Lazy Day

Today I slept in far too late to tell anybody. Lets just say I had breakfast around 2pm. I got up and went rowing for an hourish with our soon to be new coach. His name is Chris and he coaches the younger team just down the river. That team has been rowing since they were probably in middle school :) This upcoming weekend, Halloween weekend, the team and I are going to meet up with the other campus' rowing teams and have a night out together. Should be some good craic. I came home and read and began to feel a little homesick. I get homesick when I'm not busy and I am alone for most of the day. I try not to think about it and focus on my school work or cleaning my room. It's really not that far away till I can see everyone again! My friends and I are trying to plan a trip to Poland to see Auschwitz. We are all very excited even though the trip may not be extremely happy. Mom I know you visited Poland with Gigi when you graduated. Where did you go? Tell me about it! If anyone has any friends or family or people they know that live there it would be neat to meet them.

I went shopping in Derry yesterday with Emily. We bought a ridiculous amount of clothes and shoes and spent a ridiculously small amount of money :) It was great! I bought some 4 inch high heels so I can fit in with the Irish girls when we go out. Emily and I have to practice walking in them so we don't make fools of ourselves. Hopefully when I come back I will look very European and high-fashion haha :)

It is getting so cold here, whenever I go outside and am not wearing a huge winder coat with gloves and a hat I am chilled to the bone for the rest of the day. Brrr!!

I'll leave you with some more interesting facts about Irish lifestyle:
They pronounce the letter 'H' as 'Haytch'
Usually, when someone pronounces it 'Haytch' they are from the republic. This is another way people can figure out where you're from/what religion you probably are. Freaky huh?!
They don't use different flavored salad dressing, they usually only have one that is similar to something like mayo, water, and sugar. Blech...
No one has ever had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Irish peanut butter is terrible compared to American Jiff peanut butter.
They only have about 3 options for sugared cereal: Frosted flakes, chocolate hazulnut crisps, and honeynut cheerios. Out of any country in the world, I though Ireland would at least have Lucky Charms.
Most of their fresh fruits and vegetables are pre-packaged.
Their grading scale is different. A mark of 63-73 is an A, 48-62 is a B, 33-47 is a C, and so on. I won't worry about the rest of the marks because I won't get below a B :)
They call the marks First, Upper Second, Lower Second, Third, and Fail.

Hope everyone is well! Talk to you all soon! If you want to skype me, my skype name is ellie.holcomb I'd love to hear from you.