A Last Minute Trip.

January 3, 2012

Seven days before all final work was due Megan, Tomas, and I hightailed it to Scotland. It was to be our final excursion of the semester. After what seemed like less than an hour flight, we arrived in Edinburgh. Being late at night, we just headed to our hotel for the night. Much to our surprise, our room was spectacularly modern- a welcome change from Derry. Our building was also right on the water so we had a great view. From what we saw, Scotland looked relatively similar to Ireland, but was much, much colder.

The next morning, we got all bundled up and headed to the train station. Our destination? St. Andrews. Not only would Megan be able to fulfill her parents’ wish of walking on the famous greens of the St. Andrews golf course, but I could see my good friend and fellow Spider, Kate. She has been studying at University of St. Andrews. Needless to say, we were all very excited about the day ahead of us.

The train to St. Andrews passed over some beautiful rivers and scenery. When you are in Europe, it is difficult not to miss something. Everything is intriguing and interesting- the nature, the buildings, the people. I could not get enough of simply looking around. Purely observing my surroundings would have been good enough for me.

Meeting up with my UR friend Kate was uplifting. It was just enough of home to help me to the end of the semester. I had been homesick lately, but seeing her washed those feelings away. After visiting the St. Andrew’s Links Golf Course, Kate showed us around a bit. We visited the ruins of a cathedral and a castle. It is amazing that such sights could not really be seen in America. Here’s a picture of Kate and me:

Back in Edinburgh at night, we happened upon a German food festival near the train station. Spontaneous events such as this have been the highlight of my trip abroad. The next day in the city we followed this trend by wondering aimlessly through the intertwining alleyways and streets of Edinburgh. The easiest way to gain the feel of a city is to just walk around and explore. Our main plan for the day was however to visit Edinburgh Castle.

Finally I fulfilled one of my main goals of going abroad- visiting a castle. Perched atop a hill in the city, the views were remarkable. We were even able to see across the water to St. Andrews where we had been the day before. In the distance, the mountains were covered with snow. We explored the dungeons, the oldest building in Scotland, chambers of Scottish royalty, as well as saw the Crown Jewels. Here’s a picture of the castle:

Our last day in Edinburgh ended with a ghost tour in the crypts underneath the city. On that frightening note, I returned to Derry where all of my final work waited for me. Famous for procrastination, I headed straight to the computer lab to get my work done. After a long week of nonstop work, I had finished and turned in the work for all three of my modules.

For graphic design, I just needed to edit projects created previously in the semester. Finishing up the work for this module took no time at all. Animation and 3D however were the most time consuming. I needed to finish up my dinosaur character for 3D as well as make my robot character walk for Animation. Both proved to be difficult tasks, but here is what I came up with:

Now all that lay ahead of me was my last week here in Derry and my long, long journey home…

Fun Fact #15: The oldest pub in Derry is called the River Inn. It has recently been converted into a much more modern bar.

Fun Fact #16: Irish people call potatoes spuds.

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A Taste of Home

December 16, 2011

4 am… my alarm goes off. Surprisingly though I am not struck by my normal aggravated sleep deprived attitude that makes me want to throw my alarm clock out the window, but instead I smile.  Today is going to be a special day, one that I have been looking forward to all semester long. I call a cab (mass transportation in Italy doesn’t start running until 6) and head for the train station which will take me to the airport, which will take me to Rome.

Now don’t get me wrong, I was excited for Rome, but the thought of seeing the beautiful city filled with historical sites, both beautiful and meaningful, was not what I had been dreaming of and longing for. But instead it was what awaited me in Rome that fueled by excitement… My mother, my father, my sister, and my best friend.

Italy has been amazing. I have experienced an incredible and brand new culture, I have met people different from myself from every corner of the globe, and I have traveled and seen some of the most amazing places the world has to offer. But even among all of the excitement, adventure, and incredible experiences you can never forget about home, and having a taste of home by spending time with the people I love meant the world to me.

A 10-day tour of Italy was filled with adventure, frustration, and all in all a lot of love.  Now, every family vacation includes some kind of dysfunctional acts and my family is no exception, but I believe that it is how you handle those situations that defines what a family truly is.

Now after arriving in Rome, excitement and jet lag were in a vicious quarrel after the 10-hour flight, but for the most part excitement won out and allowed us to begin getting a feel for the busy city and seeing why it is considered one of the worlds greatest.

That weekend was phenomenal for a number of reasons. Rome is truly beautiful and the sites are breathtaking, but in all of my trips so far I have learned that much more than just seeing sites, the true value of experiencing them lies in who you share them with. While I will always remember seeing the sights, more fondly I will remember the experiences and memories that correspond with the sights. I won’t just remember seeing the Trevi Fountain, I will remember throwing coins into it, and paying a street vendor 2 euros and 1 dollar (in quarters) (which was all we had at the time) to take a Polaroid picture. I will not only remember the Vatican and Sistine Chapel, but also remember spending time with my family there, and helping my dad survive the number of monotonous stairs while attempting to keep up with our speedy tour guide. I will remember translating Italian into English in an authentic Italian restaurant, sitting at the top of the Spanish Steps and buying flowers on a romantic night, seeing the view from the top of the Castello San Angelo, and pretending I was starring in Gladiator while I was at the Coliseum. As amazing as Rome was, I know that most of my fondest memories of it are because of who I was with as opposed to what I was seeing.

A Monday train ride brought us to Milan where I delighted in showing my family the appeals of the city I have called my home for the past 4 months. I was proud to show off Milan, and was excited to finally be able to show them the places and people I had been describing since my arrival. I quickly felt like an excited tour guide and wanted to show them all of the things that have made me come to love Milan. A day trip to Florence (one of my favorite cities in Italy) and a few more days in Milan put everyone in a great mood and gave us some time to relax after the stresses of attempting to squeeze the large city of Rome into 2 and a half days.

Finally our journey continued to the beautiful and breathtaking Lake Como, which was a breath of fresh air and took us away from city life. Boat trips, Mountain-top views, and amazing dinners outlined this weekend, but again it was the memories of who I was with that made it all that more special. Como has a very special place in my heart having been in awe of it’s sights, having enjoyed its amazing food, and having experienced some truly romantic and amazing moments there. I won’t get into any deep details, but never have a padlock, an old rickety iron fence, and a swan ever made me feel so loved.

Most importantly seeing and spending time with the people I care about most in this world was an incredible treat that I will always be thankful for getting to experience. As great as study abroad and living in Europe has been for me, being able to get a little taste of home brought me a whole lot of happiness, and seeing those that I miss the most was something I desperately needed.

The sights were great, the memories were better, and the people were irreplaceable… I will never forget it.

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The Last Supper

December 14, 2011

The semester was coming to a close. At this point, finals were done, summer had begun (remember, Australian seasons are backwards from the US) and, sadly, many people, like myself, were preparing to go home. That meant that a plethora of last hurrah’s would have to be packed into the few days remaining before I would return to a cold winter.

Study abroad is filled with expectations. Some are met and, conversely, some are not. But sometimes, maybe even more often than not, it is the things you least expect to meet your expectations that do. Sometimes it is the events you happen upon by chance that leave a firm imprint in your memory.

And sometimes, it is the things you go to out of obligation that become the moments you’ll never forget. I remember getting a text message from my friend coaxing me to come out as it was his last night in Australia, the same night I had already said yes to my final taekwondo dinner. This would be one of my last opportunities to hang out with the taekwondo club, the club that helped me to find my place here. At the same time, this would be my last night in Australia to hang out with a close friend I had made. So, I figured we could just put the night plans on hold and at least go to the team dinner first. They had made a tertiary reservation for my friend because, after spring breaks shenanigans and my midlife taekwondo crisis, he decided he would come to the last few practices that were left. And so we decided we would both go to the dinner and put our plans on hold until later.

What proceeded were the shenanigans and inside jokes I had loved come to live with and would soon have to learn to live without. I could easily say we were having a great time. Soon the dinner was coming to a close and final speeches were made for graduating presidents and jobs well done by coaches. And then a speech was made…for me. A speech was made and a gift was given to the exchange student who had been a part of the club for barely half a semester. People applauded and thanked…me. I was dumbfounded. I was speechless. Most of all, I was touched, sincerely. At that point I didn’t know what to say, but I had to say something so I stood up and spoke. I thanked everyone for being so welcoming and really making me feel like a part of the team. I thanked everyone for treating me like a family and really being my closest friends while I was abroad. And, as I was talking, I realized that all these things that rushed to my head that I just repeated without hesitation were completely true. In a nutshell, these people really helped to make my experience what it was and I can confidently say it would not be the same otherwise. Even days before I left, days after finals, I was still learning. And thus, things you expect to occur do not always do. However, sometimes, those expected things that don’t occur, or the expected one’s that do, make your situation better than you could have possibly imagined.

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Sydney Adventures

December 14, 2011

So they say the human attention span limits our ability to focus for extended periods of time. That’s why experts recommend that about every two hours you deserve a 45 minute study break in order to refresh your mind. You know what? I value expert opinions. I mean, after all, they are called experts for a reason. So before my last exam I figured I’d take my study break. But, since I had been studying and writing essays for the past two weeks, I figured that, mathematically, I need a break proportionate to the amount of work I had been doing. And that’s how I justified my one week vacation to Sydney before my last exam. A few other spiders studying at University of Melbourne and I went off to Sydney to stay with a few Spiders studying there. And thus, we were spreading our spider web over Australia…because we’re spiders. Spiders spin web. And that, my friends, is almost definitely the last Richmond Spiders pun I will make.

Anyway, a few friends of ours from Richmond offered to let us stay with them in Sydney. What’s nice is we’re getting an opportunity to see what it’s like at other universities in Australia. They live on campus at their university, but much like University of Melbourne it is very much a commuter school. Still, the smaller minority who live on campus is proportionate to the size of the entire student population. So, there are about 1000 students living here at a time.

The city of Sydney is incredible. We took time to visit some of the famous touristy areas like the opera house and the royal botanic gardens. Before we left to venture out into the nightlife of Sydney, we had to decide whether we would try to catch the last night train, or wait until they started again in the morning. And that’s when I realized you reach a point in life where you tell yourself that all-nighters are over-rated. You come to believe and accept that, after countless late night study sessions and written-in-one-night papers, nothing really special happens at the break of dawn other than a weird bodily sensation of fatigue that you can’t really differentiate between “just woke up” fatigue and “it’s really time for me to go to bed but I’ve had too much caffeine” fatigue.

So, like back at school, we decided that we would catch the last train, feeling that we had outgrown the all-nighter phase. And with that decision, we learned another very important lesson. Some decisions don’t go the way you plan them to. Sometimes, because of things like track work on trains, a changed bus schedule and a very convincing argument that there will be a second “last train”, you just don’t get to avoid the all-nighter…And sometimes you don’t get to avoid it three times in a row. Now, as much as I would love to say that the incredible people we met at 4:30 in the morning showed us a different part of Sydney that I will personally hold dear forever, I can’t, mainly because everyone else was asleep at 4:30 in the morning. What was incredible, though, was the way friends can make up games to keep themselves entertained for hours until the trains start running again. I guess that’s when the creativity kicks in. But you definitely find out who you can and cannot deal with after four hours in the Australian version of Burger King. And I was pleasantly surprised with the outcome.

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The Story With a Moral

December 7, 2011

My first in-class exam was in Intermediate Macroeconomics, and I was slightly terrified.

After my three days of non-stop studying (minus the bathroom breaks and nap breaks and food breaks… and Facebook breaks and TV breaks including, but not limited to, Dexter, Community and How I Met Your Mother), I was as ready as I would ever be to take this exam.  I decided I would get there relatively early, and this meant that I would get 15 minutes of reading time before the exam began, almost like a bonus for being early. I was ready to go. I had my pre-exam cup of coffee. I had pencils, pens and a calculator. I was wearing pants, unlike most typical pre-exam nightmares.  The only thing I hadn’t done was the pre-exam workout my housemate had suggested, but I figured I could do without the morning jog.

I went to the general exam hall 15 minutes early, and I learned three very important lessons. Lesson number one: not all exams are held on campus, apparently. Lesson number two: my exam that day was not held on campus. Lesson number three: I would get that pre-exam workout my housemate suggested. After asking around and discovering that my exam was a solid five blocks away from campus, I ran for my life.

When I finally got there, not only did I fail to arrive 15 minutes early, I was 15 minutes late. I jumped into my chair as the gears in my brain jumped into double overtime. I was wide awake at that point, and scribbling answers as fast as I could. I glared at test proctors as they distracted me from my exam by reminding me to fill out insignificant information like my name and student ID number. Sweat was racing down my face as if my eyes were the finish line, forcing me to waste time to clear my vision.

However, at last, I finished without a second to spare and not a second to double-check. I walked out of that exam hall to a shining sun and warm happy smiles all around. The moral of the story is…well… I don’t think it has anything to do with morning jogging, really. Maybe the moral is… “directions a day keep the lost and tardy away!” Okay, you know what? We’ll just go with the moral: “In life, the unexpected occurs.” So, in preparation, be prepared to be unprepared, because preparing can only help you to prepare for that which can be prepared for.

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The Work of a Giant.

December 6, 2011

As the final weeks of term loom ahead, I would like to reminisce about being new to this whole living in Europe thing. Back in the day (sure seems like a heck of a lot longer than just 3 months), I felt the electric excitement of exploring Derry and its surrounding areas. Early on in the semester, a group of American students and I decided to hop on a train one Saturday morning and take it to the coast. Two hours and a long stream of breathtaking landscapes later, we arrived at the Giant’s Causeway on Northern Ireland’s Antrim Coast.

When researching the must-see sights of Ireland, the Giant’s Causeway always tops the list. Ever since I saw a picture of this geological phenomenon, I knew I needed to see it. My American companions all had the same thought. Just as we stepped off the bus, rain began to fall. It didn’t matter to us, though — we were determined. An advisor here at Magee actually told me that going to the coast in less-than-perfect weather was kind of a good idea. She said that seeing the waves violently crash against the coast made the cliffs and sights dramatic to behold. Anticipation was building as we made it all the way down the winding coastal path, passing signs warning of falling rocks. We rounded a final rock wall, and then we saw it. There is no way to describe it. Pictures don’t even do it justice. It’s one of those sights that you have to experience in person. Here are some pictures to give you an idea:

The Giant’s Causeway is basically a path of huge circular rocks projecting into the sea. Millions of years ago, the lava of an erupted volcano cooled in a certain way to form the almost perfectly circular rocks. It is really amazing because they look completely manmade. Even more interesting than the science behind the causeway is the Irish myth (and its namesake) about the place. The story is that an Irish giant named Finn MacCool wanted to battle with a Scottish giant known as Benandonner. Finn built a great stone bridge to link Ireland with Scotland so that Benandonner could cross. As Benandonner began approaching Ireland, his sheer figure terrified MacCool into hiding. The myth goes that MacCool was disguised as a baby and was placed in a giant crib. Upon seeing the ‘baby’, Benandonner did not want to imagine how massive MacCool would be if that was the size of his child. Quickly he turned around and ripped up the pathway as he ran back to Scotland.

As we were exploring the Causway, the rain finally let up and we were able to see the sights really well. We then took another bus to the nearby town of Bushmills. The attraction here? Ireland’s famous Bushmills Whiskey brewery, of course! We took a tour of the plant and learned about how “the water of life” is made. This is the literal translation of the Irish word for whiskey! They sure do love it here. A picture of the factory even appears on some Irish £20 notes. At the end of the tour we were offered a sampling of the whiskey. I’d have to say it was a wee bit strong for my tastes… Here is a picture of me next to a bunch of Bushmills barrels:

The next stop on our journey of the coast was the resort town of Portrush. Seeing it during the month of September obviously wouldn’t reveal all that the place has to offer, but it was beautiful in any case. The city is a place where many families in Ireland and the UK come to vacation. Here I finally had my authentic Irish Fish and Chips that I had been dying for! Here’s a picture:

Reflecting on it now, that trip really opened my eyes to the wonders that exist outside the borders of the United States. It made me hungry to see more and more of what else is out there! This is probably the reason why Megan and I planned a last minute trip over to Scotland. With only 2 weeks until all my final artwork is due, it’s proper crazy if you ask me! Well, at least I’m making progress. Here’s a wee picture of my latest work-in-progress creation… he will end up being a dinosaur of sorts:

Fun Fact #13: The Titanic was built in Northern Ireland’s capital of Belfast.

Fun Fact #14: The HBO series Game of Thrones is shot here. I met someone who was actually an extra in next season’s filming that took place earlier this semester. Also, Rihanna’s video for “We Found Love” was shot near Belfast. Apparently she was filming in a farmer’s field, but the shoot got a little too risqué, so the farmer kicked her off his land.

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Time for Harvest, and Final Projects

December 5, 2011

Harvest time means that all the green fields from the beginning of my journey have turned golden yellow.  It is a physical representation of truly how much time has passed.  Pretty cool, though, because just as the rice has changed through process, so have I, through our group process.

This last unit before final projects was based on mining, and it brought together everything we have learned so far.  Water gets poisoned, land rights are violated, and of course, the farmland is destroyed.  What was most interesting about this unit was its complexity.  I, as an American consumer, contribute to this issue.  At our reading discussion, we had to take everything that had mined products in it and put it at our feet.  Jewlery, electronics from our backpacks, notebooks, pens — everything was sitting at our feet.  It was a scary realization.  Then we went off to the communities, and they, too, use products that have been mined.  It’s really a “not in my backyard” argument, but it needs to happen in our current economy, so whose backyard do we put it in?  More importantly, how do we ensure that those people have a say? That seems to be one of the biggest problems here in Northeast Thailand.  The villagers simply are not heard when the proposed projects will change their livelihood forever.

Despite all the work that was due, two friends and I decided to take our personal days and return back to the organic village.  What an adventure it was.  I could not stay with my host family, so I stayed with my friends and Paw Wan.  Paw is the local rice varieties expert, so it was cool harvesting rice in his farm.  It wasn’t just Jasmine 105 or Gaw Kaw 6; we were harvesting black rice, and then for dinner, we had the most delicious red sticky rice.  (Which doesn’t mean the rice is sticky — it is a different kind of rice that is eaten in this region.)

The trip back was where the adventure happened.  A driver brought us to the city nearby, then we got on an open air bus to take us to the bus station, and then there was only standing room on the four-hour bus ride.  Plus, the air conditioning was broken.  I found myself sitting on the floor (because it was cooler) scrunched between my friends, and just hoping that time would pass quickly.

We got home safe and sound as always, appreciating the adventure and impressed with our language skills.  It is now time for final projects, so off to the village to assess the feasibility of a Green Market.  But more on that soon…

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Adventures in Paris.

November 29, 2011

Since we met each other in September, Megan, Lauren, and I had been talking about taking a trip together. We all wanted to venture deeper into Europe and have a wee vacation away from Derry. We unanimously decided on Paris. We had been told several times that we would fall in love with the city if we visited. A professor had also mentioned that an airline called EasyJet always had cheap tickets for travel within Europe, so our planning began.

We researched several different hostels within the city and settled on one that had pretty good reviews online. The only downside to this particular establishment was that management only spoke French. Having a history with the French language, our little group relied on me to deal with any transactions in my very simple French.  It turned out to be no problem at all.

On our first night in the City of Love we explored a bit trying to find somewhere suitable to eat. I’m not sure about my friends, but I know that I was a bit nervous to walk into a restaurant and order off a menu only written in French. We happily stumbled upon a restaurant/café with the menu posted outside (written in both French and English). The waiter happened to be standing outside when he heard us speaking. It must have been a novelty for him to run into Americans because he seemed excited to learn where in the States we all were from. He guided us inside and immediately recommended the duck- a French classic. Lauren and I decided to try as many French foods as possible while we were in Paris, so we went with his suggestion. It was absolutely lovely. At the end of our meal we chose crème brulee as our dessert to celebrate our trip to Paris. To our surprise, the waiter (who we later referred to as “nice French man”) also brought out a dish of chocolate mousse to welcome us to the great city. As we were leaving he also quickly wrote down metro directions to the Eiffel tower which we were planning to see the next morning. My experience in Paris proved the stereotype that the French dislike Americans completely false.

The next morning we took the lift all the way to the tip top of the Eiffel Tower. The views were remarkable to say the least. I have been in some pretty tall buildings (like the Sears Tower in Chicago) but it is much different to be that high in the open air. Megan and Lauren were a bit skeptical in taking the second lift all the way to the topmost level. I was too excited to look around the be nervous. My knees however did start to quake a bit when we took the stairs down from the second level to the first level. Its very strange to be that high up on an open air structure when you can feel the wind blowing. It will definitely be something I will never forget.

After we made it all the way back down, we walked a good distance away to get a view of the monument from afar. We walked by a street artist with work displayed and I fell in love with some of his drawings. I ended up buying 4 of them and the artist gave me another one for free- see, the stereotype being broken. You can see his work at this website: http://www.mario-paris.com/.

While taking some pictures, we ran into another group of American students. They were all from St. Cloud in Minnesota and were currently studying in Germany. It was very strange to hang out with some other Americans for a while. I love the people here in Europe, but it was just refreshing to talk to people going through a similar experience. From the tower we all walked to the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs-Élysées. We walked around for a while then made plans to meet up with the other Americans later for drinks. Being the American girls that we are, Lauren, Megan, and I decided to see all the stores lining the Champs-Élysées- a big shopping location in Paris. We grabbed dinner which included a lovely appetizer of snails. I have had escargot before, so I knew what I was getting myself into. It was great to see Megan and Laruen’s faces as they tasted it for the first time. I was then able to check that off the foods-to-eat-in-Paris list.

While talking to the American students we had met, we came up with the best meeting place ever- under the Eiffel tower. That night we actually ended up going to and Irish themed pub which made the three of us feel at home.

The next morning we had three things on our to do list- Versailles, the Louvre, and Notre Dame. Because Versailles is further out of the city, we decided to go there first. After several buses and trains, we finally got there. And all the traveling was well worth it. The place is massive. And beautiful. In fact, it is so massive and beautiful that there are bikes for rent to take around the gardens and that is exactly what we did. We rode all around the grounds and the pond and just enjoyed the lovely day. Before we left we took a tour of the larger palace and were amazed at the size and grandeur of the place. There are countless rooms with crystal chandeliers and hundreds of pieces of artwork. There were salons with paintings big enough to take up the entire wall. In several rooms, the ceilings were completely painted with Bible scenes. Here are a few  pictures of Versailles:

After we felt so completely like princesses, we decided to head to the Louvre. Not having planned much of our trip in advance, we sadly arrived at the Louvre to find that the museum portion was closed for the day due to a national holiday. This was slightly disappointing, but who can be sad in Paris?! We headed on to the Notre Dame and realized that day was November 11, 2011. That’s 11/11/11. So at 11:11 pm on 11/11/11 we could make the most epic wish ever underneath the Eiffel tower. We had a bit of time to kill so we enjoyed the Notre Dame Cathedral from every angle and wandered the streets of Paris for a while. Then our last night in Paris ended while sitting underneath the Eiffel Tower making wishes. It was magical.

Fun Fact #11: Young people in Northern Ireland are paid a “living expense” to go to school when they are around the age of people in high school. My friend Tomas said, “Aye, I think we were given about 30 quid a week”.

Fun Fact #12: “Aye” means “yeah”. People here never say “yeah”. They also never say “little”. Everything is always just “wee”.

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Hallowe’en Night

November 16, 2011

Ever since I got to Derry, I have been told again and again about Halloween night. “It’s a shame you’re missing St. Patrick’s Day,” people would say, “but at least you get Halloween!” People around here flock to the city centre for this holiday. The town puts on a parade and a firework show over the Foyle River. The bars and pubs are packed with costumed celebrators.

My Halloween celebrations actually started quite early. Tomas, my Irish friend, and his father picked up me and my two American friends at the Student Village (on-campus housing) around 4 pm. It felt a little strange walking down the street this early already dressed as Dorothy from head to toe. I’m not going to lie… I got a few strange looks. We headed over to Tomas’ house to eat dinner with his family. His mother made lasagna and served it with chips. All the food here comes with chips… even Chinese. (And when I say chips, I am of course talking about french fries.)

Followed by dinner was dessert. This dessert was extra special, because it was the first pumpkin pie Tomas had ever baked. See, a week previously, Megan, Tomas, and I got together to carve pumpkins and bake pies. Megan and I found it terribly strange that carving pumpkins and eating pumpkin pie are not really part of the Halloween tradition here. Very few Irish people I have met have ever carved a pumpkin, and many didn’t even know that it could be made into a dessert. Tomas was slightly embarrassed to be carrying around our five pumpkins in the supermarket, as he was getting some strange looks. We explained to him that carrying around a bunch of pumpkins in America only inspired more Halloween spirit in onlookers. Not only is it interesting to learn about the culture here, but it feels great to introduce others to some of our fun traditions. Here is a picture of the lovely jack-o-lanterns we made that night (mine, Megan’s, and Tomas’):

Later on Hallowe’en night (how many people in Europe spell the word), we headed into town to take part in all of the festivities. We caught a couple minutes of the Halloween parade before heading over to the banks of the Foyle River to get a good spot for the fireworks. They shot the fireworks high above the river, choreographed to a soundtrack. It was definitely a sight to see. Not only were the fireworks amazing, but the number of people who came out dressed in their Halloween best was astounding. I quite enjoyed watching as all the costumes walked by. After the events in town were over, we headed to a Halloween party held in the Students Union. The night truly was a blast. Here’s a picture of Megan, me, and Lauren in our costumes:

Fun Fact #9: Traffic lights here go from red, to yellow, to green as well as from green, to yellow, to red.

Fun Fact #10: Electrical plugs have on and off switches here. This can get quite annoying for us Americans, because we always seem to plug something in, but forget to hit the on switch… so my phone will just end up sitting there, not charging.

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Silly Souvenirs

November 7, 2011

We all do it. Every tourist, every abroad student — we buy things as souvenirs we would never buy in our own country.

Consider a postcard… In America, you see a postcard of the Statue of Liberty or the Liberty Bell, and you think, “Ha, why would I pay a dollar for a picture I could take myself? Obviously, no one mails postcards… what is this, the stone age?” Postcards, despite being clearly made obsolete by various technological channels of communication, are still made because they are cheap and because they are the ultimate tourist trap.

I feel pretty confident in saying this because I, too, am a giddy, interested, stupid tourist whenever I see postcards abroad. I currently have a postcard from just about every city I have traveled to this semester. Postcards of Big Ben in London, the Duomo in Florence, the majestic Danube River, and the state building in Budapest, to name a few. I don’t know what it is, but when we see a postcard from a new place, it suddenly takes on a whole new meaning — from a floppy piece of cardboard in our hand to a portal that reminds us of an experience that we treasure and enjoy. It triggers the memory in the back of our brain and makes us feel like we are there, remembering the experience, just as excited as ever.

In addition to postcards, we will willingly overpay for anything that makes us feel like we are part of the home culture. Recently, I bought an Italian soccer jersey in Milan, as well as 2 Italian soccer scarves, because to me, they were inherently Italian. Uniqueness is a big thing for souvenir buyers, as we find that anything we could not readily purchase in our home country is something we must buy immediately (Haven’t any of us heard of the internet?).  Everything from watches in Switzerland, to fish and chips in London… anything we see that we identify as being unique to where we are visiting, we go crazy for. (You should have seen how much stuff I bought at the Guinness Factory in Dublin. My bank account trembles just thinking about it).

The real reason that we tourists spend money, however, is that everyone wants to feel as though they connected with the culture that they experienced. It comes in different degrees, based on the length of your journey, obviously, but in some way, a true tourist or world traveler wants to do something that identifies them with the country at least once while they are there. Whether that is eat at an authentic cultural restaurant, buy authentic cultural attire, or attend an authentic cultural event, we search for an experience we have never had before in a place we have never been. After all, we do always covet things we have never had.

The next fun souvenir topic, and probably the most important, is mastering the souvenir gift. This can be tricky, and I have already had some trouble with this myself. The truth is, we generally have a lot of souvenirs to buy,  in order to avoid the classic reaction of “Why did she get one, but I didn’t?” This also means that we can’t buy something too expensive for everyone, or we won’t be able to pay for dinner at the authentic cultural restaurant we already made reservations for a month and a half in advance. (We tend to get very prematurely excited about our trips.)

So how do you find something that is unique to the place you’re visiting, unique to the person you are giving it to, not too expensive, and is something they might actually want? … It’s almost impossible, and I feel like that last criteria gets overlooked most of the time. While hopefully the trend of t-shirts and other things saying “My (fill in generic family member title here) came all the way to (fill in place you are traveling here) and all I got was this lousy (fill in name of useless item here)” is dead and gone, there are still plenty of worthless souvenirs to go around.

While for a normal gift, our biggest concern in getting something is “Do I think they will like it?,” that seems to be the farthest concern from the mind of a souvenir gift buyer. Realistically, how many of us have gotten souvenir gifts and never looked at them again? Probably 90 percent of us. But it isn’t even the souvenir buyer’s fault– it is the system’s fault. We are obligated to buy gifts, and the stuff we have to choose from is stuff no one would ever want! It is inevitable that these gifts will be presented to less-than-thrilled family members. But it is the thought that counts, right? So remember, as you go to purchase that Swedish snow globe, or if you are receiving a“I heart Madrid” keychain — giving a bad souvenir gift is still always 100 percent better than giving no gift at all.

So as we all waste our money on these items of uselessness, let us remember that:

1. We are stimulating the economy of the country that is so graciously hosting us, and
2. To embrace this practice, as it is simply part of being a tourist. Enjoy your junk! I know I will.

1 Comment | Fall 2011, John in Italy | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by johninitaly

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