tend to rather admire the courage and dedication the leaders showed and I am appalled by the fact that they were executed. My knowledge of the events is too basic at the current time to make any different judgement than the one based on how I felt after reading all the material at the exhibiton.
If you are interested in this event I would absolutely recommend you to have a look at some of these links. The whole situation was a lot more complex and there were many other things going on as well than I was able to write about in this post. Also please feel free to comment!
Library Online Exhibition
Home Rule and Ireland
The 1916 Easter Rising
Personal View of 1916
In order to get an understanding of the 1916 Rising - which is something like a revolution, but it might all together be a different thing depending on how you look at it - we will first have to look at the past of Ireland's history.
Before 1916 - A Short Irish History
The English rule over Ireland began in the 12th century when King Henry II secured lordship over the south-eastern area of Ireland, which would mostly be Dublin and its surroundings. Only the Tudors in the 16th century managed to get a hold of the entire country. From then on the Irish were more or less ruled by the English. At first the English set up in Dublin and ruled the country from there, but as the centuries progressed a system called Home Rule was put into place, which basically gave the Irish a bit more freedom in decision making (at least this is how I understood it). Also how I understood it a lot of the Irish culture and especially the language was being suppressed during those times. ***Just an aside, I think this Home Rule system was actually never really put into place as events seemed to happen in a really quick manner around that time...***
Involved Parties
What we also have to look at first is who was actually involved in the party and what were their political goals and motivations? I will sum this up very shortly:
- IRB (Irish Republican Brotherhood) - formed in 1858, secret organisation with the goal of Irish independency
- Gaelic Athletic Association - founded to promote Irish sports primarily, but also dancing, music and the Irish language in 1884.
- Gaelic League - founded in 1893 to promote the Irish language.
- Sinn Féin - founded in 1905. As I understand this party was formed to bring together the various nationalists across the country.
- Ulster Volunteers - founded in November 1913. They were happy with being ruled by London and didn't want anything to change.
- Irish Volunteers - founded in 1914. Many members joined them (possibly even 200'000), but only a couple of thousands got military training.
Come August 1914 the First World War broke out and the reactions in Ireland were very different. Many men in the Ulster Volunteers were going to postpone the issue of Home Rule and actually went to fight for the British Army agaist the Germans. But the IRB thought that the British involvement in the war would be an amazing opportunity to seize power themselves, seeing that the military forces of England would be focused towards Germany and not Ireland. Also a small percentage of men in the Ulster Volunteers didn't want to help England and so the party split (those ones with England: National Volunteers, the others Irish Volunteers).
The Planning
I think the planning mostly started in 1915 with primarily men both in the IRB and the Irish Volunteers (they were in both organisations) being involved in the process. Names include: Patrick Pearse, Joseph Plunkett, Eamont Ceannt, Thomas MacDonagh, Tom Clarke and Seán MacDermott, later on also James Connolly got involved. These 7 men were going to plan the rising and had the idea that they were going to accept any help they could get from Germany... I think the main problem was that they didn't have enough weapons and so they tried to get weapons shipped into Ireland.
The 1916 Easter Rising
On Easter Monday the Rising started. Strategically important points were seized throughout the city, but they didn't succeed in taking over Trinity College (only armed with a handfull of unionist students) and Dublin Castle (also not very heavily armed).
On the first day the English forces where generally rather surprised and uncoordinated in their response.
As the rebels had failed to seize the train stations or the harbour the English just brought over reinforcements. Also they brought in a vessel called Helga on the Liffey. So together with the guns positioned inside Trinity and the support of the Helga on the river the English were able to get the situation under control. Eventually the rebells had to surrender to avoid further loss of life.
I think that over 400 people died and more than 200 of these were civilians.
Aftermath
What happened after the Easter Rising is in my view not a nice chapter of history... An enormous amount of people were arrested and the leaders were sentence to death and executed by firing squad at Kilmainham Jail in Dublin.
By 1922 the Irish Free State had been created which later became the Republic of Ireland.
Traitors or Heroes?
I guess there is two main views of the people involved in the 1916 Rising... the ones that were executed can be seen as martyrs, seeing they died for a cause they believed in. But also they - in a way - were traitors to their country, which at the time was ruled by the British.
Also opinions as to wheather the Rising was necessary to make Ireland become an independent republic are different. Some think that yes it has helped and some would argue that with the Home Rule acts and how things were going it would have happened anyway.
Seeing the exhibition at the National Museum about the 1916 Rising I personally tend to rather admire the courage and dedication the leaders showed and I am appalled by the fact that they were executed. My knowledge of the events is too basic at the current time to make any different judgement than the one based on how I felt after reading all the material at the exhibiton.
If you are interested in this event I would absolutely recommend you to have a look at some of these links. The whole situation was a lot more complex and there were many other things going on as well than I was able to write about in this post. Also please feel free to comment!
Library Online Exhibition
Home Rule and Ireland
The 1916 Easter Rising
Personal View of 1916
Donnerstag, 14. Oktober 2010
Printing Slides...
So today I decided to catch up on some of the course work and thought I'd start out with printing the slides of my lectures...
If this seems like an amazingly simple task... well, it's not :-).
So I knew that I can print for free in the computer science labs. I managed to get the slides, put 4 on 1 and send it to the printer... (eventually I even figured out which one was the right one). First problem: No paper in the printer...
I set out on a "paper-stealing-mission" and nicked some from a photocopier machine, went back, put the paper in and it started printing... Just not MY stuff :-(... So all my stolen paper got used for someone else's report about Hacking... And again... I set out to steal some more paper ;-). Managed that without being caught by a securtiy guard, got back to the printer and finally it started printing my slides, yay... Until it ran out of paper again and then there was a printer jam and nothing worked anymore.
At least it did actually print most of the slides... At least those that were available on the net. Some of my lecturers don't seem to understand the notion of "putting slides online after the lecture"...
About the other blog posts I was going to make... Haven't forgotten about it, just didn't find the time to write about 1916 (I will do that, my Irish friends insisted on it) and I'm still trying to somehow get pictures of people walking around in crazy outfits... The problem is just to have your camera ready and not be obvious when trying to take a picture of a girl with blue hair, a mini skirt and not a lot else in autumn...
Apart from the printing experience it is going great here... A quick update for everyone:
I am down to 4 of my initially 6 courses... Mainly because the 2 courses I dropped were pretty boring and also because my courses - especially the Vision one - do take up a lot of time. So my 4 remaining courses are actually great and I enjoy going to lectures and doing the work. Also I did get a Final Year Project supervisor, which is great. I will get to work on a really interesting project and work with an existing program called SARA :-). The project is situated in Information Systems and more accurately in semantic web. The general idea so far is that my project will allow school children to enter queries in natural language about mountains and the output will be generated using SARA and various information sources, such as DBPedia.
Ok, hope you are all well :-)
If this seems like an amazingly simple task... well, it's not :-).
So I knew that I can print for free in the computer science labs. I managed to get the slides, put 4 on 1 and send it to the printer... (eventually I even figured out which one was the right one). First problem: No paper in the printer...
I set out on a "paper-stealing-mission" and nicked some from a photocopier machine, went back, put the paper in and it started printing... Just not MY stuff :-(... So all my stolen paper got used for someone else's report about Hacking... And again... I set out to steal some more paper ;-). Managed that without being caught by a securtiy guard, got back to the printer and finally it started printing my slides, yay... Until it ran out of paper again and then there was a printer jam and nothing worked anymore.
At least it did actually print most of the slides... At least those that were available on the net. Some of my lecturers don't seem to understand the notion of "putting slides online after the lecture"...
About the other blog posts I was going to make... Haven't forgotten about it, just didn't find the time to write about 1916 (I will do that, my Irish friends insisted on it) and I'm still trying to somehow get pictures of people walking around in crazy outfits... The problem is just to have your camera ready and not be obvious when trying to take a picture of a girl with blue hair, a mini skirt and not a lot else in autumn...
Apart from the printing experience it is going great here... A quick update for everyone:
I am down to 4 of my initially 6 courses... Mainly because the 2 courses I dropped were pretty boring and also because my courses - especially the Vision one - do take up a lot of time. So my 4 remaining courses are actually great and I enjoy going to lectures and doing the work. Also I did get a Final Year Project supervisor, which is great. I will get to work on a really interesting project and work with an existing program called SARA :-). The project is situated in Information Systems and more accurately in semantic web. The general idea so far is that my project will allow school children to enter queries in natural language about mountains and the output will be generated using SARA and various information sources, such as DBPedia.
Ok, hope you are all well :-)
Samstag, 9. Oktober 2010
Grafton Street and Shopping on a Saturday
So I'm back on my blog...
No time to change the design tough, sorry for everyone who's complaining about my lovely green background, you'll just have to suck it up some more days or copy the text ;-).
This afternoon I met Nilay and Jason in town. I got to know them over the internet while looking for accommodation in Dublin. We met at Stephen's Green (seeing they live in Dundrum and take the Green Luas to Stephen's Green), so I had the pleasure of walking through Grafton Street on a Saturday... You can't imagine it, it's a no-cars-allowed street and there's sooo many people, I'm sure it looks a bit like a really busy ant-hill from the air ;-). And then there's all these street artists playing music or doing something else and a lot of people watching. Also there's all these guys with the most amazing job ever... They stand there holding a sign on a post and they sort of wave the post... On the sign there's usually some sort of special offer ad for a shop... It's just crazy! And all of them have an umbrella fixed to their post...
Well, so I met Nilay and Jason and we went into a nice café... it was really big and really full, but we found a place. We talked and talked and then went out into the city to go shopping. So you need to know that Grafton Street is to the south of Trinity College and we generally walked north, walked through Tempel Bar and crossed the river over this lovely bridge and went to shop some more on the north side. By then about 3 hours had passed and I went back home again.
So now I just got back and I feel very tired... And I'm supposed to do a lot of work for uni. I kind of couldn't be bothered this week and last week I was still trying to figure out how everything works at Trinity. So now things have started to pile up a bit... Guess later today and tomorrow I'll have to try and catch up a bit seeing that Cian is gone anyway for the whole weekend... I might just do something sensible for once ;-).
Ok everyone back home and in New Zealand and Ireland or wherever you are from (I get hits from all over the world, yay) enjoy your Sunday!
Oh, some more info: I will at some stage put some more pictures on facebook, I will also change the design of the blog and I am trying to get pictures to show you what I mean by eccentricity... but it's quite difficult seeing that I keep forgetting my camera at home.
No time to change the design tough, sorry for everyone who's complaining about my lovely green background, you'll just have to suck it up some more days or copy the text ;-).
This afternoon I met Nilay and Jason in town. I got to know them over the internet while looking for accommodation in Dublin. We met at Stephen's Green (seeing they live in Dundrum and take the Green Luas to Stephen's Green), so I had the pleasure of walking through Grafton Street on a Saturday... You can't imagine it, it's a no-cars-allowed street and there's sooo many people, I'm sure it looks a bit like a really busy ant-hill from the air ;-). And then there's all these street artists playing music or doing something else and a lot of people watching. Also there's all these guys with the most amazing job ever... They stand there holding a sign on a post and they sort of wave the post... On the sign there's usually some sort of special offer ad for a shop... It's just crazy! And all of them have an umbrella fixed to their post...
Well, so I met Nilay and Jason and we went into a nice café... it was really big and really full, but we found a place. We talked and talked and then went out into the city to go shopping. So you need to know that Grafton Street is to the south of Trinity College and we generally walked north, walked through Tempel Bar and crossed the river over this lovely bridge and went to shop some more on the north side. By then about 3 hours had passed and I went back home again.
So now I just got back and I feel very tired... And I'm supposed to do a lot of work for uni. I kind of couldn't be bothered this week and last week I was still trying to figure out how everything works at Trinity. So now things have started to pile up a bit... Guess later today and tomorrow I'll have to try and catch up a bit seeing that Cian is gone anyway for the whole weekend... I might just do something sensible for once ;-).
Ok everyone back home and in New Zealand and Ireland or wherever you are from (I get hits from all over the world, yay) enjoy your Sunday!
Oh, some more info: I will at some stage put some more pictures on facebook, I will also change the design of the blog and I am trying to get pictures to show you what I mean by eccentricity... but it's quite difficult seeing that I keep forgetting my camera at home.
Donnerstag, 7. Oktober 2010
And suddenly I like it even better...
How could this become even better? Well, great place to live with really nice people, an awesome university, a lovely town and country and now this :-).... A real Irish man *smile* with red hair and freckles (no kidding). So now every morning I have an awesome reason to go to university, the sun is a bit brighter and the rain a little less wet ;-).
And that's about all I'm gonna say now. I should actually be working on my grad really bloody difficult assignment for Computer Vision... it's taking me ages and I'll be graded on it.
So enjoy your days!
And that's about all I'm gonna say now. I should actually be working on my grad really bloody difficult assignment for Computer Vision... it's taking me ages and I'll be graded on it.
So enjoy your days!
Dienstag, 5. Oktober 2010
I'm in Love...
... with Dublin :-).
The city is just so beautiful on a sunny day.
Today I had an awesome day, nothing more to be added to that.
I'm working on getting pictures to illustrate my Eccentricity post that will follow soonish.
By the way, if you want to have a look at some really nice pictures of Ireland:
http://www.cianclarke.com/component/option,com_gallery2/Itemid,49/?g2_itemId=324
The city is just so beautiful on a sunny day.
Today I had an awesome day, nothing more to be added to that.
I'm working on getting pictures to illustrate my Eccentricity post that will follow soonish.
By the way, if you want to have a look at some really nice pictures of Ireland:
http://www.cianclarke.com/component/option,com_gallery2/Itemid,49/?g2_itemId=324
Montag, 4. Oktober 2010
Lucky Monday
And so the next week starts...
I woke up and the sun was shining :-). Had a nice breakfast (porridge, yummy!) with a cup of tea and then I had to run to catch the Luas and caught it. I walked into my lecture 1 minute before it was due to start and it was a fairly interesting start into this week. After this 1 hour lecture from 10-11 I had 3 hours of nothing... Seeing that I was still not 100% recovered from the stupid cold I didn't go swimming. Instead I tried to do something useful.
Went into the computer lab (found out something really useful there, but it's a secret *smile*) and tried to do my first assignment for Computer Vision. Couldn't do all of it as I just didn't get the video loading part. Then I had 2 more lectures where I luckily met Cian in one of them. He's in both of my computer science courses and he has already done assignment 1. So he helped me a little to get the loading parts right... After that I got so excited about perfectioning the result that I forgot all about time. I handed in the assignment online and realised that I was 25 minutes late already for my next lecture...
Arriving there I realised I could have perfectioned my program even further because it was soooo boring... We did these very awesome project management charts and looked at Forward and Backward Pass and Latest Start, Early Finish and so on (for those that don't have a clue: I did all of that in Software Engineering at ETH). So after that it was already 6pm and I had yet another lecture. At 10 to 7 I was off and the weather was pretty iffy... (learned that word today). It was windy and the sky was coloured in a way that didn't mean something good. Walking to the Luas I felt like in a Hitchcock movie... The birds where going a bit crazy, flying over the buildings in swarms and making a lot of noise...
At the Luas station I had to wait couple of minutes and as soon as I got into the Luas it started pouring down. And come Rialto stop it stopped :-). So I walked home fighting the wind and when I got inside Fionnula was already asking me whether I was hungry :-). I was hungry and so I dinner was just ready! So this was a really long long day (uni from 10 to 7, the longest I ever have) and I'm tired now, so I'll go to bed...
As to my next post... I'd like you to vote on the theme:
I can write about:
I woke up and the sun was shining :-). Had a nice breakfast (porridge, yummy!) with a cup of tea and then I had to run to catch the Luas and caught it. I walked into my lecture 1 minute before it was due to start and it was a fairly interesting start into this week. After this 1 hour lecture from 10-11 I had 3 hours of nothing... Seeing that I was still not 100% recovered from the stupid cold I didn't go swimming. Instead I tried to do something useful.
Went into the computer lab (found out something really useful there, but it's a secret *smile*) and tried to do my first assignment for Computer Vision. Couldn't do all of it as I just didn't get the video loading part. Then I had 2 more lectures where I luckily met Cian in one of them. He's in both of my computer science courses and he has already done assignment 1. So he helped me a little to get the loading parts right... After that I got so excited about perfectioning the result that I forgot all about time. I handed in the assignment online and realised that I was 25 minutes late already for my next lecture...
Arriving there I realised I could have perfectioned my program even further because it was soooo boring... We did these very awesome project management charts and looked at Forward and Backward Pass and Latest Start, Early Finish and so on (for those that don't have a clue: I did all of that in Software Engineering at ETH). So after that it was already 6pm and I had yet another lecture. At 10 to 7 I was off and the weather was pretty iffy... (learned that word today). It was windy and the sky was coloured in a way that didn't mean something good. Walking to the Luas I felt like in a Hitchcock movie... The birds where going a bit crazy, flying over the buildings in swarms and making a lot of noise...
At the Luas station I had to wait couple of minutes and as soon as I got into the Luas it started pouring down. And come Rialto stop it stopped :-). So I walked home fighting the wind and when I got inside Fionnula was already asking me whether I was hungry :-). I was hungry and so I dinner was just ready! So this was a really long long day (uni from 10 to 7, the longest I ever have) and I'm tired now, so I'll go to bed...
As to my next post... I'd like you to vote on the theme:
I can write about:
- clubs and societies at Trinity
- 1916 Rising (I was at an exhibition yesterday about that, it's one of the most important historical events in Dublin and Ireland)
- Eccentricity of Irish people with respect to clothing
What should I write about next?
Freitag, 1. Oktober 2010
Lectures
So I'm back with a new post, yay... Honestly I'm not too motivated right now to write something, but I'm a bit bored while waiting for Visual Studio to download. My head feels about twice it's size, my nose is really red (I look like Rudolph, *don't laugh, it's not funny!*) and instead of going to my 3 lectures today I slept most of the day... stupid Irish bugs ;-) *sorry* Actually it's just a bad cold. So enough of this boring stuff...
Lectures in Ireland are really really strange... I already miss my awesome lectures at ETH and all the great lectureres there! Just KIDDING. So far it's been great except for some minor details.
What am I doing this semester:
Lectures in Ireland are really really strange... I already miss my awesome lectures at ETH and all the great lectureres there! Just KIDDING. So far it's been great except for some minor details.
What am I doing this semester:
- I do Computer Graphics (taught by an awesome woman, Carol O'Sullivan). ***The course seems to be really interesting http://isg.cs.tcd.ie/cosulliv/teaching.html and dear ETH people, if you want to have a laugh just have a look at the LinAlg slides... Yeah, I thought she was joking, but she wasn't. As a short explanation to this extremely crazily kindergartenish introduction to LinAlg... also non-computer-scientists, such as mathematicians can take this course (doesn't seem to make sense tough anyway...). *** So I'm waiting for the interesting parts!
- Also I do Computer Vision... the peculiar thing here is that we're about 12 people in class, YES, it's crazy... and I think 4 of these are exchange students. Also funny, it's supposedly the best course and it really seems great. Guess the reason is that there are only about 30 students in 4th year of Computer Science... sucks!
- I do 3 Business courses:
- Introduction to Accounting (yes, seriousely, no joke!)... I met the professor personally already, yay... and he seems like the nicest person :-).
- Introduction to Operations Management... No idea, that course would have been today.
- Organisational Behaviour... This 2 hour lecture was hilarious, the lecturer is like an exaggerated form of Prof Kossmann and he's really really good! Imagine... we're in the biggest room in the arts building and people JUST fit in... So there's over 320 students (in all of these BESS courses) and the professor (Martin Fellenz) is making the whole lecture interactive... So he's walking around all the time, asking the people in the last rows questions and illustrating his points with great examples using the students... *** So, he said that people get motivated by money... One student said that this is not true, so he told her to stand up and wave at everyone... He went to this other guy, telling him to get up, that guy didn't do it, so the prof actually offered 5 Euro and the guy got up and gave the money back ;-). Later he offered money again for something and this time another guy kept it ***
- And I also do Management for Engineers... there we'll do a business game called SimProject (yes, VERY creative), but it looks like a bit of fun at least.
Donnerstag, 30. September 2010
Map of Ireland
So, today I bought a big poster of Ireland... Why?
Yesterday I started thinking about what I want to do on the weekend. I had gotten all these touristy brouchures for all the trips you can do and I had no clue how to decide... I started making a list of all the places I want to see while in Ireland... I can tell you, the list is long and I am not even done yet.
What I will do now is mark all the places on the map, where I have been... So hopefully by the end of my stay there will be a lot of points or crosses or whatever on the map... Still have to figure out how to mark the places, any clever suggestions that do not cover up the place names are welcome!
This is how the map looks now:
So I already have some places where I'm supposed to put markings: Dublin (yes, really), Kilkenny, Glendalough and Jerpoint Abbey... I'll do that as soon as I have figured out how.
As to how the first week at Trinity went I shall post in the next few days...
Yesterday I started thinking about what I want to do on the weekend. I had gotten all these touristy brouchures for all the trips you can do and I had no clue how to decide... I started making a list of all the places I want to see while in Ireland... I can tell you, the list is long and I am not even done yet.
What I will do now is mark all the places on the map, where I have been... So hopefully by the end of my stay there will be a lot of points or crosses or whatever on the map... Still have to figure out how to mark the places, any clever suggestions that do not cover up the place names are welcome!
This is how the map looks now:
As to how the first week at Trinity went I shall post in the next few days...
Montag, 27. September 2010
The Leprechaun
So I was at the Leprechaun Museum the other day....
Because I am a bit lazy and uncreative today I'll just copied some of the information boards from the museum and this is what they have to say about Leprechauns: So this is not owned by me, but by the National Leprechaun Museum:
Leprechaun Sara :-)
The leprechaun is shoemaker to the fairies. He usually appears alone, and can be seen sitting on a toad-stool smoking his pipe and hammering a shoe. He is small and wizened in appearance, although not necessarily old. Old clay-pipes, especially if small, when found on the ground are thought to be his tobacco-pipes. His hammering can be heard for some distance in the woodland.
Although having short and thin legs, he is very agile, and can move very quickly through the fields and woods; he climbs trees very well, and is a great swimmer. A slick speaker, he is also a great musician, and can be seen resting or playing music on a toad-stool, on a stone or rock, or on the branch of a tree. He is usually seen at daybreak or at sunset.
He lives in a secluded spot – usually a hole in the ground. Covered by foliage, in which he has built a comfortable little dwelling. He is said to have a mother, who cooks his food for him, especially his ‘potatoes’ (i.e. pig-nuts). He dresses in old 18th – 19th century style. He is very wealthy, and has his treasure hidden in a crock of gold in the earth or underwater. He has three purses in his jacket – one for copper coins, one for silver coins, and one for gold coins.
The first written mention of the leprechaun dates back to the 8th Century, and they make an appearance in the story of Fergus Mc Leti a king of Ulster.
A man meets a leprechaun, who gives him a purse called sparán na scillinge (the purse of shillings). Each time the man does business and puts his hand into the purse to pay his debts he finds a shilling there. However, the man abuses the privilege by becoming greedy and puts his hand time and again into the purse, without any real need to do so. One night its contents change to dust.
A man captures a leprechaun and takes him home, hoping to force him to tell where his treasure is. He shuts him up in a room, but during the night the man hears terrible noise and commotion. The leprechaun has gone wild, and is breaking everything in the room, and so the man in terror and desperation lets him go.
A man with a deformity captures a leprechaun and asks him where his treasure is. The leprechaun bargains that, if released, he will cure the man’s ailments. The man releases the leprechaun, and next morning he wakes up to find that he is well and sound.
A strange little man comes as a stranger to a farmer and offers to do the farm-work. He is a great worker – not only does he look after the cattle and horses, but he also cleans up the house every night, leaving everything spick and span. The grateful farmer has a suit made for the leprechaun as a surprise. The leprechaun takes this as an insult and departs.
A strange little man appears as a portent of some impending disaster. For instance, a lord in his castle is visited by such a little man, who warns him not to go hunting on a certain day. The nobleman ignores the advice and meets with his death by accident.
A strange little red-haired man appears to a chieftain and offers to help him in an imminent battle. In the fighting, the little man proves to be a great archer, and with his arrows puts the enemy to flight.
A great jockey looks like a little fairy man, and he wins every race. He is heard to talk to the horse he is riding during the race, and the horse replies to him. People think that he is indeed a fairy, and this is proved when a musician is brought into a fairy fort and meets the jockey there. Or the jockey may in fact be a human who was abducted and, through riding with the fairies at night, has learned their great skills.
Samstag, 25. September 2010
So Far So Good
So how has life been these first 9 days? Short answer: very good!
It doesn't feel like 9 days have passed already... times seems to be flying by, which is - I suppose - a really good thing. At Trinity everything seems to work out just great with the courses, it's only ETH that might not give me credit, but who cares ;-). *** aside: as I passed all the exams, I don't really need the points anyway, but it would certainly help***
I feel at ease here in Dublin:
The weather doesn't bother me too much, just bought a nice coat that is also a bit waterproof and I always carry my umbrella with me... As for the cold - yes it is really really cold here already - nothing many clothes can't take care of. And if the sun comes out, you appreciate it all the more. About the weather and Dubliners... If you walk around the streets feeling really cold, even tough you wear 2 t-shirts, a pullover and a jumper there's unbelievable things you can see... I actually saw a lot of people walking around in flip flop, shorts and t-shirts and there were a couple of women wearing summer dresses, and all this just because the sun was shining a little :-). You really have to admire these Irish people! Or you can think they're crazy ;-). I haven't decided yet.
The people are generally very friendly! I already got to talk to many people of all ages and it was always interesting. What I feel here is that people seem very interested in foreigners, they ask a lot of questions and listen attentively to what you have to tell them. So I am quite in paradise here :-). Also it is very easy to talk to people at university and if you don't know your way everyone seems quite happy to help. Naturally not all is perfect, not even in Ireland ;-). When it comes to getting on the Luas people seem to forget about politeness very fast... But Fionnula told me about a trick she is using to avoid the Luas problem and it's really simple :-). Due to copyright issues I'm not going to say how it works *grin*, but it makes my life soooo much easier.
The language is just cute here. I especially love it if people say things like: "Let's meet at half 3" or "I'm 33 years old"... some of my former English teachers would actually freak out if they would hear it... So I'm thirty-three years old actually sounds like "I'm turty-tree years old"... Yes, they do like their trees here :-). One extremely peculiar thing *very sarcastic* is that they have tons of slang words for drunk here... very funny that is!
The city is just lovable, as long as you don't have to drive in a car - I think. There's some very nice, big parks (haven't been to one of them yet tough), there's nice shopping areas where cars are not allowed and it's pretty much all within walking distance. Also there are many buildings that look very nice. One thing I find is quite extreme here is the number of beggars. There's beggars on every bridge over the Liffey and pretty much on every corner. Also women with babies which I find quite unhealthy for the babies in this weather. But I guess there's beggars in every city and I already got used to "not really seeing them" and walking past.
The traffic doesn't concern me too much, but there's certainly some points worth mentioning. My room goes out to Herberton Road, which is a 2 lane road and cars drive by at all hours of the day. In the beginning it seemed really loud, but I got used to it pretty fast and now I don't even notice it anymore if I don't pay attention. As I pedestrian I lived a little dangerous the first 1 or 2 days... Yes, it is quite weird to suddenly have to look to the - wait gotta think... - right side first when crossing the road! What makes this all the more confusing is that from Abbey Street (the Luas stop I get out) to Trinity College there's loads of one way systems, so the "right first rule" doesn't apply always. Yes, there's traffic lights on every crossing, but they are programmed in a really dumb way! So if you'd actually respect them it would probably take me about 15 minutes instead of 5 to get to TCD. Everyone, yes EVERYONE walks when the light is red. Some are more adventurous than others (or seem to have a death wish) and just run across (or ziczac through the cars) others - like me - have figured out the signal system and know when it's safe to walk. Actually the later hour it is the more couragous or stupid people seem to get *I wonder why...*.
The men are... Lol, if you expect some great analysis of Irish men you are in the wrong place... They are all different, some good looking, some not, some thin, some not, some blond, ... you get the point. And most of them don't have red hair and freckles ;-).
So that's it for today! On Monday uni finally starts... But due to a death of a member of staff from the School of Business I'm only gonna have lessons from 10-11 and from 15-16, so I get to go swimming in-between, yay :-).
Something to make you all jealous: I take 40 KP and I only have: 23 lessons a week and I NEVER start before 10 :-) AND I got Friday morning off completely... Yes this is paradise!
It doesn't feel like 9 days have passed already... times seems to be flying by, which is - I suppose - a really good thing. At Trinity everything seems to work out just great with the courses, it's only ETH that might not give me credit, but who cares ;-). *** aside: as I passed all the exams, I don't really need the points anyway, but it would certainly help***
I feel at ease here in Dublin:
The weather doesn't bother me too much, just bought a nice coat that is also a bit waterproof and I always carry my umbrella with me... As for the cold - yes it is really really cold here already - nothing many clothes can't take care of. And if the sun comes out, you appreciate it all the more. About the weather and Dubliners... If you walk around the streets feeling really cold, even tough you wear 2 t-shirts, a pullover and a jumper there's unbelievable things you can see... I actually saw a lot of people walking around in flip flop, shorts and t-shirts and there were a couple of women wearing summer dresses, and all this just because the sun was shining a little :-). You really have to admire these Irish people! Or you can think they're crazy ;-). I haven't decided yet.
The people are generally very friendly! I already got to talk to many people of all ages and it was always interesting. What I feel here is that people seem very interested in foreigners, they ask a lot of questions and listen attentively to what you have to tell them. So I am quite in paradise here :-). Also it is very easy to talk to people at university and if you don't know your way everyone seems quite happy to help. Naturally not all is perfect, not even in Ireland ;-). When it comes to getting on the Luas people seem to forget about politeness very fast... But Fionnula told me about a trick she is using to avoid the Luas problem and it's really simple :-). Due to copyright issues I'm not going to say how it works *grin*, but it makes my life soooo much easier.
The language is just cute here. I especially love it if people say things like: "Let's meet at half 3" or "I'm 33 years old"... some of my former English teachers would actually freak out if they would hear it... So I'm thirty-three years old actually sounds like "I'm turty-tree years old"... Yes, they do like their trees here :-). One extremely peculiar thing *very sarcastic* is that they have tons of slang words for drunk here... very funny that is!
The city is just lovable, as long as you don't have to drive in a car - I think. There's some very nice, big parks (haven't been to one of them yet tough), there's nice shopping areas where cars are not allowed and it's pretty much all within walking distance. Also there are many buildings that look very nice. One thing I find is quite extreme here is the number of beggars. There's beggars on every bridge over the Liffey and pretty much on every corner. Also women with babies which I find quite unhealthy for the babies in this weather. But I guess there's beggars in every city and I already got used to "not really seeing them" and walking past.
The traffic doesn't concern me too much, but there's certainly some points worth mentioning. My room goes out to Herberton Road, which is a 2 lane road and cars drive by at all hours of the day. In the beginning it seemed really loud, but I got used to it pretty fast and now I don't even notice it anymore if I don't pay attention. As I pedestrian I lived a little dangerous the first 1 or 2 days... Yes, it is quite weird to suddenly have to look to the - wait gotta think... - right side first when crossing the road! What makes this all the more confusing is that from Abbey Street (the Luas stop I get out) to Trinity College there's loads of one way systems, so the "right first rule" doesn't apply always. Yes, there's traffic lights on every crossing, but they are programmed in a really dumb way! So if you'd actually respect them it would probably take me about 15 minutes instead of 5 to get to TCD. Everyone, yes EVERYONE walks when the light is red. Some are more adventurous than others (or seem to have a death wish) and just run across (or ziczac through the cars) others - like me - have figured out the signal system and know when it's safe to walk. Actually the later hour it is the more couragous or stupid people seem to get *I wonder why...*.
The men are... Lol, if you expect some great analysis of Irish men you are in the wrong place... They are all different, some good looking, some not, some thin, some not, some blond, ... you get the point. And most of them don't have red hair and freckles ;-).
So that's it for today! On Monday uni finally starts... But due to a death of a member of staff from the School of Business I'm only gonna have lessons from 10-11 and from 15-16, so I get to go swimming in-between, yay :-).
Something to make you all jealous: I take 40 KP and I only have: 23 lessons a week and I NEVER start before 10 :-) AND I got Friday morning off completely... Yes this is paradise!
Abonnieren
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