The Homestay...

So I know I haven't had a chance to update this in a couple days and I apologize. The main reason being that I was gone all weekend and didn't have my computer with me. Our program set up through another program this thing called a Homestay. For those of you who don't know, this is when you go and stay with an Irish family or whatever the established time is, to experience what real everyday life is like outside the college world. Well we were taken to a town called Navan. Moderate kinda small size, quite cute actually, with many pubs and cute streets with lots of little shops everywhere. Granted by the time we discovered these things they were all closed but let me start with Friday and tell you all how my weekend went.
(sorry for this photo, its taken the wrong way and i cant get it to rotate)

So Friday we were told to be picked up out front Queen's at 4:30pm to be transported by bus to our town. However, after standing for a good 35-45 minutes we finally all realized there was some confusion and called our program. Basically, no one told the bus driver that the location of the pick up had been changed and he had been waiting for us at Elms since 4... awesome. Now before we figured this out I got too freezing and decided to wait inside the Student Union while the rest of the group figured it out. My toes were numb. Anyways, got on the bus, its about a 2 and half hour drive or so. not bad. Got dropped off at the Round O pub. (yes its called round-o) where of course the single pair that doesn't get picked up is myself and Clarissa (we were in a pair together). The lady didn't want to come get us and was under the impression we were supposed to be dropped off. After everyone else was met by happy moms, we got in the car of the lady who was the daughter of the person who was supposed to meet us. (basically she was doing her mothers job it seems) and drove us literally down the road. Took us a little while to figure out where the house was, finally did and went inside. First impression-iffy. Our lady was a wonderful women super hilarious and crass, a bit....nontraditional. We had barely said our names when she tells us our options are to go out with her son to the rugby club or sit at home and be bored. Hence, we choose to go out. It was a lot of fun. We met a ton of people, drank some, well I did at least. Pathetic Coors light to be honest... yes how American of me. I tried Heineken...tasted like pee... so yes met lots of nice lads, two of which we found out were 16 and 18..haha funny. Good times. I even got up and danced around a little which is a huge accomplishment.

We ended up going to bed that night at 3 30am which was super early considering everyone else who came back to the house with us didn't leave until 6 am... Saturday was pretty uneventful. Her 30 something year old daughter made us breakfast and i tried Blood pudding, it was disgusting but I can say that I tried it.. go me! Then we sat around and had some pretty good conversation. Politics, rugby, books, traveling, places to go when were on spring break, all that. We also sat and watched the big Ireland Rugby match that was on TV that day. Finally we decided to walk into town, a little late as everything was closed, and she told us we were on our own for dinner. Being adventurous, and after experiences bad food all over the place when we try to get "safe" American food, Clarissa and I decided to try this Thai restaurant that looked really yummy and classy. We walked in, asked to see the menu and thought it seemed reasonable and sat down. Then we were handed another menu... this menu had prices that were DOUBLE what we had just read and out of our budget. When the waiter came over to us she told us that the cheaper menu was just for take away. That's what they call take out here. We politely told her we would rather do that so we left to the waiting area so we could pay the mere 8quid verses 15.

At this point, we had realized that our phones didn't work because since we weren't in the UK our free minutes and texts didn't apply and both our money balances were too low. However, we received a text from our fellow American friends telling us to meet at McDonald's at 8 30. Since we had gotten take away we now needed somewhere to eat... our solution: the back of Micky Ds so we would be there waiting for them. We felt super guilty eating Thai there... then Clarissa went to get drinks and utensils... however when she asked the lady for utensils she looked at her like she was absolutely bonkers. just considering that not a single thing on their McDonald's menu requires utensils... Again we were faced with adversity and we problem solved to using out fingers like kids. Lucky for me tho! I had a random spoon in my purse. that helped at least move it around to make it less hot. Finally we finished and were waiting for our friends who never showed up. We asked some random hansom Irish guy next to us to use his phone and it took half the store (ok only him and two other people) to help us figure out how to call UK phones from the Republic. Super confusing, country code, plus area code but drop the zero if its a cell phone....etc etc you get the point. Got through to Sabrina who told us the pub they were at and we eventually met up.

Loved this pub. It was for sure an old mans pub. We were easily 40 years the junior of anyone in that bar. At one point they even played BINGO! but the bartenders were funny and wonderful, the drinks good, and the atmosphere cozy and cute. We stayed a pretty long time. Got in a cab to get us back home, told the driver where we were going and got so turned around. He took us to the wrong place, ended up costing like 9.75 euro plus 4 euro for all of us passengers. It turns out we were a 5 minute walk away.... awesome. Once home we just got in bed and read our books and talked since we didn't have much to say to the lady and it was late. Sunday was the same, we slept in until 2, ate toast for breakfast, talked some, then got ready and were dropped off again at the Round O. Bus ride home, got here, I finished my book I have been reading, Dear John by Nicolas Sparks, then watched the Superbowl and skyped and stayed up way too late to start this week a little shaky.

Overall, the weekend was memorable to say the least. In comparison to my friends families I feel slightly jipped because we didn't get a tour, or taken to a castle or a homemade meal cooked for us.. But then again, not every family is like that and its ignorant to assume so just like in America not all families have 4 kids, live in a cookie cutter house and bbq...I am very glad to be back in my own room with my own bed and no smoking, but I'm happy we got the chance to go. Now that I have posted the longest update ever I am going to bed as I am running on not enough sleep for a Monday. This is the first week of real lectures also...stay tuned