This week has been pretty low key but I figured I would share some details about daily life in Cork and my weekend so far! I know a while ago I promised more pictures of the city and finally I am going to get around to that.
Over the past two weeks I have been writing down observations about Cork or Ireland in general that are different than the U.S. and I thought that might be fun to share! I really have enjoyed trying to fit in with the locals and do things how they do them. Just being immersed in a place where things are done differently is cool! Here goes my list of more new things!
-There are some green Mcdonalds instead of red.
-The buildings and doors are much more colorful, maybe to offset the cloudy weather and brighten the city?
-Having coins is ok, you could have 10 euro with 5 coins! Still getting used to this though!
-There is a lot of dog poop on the sidewalks. Makes for an eventful walk sometimes!
-There are many more rivers than lakes.
-Many of the side streets look like sidewalks. You wouldn't know its a street until a random car starts plowing through the people.
-Pedestrians almost never follow the traffic lights unless its a busy street.
-A lot of streets have different names on every block. Makes for confusing directions and getting lost sometimes :)
-Quay is pronounced 'key' and is another label for a street. For example I live on Bachelors Quay.
-The tallest building in Cork is 17 stories and its the tallest by far!
-Public transportation is incredibly easy. There is a bus station and a train station about 20 minutes walk from my apartment.
-Instead of ketchup bottles on the table sometimes there are ketchup packets.
-There is no such thing as take out, its take away! Chinese take away, coffee take aways, take away boxes, etc.
-Also, no such thing as french fries. They are chips! And American potato chips are crisps. Be prepared for weird looks if you ask for fries.
Anyways, I have done a bit of exploring this week and found a few of my new favorite cafes and found some really nice views of the city. The first I found by myself and it is called O'Connails Chocolate. It is on a little side street right in the middle of city centre. I splurged and had the best cup of hot chocolate I have ever had! Since chocolate is their specialty, I just had to order one. It was served with a sample of their chocolate chips, white chocolate, dark and milk. Yum. I will be going back there when I want to treat myself :)
The best hot chocolate I have ever had!
View of the front
On wednesday I went with a few girls who were going to a clinic on the other side of town. They said that it had a great view of the city and much nicer houses than we see around city centre or UCC so I figured I would go check it out. I am glad that I went just so I can say I saw the other side of the city and saw a nice view of the city from a different angle.
After that a few of us went to check out a little cafe that we heard good things about called the Buttercup cafe. We had a nice view of the Shandon tower and it was tucked away in a quiet little corner of the city. We got lunch and hot drinks and scones for later. I was one happy girl! They also serve Irish breakfast, which I have found is pretty common among the cafes. So it looks like ill just have to try them all? :)
This week I also went to a few practices for ultimate frisbee club. Yes you read that right. I am not super athletic or into sports so I surprised even myself by trying it out. I enjoyed it for the most part, mainly because it was a chance to interact with Irish students. But I may keep going, I'll keep you updated :)
Buttercup Cafe
Shandon Tower
Delicious mocha- Although my favorite drink here so far is a chai latte :)
Happy girl
On Fridays, I don't have class so I have a nice long weekend to be able to do more exploring and traveling! This Friday four of us from our group decided to go buy some meat from the English Market and make dinner. The choices are so overwhelming there its so hard to choose any one thing but we ended up choosing some chicken kabobs with peppers and onions. They were so good! The meat was falling apart after it was done cooking and since I don't eat meat very often here it was especially good.
Today was a lovely Saturday. I went with the same three girls from dinner to Midleton, which is a smaller town in County Cork that was about a 25 minute bus ride from City Centre. We left pretty early so we could catch the farmers market that we read about online. It was very cute and the vendors were so kind and offered us all sorts of samples. They had a fresh fish stand with fancy salmon cakes mixed with chive and tarragon, cheese stands with fresh goat cheese, bread stands with pastries and traditional Irish breads and even a homemade pizza stand. Paradise for a foodie. There was a man selling chicken pate and offered some to us and eventually we ended up talking with him for about 15 minutes! He suggested places to go in Cork and asked about Minnesota, everyone was really so friendly!
After that we wandered around a bit, eventually making our way to the Jameson whiskey distillery. This is the big tourist destination in Midleton, so of course we decided to go on a tour of the distillery. It was very interesting to hear the history of how John Jameson started making whiskey in 1780 and all of the steps that go into making it. We saw the largest pot still in the world that was used to distill the whiskey and could hold 140,000 liters of liquid. At the end of the tour my friends and I volunteered for taste testing and we tasted three different whiskeys, Scotch, Jameson and Jack Daniels. Everyone who got to taste test liked the Jameson the best. Since it is triple distilled it was smoother and had a hint of vanilla. It was a little strong for me! But I enjoyed the complimentary drink with ginger ale and lime that came with the tour ticket!
Pastries at the Farmers Market
In front of the distillery
Before our taste testing
The rest of the weekend will just be relaxed, we may go listen to some traditional music tonight and I hope to find a church tomorrow morning! Thanks for reading everyone!
Aw, looks so fun Steph. I am jealous of the farmer's market pastries!!!
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