Learning Experience in Ireland

I am just in shock at the kindness of the people in this country. I am also in shock at how many things have gone wrong today. But, if it weren’t for all of the craziness we would not have been in vulnerable situations that have allowed us to experience the gifts of the Irish.

This morning at 6 am (12 AM in Illinois) Jared and I were lying in our fluffy bed still trying to fall asleep. We headed to bed at about 4 PM Illinois time in hopes that we could fall asleep at about 10:30 Ireland time and then get acclimated to the time here. If you do that math – we laid in bed for 8 hours. Jared was really trying to fall asleep. I knew better, so I got my kindle out and began to read. A couple of hours later, Jared was still awake so we decided to try to rent a movie on Netflix. We signed up for the unlimited DVDs and then realized that they obviously can’t ship them to Ireland. So, we had to unsubscribe to that. We tried watching free movies, but they weren’t really free. We finally decided to watch some episodes of Friends. When we got bored with that we got on Skype and talked with some family and friends for about two hours (still lying in bed). We decided to buy a movie after Friends, so we ordered Dinner with Schmucks on itunes. As it was downloading we got a notification that we had used 100% of the internet usage we had purchased for the month. Crazy. So we couldn’t watch our movie, and we were without internet – which is terrible because we have to have it for work. We didn’t realize that Broadband is measured not in time, but in the amount of uploads and downloads done. Then, we still couldn’t fall asleep. So, at 6 AM (Ireland time) I gave up, got out of bed, and cleaned the house. The whole thing - So. Like. Me. Finally, at 7:30 I fell asleep… the sun came up at nine, and we got out of bed. We walked to the “grocery store” which is really a gas station that has some really overpriced groceries. Purchased some, and then walked home. We saw two cows on the walk. Jared named one Boo and I named mine Nola. They really liked us.

So, we got home, still no internet. No phone to call anyone (because our only means was Skype). I had a conference call at 4 and it was noon. I wasn’t panicking or anything, but I was a little worried. We were expecting our landlords at some point during the day. They would have a phone and I could call the internet company and reload our simcard when they got here. With no internet and no transportation we had nothing to do, so we slept. We woke up at about 2:30 and still no landlord. We realized they may not be coming at all. We had to take action (this is where it gets interesting). We brainstormed for a bit, tried to get online multiple times (cheat the system, you know). Time was getting slim so we did the only thing we could think of. We walked to the nursing home next door and asked to use the phone. They really wanted to let us use it, we could tell, but they couldn’t because they are under inspection. We discussed knocking on random people’s doors for a minute and then decided to give it a try. The first house was a no answer even though we could see people moving about inside. The second house was a large home, with a bunch of dogs in the front yard. We were talking about if we should try it when an older wrinkly man in a black bath robe walked outside. We approached. His name is Bill. Very kind. He told us that he was a German Soldier for 20 years, and then (of course) talked all about it for a few minutes. It was wonderful to hear. We told him we needed to make a call. He gave us his cell phone. Literally. He said, “Here. Take this. I have two. It has about 70 Euro on it and you can use as much as you want, as long as you bring it back to me before you leave Ireland.” We stayed and talked for about 20 minutes, and then headed home with a cell phone and a happy heart.

To make a long story short: We got a hold of Brian who had e-mailed us earlier that day and told us that they would be unable to come. We were waiting for nothing! Stupid European Internet! He said he had a plan though, and not to worry. A few minutes later a Mercedes Benz pulled up with a jolly man inside who said Brian had called him and he would take us to his home to use his internet. His name was Patrick. We were so shocked at the kindness he showed us. He was extremely friendly and loved sharing the history of Ireland with us. His wife, Eleis (Pronounced Ee-leash, Gaelic for Elizabeth), was just as wonderful. She invited us for tea and coffee after we were done working and then for dinner after that. We had fish cakes, pork chops, salad, puréed veggies, potatoes, and good conversation. During our time there we had some discussion about the expensiveness of the groceries we had purchased and how few we had, and so he drove us to the next town so that we could shop. We loaded up, and should be good for the rest of our time here. He then drove us home, and of course, like everyone else who has been so kind to us, would not let us pay for his gasoline.

To top off the day, we finally figured out how to pay for more internet, and got it working at our house again. We also talked to Mrs. Fitzpatrick who invited us to stay the weekend at her home in Ennis so that we could be in the city and do some shopping. She is picking us up on Friday. She is also bringing bikes by tomorrow so that we can ride to the surrounding towns and to the cliffs of Moher (only 3 miles away).

During our day we learned some interesting things. Take vocabulary for instance.

Shopping Cart – Trolley

Garden – Vegetable Patch

Trash – Rubbish

We learned that European internet is ridiculous, expensive, and that it is measured not monthly, but by how much internet we use.

We learned a lot about the culture today - two different kinds of meat at dinner.

Most importantly, we learned that the people in Ireland are the kindest people in the world.