Well, here's something I never thought I'd get to do in my life.
My mentor teacher and I have been talking about beekeeping, since she helps take care of the bees, and she invited me and Bethany to visit and see how beekeeping works. So Bethany and I showed up this afternoon, met Katrin, and soon found ourselves in a long shed, climbing into beekeeping suits (like this except yellow). This was not the first time I was cursing that I hadn't brought my camera.
We traipsed out of the shed and into a small neighboring field, where ten or so green-painted towers of Styrofoam sat benignly in the sunlight. We met Jürgen, who is apparently the bee expert, and then Katrin led us to one of the hives and gave us a tour. This involved taking the roof off to make sure that the bees have enough food (since their honey was harvested, the beekeepers feed them a sugar mixture that they can feed off but won't turn into honey) and then taking off the feed level to expose slats of honeycombs hanging inside.
The amazing thing was being so close to a beehive--looking down inside it, hearing the monotone buzz all around--and not having to be afraid. Only my hands were bare, but the bees were totally uninteresting in attacking us, and mostly ignored us, despite the fact that Katrin proceeded to reach in and pull up the slats of honeycombs one by one, showing us where the bees keep their food and their growing young. The bees just continued about their business as usual, apparently unconcerned that three humans were pulling their hive apart and then putting it back together.
As usual when I find myself learning about a new skill/area of expertise that I know next to nothing about, I found that it is way more complicated than I would've imagined. The beekeeper has to monitor the health of the hive: if the bees are eating enough, if they have enough food, if there are too many blood-sucking mites on the young, if the queen is healthy, and many other things I don't know about yet. If the queen isn't healthy, if she's dead or defective or mean, then steps have to be taken.
The most important bee is, of course, the queen, who is responsible for laying eggs. In this capacity, she also determines the attitude--"genetic disposition"-- of the hive. We didn't go near one of the hives because it was described as "richtig böse" (really mean); Jürgen had to look after those in a full suit with boots and gloves, and they swarmed him furiously. As we were working with another hive, he came over to us with one of the honeycombs and showed us the queen, which simply looked like a bigger version of all the swarming workers. The hive follows the queen, and because the queen was passing on an aggressive attitude, she had to go, and was therefore killed. The hive also can't survive without the queen, so the beekeepers will wait until all the late queen's larvae are sealed up and her "smell" is gone, then they can be safely combined with another hive that has a more benevolent queen.
Another small hive that Katrin, Bethany and I checked didn't appear to have a queen at all, as there were no larvae in the hive to be found. To keep the hive from dying out, Katrin and Jürgen simply put it together with another small hive. They say that without a queen and any young to remind them of her, the queenless hive will simply accept the new queen as their own.
All this new information is certainly fascinating, but the best part for me was the opportunity to see a beehive firsthand and up close. I held, with my bare hands, one of the combs, and watched the determined, fluffy little beige-and-black bodies push and buzz busily by. They really are beautiful, and, as long as you don't piss them off or do anything stupid, mostly tolerant of intrusions. I'm looking forward to going back next week and having another look at them. I'm also looking forward to some honey next summer!
P.S. I'll try to remember to take pictures next time. Sorry!
Monday, September 20, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Schöne Stadtroda
Hello again, everyone.
I've been in Stadtroda now for...oh, a bit over a week. I can really hardly believe it; it seems like just a little while ago I was hearing about my placement and sending my first e-mails to my mentor teacher. Now I've moved into the dorm, met my suitemate, taught a few lessons, and had a few adventures, albeit of a very different sort than those that dominated my summer. I was going to try to do a sort of play-by-play introduction, but now 1) over a week has passed and that's just disgraceful and 2) there would be way too much of "then I took a nap" or "then I Internetted for a few hours", so I'm just going to ramble about this place for a bit, if that's okay with everyone.
So, if you weren't paying attention before, I'm in Stadtroda, a small, quiet town just southeast of Jena in the German state of Thuringia ("Thüringen", if you'd like to try for that high front rounded vowel followed by the German "r". No? Didn't think so.) This means I'm in eastern Germany--former GDR territory--and in the countryside. Neither of these things are by any means bad, just...not quite the same as last time, when I was in a good-sized university city just an hour from Frankfurt in Hessen, which is in the West.
I'm living in the Studentenwohnheim (student dormitory) owned by the Fachschule (technical school) where I work. Like the dorm in Marburg, the Fachschule is stark, white, and echo-y, usually oddly quiet and sparsely populated--at least it feels that way, because you rarely actually seen anyone. As I usually do when presented with an empty room with blank white walls, I went a little crazy and stuck posters, postcards, patches and pictures all over the place and dumped stuff everywhere so it now looks lived in. Normally, this Jenniferizing process takes weeks or months, and the collages are added to gradually over the duration of my stay, so I'm rather pleased that I've put all of the major and most of the minor stuff up in a week. It looks pretty awesome, if I may say so. This is, of course, a frantic effort to combat the echo-y starkness of the dorm in general. Living in a place like this would drive anyone mad in short order without getting to know some fellow humans relatively quickly, Batman posters or no, so thankfully I've been blessed with a suitemate.
My room shares a bathroom and a short hallway connecting to the main hallway with another room, wherein dwelleth my new friend Bethany. Bethany comes from England--from north Yorkshire, she would probably like me to say--which of course means we have plenty to talk/laugh/argue about, since she's a fun, friendly, cheerful, optimistic person and I'm a snarky, eternally curious Anglophile. We've spent a lot of time together over the past week, in large part because we quite enjoy each other's company, but also in small part because there isn't really anyone else to hang out with.
That brings me on to my students, with whom I share the dorm. They are mostly between 19 and 24 (with a few older outliers, up to one 51-year-old) and are studying agriculture and household management in order to do stuff like farm management and hospitality services. So far, they've been generally civil and polite but not overly welcoming or friendly. This is not to say they're unfriendly, just...reserved. Many of them go home for the weekends, and during the week, they're shut up in their rooms, out working, or in class. Anyone who may remember my Fulbright application will know what I mean about the closed-door policy, which is common in Germany but signals "I don't want to talk to you" to me and, apparently, to Bethany as well. In response, we've made cookies. I'll let you know how that turns out.
The school is a lot like a specialized community college, and is apparently well-known, at least in Thüringen. The students are separated in different English classes by their area of study and not by English proficiency, which means that in the same class I have a couple upper intermediates, some mid and lower intermediates, a few mid to very low beginners, and maybe even one low advanced. This makes teaching complicated, since on any given task, either the beginners will be bored, the upper intermediates and advanceds will be bored, or both. Whew. Good thing we spent so much time in TESOL class talking about mixed classrooms; now I get to see how it works firsthand. In any case, I won't be using the books I've been reading to teach these students, since they're not nearly that advanced, but I'm still glad I've been reading them, because that's had the unexpected effect of getting me addicted to reading and making me a compulsive book-buyer. My total book count at the end of this summer is somewhere around 20. I started with one.
Anyway, thankfully, in addition to a fun suitemate, I've also been blessed with a great mentor teacher. Katrin met me on the train station on the first day, gave me a tour of the town, and made sure I had everything I needed to survive the first few days. She also set up appointments for me at all the different official offices and went with me to make sure that everything went well. So, with little effort or pain on my part, I'm a registered resident of Stadtroda, I've opened a bank account, and my visa is on its way.
Also, Katrin is very generous with her class time, by which I mean that half of each 90-minute class period belongs to me. This is both great--I don't have to spend (much) time handing back papers or observing when I could be teaching--and intimidating, because I'm expected to plan those 45-minute lessons on my own, making my own materials and worksheets and handling the class with little support from Katrin. Honestly, though, this is wonderful for me, since I feel fairly well-prepared for the responsibility by my training in TESOL and volunteering and working in classrooms for years now.
The first classes were somewhat frightening, though. I had to do an introductory lesson for six different classes--I did a Powerpoint about myself, introducing my state, city, family, and hobbies, then asked them to interview each other and introduce each other to me. For the first couple times, this went well; Katrin started the class, asking them some warm-up questions so I could get a feel for their English level, then she'd introduce me. But for the last few intro classes, there was no chance to hear them speak before I started, so I was going in blind, hoping they'd understand me. However, there's only one class where I've really had trouble getting them to respond--the "lame" class, as Katrin calls them.
Apparently, many of the Fachschule's students are still out working at the end of summer jobs or internships, since it's still the end of the agricultural season. After the break in October, they'll all come back to start classes, and our six-classes-a-week schedule will get a lot more complicated. Eesh. I'm glad at this point that I'm being eased into it gently! At the moment, the class schedule fluctuates each week, so although I had classes ever day but Thursday last week, this week I don't have any on Monday or Tuesday. At this point, I just shrug and show up when Katrin tells me to.
Speaking of October, although it seems a bit odd to me to have a two-week break so early in the year (especially when we get only one week for Christmas!), I'm not going to say no. I've started looking at the options, and it looks like it would be great fun to spend those two weeks exploring Spain, Portugal, and maybe even a bit of Morocco. I've never been to any of those places before. And Ryanair flies to Barcelona for cheap! I really do love living in Europe.
Right. It can't look good that I'm already daydreaming about going elsewhere when I just got here. It's just that adjusting to a new place is always daunting, and Stadtroda is so very quiet. As I mentioned, the students are difficult to get to know--with one very friendly exception, who baked cookies with me and Bethany last week--and even in the middle of the day, the streets feel deserted. The "old town" is all bright pastel buildings that look very pretty except that there is almost never anyone around; the "new town" where I live, up the hill a bit, has a few stores (a Lidl, a bakery, a Sparkasse, a couple flower shops) but, again, rarely very many people. Where is everyone?
Most likely in Jena. Unfortunately, the train station is a good 20-minute walk from the Wohnheim, but from there it's only about 12 minutes to the much bigger city of Jena, that has real shops (hooray!) crowds of people (wow!) and a university, where I shall matriculate come the beginning of October--although, with our accelerated Fachschule schedule, I doubt I'll be able to take many classes. Doesn't matter too much to me, though; my main aims are to get the Semesterticket, which gets me on all public transport in Thüringen for free for the semester, and to meet other students. I also may be able (hopefully) to join a guitar class in Stadtroda, but Jena definitely has more options. Bethany and I spent the afternoon there on Saturday, just shopping and looking around, and I may go back tomorrow or Tuesday to try to get a cell phone finally.
Hmm, I'm not sure what else to add, except my own feelings about all this stuff. Mainly, I'm still waiting to see how it all turns out. I really hope to make more connections with the students at the Fachschule, to spend more time getting to know Katrin with her family, to make friends with the university students, and just really to make a place for myself in this town. This is hard when just finding people to talk to is a challenge. I remain, however, confident that this will improve, and I feel like all the ingredients are here for a really wonderful experience, if I can just make the most of it.
Please feel free to comment if you have more questions. This is, after all, what this blog is supposed to be about!
P.S. I have pictures ready but Blogger isn't letting me insert them. It's late so I'll try again later.
I've been in Stadtroda now for...oh, a bit over a week. I can really hardly believe it; it seems like just a little while ago I was hearing about my placement and sending my first e-mails to my mentor teacher. Now I've moved into the dorm, met my suitemate, taught a few lessons, and had a few adventures, albeit of a very different sort than those that dominated my summer. I was going to try to do a sort of play-by-play introduction, but now 1) over a week has passed and that's just disgraceful and 2) there would be way too much of "then I took a nap" or "then I Internetted for a few hours", so I'm just going to ramble about this place for a bit, if that's okay with everyone.
So, if you weren't paying attention before, I'm in Stadtroda, a small, quiet town just southeast of Jena in the German state of Thuringia ("Thüringen", if you'd like to try for that high front rounded vowel followed by the German "r". No? Didn't think so.) This means I'm in eastern Germany--former GDR territory--and in the countryside. Neither of these things are by any means bad, just...not quite the same as last time, when I was in a good-sized university city just an hour from Frankfurt in Hessen, which is in the West.
I'm living in the Studentenwohnheim (student dormitory) owned by the Fachschule (technical school) where I work. Like the dorm in Marburg, the Fachschule is stark, white, and echo-y, usually oddly quiet and sparsely populated--at least it feels that way, because you rarely actually seen anyone. As I usually do when presented with an empty room with blank white walls, I went a little crazy and stuck posters, postcards, patches and pictures all over the place and dumped stuff everywhere so it now looks lived in. Normally, this Jenniferizing process takes weeks or months, and the collages are added to gradually over the duration of my stay, so I'm rather pleased that I've put all of the major and most of the minor stuff up in a week. It looks pretty awesome, if I may say so. This is, of course, a frantic effort to combat the echo-y starkness of the dorm in general. Living in a place like this would drive anyone mad in short order without getting to know some fellow humans relatively quickly, Batman posters or no, so thankfully I've been blessed with a suitemate.
My room shares a bathroom and a short hallway connecting to the main hallway with another room, wherein dwelleth my new friend Bethany. Bethany comes from England--from north Yorkshire, she would probably like me to say--which of course means we have plenty to talk/laugh/argue about, since she's a fun, friendly, cheerful, optimistic person and I'm a snarky, eternally curious Anglophile. We've spent a lot of time together over the past week, in large part because we quite enjoy each other's company, but also in small part because there isn't really anyone else to hang out with.
That brings me on to my students, with whom I share the dorm. They are mostly between 19 and 24 (with a few older outliers, up to one 51-year-old) and are studying agriculture and household management in order to do stuff like farm management and hospitality services. So far, they've been generally civil and polite but not overly welcoming or friendly. This is not to say they're unfriendly, just...reserved. Many of them go home for the weekends, and during the week, they're shut up in their rooms, out working, or in class. Anyone who may remember my Fulbright application will know what I mean about the closed-door policy, which is common in Germany but signals "I don't want to talk to you" to me and, apparently, to Bethany as well. In response, we've made cookies. I'll let you know how that turns out.
The school is a lot like a specialized community college, and is apparently well-known, at least in Thüringen. The students are separated in different English classes by their area of study and not by English proficiency, which means that in the same class I have a couple upper intermediates, some mid and lower intermediates, a few mid to very low beginners, and maybe even one low advanced. This makes teaching complicated, since on any given task, either the beginners will be bored, the upper intermediates and advanceds will be bored, or both. Whew. Good thing we spent so much time in TESOL class talking about mixed classrooms; now I get to see how it works firsthand. In any case, I won't be using the books I've been reading to teach these students, since they're not nearly that advanced, but I'm still glad I've been reading them, because that's had the unexpected effect of getting me addicted to reading and making me a compulsive book-buyer. My total book count at the end of this summer is somewhere around 20. I started with one.
Anyway, thankfully, in addition to a fun suitemate, I've also been blessed with a great mentor teacher. Katrin met me on the train station on the first day, gave me a tour of the town, and made sure I had everything I needed to survive the first few days. She also set up appointments for me at all the different official offices and went with me to make sure that everything went well. So, with little effort or pain on my part, I'm a registered resident of Stadtroda, I've opened a bank account, and my visa is on its way.
Also, Katrin is very generous with her class time, by which I mean that half of each 90-minute class period belongs to me. This is both great--I don't have to spend (much) time handing back papers or observing when I could be teaching--and intimidating, because I'm expected to plan those 45-minute lessons on my own, making my own materials and worksheets and handling the class with little support from Katrin. Honestly, though, this is wonderful for me, since I feel fairly well-prepared for the responsibility by my training in TESOL and volunteering and working in classrooms for years now.
The first classes were somewhat frightening, though. I had to do an introductory lesson for six different classes--I did a Powerpoint about myself, introducing my state, city, family, and hobbies, then asked them to interview each other and introduce each other to me. For the first couple times, this went well; Katrin started the class, asking them some warm-up questions so I could get a feel for their English level, then she'd introduce me. But for the last few intro classes, there was no chance to hear them speak before I started, so I was going in blind, hoping they'd understand me. However, there's only one class where I've really had trouble getting them to respond--the "lame" class, as Katrin calls them.
Apparently, many of the Fachschule's students are still out working at the end of summer jobs or internships, since it's still the end of the agricultural season. After the break in October, they'll all come back to start classes, and our six-classes-a-week schedule will get a lot more complicated. Eesh. I'm glad at this point that I'm being eased into it gently! At the moment, the class schedule fluctuates each week, so although I had classes ever day but Thursday last week, this week I don't have any on Monday or Tuesday. At this point, I just shrug and show up when Katrin tells me to.
Speaking of October, although it seems a bit odd to me to have a two-week break so early in the year (especially when we get only one week for Christmas!), I'm not going to say no. I've started looking at the options, and it looks like it would be great fun to spend those two weeks exploring Spain, Portugal, and maybe even a bit of Morocco. I've never been to any of those places before. And Ryanair flies to Barcelona for cheap! I really do love living in Europe.
Right. It can't look good that I'm already daydreaming about going elsewhere when I just got here. It's just that adjusting to a new place is always daunting, and Stadtroda is so very quiet. As I mentioned, the students are difficult to get to know--with one very friendly exception, who baked cookies with me and Bethany last week--and even in the middle of the day, the streets feel deserted. The "old town" is all bright pastel buildings that look very pretty except that there is almost never anyone around; the "new town" where I live, up the hill a bit, has a few stores (a Lidl, a bakery, a Sparkasse, a couple flower shops) but, again, rarely very many people. Where is everyone?
Most likely in Jena. Unfortunately, the train station is a good 20-minute walk from the Wohnheim, but from there it's only about 12 minutes to the much bigger city of Jena, that has real shops (hooray!) crowds of people (wow!) and a university, where I shall matriculate come the beginning of October--although, with our accelerated Fachschule schedule, I doubt I'll be able to take many classes. Doesn't matter too much to me, though; my main aims are to get the Semesterticket, which gets me on all public transport in Thüringen for free for the semester, and to meet other students. I also may be able (hopefully) to join a guitar class in Stadtroda, but Jena definitely has more options. Bethany and I spent the afternoon there on Saturday, just shopping and looking around, and I may go back tomorrow or Tuesday to try to get a cell phone finally.
Hmm, I'm not sure what else to add, except my own feelings about all this stuff. Mainly, I'm still waiting to see how it all turns out. I really hope to make more connections with the students at the Fachschule, to spend more time getting to know Katrin with her family, to make friends with the university students, and just really to make a place for myself in this town. This is hard when just finding people to talk to is a challenge. I remain, however, confident that this will improve, and I feel like all the ingredients are here for a really wonderful experience, if I can just make the most of it.
Please feel free to comment if you have more questions. This is, after all, what this blog is supposed to be about!
P.S. I have pictures ready but Blogger isn't letting me insert them. It's late so I'll try again later.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Book: Oliver Twist
Author: Charles Dickens
First Published: 1837-1839, England
Original Language: English
Topics: Childhood, adulthood, poverty, generosity vs greed, indifference vs compassion, crime, murder
In A Nutshell: The book follows the childhood years of one Oliver Twist, an orphan raised in abuse and poverty. Through some absolute miracle--the persistance of innocence and love in the fact of horrible circumstances, I guess--Oliver is sweet, loving, naive, and generally the most perfect and adorable child you could imagine. The weird thing is that against all proof (and reason), almost everyone he meets immediately assumes that he's a deceitful, villianous little demon, and treats him accordingly, despite which Oliver continues to be innocently honest and perfect. At a very young age, he is apprenticed out to an unsympathetic master to learn the trade of undertaker, but when he is accused of attacking an older apprentice, he runs away to London, where he is taken in by a gang of child pickpockets run by a greedy Jew (yay stereotypes) named Fagin. At first grateful for their kindness, Oliver soon learns that they are theives, and on his very first outing with them, gets accused of pickpocketing (of which the Artful Dodger, and not he, is guilty) and is arrested.
During the trial he meets Mr Brownlow, who believes in his innocence and takes Oliver in.
Oliver's domestic bliss in the loving care of Mr Brownlow and his housekeeper is shattered when he is kidnapped by Nancy and Bill Sikes, associates of Fagin's, and dragged back to their lair. They force him to help them with a robbery at a countryside house, which goes horribly awry when Oliver tries to warn the family within and gets shot for his trouble. The baddies leave him to die, and he is found and cared for by the Maylies, with whom he finds great happiness and a return to health. Sikes, Fagin, and a mysterious man named Monk are plotting Oliver's death, but they are overheard by Nancy, who goes to the Maylies to warn them. Sikes finds out and kills Nancy in a rage, but through the actions of Mr Brownlow and the Maylies, Oliver's persecutors are finally confronted.
The twists (lol pun) and turns in the plot are endless, but eventually, they find out who Oliver's parents were, restore his name and inheritance, and the baddies get their comeuppance, so they all live happily ever after the end.
Thinking Makes It So: I very much enjoyed this book, but I was a bit surprised to discover that despite the title, the book is not really about Oliver at all. It follows his story, and the plot revolves around his identity and the events of his young life, but the real focus of the book is the people around him, who act for or against him. Oliver has very little control over anything that happens, and is generally totally at the mercy of these people, and so he acts as a mirror to show their personalities and characters as they interact with and respond to him. In this capacity, Oliver has really little to no personality of his own beyond being, as mentioned above, unfailingly sweet, innocent, and almost irksomely angelic all the time.
On the other hand, there is a wealth of characters in this book with greatly varied personalities, motivations, and conflicting desires, which are thrown into sharp relief by the problem of Oliver's destiny. Of these, my favorite is Nancy, who, although considering herself to be inextricably tangled in the life of abuse and crime she has known all her life, has pity on Oliver and tries to help him as best she can, at terrible cost to herself. While for Oliver, as a mirror at best and plot device at worst, it is difficult to feel anything beyond concerned compassion, Nancy's plight evokes sympathy, frustration, rage, grief, and pity as she struggles between the urges of her compassion for Oliver to do the right thing and the entanglements of her horrible, dysfunctional life that try to keep her where she is.
Dickens' use of language is one of the best parts about the book, being simultaneously wry, satirical, sarcastic, and critical of the callous way that people treat Oliver as a fictional stand-in for orphans and unfortunates everywhere. Dickens is particularly sharp-tongued over the aptly named Mr Bumble, a parish beadle who, far from fulfilling his Christian duty to take care of the poor, tries to give them as little as he can, uncaring of whether they survive or suffer. His punishment comes in the form of his selfish marriage to Mrs Mann, who, true to her name, wears the (metaphorical) pants and browbeats him to her will. Dickens describes Mr Beadle's uncompassionate treatment of the poor with mocking sarcasm, and his subsequent enslavement by his wife with almost gleeful understatement. Dickens' tongue-in-cheek statement of the attitudes of selfish and uncaring people towards the poor evokes both indignation and a little guilt, as if he's muttering between the lines, "You laugh, but I know you've thought this way too." It's simultaneously amusing, frustrating, and unsettling.
Anyway, there are so many characters and convoluted plot resolutions packed into this one book that I'm sure I could study it for ages and still have something to say. The self-serving greed of Fagin, the careless joviality of the Dodger and his friend, the angelic compassion of Miss Maylie, and the brutality of Sikes are all magnified by their proximity to Oliver for the reader's benefit to examine and wonder how, if they were presented with a poor, lost orphan child, they would choose to respond.
That You Must Teach Me: Although amusing and ironic to a native speaker, I can easily imagine that much of Dickens' clever social commentary will be lost on a long-suffering English learner in a tornado of incomprehensible snide remarks and sarcasm. I'd be careful to draw this out by asking students what they think Dickens' opinion of the different characters are, what his views on the poor and charity are, and what the students themselves think of the same things. It would take a long time, though, to get through this book, because of the combination of a fairly convoluted plot and a lot of snarkiness.
First Published: 1837-1839, England
Original Language: English
Topics: Childhood, adulthood, poverty, generosity vs greed, indifference vs compassion, crime, murder
In A Nutshell: The book follows the childhood years of one Oliver Twist, an orphan raised in abuse and poverty. Through some absolute miracle--the persistance of innocence and love in the fact of horrible circumstances, I guess--Oliver is sweet, loving, naive, and generally the most perfect and adorable child you could imagine. The weird thing is that against all proof (and reason), almost everyone he meets immediately assumes that he's a deceitful, villianous little demon, and treats him accordingly, despite which Oliver continues to be innocently honest and perfect. At a very young age, he is apprenticed out to an unsympathetic master to learn the trade of undertaker, but when he is accused of attacking an older apprentice, he runs away to London, where he is taken in by a gang of child pickpockets run by a greedy Jew (yay stereotypes) named Fagin. At first grateful for their kindness, Oliver soon learns that they are theives, and on his very first outing with them, gets accused of pickpocketing (of which the Artful Dodger, and not he, is guilty) and is arrested.
During the trial he meets Mr Brownlow, who believes in his innocence and takes Oliver in.
Oliver's domestic bliss in the loving care of Mr Brownlow and his housekeeper is shattered when he is kidnapped by Nancy and Bill Sikes, associates of Fagin's, and dragged back to their lair. They force him to help them with a robbery at a countryside house, which goes horribly awry when Oliver tries to warn the family within and gets shot for his trouble. The baddies leave him to die, and he is found and cared for by the Maylies, with whom he finds great happiness and a return to health. Sikes, Fagin, and a mysterious man named Monk are plotting Oliver's death, but they are overheard by Nancy, who goes to the Maylies to warn them. Sikes finds out and kills Nancy in a rage, but through the actions of Mr Brownlow and the Maylies, Oliver's persecutors are finally confronted.
The twists (lol pun) and turns in the plot are endless, but eventually, they find out who Oliver's parents were, restore his name and inheritance, and the baddies get their comeuppance, so they all live happily ever after the end.
Thinking Makes It So: I very much enjoyed this book, but I was a bit surprised to discover that despite the title, the book is not really about Oliver at all. It follows his story, and the plot revolves around his identity and the events of his young life, but the real focus of the book is the people around him, who act for or against him. Oliver has very little control over anything that happens, and is generally totally at the mercy of these people, and so he acts as a mirror to show their personalities and characters as they interact with and respond to him. In this capacity, Oliver has really little to no personality of his own beyond being, as mentioned above, unfailingly sweet, innocent, and almost irksomely angelic all the time.
On the other hand, there is a wealth of characters in this book with greatly varied personalities, motivations, and conflicting desires, which are thrown into sharp relief by the problem of Oliver's destiny. Of these, my favorite is Nancy, who, although considering herself to be inextricably tangled in the life of abuse and crime she has known all her life, has pity on Oliver and tries to help him as best she can, at terrible cost to herself. While for Oliver, as a mirror at best and plot device at worst, it is difficult to feel anything beyond concerned compassion, Nancy's plight evokes sympathy, frustration, rage, grief, and pity as she struggles between the urges of her compassion for Oliver to do the right thing and the entanglements of her horrible, dysfunctional life that try to keep her where she is.
Dickens' use of language is one of the best parts about the book, being simultaneously wry, satirical, sarcastic, and critical of the callous way that people treat Oliver as a fictional stand-in for orphans and unfortunates everywhere. Dickens is particularly sharp-tongued over the aptly named Mr Bumble, a parish beadle who, far from fulfilling his Christian duty to take care of the poor, tries to give them as little as he can, uncaring of whether they survive or suffer. His punishment comes in the form of his selfish marriage to Mrs Mann, who, true to her name, wears the (metaphorical) pants and browbeats him to her will. Dickens describes Mr Beadle's uncompassionate treatment of the poor with mocking sarcasm, and his subsequent enslavement by his wife with almost gleeful understatement. Dickens' tongue-in-cheek statement of the attitudes of selfish and uncaring people towards the poor evokes both indignation and a little guilt, as if he's muttering between the lines, "You laugh, but I know you've thought this way too." It's simultaneously amusing, frustrating, and unsettling.
Anyway, there are so many characters and convoluted plot resolutions packed into this one book that I'm sure I could study it for ages and still have something to say. The self-serving greed of Fagin, the careless joviality of the Dodger and his friend, the angelic compassion of Miss Maylie, and the brutality of Sikes are all magnified by their proximity to Oliver for the reader's benefit to examine and wonder how, if they were presented with a poor, lost orphan child, they would choose to respond.
That You Must Teach Me: Although amusing and ironic to a native speaker, I can easily imagine that much of Dickens' clever social commentary will be lost on a long-suffering English learner in a tornado of incomprehensible snide remarks and sarcasm. I'd be careful to draw this out by asking students what they think Dickens' opinion of the different characters are, what his views on the poor and charity are, and what the students themselves think of the same things. It would take a long time, though, to get through this book, because of the combination of a fairly convoluted plot and a lot of snarkiness.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Orientation, or, How It All Began
Originally written September 8th
So here we go. After many drafts of essays, an unhealthy dose of stressful waiting, and a long summer spent traveling that was over far too soon, I find myself finally at the Fulbright orientation in Cologne. It seems just a tiny bit ridiculous to be here, both because I can't believe it's arrived so quickly and because I can't wait for it to be over. As a general rule, I don't like orientations.
This one, though, could be a lot worse. We met up at the Cologne train station on Monday and took a couple of buses out to the much smaller village of Altenberg, which has a big conference center that can hold all 200-odd orientees. After dinner, we had a brief introductory session and were then set free to mingle and drink beer at the temporary bar. (Ah, I must be in Germany...)
Yesterday morning began early, and varied from interesting and relevant talks about life in a German school to the boring and necessary stuff about housing and insurance. The rest of the day was devoted to working on a 45-minute lesson plan, which will be presented tomorrow. Just after dinner, we all reconvened for a Q&A with some of last year's participants.
Today was excruciatingly long, consisting almost entirely of the presentation of the lesson plan project. The level of experience of the assistants with preparing and teaching a lesson is, as expected, quite varied, although there were definitely no unqualified disasters. The tutors, German teachers who had come to help prepare us for teaching, observed and commented on our work, which was simultaneously helpful and frustrating--the latter because different tutors sometimes gave us conflicting advice. After all that, we then had two hours straight of lectures about Fulbright-related stuff--how to get reimbursed, who to call if there's trouble (Ghostbusters!), official channels of communication, etc.
I've been trying to interact and pay attention, but I've felt drowsy and odd for the last few days. It's an odd combination of feeling lethargic and being desperately excited to get going. At this point, I'm so close to the place that I've been looking forward to for months that the couple days that stand between me and Stadtroda don't seem to be much more than inconsequential formalities.
I've met several nice people here, many whom I'm sure I'll never see again for the most part. Socializing is all well and good, but I'd rather spend my time getting to know my students, my teacher, and my town than other Americans who will be living a hundred miles away.
Now at the end of it, I found the orientation session, at least for me, not so helpful. The most important parts were the sessions of genuinely helpful information, such as about insurance, the school schedule in our areas, and getting money refunded, and meeting other people who will actually be living in the same area. I didn't feel like the lesson plan practice was that helpful, although I've been working in ESL classes for a while, so it was very similar to what I've been hearing in my TESOL classes for years.
Now, though--now it gets real. Now, off to Stadtroda, to finally, after such a long and winding journey, get started.
So here we go. After many drafts of essays, an unhealthy dose of stressful waiting, and a long summer spent traveling that was over far too soon, I find myself finally at the Fulbright orientation in Cologne. It seems just a tiny bit ridiculous to be here, both because I can't believe it's arrived so quickly and because I can't wait for it to be over. As a general rule, I don't like orientations.
This one, though, could be a lot worse. We met up at the Cologne train station on Monday and took a couple of buses out to the much smaller village of Altenberg, which has a big conference center that can hold all 200-odd orientees. After dinner, we had a brief introductory session and were then set free to mingle and drink beer at the temporary bar. (Ah, I must be in Germany...)
Yesterday morning began early, and varied from interesting and relevant talks about life in a German school to the boring and necessary stuff about housing and insurance. The rest of the day was devoted to working on a 45-minute lesson plan, which will be presented tomorrow. Just after dinner, we all reconvened for a Q&A with some of last year's participants.
Today was excruciatingly long, consisting almost entirely of the presentation of the lesson plan project. The level of experience of the assistants with preparing and teaching a lesson is, as expected, quite varied, although there were definitely no unqualified disasters. The tutors, German teachers who had come to help prepare us for teaching, observed and commented on our work, which was simultaneously helpful and frustrating--the latter because different tutors sometimes gave us conflicting advice. After all that, we then had two hours straight of lectures about Fulbright-related stuff--how to get reimbursed, who to call if there's trouble (Ghostbusters!), official channels of communication, etc.
I've been trying to interact and pay attention, but I've felt drowsy and odd for the last few days. It's an odd combination of feeling lethargic and being desperately excited to get going. At this point, I'm so close to the place that I've been looking forward to for months that the couple days that stand between me and Stadtroda don't seem to be much more than inconsequential formalities.
I've met several nice people here, many whom I'm sure I'll never see again for the most part. Socializing is all well and good, but I'd rather spend my time getting to know my students, my teacher, and my town than other Americans who will be living a hundred miles away.
Now at the end of it, I found the orientation session, at least for me, not so helpful. The most important parts were the sessions of genuinely helpful information, such as about insurance, the school schedule in our areas, and getting money refunded, and meeting other people who will actually be living in the same area. I didn't feel like the lesson plan practice was that helpful, although I've been working in ESL classes for a while, so it was very similar to what I've been hearing in my TESOL classes for years.
Now, though--now it gets real. Now, off to Stadtroda, to finally, after such a long and winding journey, get started.
Viva Colognia!
Ahh, Cologne. I have a special place in my heart for Cologne.
Part of it is because of the towering and fantastic cathedral, which never ceases to be breathtaking no matter how many times I see it. The Kölner Dom is one of my favorite churches that I've ever visited, in large part because when I was here for the first time, it was a sanctuary of quiet and calm in the middle of the chaos of Karneval.
Part of it is memories of visiting the city during Karneval: the nuns wearing bandoliers of hard liquor, the schunkling and singing, the ankle-deep drifts of broken glass littering the streets, the complete insanity of a parade of clowns banging through the Hauptbahnhof and getting odd looks for not wearing a psychedelically colored costume, watching a Chinese grandma beat up a towering, drunken German dressed like a surgeon who was trying to muscle his way into his restaurant's bathroom and bullying her employees. I love Cologne.
This time, of course, it was much quieter. Our bus from Frankfurt Hahn was delayed by a horrible traffic jam caused by a triathalon along the Rhine, so it was midafternoon already when I staggered into the hostel. I headed out again to a flea market in Neumarkt and looked in the shop windows, but many of the stores were already closed. I wandered down to the bank of the river and, while examining a water sculpture in a park, was approached by a Frenchman who struck up a conversation and asked me out for coffee. (Why does this keep happening? Odd...)
I met up with him a couple hours later, and we got some coffee, sat outside at a cafe overlooking a brightly lit square, and chatted for hours about language, culture, travel, stereotypes, and life in general. Fouad, my new friend, was very gentlemanlike, and we spoke in a combination of German and English, sprinkled with French and, when I could coax it out of Fouad, Moroccan or Arabic. As it got later, I insisted on going back to my hostel and getting a good night's sleep for the beginning of orientation the next day, so Fouad and I walked back past the cathedral and I returned to my room to crash.
I got up, did my laundry, and spent a few hours wandering around the city, looking for a Caffrey hat in the fashionable streets of Cologne. I ended up with something significantly more on the Michael Jackson side, but hey, I like it, so don't judge. At about 3pm, I picked up my bags and lugged them to the train station to meet up with the Altenberg group.
The hour-long bus ride to the conference center was not that eventful, but the key thing is that finally, I'm beginning the thing I've been waiting for and looking forward to for so long. Now all that remains is for the excitement to turn into nervousness.
Part of it is because of the towering and fantastic cathedral, which never ceases to be breathtaking no matter how many times I see it. The Kölner Dom is one of my favorite churches that I've ever visited, in large part because when I was here for the first time, it was a sanctuary of quiet and calm in the middle of the chaos of Karneval.
Part of it is memories of visiting the city during Karneval: the nuns wearing bandoliers of hard liquor, the schunkling and singing, the ankle-deep drifts of broken glass littering the streets, the complete insanity of a parade of clowns banging through the Hauptbahnhof and getting odd looks for not wearing a psychedelically colored costume, watching a Chinese grandma beat up a towering, drunken German dressed like a surgeon who was trying to muscle his way into his restaurant's bathroom and bullying her employees. I love Cologne.
This time, of course, it was much quieter. Our bus from Frankfurt Hahn was delayed by a horrible traffic jam caused by a triathalon along the Rhine, so it was midafternoon already when I staggered into the hostel. I headed out again to a flea market in Neumarkt and looked in the shop windows, but many of the stores were already closed. I wandered down to the bank of the river and, while examining a water sculpture in a park, was approached by a Frenchman who struck up a conversation and asked me out for coffee. (Why does this keep happening? Odd...)
I met up with him a couple hours later, and we got some coffee, sat outside at a cafe overlooking a brightly lit square, and chatted for hours about language, culture, travel, stereotypes, and life in general. Fouad, my new friend, was very gentlemanlike, and we spoke in a combination of German and English, sprinkled with French and, when I could coax it out of Fouad, Moroccan or Arabic. As it got later, I insisted on going back to my hostel and getting a good night's sleep for the beginning of orientation the next day, so Fouad and I walked back past the cathedral and I returned to my room to crash.
I got up, did my laundry, and spent a few hours wandering around the city, looking for a Caffrey hat in the fashionable streets of Cologne. I ended up with something significantly more on the Michael Jackson side, but hey, I like it, so don't judge. At about 3pm, I picked up my bags and lugged them to the train station to meet up with the Altenberg group.
The hour-long bus ride to the conference center was not that eventful, but the key thing is that finally, I'm beginning the thing I've been waiting for and looking forward to for so long. Now all that remains is for the excitement to turn into nervousness.
Adventuring in the Aran Islands and Kicking around Killarney (and Discovering Dingle!)
I peeled myself out of bed early on Thursday (the 2nd of September) and got myself down to the shuttle bus for a 45-minute ride to the ferry dock. From there, it was onto the ferry for another 45-minute crossing to Inis Mor, the largest of the three Aran Islands.
I debated getting on a minibus for a tour, but eventually pride and adventure won out, and I rented a bike instead. In retrospect, this was rather stupid. I haven't ridden a bike in at least two years, and I've never been very good at it. But I couldn't stomach the idea of being squished into a minibus and just staring out the window for three hours, and the lady at the TI said I could probably handle it, so off I went.
After a stop at a Spar for a picnic, I set off in earnest. It quickly became apparent, in the form of a series of gentle uphills, that I was not well-prepared for what I'd gotten myself into. I was soon getting quite tired, but I pushed on, and only had to walk my bike once. Finally, I came to the turn-off for the steep track leading up to my first destination, the lighthouse, so I left my bike there and continued on foot.
A short but intense hike later, I was standing at the highest point of the island. The sun was shining in a watery sort of way through the screen of swiftly-blown clouds high above. This might explain part of why the landscape looked so washed out. The bleak hills went rolling away in all directions down toward the sea, scruffy short grass and thistles, crisscrossed by chest-high stone walls with, apparently, no rhyme or reason to their paths. The lighthouse itself sat boarded up and silent, a cylinder of grey stone, beside some kind of house of similar material that had long since begun the process of decay. What with the powerful wind sweeping over everything and, beside its wailing, the vast, empty, open-sky silence, there was a sort of forlorn sadness about the whole place.
I followed a path down to a circle of grey stone, across and over the walls that crossed the way, and talked with a Canadian couple going the same way. At the circle, I climbed up on the precariously loose rocks and looked back and the unsympathetic lighthouse, and across over the fields again, and decided it was time to get going.
Back at my bike, I found to my delight that all of the uphill had been taken care of. I cruised down the gently sloping road until I passed a crescent-shaped beach of white sand and turquoise water, which looked oddly out of place, like someone had transported an entire Caribbean beach to this gritty, tough, windswept island in Ireland. A short bit later, and I was at the Dún Aonghasa visitor's center and hiking up yet another path toward the sea.
This is the main attraction on the island: a semicircular stone-age fort on the edge of a 300-foot cliff over the ocean. There are no railings and no warning signs; the stony ground simply ends in a straight drop to the turbulent seas below. The fort itself, while I'm sure it's very historically significant, isn't much except for its incredible age. The really awe-inspiring bit is that spectacular cliff.
As I am my mother's daughter, I found a nice spot on the edge and dangled my feet over, much to the surprise of other visitors. The thing is, though, that if you're careful, you're no more likely to fall off a cliff than you are to fall off a sidewalk, and sitting on the side of the ledge isn't any more likely to pitch you into the sea than a stool is likely to spontaneously throw you to the floor. The key is to move slowly and deliberately, with no sudden movements to throw you off balance, and to have respect for the death that lurks around those edges. But there's no reason to panic.
I ate my lunch there on the edge of the cliff and looked out over the endless ocean until my fingers started to go numb from the wind. Then I got up carefully and made my way back to where I'd left my bike. I still had some time before I really needed to head back to the ferry, but I decided that given my physical condition and the distance involved, it would probably be wiser just to head straight back.
This turned out to be a very good idea. I had to pedal constantly most of the way back, and I was already tired. I rolled back into town with about 20 minutes to spare, which was just enough time to buy some Fanta at the Spar, return my bike, and stagger onto the ferry, where I promptly fell asleep for the entire journey back.
Back in Galway, I was powerwalking through the shopping area to try to get to the jewelry store I'd decided on, which was closing in just a few minutes. I made it in time and picked out the ring I wanted, which I'm now very happily wearing. I hope it'll last longer than the last one!
Dinner, a cappuccino, and a shower later, I finally crawled gratefully into bed.
The next morning, I again got up early (what is the deal?! Augh!) to catch the bus out of Galway. I arrived in Limerick (what a fantastic name for a city, eh?) with two hours of layover waiting for the bus to Killarney, so I spent it looking for a new book to read--I'm an addict, so sue me--and having a nice lunch in the sun. I got a bed in a nice hostel upon arriving in Killarney and set off again toward the national park that abuts the town, forgetting two things: 1) I'd biked like 4 or 5 miles the day before and 2) 6 miles is a long way to walk.
By the time I made it to the park, I was already tired, but I explored the ruined abbey, partially restored and partially dilapidated and nestled amid a small forest of cockeyed Celtic crosses. From there, I had the choice to turn around or go on, and that was how I ended up another mile down the road at Muckross House, a beautiful old manor house on the lake. I poked around a bit, but the day was ending and almost everyone had already gone. Leaving the park, I began the long trek back to town, stopping on the way at a pub for some water. It was close to 9pm when I finally made it back, but I stopped in a bookstore anyway. I can't help it.
On the 4th, I went on a bus tour to Dingle. Now, I'd planned on actually going to Dingle and staying there for the two nights preceding my flight, but it turned out that 1) Dingle's really far away and 2) my flight leaves at 9am, so I have to be close by. This is how I ended up in Killarney instead, which is near the airport, taking a bus day trip out to Dingle instead.
Turns out it was a really good thing I did. Although I'm not, in general, a huge fan of minibus tours, this one was more than worth it because of the absolutely spectacular scenery and a wonderful guide. We drove across rolling green pastures first to Inch Strand, another little stretch of soft sand and gentle waves, that looks into the long inlet between Kerry and Dingle peninsulas. I took off my shoes and padded down the beach, looking for shells and wave-smoothed stones, soaking up the sunlight for as long as possible before I had to dash back to the bus.
We dove through twee little Dingle Town, perched on the side of a wide harbor and packed with runners in a marathon around the peninsula. We drove on out to the very end of the peninsula and looked out towards the Blasket Islands and, over the edge of the glittering horizon, America. Circling back around, stopping now and then to take pictures of the fantastically vibrant emerald landscape against the glimmering sea, we came back to Dingle Town for a late lunch and a quick look around the town before we headed back to Killarney.
The hilarious part of all this was our guide, John. He laughed and joked with me every time we pulled over for pictures, and invited me out to a drink at a pub after we got back. I agreed, but first he let me borrow his bicycle to ride for a bit through the national park near Killarney. I cruised out to the old castle on the lakeshore and back, then headed out to find the pub.
It took me a few tries, but I eventually found the right one and found myself in an Irish pub, in Ireland, drinking cider and trying in vain to understand most of what was being said to me. When they spoke to me directly, I could usually understand what the denizens of the pub said, but when they spoke to each other, they might as well (and could have been) speaking Gaelic. After a couple pints of cider, John, a friend of his, and I went up to a 21-year-old's birthday party, then to a couple other pubs to hear different types of music, ending in a real Irish pub with real Irish music, drinking Bailey's Irish creme with an Irishman. I felt, as you can imagine, quite Irish.
I should mention at this point that John is old enough to be my father, and it was fun and relaxing to hang out with him as he showed me around the town. We got to talk about life and the future, and I returned to my hostel tired and happy.
I got up at (what felt like) the crack of dawn to take a taxi to the airport and, regretfully and reluctantly, got on the plane to leave the British Isles. I'd gladly move there and I didn't really want to leave, but duty called me across the Channel back to the Continent. With a mixture of sadness and excitement I watched the green hills of Ireland drop away below me and looked forward to the upcoming orientation.
I debated getting on a minibus for a tour, but eventually pride and adventure won out, and I rented a bike instead. In retrospect, this was rather stupid. I haven't ridden a bike in at least two years, and I've never been very good at it. But I couldn't stomach the idea of being squished into a minibus and just staring out the window for three hours, and the lady at the TI said I could probably handle it, so off I went.
After a stop at a Spar for a picnic, I set off in earnest. It quickly became apparent, in the form of a series of gentle uphills, that I was not well-prepared for what I'd gotten myself into. I was soon getting quite tired, but I pushed on, and only had to walk my bike once. Finally, I came to the turn-off for the steep track leading up to my first destination, the lighthouse, so I left my bike there and continued on foot.
A short but intense hike later, I was standing at the highest point of the island. The sun was shining in a watery sort of way through the screen of swiftly-blown clouds high above. This might explain part of why the landscape looked so washed out. The bleak hills went rolling away in all directions down toward the sea, scruffy short grass and thistles, crisscrossed by chest-high stone walls with, apparently, no rhyme or reason to their paths. The lighthouse itself sat boarded up and silent, a cylinder of grey stone, beside some kind of house of similar material that had long since begun the process of decay. What with the powerful wind sweeping over everything and, beside its wailing, the vast, empty, open-sky silence, there was a sort of forlorn sadness about the whole place.
I followed a path down to a circle of grey stone, across and over the walls that crossed the way, and talked with a Canadian couple going the same way. At the circle, I climbed up on the precariously loose rocks and looked back and the unsympathetic lighthouse, and across over the fields again, and decided it was time to get going.
Back at my bike, I found to my delight that all of the uphill had been taken care of. I cruised down the gently sloping road until I passed a crescent-shaped beach of white sand and turquoise water, which looked oddly out of place, like someone had transported an entire Caribbean beach to this gritty, tough, windswept island in Ireland. A short bit later, and I was at the Dún Aonghasa visitor's center and hiking up yet another path toward the sea.
This is the main attraction on the island: a semicircular stone-age fort on the edge of a 300-foot cliff over the ocean. There are no railings and no warning signs; the stony ground simply ends in a straight drop to the turbulent seas below. The fort itself, while I'm sure it's very historically significant, isn't much except for its incredible age. The really awe-inspiring bit is that spectacular cliff.
As I am my mother's daughter, I found a nice spot on the edge and dangled my feet over, much to the surprise of other visitors. The thing is, though, that if you're careful, you're no more likely to fall off a cliff than you are to fall off a sidewalk, and sitting on the side of the ledge isn't any more likely to pitch you into the sea than a stool is likely to spontaneously throw you to the floor. The key is to move slowly and deliberately, with no sudden movements to throw you off balance, and to have respect for the death that lurks around those edges. But there's no reason to panic.
I ate my lunch there on the edge of the cliff and looked out over the endless ocean until my fingers started to go numb from the wind. Then I got up carefully and made my way back to where I'd left my bike. I still had some time before I really needed to head back to the ferry, but I decided that given my physical condition and the distance involved, it would probably be wiser just to head straight back.
This turned out to be a very good idea. I had to pedal constantly most of the way back, and I was already tired. I rolled back into town with about 20 minutes to spare, which was just enough time to buy some Fanta at the Spar, return my bike, and stagger onto the ferry, where I promptly fell asleep for the entire journey back.
Back in Galway, I was powerwalking through the shopping area to try to get to the jewelry store I'd decided on, which was closing in just a few minutes. I made it in time and picked out the ring I wanted, which I'm now very happily wearing. I hope it'll last longer than the last one!
Dinner, a cappuccino, and a shower later, I finally crawled gratefully into bed.
The next morning, I again got up early (what is the deal?! Augh!) to catch the bus out of Galway. I arrived in Limerick (what a fantastic name for a city, eh?) with two hours of layover waiting for the bus to Killarney, so I spent it looking for a new book to read--I'm an addict, so sue me--and having a nice lunch in the sun. I got a bed in a nice hostel upon arriving in Killarney and set off again toward the national park that abuts the town, forgetting two things: 1) I'd biked like 4 or 5 miles the day before and 2) 6 miles is a long way to walk.
By the time I made it to the park, I was already tired, but I explored the ruined abbey, partially restored and partially dilapidated and nestled amid a small forest of cockeyed Celtic crosses. From there, I had the choice to turn around or go on, and that was how I ended up another mile down the road at Muckross House, a beautiful old manor house on the lake. I poked around a bit, but the day was ending and almost everyone had already gone. Leaving the park, I began the long trek back to town, stopping on the way at a pub for some water. It was close to 9pm when I finally made it back, but I stopped in a bookstore anyway. I can't help it.
On the 4th, I went on a bus tour to Dingle. Now, I'd planned on actually going to Dingle and staying there for the two nights preceding my flight, but it turned out that 1) Dingle's really far away and 2) my flight leaves at 9am, so I have to be close by. This is how I ended up in Killarney instead, which is near the airport, taking a bus day trip out to Dingle instead.
Turns out it was a really good thing I did. Although I'm not, in general, a huge fan of minibus tours, this one was more than worth it because of the absolutely spectacular scenery and a wonderful guide. We drove across rolling green pastures first to Inch Strand, another little stretch of soft sand and gentle waves, that looks into the long inlet between Kerry and Dingle peninsulas. I took off my shoes and padded down the beach, looking for shells and wave-smoothed stones, soaking up the sunlight for as long as possible before I had to dash back to the bus.
We dove through twee little Dingle Town, perched on the side of a wide harbor and packed with runners in a marathon around the peninsula. We drove on out to the very end of the peninsula and looked out towards the Blasket Islands and, over the edge of the glittering horizon, America. Circling back around, stopping now and then to take pictures of the fantastically vibrant emerald landscape against the glimmering sea, we came back to Dingle Town for a late lunch and a quick look around the town before we headed back to Killarney.
The hilarious part of all this was our guide, John. He laughed and joked with me every time we pulled over for pictures, and invited me out to a drink at a pub after we got back. I agreed, but first he let me borrow his bicycle to ride for a bit through the national park near Killarney. I cruised out to the old castle on the lakeshore and back, then headed out to find the pub.
It took me a few tries, but I eventually found the right one and found myself in an Irish pub, in Ireland, drinking cider and trying in vain to understand most of what was being said to me. When they spoke to me directly, I could usually understand what the denizens of the pub said, but when they spoke to each other, they might as well (and could have been) speaking Gaelic. After a couple pints of cider, John, a friend of his, and I went up to a 21-year-old's birthday party, then to a couple other pubs to hear different types of music, ending in a real Irish pub with real Irish music, drinking Bailey's Irish creme with an Irishman. I felt, as you can imagine, quite Irish.
I should mention at this point that John is old enough to be my father, and it was fun and relaxing to hang out with him as he showed me around the town. We got to talk about life and the future, and I returned to my hostel tired and happy.
I got up at (what felt like) the crack of dawn to take a taxi to the airport and, regretfully and reluctantly, got on the plane to leave the British Isles. I'd gladly move there and I didn't really want to leave, but duty called me across the Channel back to the Continent. With a mixture of sadness and excitement I watched the green hills of Ireland drop away below me and looked forward to the upcoming orientation.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Galway! Hooray!
Sorry, lame title, moving on.
So I've got to get back in the habit of writing regularly so that I don't end up two weeks behind, as has happened all too frequently. Also, I need the writing practice so I don't forget how to turn a phrase intelligently. If I ever knew.
SO! The train left me right smack in the middle of lovely little Galway. Now, when people said Galway was a small town, I thought they meant that it was like...small. And a town. Like, I don't know, Wells, or Keswick. Galway is not small. It's small compared to, say, Everett, but not compared to Snohomish. But no matter, because it's cute, and as any new pet owner can tell you, being cute makes up for a lot.
I hung out in the hostel for a bit, waiting to check in, but eventually got fed up by the long line and was lured away by the warm sunlight. I wandered through the town to the cobblestone pedestrian shopping area to actually do some shopping. I'm looking for a Claddagh ring, since my last one broke and the ring originated in this area. I spent some time perusing the shops and getting an idea of the price range before heading off to see more of the town. I walked up the canalside promenade to the impressively huge stone cathedral, and from there dropped by the local university's lovely old quadrangle before heading back to the hostel.
I finally got checked in and met some of my roommates, who told me that they weren't expecting to come back from partying until about 3am--eurgh. Getting hungry, I headed back into town and ended up at a small coffeehouse near the quays, where I had a wonderful salmon quesadilla for dinner. I got a cappuccino to go and headed out to walk along the beach as the sun set. A ways along, I found a causeway leading out to a lighthouse perched on an island. The island was off-limits, but I stopped to chat with an older Irish gentleman who was fishing off the causeway about his catch of mackerel. When I could hardly see him anymore, I headed back through town to the hostel.
Looks like the plan for tomorrow is to visit the Aran Islands. Hopefully the weather will be tolerable. I'll let you know what I think. So far, this seems to be a lovely corner of the world.
So I've got to get back in the habit of writing regularly so that I don't end up two weeks behind, as has happened all too frequently. Also, I need the writing practice so I don't forget how to turn a phrase intelligently. If I ever knew.
SO! The train left me right smack in the middle of lovely little Galway. Now, when people said Galway was a small town, I thought they meant that it was like...small. And a town. Like, I don't know, Wells, or Keswick. Galway is not small. It's small compared to, say, Everett, but not compared to Snohomish. But no matter, because it's cute, and as any new pet owner can tell you, being cute makes up for a lot.
I hung out in the hostel for a bit, waiting to check in, but eventually got fed up by the long line and was lured away by the warm sunlight. I wandered through the town to the cobblestone pedestrian shopping area to actually do some shopping. I'm looking for a Claddagh ring, since my last one broke and the ring originated in this area. I spent some time perusing the shops and getting an idea of the price range before heading off to see more of the town. I walked up the canalside promenade to the impressively huge stone cathedral, and from there dropped by the local university's lovely old quadrangle before heading back to the hostel.
I finally got checked in and met some of my roommates, who told me that they weren't expecting to come back from partying until about 3am--eurgh. Getting hungry, I headed back into town and ended up at a small coffeehouse near the quays, where I had a wonderful salmon quesadilla for dinner. I got a cappuccino to go and headed out to walk along the beach as the sun set. A ways along, I found a causeway leading out to a lighthouse perched on an island. The island was off-limits, but I stopped to chat with an older Irish gentleman who was fishing off the causeway about his catch of mackerel. When I could hardly see him anymore, I headed back through town to the hostel.
Looks like the plan for tomorrow is to visit the Aran Islands. Hopefully the weather will be tolerable. I'll let you know what I think. So far, this seems to be a lovely corner of the world.
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