Norwich in Winter

Season's Greetings!!!!!
Hope everyone is having a merry ol' time. This is a picture I took on the way to class Monday morning. You are looking at Earlham Park, located conveniently right next to University Village where I live. The walk to class is about ten minutes long, which stinks on cold, rainy days, but can be very refreshing on clear ones.

So what has happened since my trip to Ireland last month? Well, there have been a lot of papers. Research takes up a lot of time (especially when the internet is down - thanks UEA, please get your act together) and then of course there is the regular everyday assignments for each class.

My children's literature class took a mini field trip to the Forum (Norwich library) to hear the children's librarians speak. I was horrified to learn that if a book gets returned to the library with even so much as a pencil mark, the book gets shredded. Are they insane?!?! You don't destroy books! What kind of a library kills books? This is apparently a nationwide policy. (Brits please take note - you have just lost serious man points)

Anyway, the library itself, besides its campaign for discrimination against battered books, is actually a very interesting place. The main hall has new exhibits, fairs.... and there is always something going on just outside. This is what I found the last time I went.

Pretty cool, huh? You know the Ardsley library never has anything like this. One time when I walked past and they had a huge blow up pool and what looked like two giant hamster wheels. You were supposed to go in the bubbles and then walk on water! Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera. And even more unfortunately, I didn't have time to try it.

Here are a few random pics for you:

Me and the girls on Thanksgiving at KQ's house.

 Laura's birthday dinner.........not my Laura.....the Aussie Laura 

(she's the one in the yellow sweater in the middle)

 These are my flatmates, minus Elvish who never seems to say very much. Next to me is Claire, then Parisha, Alex (top left) and Jamie (top right).

Me and the girls from flats 4, 5 & 6. 

And a few extra pics from Ireland

 About to kiss the Blarney stone!!! The guy has to hold onto you otherwise you might fall through the gap - although there is a nice sign that asks you to consider how unsafe it was before they installed the two very thin, good for nothing safety bars.

Killarney

We started off our day on a good note - when we got out of the Killarney train station we saw a rainbow (I wanted to look for a pot of gold but...) You cant really see it all that well in this picture, but I think the church is pretty too.

And here are some pictures of the town. Its mostly made up of little shops and pubs.

The first stop sign we've seen in months. Seriously - they do not exist in England.

Welcome to Killarney National Park!
The land was originally privately owned and then turned over into Ireland's first national park.

Here's Muckross House, the Victorian mansion where the lords and ladies used to live. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert paid a visit once.

That first picture with the mountains is the view of their backyard. Not too shabby huh? And here are some more!!!

Adventures in Cork

River Lee

Coolest thing about Cork? BLARNEY CASTLE

By the time we actually made it to Blarney it was already near dark.

The stairs were narrow and steep. All you had was a rope to hold onto. Going down wasn't much better.

Dublin

Alright, so I decided that I would split up my pictures of Ireland into three different posts. The first will be Dublin, the second Cork and finally the third will be an entry on Killarney.

While we were in Dublin, we stayed in this hostel called the Four Courts.Having never stayed in a hostel before, I wasn't really sure what to expect from them. I thought they would be a bit sketchy and maybe dirty, but they were all clean and everyone there was friendly.

Our beds and my friends Mary Kate (left) and Kaitlin (right)

The Four Courts is located right on the Liffey, the river that runs through Dublin (cool name right?).

The girls and I decided we would go on a free tour that the hostel recommended. Here are some of the highlights:

 Dublin Castle

This green is a part of Trinity College and is surrounded on all sides by different libraries. Dream come true.

The Dublin wall of fame - in other words - Bono

Me at a pretty park we stopped at that I can't remember the name of. It was REALLY windy and cold.

A few random things:

There was a lot of Viking stuff.

And later that night...

 We went on a tour of the Guinness factory. And after that we hit up a few pubs for some traditional Irish music.

More coming soon!!!!!