Hello and good morning everyone,
I´m sorry that this entry comes at this time of the day. The week was exceptionally full, especially the weekend. Better now than never, right?
After my host father´s fall last Sunday, the week started pretty normal on the Monday. It was a more or less relaxing day, compared to the rest of the week. In school I started to cut my short movie. In a subject called “media development” our main assignment is to direct our own short movie. I chose a dog movie to ease the process and I got the filming more or less done. So, the cutting can start.
Anyways, on the Tuesday, my school took me up to a driving track and learning center. We took the bus to another County, where we stopped at a driving center. The day was split into three sections. The First one was about the mechanics of a car and the man told us useful thing for the Irish driver’s license. By the way, I might do my theory test over here. They only have to do 45 questions and get 35 right. Furthermore, they can practice these questions as much as they want before on an app. I mean, that is so much easier than in Austria. And in that section we also did a reaction time test. I was shite at that. Joking aside, my reactions are not necessarily the best and I know that too. If anybody has exercises to improve my reactions and reflexes, please let me know. The second part was theory again. This time another man held a presentation, which mainly covered road safety. What was different to what I´ve seen and hear before was the fact that the showed videos weren´t simulations but real life events that had happened in the past. With that piece of information and the shocking reality, that presentation has left a considerable impact on me for sure. To get us out of the serous shock and get us back laughing we finished that section off, by putting on beer goggles. Man, they were funny. They don´t necessarily match up to reality, but it was still great crack with my group. The best answer was “Yes sir, I can see about two and a half of you”. And last but not least, the best part came. The driving! You see, in Austria I´ve never driven a car myself so it was my first-time driving. The cars in which we were driving were dual manual so the passenger could stop or speed too. I had the best time there, honestly. Driving is great and it was terrific to just drive yourself. I enjoyed it so much that I didn´t even notice, that I was driving on the wrong side of the road for the whole time. Just when my tutor told me about 10 minutes into my session, I realized it. It didn´t matter though. They told me that since it is a racetrack, it you´re allowed to drive the way you want. However, it would be a really big problem on the real roads. Good thing I wasn´t driving on them. So yeah, it was just pure class! I am super proud to say now that I have already driven a car in my life and I will present you that piece of unwanted information with a big grin on my face :) That´s the shortened version of my driving experience. Oh and before I forget. I got given out to that day before we left as well. Actually, they did not just give out to me but gave out to the whole bus. It was the first time that I knew I was included and it was addressed to mee too. I bet, yous are wondering what I did. Nothing bad in Austria I´d say. I showed up with the uniform hoodie but because I was unsure what P.E. Uniform meant for pants, I decided to wear my light blue jeans. Usually no one sticks to the dress code and wears whatever they want. Not that day no, everyone wore black trousers. Ups…. At least now I know and since I didn´t get into serious trouble, I don´t mind it anymore
As the week went on, so did the events. On the Wednesday, I went up to Athboy with the first- and second-year basketball girls. The teachers that organize it for them are absolutely amazing and I like them a lot. IT was a great time out again, but since the girls lost the match and no one showed up to the training the previous week, there weren´t just smiley faced. Hopefully more of them will show up and improve their game that way. But I´m very confident that if they train, they can win!
Our TY-Ball is next week and I wanted to make sure I had everything done and covered, so that I would have any problems on the day of the event. That is why I did a trial run on the Thursday. I tried to do my make up properly for the first time in my entire life and through a miracle it actually worked. With that heads up in the beginning, the rest was easy too and I think I´m all set for the Ball. I really hope that it looks pretty, but from my point of view it does. I´ll probably give you an update on that next week.
With the Friday the usual work experience came. Like always I enjoyed it endlessly. I think this year really helped me and reassured me that teaching might not be all too bad even with the 5 years of university. That´s something huge, I guess.
The week was great but the weekend was one of the best ones I´ve ever had over here. On the Saturday, two friends of mine, Fiona and Emmi, and me went up to Dublin. Firstly, we went to Ikea, where we looked at the different rooms and made plans about our future homes, where we could see ourselves live in. That was just hilarious. Then we went to the Ikea restaurant. I´ve never been to one, which the others couldn´t believe. They are both city kids and each have an Ikea in their town. I on the other hand am a country girl and I love my town. I wouldn´t go to Ikea just for the crack every other week. It would be too long of a drive in Vorarlberg. I really enjoyed it here though. The laughs we had were amazing and it was just a brilliant time. Another good thing is, I always speak high german with them, so they can understand me. That way, I am prepared for my German A-levels. Isn´t that great too, hahaha. After the Ikea tour we went to O´Connell street in Dublin where we continued with some shopping. I got a random nosebleed, which brought us into an amazingly cheap Polish shop. It was all just a wonderful day and I really, really, really enjoyed my time with them:)
And to top all of that off, I was able to spend the Sunday with my friends too. It was one of the exchange students´ birthday during the week and we planned a little surprise for her. All of her closest friends went up to Dublin and took the bus to Howth. I´ve already been to Howth once with my dad and I was blown away by the beauty of it all. It was the others´ first time and it was so cute to see their amazement. We walked along the cliffs and then “hiked” down to a small beach surrounded by cliffs. It looked like a painted picture, I´m telling you. When we were done spreading all our stuff out and putting the decoration up, it was Pinterest on its finest. The picknick we prepared was lovely and we had the best time. We spend the day looking at the waves, talking, exploring and laughing. Awesome! Before we took the train home, we had a little look around the Howth market and then went to the peer. The sun was just going down and the sunset rose. I´m still getting goosebumps when I write about it. It was absolutely gorgeous and unreal. To experience this moment together with some friends topped it all just off. A big appreciation to them!
Yeah, that was roughly my week. I can count the days ´til I´m home on one hand now and I´m really excited. I hope all of yous are well and made it to the mark hand-ins. I´m proud of each and every single one of you! with all the love emma<3
PS: there mightn’t be a post next week or the following. I´m going home so there isn´t that much of a point informing the people back home of what I did. However, I will definitely upload a summary, to give you some insight:)
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