ovember, I would always get the same response: Ah yea, but it’s a dry cold. Because no matter where you are in the world, we always seem to assume that the weather is better if you’re not in Ireland. But it might interest you to know that the Irish climate is more similar to that of Greece than the climate in America. Economically speaking of course. (oooh topical humour)
However on the day I was to leave Boston, I walked into my apartment on what was just a regular cold and windy day to pack to go home (Yes Mum, I left my packing until the last day) and I looked out the window twenty minutes later to see what can only be described as a blizzard, coating everything in a bright white powder. Now, because I am an absolute idiot, I didn’t think to take any pictures of the snow, so the pictures that are included in this blog have been stolen from friends’ Facebook pages. I do intend to take more pictures next semester, because apart from the first few weeks my camera has sat idly on my windowsill gathering dust. When I say that I will be taking more pictures, what I mean is that I will be giving my camera to the girls when we go out or do anything, because it is a scientific fact that girls are more snap happy, so I’ll be entrusting my camera to them so I can have my memories recorded for me and they can have fun with a shiny camera, everybody wins.
But I am halfway through my year in Boston, and next semester is going to be a strange
semester. A lot of the international students that made up a large part of my group of friends over here were only studying in Boston for one semester, so the small group of us that are coming back for a second semester are going to miss the group that have gone. However this just means that once this year is over, we’re going to have to go visit them to make up for a lost semester. Now all we need is for Ryanair to open a flight to Australia and we can all have a reunion there. I’m sure I could find a few people that might just agree with that, trip Down Under anyone?
Probably the thing I was looking forward to the most since deciding to come to the States was Thanksgiving. We’ve all seen Thanksgiving through films and TV shows but I really didn’t know it was such a big thing. People asked me if I was going home for Thanksgiving, even if they knew I was Irish. I don’t think this is a case of them being stupid but rather that the idea of growing up without Thanksgiving is inconceivable to them. I suppose it’s similar to Christmas in the importance they place on it, but it seems to be almost a nicer version; you don’t buy presents, you don’t have to deal with weeks of ads telling you that you should feel Christmassy, but rather, the whole emphasis of the day is to spend it with your family… and to eat ridiculous amounts of food. I was very fortunate 
to be invited to have Thanksgiving with Jay’s family in Charlestown and I have to say that I was a little bit terrified by the sheer amount of food. There were a lot of people, but no more than I would be used to at Christmas day, probably 12 or 14 people, but just so much food. I, of course, didn’t bring my camera so I have no physical record of the day but I think the fact that they had seven plates of seven different types of cookies is as good an indicator as you’ll get to describe how many different types of deserts there were. As for Jay’s family, I couldn’t have felt more welcome by everyone there. When we arrived in the house in Charlestown, we had a beer, watched football and generally had a laugh. You know when they show Thanksgiving on TV, they always go around the table and say what they’re thankful for? Well there was none of that here, that’s a West Coast touchy-feely kind of Thanksgiving, whereas Bostonians are a bit more understated than the rest of America it seems.
For the first time since I was in 6th year, I had exams before Christmas unlike Maynooth where we have them when we come back in January. It’s a nice feeling now, writing this and not thinking about when I should start studying or when I should be leaving home to get back up to the library, but instead I can relax, leaving all of last semester’s subjects in December where they belong. Even apart from the time exams were on, they were a very different experience from exams in Maynooth. The lowest percentage exam I’ve ever had in Maynooth was 45% and the majority of the exams I’ve done are worth 90% but the highest percentage exam I had in Boston College was worth 25%. The main difference in studying in the States and at home is how the work is distributed throughout the year. Instead of having very stressful big essays and big final exams, which cause a lot of stress for a short period of time, colleges in America give lots of short assignments, which instead of getting rid of these periods of high stress instead just means that students here are at the same level of constant stress for the whole term. It might be a quiz worth 5% in the next class, or a 1 page response paper to an article we had to read, but there is always something to do. So when exams came around people were breathing a sigh of relief that the mountain of constant work wasn’t knocking at the door anymore. I found that I had more free time during the exams than at any other time of the year. As well as that, because of the continuous assessment throughout the year, we knew that we couldn’t fail the subjects. However, the regular students in BC were all putting themselves under the same level of stress as they would normally be subjected to. This ethos of putting yourself under a huge amount of stress seems to be encouraged by Boston College as the library remains open 24 hours a day during the exam period and free coffee is given out in one of the dining halls. Just in case you’re worried, I didn’t let myself get caught up in the hysteria and went Christmas shopping right in the middle of my exams. I haven’t changed that much yet…
I have to admit that this year is the first time in a long time I was genuinely excited for Christmas. Of course I enjoyed Christmas Day with my family and having time to rest, but I’ve never understood people who count down the days to Christmas once Halloween is over. I think it has something to do with when Christmas is brought upon us, with it seeming to come earlier and earlier every year and I’m pretty sure I’ve heard irate callers giving out to Joe Duffy about hearing Christmas music in Superquinn’s in October. For once, I can agree with the people who usually ring in about how they hate their neighbour’s cat that mews all night. But in the States the positioning of Thanksgiving in the last Thursday of November means that Christmas isn’t mentioned until after it, so Christmas is contained in December. This means that once Thanksgiving is over, Bostonians embrace Christmas with an incredi
bly contagious energy and it’s easy to get swept along with it because you know that the carols, Christmas ads, everyone wondering when the snow will come and the general feel good energy that comes with the Christmas Spirit will only be around for a few weeks so it won’t be long and drawn out like it is at home. It also helped taking part in 2 Secret Santas. One with the Irish internationals at BC, and one with the Ultimate team here. Colourful attire was encouraged at the Ultimate party. I think I look well.
On top of that, there seems to be a kind of embracing of most kinds of excitement. It’s easy to get caught up in the enthusiasm of the people around you, whatever it is they’re excited about. I found that I would look forward to going to the BC Football games at the weekend, and I felt very aggrieved when it was an away game and I didn’t get my fix of live Football. And yes, I have begun to call it simply “football” because calling it “American Football” while in America is just like going out to eat “Chinese food” when in China. Even though I do enjoy the game, it’s the atmosphere that makes it. Imagine standing for four hours in the student section of a packed 42,000 seater stadium, chanting along with the band’s songs and watching these giants playing football, and then imagine seeing those giants everyday, walking around campus or even sitting beside you in class. It must be odd for them to go from class on a Friday afternoon and then to play with 42,000 people watching. I think I once played in a ga
me that had about 42 people watching.
Sadly Football season is over, but that means that it’s the turn of Ice Hockey and Basketball. We have a 17,000 seater venue for Hockey and there’s a lot of excitement about our hockey team, seeing as BC won the national title last year and we recently walked over local rivals Boston University twice in one week, so you could say that we’re pretty good. When we have a basketball game, the ice gets covered over with a basketball court and the place we win hockey games becomes the place where we lose basketball games. But when you go to a game here, it’s not just a sporting event, it’s almost like a small festival. There’s a band, cheerleaders, Baldwin the Eagle and of course the chants coming from the student section. My personal favourite is when BC score in Hockey we chant “You suck. At life. And Goalkeeping. It’s all your fault! It’s all your fault! Seeing as I played in goals for years, it does make me feel quite bad to be chanting at them, but hey, they didn’t go to BC so clearly it’s ok. All these chants are driven by the band, and in football season there’s a huge 180 strong band that play all 4 hours of the game and do a halftime show as well. Now that we’ve mov
ed to the indoor season, we’ve got a smaller band called the pep band. Seeing as us Internationals are encouraged to take part in all things BC, two of the Irish girls, Ciara and Lucy (middle and left respectively) have joined the pep band and can be found at games, exuding pep and not quite knowing all the words to BC’s fight song “For Boston” (their words, not mine!) But Lucy has her own blog, so if you’re interested in following her and her band geek ways, you can do so here http://beantown2010.blogspot.com/
Well I only have one week left at home so I’ve been running around seeing people, playing some ultimate, meeting friends for scoops and I even had a nice walk around the library in Maynooth to see all the stressed people, which I’m not sure they appreciated quite as much as I did. Anyway, I’m going to go and enjoy my last few days in Ireland, one more visit up to Maynooth and then a last night out in Carrick for the lovely La’s 21st birthday!
However there is good news on the snow front. Seeing as I missed most of the big snow in Ireland, I’m not yet sick of it so I’m very excited to say that Massachusetts recently declared a state of emergency because of heavy snowfall. I know I’m going to get very sick of it very quickly, but until then, snow angels and snowmen with funny add ons shall be made.
Finally, every year, Dad paints the window in our sitting room. Each year we have a different theme and he thought that this year the theme had to be an American one, so he painted the Boston College logo and a the New England Patriot. Not a bad view behind it either
