Mum and Dad have been full of praise about my blogs - maybe because they have to be, but I like to think it's genuine - so I decided to dedicate this post to them. You never really realise how much you miss everyone at home until you've had a couple of visitors and then it all comes flooding back. It's not just the milestones that happen without you, like all the 21sts this year, that you miss, it's the realisation that life does in fact go on without you. It's kind of a sobering thought, that people still go to college and school and fall in love and break up and make new memories of days out and nights in and rainy days and sunny days and projects and exams and parties. However, my friends and family might be getting on with their lives, but they still cry over me several times a day and that's the most important thing to remember.
So if you couldn't follow that rambling first paragraph ( I think I wrote the draft of it a little tipsy ) , my mum and dad came to visit me here in Bawwwssttonnn a couple of weeks ago. I don't know if I've mentioned it before but I HEART VISITORS! And I'm severely lacking on the visitors scale compared to my flatties, so please come visit meeeee! Okay, neediness over. Having visitors is lovely, especially parents, and not only for the sole reason of being brought out for 2 meals a day, every day. It's great being able to show off your home to newbies and I felt such pride in Boston while doing this. I love pointing out where my classrooms are and where the best cheesecake in the world is available and how to use the T (public transport) and explaining the importance of Dunkin' Donuts and feeling totally at home. Being completely immersed in the American experience but not actually being American also gives you leave to laugh along with your family at Americans for living up to their stereotypes and therefore not being disowned for turning into one of them. This, however, I feel may be a very real possibility :(
I find myself now having to use two different languages almost in my daily life. One is my homegrown Irish English that I have been speaking forever, obviously, but now is a bit of a struggle to remember exactly. The other is filled with words straight out of Kenan and Kel, Friends, How I Met Your Mother, Thelma and Louise and every other standard American tv program / film / book you've ever experienced. It's now more natural for me to say sidewalk, elevator, chips for crisps and fries for chips, aDULT and leeeesure and levver and why in the name of God do they not understand half - one? "Is that like, half to one or half after one??" Is it really that difficult to comprehend? Compulsory doesn't exist, neither does banned, and if you say mobile they know what you're on about but they laugh until you correct yourself with 'cell'. They have handles of vodka and get carded going into bars and regard fluff as a perfectly delicious sandwich spread. College work happens seven days a week and partying is contained to Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. No other nights. Ever. There are urban legends of people occasionally missing classes due to hangovers but these have never been confirmed. Abuse of Ritalin is rampant on campus to keep people going but hey, it's better than handing an assignment in late.
My friend Conor (check out his blog! http://conor-leavinghome.blogspot.com/) has a nifty little phrase for when it hits you every now and then that you're actually in America. He calls them his 'America moments' and they're so apt for every time I find myself in a situation listed above, where I find it normal / easier to use the American version of the phrase. I have to take a step back after this happens just to take stock of the situation and I'm like ..... 'Dude, I'm in America! I'm not just here on holiday, like I belong here now.' These America moments have become more and more frequent as the weeks have passed and I've become more and more involved in the life here. In case any of you didn't know, I'm a member of the Boston College Pep Band (shut up Ruth O' Connor)
and it's an epic way to be truly truly American. I play at ice hockey and basketball games and it's perfect for somebody like me who has lots and lots of PEP and ENTHUSIASM and GENERAL OVERALL EXCITEMENT!!
I do have to confess though, I had a game to play on Friday and I had zero pep whatsoever :( *hides face, don't look at me!*
I do have a genuine reason though. I turned that magical age of 21 last Monday and sure we had to go out on Thursday night to celebrate. (For reasons we couldn't celebrate any earlier, see above. Bloody Americans.) I was lucky to have had Mum and Dad over the week before my birthday so they could buy me my birthday present and I got several parcels in the post too, which was super exciting (if anyone wants to send me more, I'll happily pass on an address!). It did kind of suck having to open them by myself instead of surrounded by my family but I had a little America moment to calm myself down and then the rest of the week went by okay. My 21st will be even more memorable because of the fact that I celebrated it so far away from all my family and friends - LOL jk, a) I can't remember that night and b) I have loads of friends over here who helped me celebrate in style! We had a typical students' night out, heading to two bars in town called Mary Ann's and An Tua Nua (Irish, wouldn't ya know) for $2 pints and $2.50 rum and Cokes. Epic! Unfortunately, too many of these, including the ones bought for me, impaired my ability to do any work whatsoever this weekend so the Americans are going to kick me out of all my classes. At least I'll still have Pep Band to fall back on!
Oh, oh, oh and exactly this time 5 weeks I'll be boarding the plane to come back home for Christmas! I've been listening to 'Driving Home for Christmas' for a while now like a total saddo but I'm vair vair excited about coming home to see everyone. The reunion at the airport with the bf is going to be especially great :) Long distance relationships can be incredibly tough but we've gotten so close since I got here that it's made it all worthwhile :) I love you Mick!
Slán gaizzzz
During the summer, a number of my co-workers (notably, one Deeface) developed several potentially lethal medical disorders. The first of these was the little - heard - of F.O.M.O., which was inevitably followed by the contraction of M.B.D.D.
The first, Fear Of Missing Out disorder, kicks in when you're sitting at home with the crumblies, watching something scintillating on the tellybox like How To Remove All The Moss From Your Drainpipe or Let's Start Planning Christmas - It's Already August! and you get a text from a friend who's at dinner / in a pub with all of your mutual friends. For whatever reason you can't make it, which immediately results in symptoms of anxiety and hyperactivity, while imaging all the fun you're missing out on by not being there.
The only solution to FOMO is to immediately drop everything you're doing, scab a fiver in change from the back of the couch and join your friends in whatever depravity they're engaging in. This, unavoidably, leads to Mad Bastard Dancing Disorder, a terrifying condition which causes the sufferer to dance like a complete moron, with or without the aid of alcohol and with or without the company of any other dancers. In the entire building.
As life - threatening as these disorders are, nothing prepared me for the most shocking thing I've EVER seen (and I watch a lot of terrible terrible documentaries). It kicked in in my very first class here, it's contagious and it's only getting worse. There's no official name for it but researchers (me) like to call it Pathological Need to Express Myself, and estimate that the prevalence rate is 99% amongst American students. While it's fun to learn random facts about your classmates (for example, during my Adolescent Psychology class today I found out that the entire family of one of the girls in my class went out for breakfast to celebrate the day she got her first period), it happens all. the. time. I have a friend with awesome pink hair and whenever we go anywhere together, at least 5 people come up to tell her how much they like her hair. Which is nice and everything, but like, chill the beans man. We've come up with a game where we spot the people who are trying their utmost to keep their thoughts in - we reckon they'll have horrible facial contortions and tics going on as they try desperately not to say what they're thinking. Fun game in theory, but in practice we haven't found anybody who hasn't said what's on their mind yet.
Sadly, this Pathological Need has spread through so much of the school and faculty that it's now a class requirement to speak up. Seriously. Between 20 and 25% of my pass rate goes towards 'Class Participation'. Obviously, being Irish, I'm absolutely crap at this and feel The Fear every time I put my trembling hand up. It doesn't help that everybody turns around and stares at you while you answer. It's terrifying!! It's an easy enough way to pick up marks but it's just so not what I'm used to. I'd better get used to it fast!
That was a massively long rant up there so now I'm going to talk about things that make me happy, like going to parties where they provide you with a keg (full-sized), my random trip to Cape Cod this weekend, Nutella tasting the same, and list of visitors that are coming to see me :) First off, the most excellent crumblies are taking Fall Vacation (bahaha, how poncy) in Boston with meeeeeeeee, at the end of October, very very exciting! Dinners out and shopping all round, woop :D After Christmas, my wonderful wonderful other half is coming over to take advantage of all the snow to go ice skating and see New York in the winter, can't wait for that either <3 THEN, my not-so-hairy-anymore big brother is coming at the end of February. We're going to get drunk and wave giant foam hands at the hockey games, shouting USA USA, regardless of the fact that both teams are going to be from the USA..... in my brother's words, "it's all going to end well"... oo er!!
As you can see, I'm busy out, and that's without the insane amount of schoolwork I have to do. Howandever, I'm having an absolute ball and year of my life! I would like to add to my above list of visitors so anyone who's up for a visit USA-side, just let me know.
Toodles for now xoxo
Here's a great recipe for moving success. - Put over 30 colleges and universities in a single city for optimal number of students
- Make sure everybody's lease begins 1st September
Both the above are do-able.
Next comes the fun part:
- Just for the craic, decide that there's no point in anybody leaving any furniture whatsoever in their old apartment - instead, they bring it all with them to their new apartment
- Hire out every moving van in the city, add all the parents' and students' cars to the mix then borrow the local police force to keep everything under control
- Take three broke Irish students who arrived too late to hire a moving van
- Find them friends who offer them mattresses to sleep on and other miscellaneous items
- Throw in their landlord who insists everything has to be gone by 8 in the morning
- Then, for the icing, stir in a heatwave which means that even at 6.30 am it's 25 degrees.
That, in a nutshell, was our moving story. We got up at 5.30am to move 3 mattresses, a boxspring to put under a mattress, a metal bed frame, a mahoosive swivel chair and 3 black bin bags of stuff about three-quarters of a mile away in incredibly humid weather. Sure, we had it done in only 4 hours, it was a great success.
The Bostonians really do have crazy moving habits. I've asked around and I can't establish whether this whole bringing-your-furniture-with-you is just a Boston thing or an all-American idea. It's a pain in the bum (and the arms and the legs and the neck) whichever it is.
Luckily, we managed to find a pretty savage apartment only 15 minutes walk from the college. On the downside, it was previously owned by a crazy Jewish lady who loved her cats and who left behind random photos of her family (which now reside on the mantlepiece), her shower sponge and a very very strong odour of kitty litter. I've scrubbed the floors about twice a day since we've moved in. Anyone who knows me knows that this is very unusual.
The rest of our time has been spent getting ready for classes. My first class is next Tuesday, in which I get to dissect a sheep's brain - ick ick ick! I feel incredibly hard done by that I'm starting back on the 7th September while all my Trinners buds aren't back for another couple of weeks - but it's only a superficial complaint, I'M IN FRICKIN BOSTON BABY!!
Boston is actually the coolest city in the entire world. It's sooooo different to Ireland and it's taking a good while to get used to. America is called the Land of the Free or The Land of the Brave or Equal Opportunities or other feel-good shite like that, but it's most appropriate name is most definitely The Land of Being Bigger and Therefore Better Than You. The cars, the buildings, the food portions, the people - everywhere I go, something is dwarfing our poor little island. It took me a full 2 hours to do my weekly food shop last night; there were 3 different aisles dedicated purely to peanut butter. Surely a country that offers a main course in a really nice restaurant of peanut butter and marshmallow fluff on toast served with honey and fruit can't be entirely sane?! On the plus side, the apparent lack of complete sanity has rendered all the Bostonians that I've met so far incredibly friendly. My first "friend" in a public service domain was Ronald, the cook in Commons in college. He is quite likely the real inspiration for Chef in South Park and made me French toast from scratch. I thought his friendliness was a happy once - off, but since then I've found out that anyone who works in a shop or the likes is happy to strike up a 10 or 15 minute conversation at the expense of other customers.
I'm hoping that everybody in school is going to be this friendly. So far, I've made friends with a bunch of other international exchange students, including people from Ireland, England, France, Holland, Australia, Belgium, Germany, China and Japan. We all have a lot in common, being internationals, and we were thrown together during orientation so it was easy enough to get to meet people. Once school starts though, it's a different matter. I'm going to have to get my ENTHUUUUSSIIAAAAASSSSMMMMMMM!!! shoes on and throw myself out there! I'm dying for my first stereotypical American house party, which I'm hoping might happen after the football game tomorrow. They're horribly strict about ID here so unless I can ingratiate myself with some house-owners-who-hold-parties, I'm house bound for the next two months :( That won't happen though, where there's a will there's a way!
Time to log off this session, my leaba is calling and I need all of my energy for the game tomorrow (BC! BC! BC! BC! GO EAGLES!) Slán go fóill.
I wrote this while sitting in the airport but I only got round to putting it online now so I'm just gonna still write it in the present tense. It's also my first blog entry EVER so be nice to me! *deep breath* Here goes...
So here I am, sitting in the Departures Lounge on my tobler. Due to my inbred paranoia (sound, Dad) and overactive imagination that predicts every possible occurrence apart from the most straightforward scenario, I've arrived in the lunge a full hour and a half too early. Verging on dangerously late, my dad would call it. The bloody Fear even prevented me having a happy wander around the MAC department and, importantly, the food shops - I better be getting fed on the plane!
Having practised the lingo earlier in Starbucks (tall skinny latte please) and having had the banter with the air hostess at check in in the hopes that she wouldn't notice my extra kilo (she didn't!), I'm now free to goggle at the melting pot of cultures in the cattle hold that is the US departures lounge. In one corner, a boy in a green farmer's cap is playing some diddley-aye on a harmonica to scattered applause. Gorgeously tanned American girls (beyotches) are sporting bright pink Trinity hoodies (touristy beyotches) and gossiping. There are people in groups and alone, but there are few who are indulging themselves, like me, in the wonderfully free activity of people watching. I'm not getting withdrawl symptoms from Facebook yet but happily I've found a socially acceptable means of stalking. While it may not be as exciting as creeping on your friend's friend's neighbour who went to Salou last week (not me *shifty eyes*) this old fashioned hobby retains its air of mystery, allowing me to make up stories and backgrounds for my fellow travellers.
The three women sitting across from me are 3 generations of the same family, I reckon, and came to Ireland either sightseeing or ancestor tracing. Then there's the young American backpackers on my other side. These guys aren't as scruffy as their European (cough Irish) (cough my brother) counterparts, but they look like they enjoyed imbibing the local beverages last night in the same way as my brother (cough all Irish) does.
I'm surprising not nervous at all. It was more embarrassing than upsetting leaving the family earlier, as they plonked themselves just outside the security entrance and waved and shouted every time I came into view. I do have to admit, however, that a few tears were shed leaving the boyfriend. He's been wonderful over the last while and I'm really going to miss him :(
The flight is being called! Must go, will catch up with everyone from the other side of the Atlantic - that is the right ocean, isn't it?
