Week 4 - The Rain Continues

Monday(01/26/2009):

Monday was really the only interesting day of the week.  That evening the U of I Study Abroad Director, Ryan Lorenz, was in Cork, so he sent an email to the four students (including myself) from U of I studying here inviting us to dinner that night.  He told us to meet him at Milano pizzeria at 7pm which was pretty nice for me, as Milano is literally about 400 feet away from South Mall Court.  We showed up and met him in the lobby where he cordially greeted us.  We got seated at our table and Ryan told us that we could order whatever we felt like, as the U of I would be picking up the tab on everything, except alcohol (ah tuition money at work).  I finally decided to go with the Romana Etna pizza, which was a spicy pizza with peppers and spiced ham, along with a large glass of Merlot (which was quite good, but then again, I was at an Italian restaurant).  While we waited for our food we (the other 3 students were girls, 2 were English majors and the other was a Chem Engineer, I can't remember their names at the moment) Ryan asked us about how we were adjusting, how we liked Cork, UCC, our housing, and how we were enjoying our experience thus far.  By the sounds of it I am extremely luck to be living at South Mall Court, as I seemed to be the only person who was truly happy with their living conditions and flatmates.  Ryan was a very friendly guy who seemed genuinely interested in our experience here and seemed to want to ensure that we enjoyed it.  He said that he was going to be going to other campuses soon and I mentioned that I knew Ann when he said he was going to Aberdeen and he said that she was on his list of people to talk to (I had to correct him on the proper way to pronounce Pataky though) and it also came about that he knew Michael and Kristin, which I thought was kinda cool that he knew all of us Champaign folk by name.  After dinner Ryan asked if any of us would like some desert, and we all almost too quickly declined the offer, so he went ahead  and became the catalyst that we needed ordered desert for himself. We all then followed suit and all ordered some desert as well. I got the Chocolate Fudge Cake, which was incredibly good (although rather small). It was a small piece of tripple layered chocolate cake with thick layers of fuge with a scoop of vanilla ice cream next to it and melted chocolate drizzled all over it. After that we talked a bit more and then departed with Ryan saying he hoped he would see us all in London on March 5th for the U of I SAO London Weekend. That night I went home did some homework and bought my tickets to London.

Tuesday(01/27/2009):

Tuesday I went to the Mardyke pool after class and did a swimming workout.....and then got an ear infection. So I don’t know what was up with that, but I won’t be swimming again until my ear stops hurting and filling up with fluid. However, dinner that night was good as Giovanni found some buy-1-get-1-free vouchers for Milano online so we all got pizza that night. One of the pizza’s we got had an egg in the middle of it, which was different from what I’m used to, but it was still really good.

Wednesday(01/28/2009):

Don’t remember anything, maybe later...

Thursday(01/29/2009):

Thursday I don’t really remember much either but it had been raining for about two weeks straight by this point. I did find organic peanut butter which is much tastier and healthier than Panda (this stuff, SUMA, only has peanuts and sea salt in it), so that made me happy.

Friday(01/30/2009):

On Friday Giovanni, Giorgio, Margherita and Laura left to go on a trip to Galway for the weekend so the apartment was rather quite for the weekend. After class, and after making myself a rather large brunch I went ahead and took Sarah Treece’s suggestion and made my way over to Butler’s Chocolate Cafe to try one of their milkshakes. As Sarah advertised, it was indeed delicious. I got a chocolate milkshake, which tasted like pure chocolate with hints of espresso in it, so it was very tasty, however it was also very small, and not very thick. For €3.95 it seemed like I should get something larger then a milk glass and I’m still wishing that it was of a thicker consistency. So so far in Cork, Butler’s has the best tasting milkshakes, and as much as it pains me to say, McDonalds has the milkshake with the best consistency. I had to wait until I could walk back to South Mall to actually drink it.....maybe I can get ice cream at McDonalds in Europe without feeling that I’m supporting a sub standard fast food company.....actually, the food at McDonalds in Cork looks much more appetizing then any McDonalds in America. Later on that night we got a text from Margherita asking us to let her cousin into her apartment when she got into Cork that night around 1am or so. So Shawn and I walked down to O’Donnovan’s and got some alcohol and then came back and watched V for Vendetta on my computer using Giorgio’s speakers. I decided that I would get some wine for the week, and I also realized that I know nothing about wine. So I ended up getting an organic red wine from Spain, which was quite good despite the fact that it was only from 2006. After a minor scavenger hunt for a cork screw, we were able to watch the movie, and then just hung out until Margherita’s cousin showed up.

Saturday(01/30/2009):

Saturday was the first day we woke up and it wasn’t raining for the first time, so that was quite refreshing. With nothing much planned though, we just took advantage of being the only two around and spent the better part of the early afternoon doing laundry and cleaning the kitchen/common room. After that I did homework, and video chatted with my mom, dad, Jennifer, Greg, and Maureen. Which was nice, as its always nice to talk to family and I really hadn’t gotten to talk to Jennifer or Greg since I left. I also started working on the website I told IPENG I would make for them about my study abroad experience, in exchange for 80% of my airfare, and it’s a good thing I’m starting now. I’m going to cheat and make a quick version using google’s engine, and then during the summer I’m going to code a good website from scratch using the first draft website as a model.

Sunday(02/01/2009):

Today I slept in till noon, got up and went to Mass at Holy Trinity Cathedral. It was nice to once again and have Mass with a priest who spoke slow enough to be able to understand him, but they apparently don’t have any music at the 12:30 Masses there, so that was kind a bummer. Looks like I will continue to cathedral hop next week. Tonight I made myself a huge dinner of penne pasta with a meat sauce along with some chicken parmesan that I also infused with sage. I was pleasantly surprised with how juicy and tender the chicken turned out, so I think I’ll have to make it again. I really love the English market. Currently Shawn and I are watching Superbowl XLIII online (probably illegally) on our respective computers. It’s 12:15 on Monday morning over here, but as Shawn is a huge Steelers fan I’m sure he won’t stop watching it till the game is over, so I’m just watching it and doing some work in the meantime. Hopefully, the next blog I write will have some information about the UCC Mountaineering Society, which I joined.