I'm Irish too! Straight out of Charlestown...

After a lengthy discussion with Mike from Cork about how the urinals in Ireland and indeed all over Europe are more rounded than the ones in America are, he came out with the line “Ah sure, either way, you’re a peein. (Geddit? European? Geddit? Gas…)

(Mc Laughlin, M.J. (2010) The Eagle’s Nest, Part. 1 Section. VI, Langerhouse publishing, Cork, Co. Cork. (My God, I love Cork))

As I’m pretty much settled in over here I’m struggling of things to talk about in this blog because I’ve become so used to everything here that it seems normal and mundane to me now, even though it fascinated me or confused me when I first got here. One thing I do still really enjoy my walk to college everyday which takes me about 5 minutes along Commonwealth Avenue to the entrance of BC. While I walk I’m not looking at the T when it flies by, nor am I looking at the pretty buildings all alongside the road, but I walk along the side of the street where the cemetery is. I know this sounds quite morbid, but it’s the headstones in there that fascinate me. The headstones at home are all kind of familiar, the same names popping up all the time, every so often a name will not be Martin, McEvoy or Farrell and then, sure, aren’t they a blow in? But the names are so fantastically mixed here, so much so that the names Zanik, Sheridan, O Sullivan, Dubnikov and even a Phelan all in a row. It’s something that I think we tend to ridicule about Americans, the fact that they all cling onto their heritage, especially in Boston where they cling to their Irish roots like a needy ex that just can’t let go. We’ve all done it, we’ve all made jokes about the Americans who break down their heritage into fractions like, “I’m 12.5% Italian, 20% German and 93% Irish.” Now, I’m not going to lie, I was right among those making the jokes about it, but since I’ve come here I started to really like that about America. Everybody is American, but they’re also not letting their heritage go, and if I’m honest, the Boston Irish are more Irish than the Irish. They know traditional folk songs, they know the history of Ireland and they drink Guinness, and when I say traditional songs, I don’t just mean Thin Lizzy’s version of Whiskey in the Jar. So I ask what’s wrong with Americans holding onto where their roots are? It’s honestly one of my favourite things about America, when I meet someone and they tell me that they’re Irish too, and they’re from Cork or Galway, or even one girl I met who told me that her family came from Offaly. I told her I was very sorry, but it’s good that she can admit it. It made me wonder if Americans will ever see themselves as just American, not Irish-American or Italian American or whatever- American, but I really hope they don’t.

Now, back to the issue of cultural differences and all that jazz! Ok, so I know that when you sneeze, sometimes a friend or a relation will say, “bless you” afterwards. Sometimes! Here anybody and everybody will say it to you! This isn’t a bad thing, but the people here do it with such frequency and speed, it’s sometimes more frightening than a sneeze that catches you off guard. If you sneeze in class, at least 4 people all seemingly vying to win the race to speak the magical words will shout it out to from across the room, down the length of the bus and probably over an intercom system if it was nearby. Just recently I was in the library (The actual library!) and I was sitting in what I can only describe as a wooden paneled cell where all possible stimuli is cut off. Sitting in my little box, I am surrounded by several other boxes all containing students who have confined themselves to the wooden prison in hopes of getting work done. For no apparent reason and with no warning whatsoever, a sneeze sneaks up on me and comes shooting out. Now, because I’m in the middle of several well-meaning students, I was barraged by at least 6 people calling out “bless you!” I was so taken aback by the response to my sneeze I said “bugger!” a lot louder than I intended to and fair few giggles were directed my way along with one person looking over the partition and asking me “Do you have an accent right now?” Which incidentally has become my favourite phrase here, like, it’s not just inquiring about whether or not I have a non- American accent, but rather whether I have it “right now” just incase I do have a foreign accent, but I sometimes like to leave it at home.

I don’t think that Boston has really lived up to the stereotypes as much as I thought it would, but in some respects I have felt very stereotypically American, like ordering pizza, having a beer and watching Football (and yes, I have given up calling it ‘American Football’) and I love it. It really is the little things that make a difference, and the biggest difference here is that pizza doesn’t come with garlic mayo. They may have the art of Pizza making down to an art, but when it comes to dipping crusts, or even the glory of folding a slice in half lengthways and dunking it into the garlic mayo, they are still in their infancy. On the topic of pizza, we now have a great relationship with the general manager of our local Dominos because when you order Dominos online, you can see who is making your pizza and subsequently who is delivering it. Quite regularly we were told that Tamer was making our pizza, and so we decided to write compliments to Tamer in the comments box on the Dominos site. We assumed that these comments would go into some kind of computer system and never actually be read. However, it turns out that those comments appear in the Dominos that you are ordering from, so they saw these comments were being read by Tamer himself. So one day, we ordered a pizza and it told us that Tamer was making our Pizza. We celebrated as usual, but then we saw it change to “Tamer has left the store with your order.” We went mental. Actually mental. When we calmed down, we decided that we should write him a song and so we changed the lyrics to Jack Johnson’s Sitting, Waiting, Wishing to a song all about Tamer. Long story short, we now have a direct line to Tamer and he sorts us out with all kinds of extras.

Moral of the story: Be nice to pizza people, they can pull strings, and probably mozzerella ones.

My America Moments

Fact: Boston College is neither in Boston, nor is it college. I actually attend Brighton University which is in the Greater Boston area. Sort your life out BC.

It’s strange to think that I’ve been living in the US for over a month now and it’s even stranger that I feel very at home here now. The memories of going to the Fiddlers in Carrick or the Roost on a regular Maynooth Thursday seem so long ago and so far removed to where I am now. As I’m about to start my 5^th week of college in America, I’m starting to get into the routine of lectures, work, studying, football games and of course, lots of Ultimate Frisbee. But every so often I get this strange feeling where I step back from what I’m doing and realise where I am. My friend Sinead described it perfectly when she called them her “America Moments.” It’s hard to describe, but at certain times when I’m doing something routine like walking to college, buying food or just sitting watching the Pats (The New England Patriots) on TV, I’ll get this feeling of “Wow, I’m in America!” I know that sounds stupid, but it really is something that you have to feel to understand. I don’t know what it is or why I get these America Moments when I do, but I think it has to be something to do with actually living in this country and then realising that what I’m doing is crazy! I’m almost 5,000 kilometers from home in a city where legendary teams like the Bruins, The Red Sox and The Celtics play, where the Boson Tea Party happened and where so many Irish people came over the years… and I live here.

I have to admit, it isn’t all great moments and fulfilled dreams here, I have been hugely disappointed by America, and more specifically by Boston in one aspect; there are no fat people here. Seriously, what use are stereotypes if I can’t even meet one loud, fat and stupid American? If you are what you eat, then Bostonians have eaten really fit, intelligent people. It seems to be particularly Boston College where the whole student body is incredibly athletic and into their personal health. I’m assured that there are some obscenely obese people here, but they’re mostly in the south. I guess they migrated, which is pretty much the last thing I expected them to do.

In other news, I’ve made my first ever American roadtrip! It was a short hop from Boston to South Bend, Indiana to visit all the Americans who were in Maynooth last year and the year before. They’re in St. Mary’s college, which is a sister college to Notre Dame. When I found out that I would be going to college in America, they all made me promise that I would come visit them. Back then it seemed so far away and I wasn’t sure if I’d get the chance to see them at all, but it all got sorted out and after class on Thursday night at 8, we started driving. I’ll spare you the details of our trip, but roughly 1450km (900miles) and 14 hours later, we rocked into South Bend!

Now it seems that all colleges in America have made their college into a brand, to be slapped onto hoodies, jackets, mugs, dog jackets, ashtrays, you name it, but Notre Dame seems to go just a bit further. Not only have they the brand of Notre Dame, but they’re known as ‘The Fighting Irish.” It’s a very strange experience to walk around a whole shop that has every conceivable piece of useless junk branded with ‘IRISH’ in a way that would make a product designer for Carroll’s think that they’ve gone a bit over the top.

If there is one thing Notre Dame to well, it has to be the band. I’m not just saying this because a good few of the girls who were in Maynooth are in the band, and they let me try on their hat, although that does sway my opinion slightly. So this is a big thanks to all the St. Mary’s girls and this time it’s your turn to make a promise that you’ll either come to Boston or back to Maynooth in the very near future.

Also, I have no idea how I lived without Dunkin’ Donuts (That's how they spell it!) I really can’t convey how much I love them in any amount of words. I’m certain that Shakespeare himself would have trouble. The best I can do is “I think, therefore I eat Doughnuts”


I've just realised that I haven't taken any more photos of Boston or Boston College, I suppose that's because the beautiful buildings on campus that I was once in awe of are now just where my classes are held, very odd. Although I can't offer you any photos of BC, I can however show you a photo of an unnecessarily large burger that I am quite proud to inform you that I finished :)

Boson is wicked pissah bro!

- Why are you awake so early?

- Because it’s one in the afternoon!

I hate Jet Lag.

So many things have happened in this last week, I don’t know how I’m going to put them all into this, but I’ll try! I suppose I’ll start with arriving in the Airport in Boston where Jay, my roommate, collected me. I couldn’t have got a better introduction to America seeing as he collected me in his Convertible Mustang! We drove to meet Louis, our other housemate and he took us to meet some of his friends where I promptly fell asleep on the couch. Life of the party as always.

Over the next few days, I got to know my housemates (2 of them at least, our other housemate Juan is moving in on the 1^st of September) and got to look around Boston College for a while as well and had a look at the football stadium and announced myself to the International office.

On Saturday our apartment was full of Irish people for a change; Oisin, Rob, Jamie, Brian, Sinead and Avril all came to Boston for a day to catch up before the lads got a 15hour bus to get to Ohio where they got a car and are currently making their way to LA to get their flight home. Kind of sickened that I can’t go with them, but Boston isn’t a bad place to have to stay!

I can now also say that I am a Red Sox fan! My friend Katie got me a ticket to the game against the Seattle Mariners, which they won 5-3! I wasn’t expecting much, but it turns out that it’s a lot of fun, especially when I had 3 exasperated Americans trying to explain to me what an inning was.

I had another group of Irish visitors, as well as one Canadian (She’s from Canadia) Rebecca, Conor, Caroline and Caitlin all crashed in my apartment for a few nights and we did a few touristy things, went to the aquarium, but more importantly, went to Salem! I don’t know why, but I expected it to be an old town that modern life hadn’t touched, but I was sorely disappointed to find that it was a fully functioning town with witch museums, but they were fun anyway!

So there’s been a lot of hanging around and meeting people, but I had International Orientation from Tuesday to Thursday where we had a strange mix of very boring talks and very fun people. I met my international assistant, Rob, who has been emailing me since I was accepted into BC, so he’s pretty much my go-to person if I need anything while I’m here so it was nice to meet him. We were all put into cluster groups with other internationals, and got to know each other and so were not totally on our ownio while we’re in BC, so it’s a great programme.

In other news, I just heard that we’re supposed to get a hurricane later today, so that should be fun living on the 12^th floor!


It's when I look at photos like this that I think "Wow, I live here" and then I smile. A lot.

Leaving home

'Do you have your passport?'

'Yes'

'Tickets?'

'All your documents?'

'Yes'

'Are you taking your *insert useless item here* with you?

'Yes Mum, I have my glow in the dark goldfish bowl with me, it's right beside my chocolate flavoured disco ball and my extendable trumpet.'

This has been the conversation between my parents and I for the last few days. Packing and unpacking over and over again and making sure I'm under the weight restriction with not one, but three different weighing scales, just to be sure. But now it's all done and I'm sitting at my departure gate, I passed immagration with flying colours and you'll be glad to know that I'm not a terrorist nor do I have any root vegetables that I intend to sell during the day, so America can rest easy now. I still can't believe I'm actually here, just waiting to board my plane and head to Boston College for the year. It's strange even saying that, I think it's the same feeling as when I went to college for the first time. I suppose it's about entering the unknown and all that, but at least I know something about American culture, the American documentary channel called MTV has been a great resource, and by the looks of things house parties are full of girls dancing while a man wearing a lot of furry clothes sings and does some strange kind of shuffle and waves in a strange manner. Bit different to playing Kings and singing the same Coronas songs over and over again.

But being serious, I have to thank Lynette for telling me not to go back and study during the Christmas exams, but sit and chat with her while she got coffee, where she told me about this international exchange that she was going on. My parents shoud probably skip this next statement, because I'm pretty sure that was the most productive day I've had in the library, as I researched all the places I could go from the USA to Canada and even to Hong Kong! That seems like a long time ago, and I don't think I fully grasped what I was getting myself, or my family into and I'm not sure it's really hit me yet either! I know I'm coming home at Christmas, which is only four months away, but it's the longest I'll have been away from home and I know that when I unpack my waterproof lampsahde, I'll miss home and especially the people that helped me pack it.