Blogs from County Cork, Ireland, Europe - page 45

Well, the day finally came for a large part of the reason why we came to Ireland....driving through the country side. And we were not disappointed. We may have spent all day making a 3 hour trip but we had some some fun stops along the way, and yes, the now-inevitable wrong turns and miles off path. But we had no schedule and the wrong turns led to amazing scenery and sharing death-defying narrow roads with nice big mac trucks barreling through like we were on an eight lane highway. Speaking of the driving, I have learned much in the short time driving here.....1) I can actually down a bottle of antacid in 3 seconds while keeping my eyes on the road and 2) luckily most gas stations do carry antacid in easy-to-carry six packs. Getting ... read more

Last weekend I visited Cork in the south of Ireland with a few friends. Cork City is much smaller than Dublin but it has a great hometown feel. It really reminds me of Pittsburgh. Friday night we took the opportunity to get to know the city by going on a great pub crawl/tour. On Saturday we went to Blarney Castle outside of the city. The castle was amazing and because its not tourist season we had the chance to climb and explore the castle and grounds. Even though its winter here, the countryside is still a beautiful shade of deep green. And of course, I took the opportunity to kiss the blarney stone which is suppose to give you the talent of eloquent speech. In addition to traveling, I am absolutely loving my time in Dublin. ... read more

So, tomorrow marks the eighth week of my stay. Not really much to say about that. I've just ended the third week of classes and I am really excited about them. Sean nos is lovely. I am finding it hard to keep vibrato and such out of my voice though. I can thank Les Hale for his teaching methods, as with just a small bit of modification I use that voice for sean nos. Very direct, and it carries well. My tin whistle (or penny whistle for you Americans) prof is an absolute delight to watch play. Her fingers are so graceful and expressive. Definitely an inspiration for my own practicing. My Latin poetry class is challenging, but not over my head, for which I am grateful. At the moment we're doing Catullus, for which I ... read more

Today was the final day of my early start music course. *sigh* I am not at all happy for it to be over. This means that the actual semester will start, and I'll have to go to real classes. That said, I think I took more notes in these four weeks than I have taken in any other course. I learned so much about music in general, 'Irish' music in particular, and innumerable bits of very specific information. What is Irish music? so our prof asked today in class...and I thought I'd write a little about it. First of all, there is no one Irish music. There are Irish musics, varying from a sean nos singer to a ceili band to a Limerick rapper to a jazz sax player...ad infinitum. The musics of Ireland are like ... read more

Been wandering around now for upwards of two hours trying to find the bay. A bay. Any body of water larger than a river. The utter lack of streetsigns once one leaves the city proper is making this rather difficult. After a time I had only the general cardinal directions to help me - and once I found myself in suburbia, they were no help at all. I've plopped down in the 'Douglas Community Park' to enjoy the shade before I try to find my way back to the part of the city I know. Next time I try this, I think I'll just follow the river. Now this is not to say I'm not enjoying myself - on my walk I got into a richer part of town: all the houses were gated, set back ... read more