The Last Post dundundun.

Saturday December 6th

Well everyone I am sorry to inform you this will be my last post on my adventures abroad. It's sad that it has finally come to an end, this was by far my favorite semester of school yet (for obvious reasons). I will never forget this experience nor the people I shared that time with. I can without a doubt say that I have taken quite a bit from my time in Italy other than just enjoying the country. Here's some advice for anyone thinking of traveling anywhere really but especially from what I've learned from Italy:

1. Learn to order gelato in Italian, they will appreciate it more and you officially become more cultured for trying. Really just attempt to learn the language of the place you are, don't be that arrogant person that wants everyone to speak english to them
2. Traveling really makes you miss home but don't let that stop you from exploring new places
3. Patience is greatly needed when traveling via train/bus/airplane, if you don't have patience you're going to have a rough time
4. Learn to sleep in weird places like on a bus or in a cafe while waiting for your plane
5. Don't sweat the small things and enjoying just being somewhere different and beautiful 
6. Be smart about going to certain areas by yourself
7. Try new things if you don't try new things like food there's no point in going to a new place
8. Respect the cultural traditions of where you are, life will be a lot easier than if you try and fight it
9. If the only thing that is stopping you fro doing something amazing is money just do it anyway, you'll find a way to get what you need
10. Can't is not an acceptable word, won't on the other hand is but be honest with yourself about whether you can't or just won't
11. Take a million and one pictures you're going to hate going through them for the good ones later but its a good way to relive your experience
12. Know when it's okay not to take pictures and to just have the beauty of something stay in your head just for you
13. Enjoy the difference from your own culture 
14. Finally have fun, if you're not having fun don't travel

I could go on and on with this list but I think that's a safe place to stop it. I hope you all enjoyed reading about my adventures overseas, I know I had fun writing this blog. And of course no blog is interesting without some pictures of my travels (I didn't forget about my Amsterdam pictures) and so here are the last of my travel pictures. Enjoy!

My plane from Dublin to Eindhoven.

The I amsterdam sign, there are a few around Amsterdam but this one is the original.

That's me hiding inside the M, get it because my name starts with M. AHAH.

And Amber hid in the A. A for Amber, we're so clever.

There was a small statue garden with iguanas and other statue lizards in it for reasons unknown, but it was funny because Amber's afraid of iguanas.

Little kid giraffe costume, if only it came in my size.

The canals are beautiful.

The Dutch like their cheese.

There was a building that had unicorns and weird fish on it so I thought I must make picture.

A pretty snazzy horse drawn carriage, the guy driving was actually wearing a top hat and official looking dress props to him.

Just a few of the many, many bikes chained up around the city. Like many many. You can't comprehend the number of bikes here until you actually experience it.

Our homemade dinner. Well the bread we bought, along with the rest of it but we did assemble it ourselves and we were very proud of it. Look at those tiny pancakes! So cute.

A canal tour boat.

Some tall ships.

There are also a lot of boats in this city. They have house boats too and they're super cool looking.

Some ducks on a boat. 

The trees are gorgeous.

Apparently putting sprinkles on things is like a big thing here (yes those are jimmies but for those of us who don't know the difference between sprinkles and jimmies I'll just leave it at that).

A weird Christmas-not Christmas boat parade thing, very weird.

Amber on the Fault in Our Stars bench, I sat on it too but I don't have that picture Amber does.

Some pretty roses.

This is a drunk bike and you know it is a drunk bike because it is decorated with fake flowers. I was pretty excited to see this.

Some locks painted green... for the season? I don't know but they were all painted green.

Amber eating stroopwafel, which is basically two very thin waffle cones that have caramel in the middle its pretty delicious.

The sunset from the plane back to Boston. It was weird since I was going back in time the sunset lasted for about two hours. So pretty.

And this is what I came back to in New Hampshire. But it was a pretty sunrise.

So pretty.

Look at that snow. And to think I was just in a country where the leaves were still attached and a pretty yellow color.

And then it all froze.

It was pretty chilly in the NH.

And that is all I have for you, again I hope you enjoyed this blog as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Ciao! 

Amsterdam

I am waiting in the Shipol Airport waiting for my connecting flight to Dublin before I finally make it home to the Boston airport. I didn't have time to blog this weekend at all so let me catch you all up on my time in Amsterdam.
Thursday I was supposed to have left the Dublin airport at 1 but we didn't end up leaving until 2:30 which made our landing time a bit later also, I landed at 5:30 instead of 4. But I got my bags and was ready to head to Amsterdam so I could meet up with Amber. I attempted to buy a bus ticket to the train station I needed only to find out my card had been shut off. Now I have not had a problem with my card up until this point, I even told my bank I would be in the Netherlands. The only way you could get on the bus was buy paying with your card, it would not accept cash (stupid I know). I called my bank and had them turn it back on. Tried my card again with still no luck. Called the bank back up and they said nothing was wrong that maybe I tried too soon after they turned it back on. Still no luck. At this point I was very frustrated and could not get ahold of Amber as she was still in class and I debated just spending the weekend in the airport. I tried to walk on the bus and hand him the exact money I needed but he would not take it without a ticket. I was at a loss of what to do. So I waited outside the ticket kiosks and kind of bombarded this girl about whether she spoke english (as I knew absolutely no Dutch) and she did amazingly so I had her buy my ticket with her card and I gave her money. I thank this girl a million times and then get on the next bus to the train station.
At the train station I have to figure out which train I'm supposed to take (the Dutch people have really weird names for things, I think they just threw letters at the ground and called it a word). I was supposed to take the train to the Bijlmer stop which I assumed was the same train that went to Amsterdam central. I was wrong. I didn't find out I was wrong until I was on the train and it was moving already. I finally got a hold of Amber and told her I was headed to Amsterdam central and she said she would just meet me there thankfully. I waited at the platform for her train to arrive and everyone got off but no Amber. I was about to give up at this point, clearly the Netherlands suck and I have no reason to be here because nothing should be this difficult. Sh messages me to go to platform 4b and to run (now I have two backpacks and a suitcase with me, not to mention I was holding my computer so I could charge my phone off it as it was about to die) and so I "ran" as best I could with all that crap. I made it to the platform just in time for the train we needed to leave and me be inside. We had a very hasty reunion on the train and waited until the stop I should have been at a few hours before. We eventually made it to our hostel (which was amazing, super nice, if you ever go to Amsterdam stay at the Hostelle it's girls only but super clean and fantastic) and then went back out to wander around and talk since we hadn't seen each other in almost a year. And then we went to bed.
Friday we headed into the center of Amsterdam so we could go to the Van Gogh museum and walk around the city a bit. I ate my last snickers for breakfast. We spent all of 40 minutes in this museum, both of us have been to way too many museums in the past months so we stopped trying to spend time in them for any length of time. After that we explored the city, Amber was my personal guide during this telling me all she knew from her previous trips here and all about her semester abroad. We got tired and headed back to the hostel around 4 and picked up some groceries on the way so we could make food in the hostel (they have a great kitchen area). Our dinner consisted of cucumbers, mini pancakes, and peanut butter lots of peanut butter. I haven't had peanut butter since being on the ranch this summer, I was in need of peanut butter so we bought a jar. We watched some great romantic comedies in the lounge and called it quits for the night.
Saturday we again went to Amsterdam central for the day, this time we took a canal cruise ride for an hour and a half. It took us all around the canals around the city and was very informative (though we didn't listen much to what they were saying). The city really is beautiful and it was nice to be able to see it without walking all of it. After that we just explored some more. Now Amsterdam is home to the largest bike population in the world, seriously they're everywhere and if you don't watch out they will hit you. I finally found a sticker that said the name of where I was on it. Oh how I wish I had one for all the places I had been in Italy, but at least I finally got this one. I finally gave in and paid to use the bathroom (only 30 cents but still) I had to get rid of all my change anyway. For early dinner we headed to the Hard Rock Cafe (say what you will, we were in need of american burgers, its hard traveling and living off foreign food) and then headed back to the hostel for the night. I bought my last (at least for 7 months) bottle of white wine and we drank that while we watched Pulp Fiction and ate cucumbers and cold pancakes. It was a great last night with my best friend, I miss her already and it's only been a few hours. I slept restlessly in anticipation of heading home the following day.
Today I packed my things once again (and for the last time) and we had breakfast of pancakes and the last of our peanut butter. I was quite surprised that we managed to finish the whole jar but it was just so good (we definitely ate it by the spoonful for a while). And we headed to the bus that would take me to the airport. We said our goodbyes and she headed back to school (she sadly still has three weeks left of class) and I went to security. I just finished a yogurt with granola in it (yogurt in different countries taste funny, I don't recommend eating it) and I am finishing up my last post while being overseas. My plane to Dublin will come in a few minutes and soon enough I will be back home eating chicken pot pie. I will post the pictures for this weekend on my blog once I get home and am not relying on crappy public wifi. But for now ciao!

Goodbye Dublin

Well Dublin, it's been a fun time. Hopefully I will come back to this beautiful country again and get to spend more time here, but until then I bid you farewell!

I'm off to the airport which will take me to Eindhoven and eventually I will end up in Amsterdam today! Ready or not here I come!

Cliffs of Moher

So yesterday I woke up at the crack of dawn to go to the Cliffs of Moher. I'm pretty proud of myself for making it there and back with only minimal injuries. I figured out which buses to take and when was the best time to take them so I wouldn't come home super late, but of course that meant waking up at 5:30 to catch the first bus out (the Cliffs are a 5 hour drive from Dublin so it was necessary). Since being in Dublin I have yet to experience Irish food yet, I'm ashamed to admit this but I'm kind of on a budget so I've been living off of snickers and Spar food (Spar is a convenience store that has taken over Dublin, there's one on almost every street I walk by) but tonight I will splurge and buy some real food since I'm leaving tomorrow. Any way the Cliffs were really awesome, it wasn't too cold or windy the first few hours I was there so walking around them was really pretty. It's weird that they don't have walls that keep you from falling off of the cliffs, I just kept thinking to myself that someone could just push me over and walk on and no one would be the wiser, its a weird feeling to think you could die at even a sudden gust of wind. Anywho on to lighter subjects. I walked on the cliffs for a while (slipped in some mud and busted up my elbow too, but I was in no danger of falling off I was just being careless) taking a bunch of pictures and I did a timelapse of the clouds moving over the cliffs. Hopefully it turned out since I'll need it for my photography final but I'll worry about that later. I chilled inside the visitor center once the clouds covered the sun and waited for my bus back to Dublin. That pretty much sums up my Tuesday.

Today I was planning on going hiking in the Wicklow park but the weather called for rain today so I took a pass on that and instead explored the city some more. I've been told to find crunchies and flakes or else I didn't actually have an Irish experience so I'll find those when I go out tonight. I painted a bit in a food court and did a timelapse of that. Of course I got some weird looks from people as they looked at my setup but I didn't really care, this timelapse is probably pretty bad so it was more for fun than requirement. Currently I am holed up in blankets on my bed at the hostel because it's pretty chilly and windy today, which I figured made it a good blogging day. Also a good Netflix day I watched Snowpiercer (it has Chris Evan (Captain America guy) in it so I was intrigued, but for anyone thinking of watching it it's pretty stupid and I advise against it it's a waste of two hours) and a bit of How I Met Your Mother. I know it's quite pathetic of me to be on the computer when I should be enjoying a new country but the fact of the matter is, it's not much fun exploring by yourself and I'm kind of over this traveling thing so I'm being lazy and doing what I would be doing if I were at home right now. 

Tomorrow I fly out of Dublin to Eindhoven at 1:15 and from there take a train to Amsterdam which is where I will meet my beloved Amber. Of course she won't meet me until later that night so I'll have most of the afternoon to figure out another country (one with a much more difficult language) before I get my own personal guide (get ready Amber to deal with helpless me). Anyway on with the pretty stuff that's always at the end!

Cows! Yay cows, there's lot of them around here.

A wee wittle bird. So cute.

A view of the cliffs.

The other side of the cliffs.

I could've walked right off into the ocean. There were a lot of suicide prevention posters around, I imagine it's not uncommon. 

I love how green everything is even in the middle of November.

Some silhouetted walkers.

On leaving Italy

The past few days have been exhausting. As I said earlier Thursday night was our Gala (and Italian Thanksgiving) and with it being the last night we would all be together we stayed up wayy too late (like almost 3am) and sang a lot of karaoke (because that's just what you do apparently). So needless to say the Friday morning was a bit rough for everyone. To top it off Rosella comes in and tells us that there is a train strike in Italy so the trains we were hoping to take to get us to Rome probably wouldn't be running. Great. We were all a bit worried at this point but Rosella took care of us, she found buses that will get us there and even tried to get our money back for the train tickets we were unable to use (stinking strike). So around 1:30 10 of us and Rosella made our way to the bus station. Earlier that morning Dave and Cassandra had left for the airport already so our numbers were down. A group of me and 5 others were to get a hotel together and then 3 others were at another hotel, Mike came to the station to say by to us as he's the only one flying out on Saturday afternoon. So we had a 4 hour bus ride instead of a 2 hour train ride, there was not much sleeping to say that much. Once we finally made it to the airport we had to find the shuttle to our hotel and then we waited. It was nice to just sit and enjoy everyone talking one of the final times. Once at the hotel we quickly dropped off our stuff and made way for our last meal as a group in Italy (how sad is that). We had pizza and fries (patatine frittes in italian) and made our way back to the hotel for the night. Chris was leaving super early in the morning to catch his 6am flight so we said by to him before going to bed. It's so sad seeing our group slowly disperse.
At 5am Saturday we all were up and ready to leave (the remaining 5 of us) and left for the airport at 5:30. Two more were dropped off at terminal 5 and then the last of us went to terminal 3. We all said our goodbyes and went our separate ways, which led me to the train station taking me to the city center of Rome (lucky me, flight doesn't leave till 9... PM) so I could spend one last day in Rome. I had a ticket for the Borghese at 9, so I wandered around trying to find the place (I may have spent a week in Rome, but I only know how to get to places from where we were staying not from the Termini station) and so I was lost for a bit. It was nearing 8:30 and I knew I had to get there soon so I gave up searching and hailed a taxi. The museum was awesome, there was only two floors but it was awesome. The top floor was paintings done by artists in the renaissance. The bottom floor were the sculptures and the really good ones were done by Bernini. He was an amazing sculptor, Dave described his work as making the marble liquid so he could shape it and then magically turning it back to hard marble when he finished (yes he was that good). So I oogled at those for a while then made out of the museum. I pretty much stayed in the Borghese gardens for the next few hours taking a few pictures here and there and reading a book (Gone Girl, I haven't seen the movie but I'm sure the book is much better so you all should read it). It was pretty chilly and looked like rain so I started moving again and made my way to the Colosseum so I could ooh and ahh at it one last time before leaving. I read there for a few hours also then went to get the last gelato I will have in the country before getting another taxi to take me to the airport.
I showed up kind of early but I was exhausted from carrying all three of my bags all day (two backpacks and a rolling one, the streets are not conducive for rolling bags) I nearly got blisters from them. So I made my way through customs and security and waited. And waited. And waited. My flight to Dublin was supposed to leave at 9 which usually means board at 8:15ish but 8:45 rolls around and nothing about the flight. It's raining pretty hard at the moment so I'm sure that was it but I just kept adding up all the time and how late we were going to land and how miserable I was going to be that late at night in the rain with all my luggage trying to find my hostel. But we finally got on the plane and off we went. We landed in Dublin at 11:30 and I had found my hostel by 12:15 which isn't too bad for being in a country by yourself for the first time. Needless to say I passed out when I finally got to bed.
Oh and I never even mentioned my food consumption, after dinner Friday night I had an orange and crackers for breakfast a croissant for lunch that I dipped in jam and a tiny can of pringles, a twix, and a snickers for dinner. Yay nutrition.
Today in Dublin I had cereal (with real cold milk, egahd cold milk who would have thunk it) and then went to the Dublin zoo. The zoo was really nice and even though it was a bit chilly and threatened to rain all day the animals were all pretty active. Unfortunately there was no giraffe feeding today (my luck with giraffes is outstanding, they're my favorite animal and I've yet to be able to touch one and I've gone to so many zoos). Then I walked around the city just kind of wandering. i ate a lot of snickers today (did you know that foreign candy taste so much better than our candy it's because we use high fructose corn syrup and they use real sugar it makes a real difference), I think the final count was 4 (but the days not over yet) and I had a bagel. Oh how I've missed bagels they're so delicious and warm and breadlike. I have decided I like Ireland a lot. They speak english do you know how hard it is to live somewhere and not understand the language, it sucks but then again I've gotten so used to Italian that when I tried to say thank you to someone today I said grazie they looked at me weird because they knew I wasn't italian so I should probably break that habit soon. Alright on with the pictures.

Fountain from the Borghese gardens. Much flow so wow.

There was some event going on in the center of Rome, there were cops and swat-like trucks everywhere.

Some lovely public gardens I walked through after the zoo today, I don't know why they've showed up before the zoo and honestly I'm too lazy to move it.

Lion cub running after momma. So cute.

A sweet building in the middle of the gardens I was in, it might have been a park instead of a garden but I'm going to keep saying garden.

Look at how majestic this tiger is, he posed like that for almost a whole minute it was very impressive.

A pretty nifty church I stumbled upon.

Monkey! Or orangutan or something like that.

Hehe, lemur. Poor Zaboomafoo who died recently. These guys are pretty cute.

A nicely reflected bridge.

I like this one better though.

Drum roll please (I'm doing it in my head so I hope you are too). Giraffe!

Mr. (or Ms I don't know rhino genders very well) Rhino.

I could not tell you the name of this animal but it's cool.

Doesn't he just look angry, again I'm assuming it's a he.

Elephant bums.

What a beautimus peacock.

Dohh sleeping red panda.

This painting was amazing, it was in the Borghese museum (excuse my scrambled pictures). The boy in the bottom left corner has a foot that looks like it is actually coming down towards us, theres even a shadow on the frame I was so impressed.

A sculpture by Bernini of the rape of Persephone. Happy scene, maybe not but absolutely stunning piece, yes.

Another Bernini, Apollo and Daphne (not scooby doo Daphne). She's a nymph so it looks as if her hands are actually turning into leaves, so freaking cool.

This was kind of creepy, it spins around and the lights go out and it goes so fast you see the scene of men killing babies. But it was still really cool (obviously not an ancient piece of work).

Look Mark I found Moak!

This is the theater I went to tonight to see Interstellar (which was amazing, Chris if you're reading this and haven't seen it yet you probably should like now), I just thought the theater was super cool and massive. I loved it.