Only 6 Days Left!

I can't believe it but I only have 6 more days abroad before coming home and it's looking like they're going to be jam packed!! We're going to be heading up to Galway this weekend and doing some exploring, then it's back to London for a pint at The World's End pub, followed by 2 shows in the West End: The Lion King and The Phantom of the Opera. After that we're on a plane home.

Before I get into what we've been up to the last few days (and believe me there's plenty) some of you might be wondering if I'm disappointed that things didn't work out the way I had hoped. In some ways I am simply because I thought working abroad was something I always wanted to do and when I got there and realized how ill equipped I was to be there it lost all it's appeal. I don't think I fully appreciated just how hard it would be or how good I have it back in Canada! Also, I spent a bunch of money just to get there and so that's a pain but really..I don't regret coming. I'm still getting a great adventure out of it and Teresa and I have been having a blast this past week. I feel like I've really learned a lot about the kind of life I want and the way I want my life to go. Yes it's too bad I had to get all the way over here to realize that it wasn't what I wanted but I love to travel so we turned it into a trip instead. Though it's been rather disorganized! Either way it was a crazy whirlwind adventure and I'll be ready for some stability when I get back home!

Anyways, here's the latest update of all the crazy shenanigans we've been getting up to! I have no idea of all the little things of course since we've been here for a week already! Hopefully we're not driving the whole family nuts yet....hah! As far as I can remember after the night we went clubbing the following day we stayed home in pj's all day playing Mario on the Wii and watching terrible TV on MTV, which was really quite enjoyable as all guilty pleasure shows are. The next day I believe we went into Dublin again and just wandered around some friends and we did manage to go out to Dundrum shopping center which was cool. It was absolutely HUGE! There were so many floors and a ton of shops. The shopping here it amazing compared with home, just ask my bank account! Also while we were there they  have a little place called Yo! Sushi where the sushi comes around on a conveyor belt which is old news I realize but since I've never eaten at a place like that it was a great time.

Following that I think we had another lazy day at home, although we did take the dog for a walk to the grocery store down the street and we tied her up outside while we ran in for a few things so I could make dinner for the family. Their dog REALLY hates the cold (lucky they live in Ireland eh?) so as we were coming out of the exit door we happened to look over to our right and there's the dog sitting in the entrance to the shop where it's nice and warm! Just sitting there...hanging out. It was so funny, she's such a goofy dog! My lasagna that night turned out really well so I was pleased that everyone enjoyed it. This was followed by even more Mario and bad MTV shows.

Ok...I'm probably skipping stuff since it's been ages since I last blogged but I'll just go straight to yesterday because we had a lot of fun yesterday. Teresa, Jenny and I went into Dublin to go to the Guinness Brewery which was really cool. I even managed to get the student price (I wasn't about to say anything!) and really it's a good deal. For 13 euro we got to go through the place and learn about all the ingredients used to make Guinness and see how it gets processed.

We even learned some of the history behind how it all started and we learned how to make barrels, which quite frankly was almost more impressive than how they make the beer. Barrel making takes some serious skill! Then on the 2nd floor there's a free tasting where they talk about the aromas of Guinness and what gives it it's distinct flavour profile and colour (which is ruby red and not black...who knew?! lol) then you're shuffled along into the next room with a teeny little glass of Guinness to learn how to drink it properly and believe me, if you don't look stupid doing it, you're doing it wrong. Just sayin. So that was a lot of fun and both Teresa and Jenny hated it! After the tasting we got to see the advertising that Guinness has been doing the whole time they've been selling beer and we also tested our beer IQ which was...ok lol. The advertising stuff was really cool though!

The public part of the brewery is so massive, it's 7 floors! This was the 4th floor I think. Also on the 4th floor was the Guinness Academy. That's where you go in and learn how to properly pour a pint of Guinness and then they give you a certificate. I thought it would be super fun so I decided to do it! Here's how it works: 1. Tilt the glass at a 45 degree angle and don't let the nozzle touch the glass or the beer, 2. Pull the handle down quickly so that there's enough gas coming through with the beer and as it fills you tilt the glass upright and stop when you reach halfway through the harp on the glass (because you're using a proper Guinness glass of course!) 3. Let it settle! It's a two part pour. 4. Once it's settled you push the handle of the beer tap away from you, this gives you more beer to fill the glass but not more gas. Let the head come just over the rim of the glass and you're done! It's pretty straight forwward, but it should take at least 2 and a half minutes to pour a Guinness. Apparently mine was the best pour my teacher had seen all day. Which he could've just been saying for the sake of the experience but I'm going to pretend like it was for real lol!

Afterwards I was able to take my pint up to the 7th floor so that Teresa and Jenny could redeem their tickets for a complimentary drink. But they both had pop since neither of them actually liked Guinness. It was very beautiful where we had drinks because you get a panoramic view of Dublin and lucky for us it wasn't raining so we actually got to see everything! Afterwards we walked through a slightly sketchy part of Dublin to get to the bus stop that we needed. Once we got home we had a lovely steak dinner and then it was off to the bowling alley! We had an absolute blast! The bowling alley was cool because it played the music videos of all the songs that would play which I thought was neat. It was pretty reasonably priced too. And they sell alcohol...we ended up sharing a bottle of wine haha it was kind of weird. Not that I minded though!

Well that's all for now! Tomorrow we're off to Galway for the weekend and then it's back to London. Like I said, it's hard to believe that our trip is coming to an end but we've been having a really good time. I'll be sad to leave Ireland for sure, but I am definitely coming back!

Cheers!
Holly
xoxo

Celbridge and Dublin!

We made it to Ireland! What a long day it was to get here but am I ever glad we decided to come! It has been such a blast from the minute we got here! So here's the story...

On Friday we got up very early to leave Sam and Lisa's flat. We were SO grateful that they had let us stay there with them and couldn't thank them enough for everything they had done for us. They are such lovely, wonderful people! As they made their way to work, we made our way to the train station. Upon arriving we had to stand and stare at the departure boards to wait and see what platform we had to go to in order to catch our train. I had just enough time to get us a snack and use the washroom before we were ready to go to our platform. Oh and by the way..we left the house at 6:35am and didn't make it to the train station until 8:30am. Welcome to public transit in London. Anyways, we were in coach B on the train so we had to walk practically to the VERY back of the train to get into our spots and then we have to figure out how to get all our luggage on the stupid train so that it was out of the way. Fortunately Teresa and I each got two seats to ourselves so that helped! It was about a 3 hour train ride. It was very uneventful, I slept, wrote in my journal and stared out the window until I got dizzy and had to close my eyes again. Finally we arrived at the ferry terminal which is basically where the train stops so that was handy. We stood in line for a little while before we were able to get our tickets and then the weirdest thing happened, we got onto a city bus and were driven onto the ferry. There was no foot passenger platform..the ferry itself wasn't close at all haha so that was an interesting difference! We had had to check our large baggage so we only had our small bags which was good because we had to climb a million flights of stairs to get up to deck 9 (the first passenger deck) and then we basically just hunkered down and got comfy for the trip because it was a long ride.

The ferries here are very different from the ones at home. The one we were on had a cinema, a full size restaurant, a huge gift shop, a large kids play area, couches, a cafe, slot machines...the list goes on. Mostly though we just sat on our own (we took a time out from each other..we needed some alone time) and I watched a movie and wrote in my journal more and just relaxed. The ferry ride was about 3 hours also, definitely a full day of travel. Meanwhile my pen pal Megan had been trying to get a hold of me on Facebook but there was no free wifi on the ferry or train so I hadn't been able to reach her because we were going to meet at a train station. Though in the end it all worked out. When we arrived in Dublin Port we didn't have any Euro's for the bus to get to the train station so we ended up taking a cab to Megan's house instead which was actually really nice. It was worth the money for sure after such a long day! We arrived at Megan's house and she wasn't home but her mom came out to greet us and say hello and from the minute we've arrived we have had the most amazing time staying here! The whole family is so kind and friendly it's been really  lovely! Once we got settled and Megan got home (we beat her haha, she was coming from work) we all had some supper and decided to stay in and have a few drinks. I taught them some drinking games and they taught us some and all in all it was a hilarious night, poor Megan was having a rough go of it with the drinking games!! Then we all called it a night and got ready for a busy day the next day!

Saturday morning rolls around, we got up early and had some brekie and then we were off to Dublin! Megan took us to see Trinity College and the Book of Kells but when we got there it was rather busy and it cost 9 euro to go and see it so we decided we'd just leave it and look at the grounds as they are quite lovely.

After that Megan took us around to have a look at some of the other places nearby. We went into a park called Steven's Green that was really lovely (and yes...quite green) which apparently in the summer time is really difficult to walk through as there are so many people around, sitting on the lawns and walking on the paths so it's hard to get through. But since it's winter and the weather was less than perfect (although quite good for Irish standards I thought) it was practically empty so we got to walk through a bit of the park before going back to the main roads.

From there we went into the Steven's Green mall, and then walked around to find lunch at a Japanese restaurant that I can't remember the name of and we found a lot of vintage shops on the way so I stopped and looked at a bunch of those. We passed a cupcake stand and had delicious cupcakes! Then we finally made it to lunch which was pretty good. I think Megan had the best one! After that we slowly made our way to Penneys (a HUGE store with lots of inexpensive stuff) and then we went to a shop nearby for some makeup and to a bookstore so Megan could grab a gift for a friend but they didn't have what she wanted so we headed home to get ready for a night out on the town!

We went to a club called The Palace which was really nice inside. Definitely a different vibe than the ones back home but still really fun! They also have a designated smoking area in the clubs here so people don't have to stand outside the front of the building which I thought was a neat idea. Teresa and I didn't know most of the music and frankly I must be getting too old for clubbing because it was fricken loud in there!! But we had some drinks and had a really good time. I got half a drink slopped down my back...I was nice and sticky after that. And I really enjoyed looking at all the girls in their crazy get ups. I really ought to have taken some pictures...

The clubs here don't close until about 4am some of them so we left at 3am to grab a bite with Megan's friends and then catch the last bus home at 4am. While we were standing outside, me in my yellow rain jacket because I'm just that cool, and this guy came up to me yelling "follow the yellow brick road!" and then grabbed a handful of my hair and smelled it. I'm talking a proper deep inhale and then he wandered away like nothing happened. It was easily the most bizzare thing that's happened since I got here! But it was funny and we had a really good time. We got home and got caught in a crazy downpour (proper Irish weather!) and ran partway home, collapsed into bed and slept soundly until 11:30am this morning.

This morning has been really chill and that's been great. We haven't had a day to just sit and do nothing in a long time so it is not just after 4pm and I haven't showered or gotten dressed today. We had a lovely start to our morning actually, we were spoiled with a proper Irish breakfast of rashers (bacon basically) sausages, black pudding (aka blood pudding), white pudding (made with organs), bread and butter and sunny side up eggs. I have now officially eaten white and black pudding and thoroughly enjoyed both! Which was a surprise haha, I didn't expect to like it to be honest. But if you can forget about what they're made of they're both actually quite tasty! I think now it's about time I showered or at least got up off the couch!

Coming soon:
- More photos of Dublin
- a possible trip to Galway
- Paris and Disneyland!

And here's a song to put you in the Irish mood! Galway Girl by Steve Earle.

Cheers!!

Holly
xoxox

Plan B!

Plan A:
- Move to London
- Rent a flat
- Teach children
- Travel!

A straightforward plan to say the least but now that we're here...we're not sure it's right for us. We have looked at flats and found lots of lovely and cute ones that are a reasonable size (nothing like you'd find at home though!) but the cost of renting here is insane! We knew it was going to be expensive but what we didn't realize was all the extra costs associated with renting here. So that turned us off of Plan A a bit. Then, we realized that we weren't all that motivated to start work. Do we really even WANT to work here? The answer turned out to be no. What we discovered is that we love to travel, we don't even mind working but for us, the two just don't mix. So we made the decision to come home.

But hey, we're here...in Europe. Why not have a bit of fun first?! So here's Plan B:

Plan B:
- Ireland on Friday to see my pen pal
- Paris on Tues or Wed to see the sights and go to Disneyland!
- Back to London for some more sight seeing (maybe a show?)
- Feb. 6th fly home.

So that's the new plan! We're looking forward to getting a bit of travel in before coming home and getting back into a routine and settling in. So stay tuned for some (hopefully) exciting and fun stories of our next adventures!

Cheers!
Holly
xoxo

Talk about a roller coaster!

Day 3

I'm not going to lie..it was a rough week for us this week. Once we were settled in our hostel it was time to start accomplishing things! So we got off to a great start! We had arranged a viewing for a flat and we were going to go and get new phones sorted out. Pretty simple day. Except that we're in London and nothing is simple here.

It started out easy enough, we weren't totally sure where to go to do the whole phone thing so we went out to the one place we knew how to get to and that we knew had the phone shop we wanted. So away we went to Watford Junction which is North London. When we got there we went to the mall where the phone store was only to find out that we need UK bank accounts to get phones or SIM cards, and we can't get bank accounts without a UK address..which of course we don't have! So there went that plan!

Well fine, there was nothing we could do so we headed back towards the train station to head over to our viewing. On the way there however we were sidetracked by a lady talking about crackers (sorry, 'biscuits') and sweets and before we knew it we were being led to St. Mary's Church for what turned out to be a taste test of new crackers for Walkers. So there we were tasting 3 different crackers (I liked the cheese ones best) and then walked out with two HUGE chocolate bars. At this point it was about 12:30 and our viewing was for 2pm. So we walked back to the train station and got there around 12:45, lots of time right? WRONG! We got on a train fairly quickly and it was an express which was great! The only problem however was that we got off the train to get onto the tube only to realize that the tube line we had planned to take is completely out of commission. Until November. SO back onto the next train to take us completely out of our way so that we could transfer to get onto the Metropolitan tube line that would get us to the station we wanted. And there we were with my phone running out of minutes, on the underground with no service and it's 1:30...and then it's 2. Don't worry, we DID manage to call the agent and say we'd be late by about 20 minutes. Boy were we wrong! We finally arrive at the station that we need and then go out the wrong exit and get COMPLETELY turned around. In the middle of hysterical, frustrated tears (on my part) the agency calls and takes pity on us and gives us directions to where we need to go. We finally arrive, totally defeated and apologetic for what turned out to be about a 5 minute viewing. The place was small but the rooms and living area were a good size. It wouldn't be ready for another couple weeks though so we're interested in it but we'll see if we can find something ready to move into first!

We went straight home after that and basically straight to bed. London kicked our butts that day and we'd had enough. We got some sleep and got ready for a new adventure the next day!

 Day 4

After the day we had we decided that we needed to do something fun to make ourselves feel better and what's more fun than some retail therapy! We decided that we would head out to Oxford Street to do some shopping. I had planned to call some properties that morning but my phone was being stupid so I emailed them all and hoped for the best! Then off we went to Oxford Street! We were told it was one of the best shopping districts! Not that we planned to spend a ton of money or anything we just needed to get out and see something!

Of course it completely slipped our minds that it was Saturday and therefore it was absolutely packed on the streets and in all the shops! So we meandered around a little bit, marveling at all the great stuff to buy and of course we went into a tacky souvenir shop to have a look around, some of it was just awful! Don't worry, we didn't spend a bunch of money! We picked up a couple things but they were all on sale and very reasonably priced! And that is literally all that we did that day haha, and later that evening we made plans to go and visit Lisa and Sam for a fun trip! Keep reading to find out where we went!!

Day 5

Well day 5 was the day we went to go and meet Lisa and Sam and have an adventure. The adventure started early when we got on the tube and went to the train station only to discover that the train was not stopping at that stop for the entire day, great! So we went BACK the way we came (we're getting used to that drill) and were told we had to hop on the bus to get to Clapham Junction to meet the girls. This was actually not as bad as it sounds because it was our very first red double decker bus ride!

First bus ride!

It's a leprechaun building!

The Start of the Adventure!!

Well here we are! The first official blog post of my latest adventure! What a whirlwind it's already been and we've only been here for two days! 

Day 1

Oh my gosh, day one was absolutely crazy! We started our day in Chilliwack and my grandma took us to the airport. We decided to take the new road to see how it was and if it was maybe a little faster. As it turns out, it wasn't. Firstly we really didn't know exactly where we were supposed to go, secondly there was about 3 signs on the entire hour long drive and thirdly the few signs there were turned out to not be at all helpful. So we ended up in Surrey before realizing that we had to turn around and backtrack until we found the turn we were supposed to take which was the turn for New Westminster...not YVR. Confusing right?

Next we got to the airport and from there it was just a waiting game..waiting in the HUGE check in line, followed by waiting in security, followed by waiting for take off which was delayed by half an hour. But we got through it just fine and the flight itself wasn't bad. Aside from the serious lack of leg room, the horribly narrow seats and the not so great food. Unfortunately for us neither one of us managed to sleep much so that really sucked. But other than that it was fine. At least the in flight entertainment was good! 

Once we landed it was time to figure out how the heck to get from the airport (Gatwick) to our hostel in central London. Really though it wasn't that hard, which was really good because at that point we'd been up for longer than usual and definitely weren't operating at full brain capacity. So the train ride was a relaxing half hour and then we got to the tube station....aaaaand everything went horrendously downhill from there! It was so packed and busy and people were jostling us and our luggage and walking all over the stairs not leaving enough room. Oh yea BY THE WAY hauling heaving stupid suitcases up and down stairs when your sleep deprived, sweaty and being jostled by hustling Britans..you get really fricken cranky...just sayin! So that was oodles of fun. Then after getting completely turned around in the station trying to find the right platform to catch the tube from we finally got to our stop, hauled our suitcases around some more and emerged victorious on the sidewalk! Well...almost. We took the wrong end of the street we were supposed to be walking up, after walking out of our way just to find a crosswalk and so it took us twice as long to get to our hostel as it should have. Which really was only 10 minutes but it was ten minutes of two sisters being miserable and cranky, hot and sweaty on a stupid narrow sidewalk (who makes them that small and then sticks a lampost in the middle?!)  but we made it one piece without killing each other and then the nightmare was over. 

HAHA! Just kidding. Upon arriving at our hostel, me feeling like I'm about to pass out I'm so hot from hauling my big suitcase around, we get our key and our luggage tags and we're told where to go to get to our building. So away we go satisfied that we finally made it and dying to sit and relax for a bit when we get to our building and realize...there's no lift. And we're on the 4th floor. Great. So we took turns hauling up our luggage one by one, wishing we could just keel over and die and finally we made it. 

After that we took it easy. We went for a short walk around the area, had dinner at the pub nearby (which wasn't as satisfying as I had hoped, oh well) and then tried our best to stay up until 8pm. Keep in mind we'd been up for more than 24 hours so needless to say we collapsed in our beds at 7pm.

Day 2 (Don't worry this one's shorter!)

Guess what! Today we woke up at 3am because we went to bed too early and got our 8 hours of sleep. Hooray! Great start to the day. *SIGH* We had a roommate with us in our room so we didn't want to disturb him so we grabbed Teresa's laptop and went to the common room to look at properties to let and keep ourselves occupied whilst leaving our slumbering roomie in peace. So we looked at a bunch and wrote down some phone numbers for later and then it was 3:45. We managed to have a quick skype with mum and dad to tell them about our adventuring thus far, they got a good laugh out of it so I guess that's good? Afterwards another guy who had woken up early like us came over and started talking to us (he never did tell us his name..) so that passed some time. Finally at 5am we decided we'd go back to our rooms and get our journals and come back to the common room but when we were getting things organized our roommate woke up to go catch a flight to New York and we got the room to ourselves so we stayed upstairs and did our writing there. We tried really hard to kill time until breakfast. We decided to give ourselves a break and just pay the 3 pounds to have the continental brekie at the hostel because we weren't feeling all that motivated to go to the store. Plus we could eat our fill so it seemed like a good deal and it was! 

Later we had to meet my consultant at the Engage Education office in North West London so away we went! He had told us how to get there. So we went to the tube and caught the proper train with no issues and then we had to take the overground train the rest of the way. Here's where we got stuck, we started at West Brompton station and we were told to go to Watford Junction, easy enough right? What he didn't tell us was that we had to transfer trains at Willesden Junction. 

So here we are waiting for a train that's going to Watford Junction and missing two trains that could've taken us to Willesden Junction had we known what we were doing. So we finally figured it out and got on and made it to our meeting half an hour late. They didn't seem to care though so that was good. It was really great getting to talk to our consultants face to face and to get some questions answered and all that good stuff. Following that we went to another building to get our finances sorted out for claiming expenses and such. We had hoped to open bank accounts today but were told that we need a letter that we won't be able to get until we have an official UK address which complicates things a bit but we're working on it!

Afterwards we walked around the area a little, had some lunch and found a really nice shopping mall that I swear had at least 7 floors! So many fun looking shops and so little spending money haha, I had better start working soon! We also saw St. Mary's Church which was quite pretty.

Oh and one last thing. I got a free cell phone (so did Teresa) from JSA, who are the people who pay us and handle our tax stuff. It is so hilariously old school I just had to share it with you all! So here you go!

Sorry this was so long! I had a lot to say today! I'll post again soon!
Cheers!

Holly

xoxo

8 Days and Counting!

I can't believe it. It's almost time.

I have been planning to go to London for over a year now and here I am, 8 days away from stepping onto a plane and out of my comfort zone. I'm so excited, nervous, happy, sad and a million other things all at once. It's definitely scary deciding to go and live somewhere that's halfway around the world but I'm fortunate that my sister will be coming along with me (which we FINALLY found out today!) After all the hoops I had to jump through I can't believe it's actually almost time to go! I don't think it will fully hit me until I check in at the airport.

I have now officially booked my flight as well as a hostel for when we get there. I've figured out my banking things, lowered my loan payments and even packed (and weighed) my suitcase to make sure I'm totally prepared. On top of the other 23 things on my To-Do list! It's so satisfying seeing everything get checked off. I've made all the calls I need to make except for one and gotten everything sorted out, though selling my car has been trickier than I thought!

Now all that's really left to do is to start saying my goodbyes. I'll only be gone for a year but it feels like it'll be longer. Mind you I'm sure it'll fly by. I am so looking forward to all the great museums and gardens and hundreds of other things in London to do. The next time you hear from me will be from the airport! See you then!

Cheers!