A Question For You

Do you know how big the Atlantic Ocean is?
If not, there is this extremely important, little, blood-pumping organ in my chest that could explain its immensity to you.
I talked to My Love this morning on Skype and I realized how far away I actually was.
You can measure distance in many ways—time differences and on maps—but you never really understand the distance between you and something that you live off of, like another persons affection, till it’s not within arms reach.
Don’t get me wrong; everyday I look forward to seeing his face on my Skype screen. And, I have become quite fond of using the minutes on my cell phone to call him on my way home from the pub just to say “Hi!” However, it can almost make it harder. I now know how far away he actually is. Except, it’s not that he is far, it’s that I am.
Relationships can be hard.
That’s a lie.
Relationships are hard. But, it’s the relationship that I miss that I wouldn’t have come here without. If My Love hadn’t told me that this was good for me, that he supported me—I probably wouldn’t be here.
For some people, this person may be a parent, brother, aunt, sister, niece, or cousin. It could be your dog for all I know. But, there is some source of support that you need to make a change in life like studying abroad. And, this person is going to be far away. It’s going to be awful, and your heart will hurt.
Trust me, I know.
My brother called me while my Aunt, Mother, and Love drove to the Logan Airport earlier this month. He told me, “Technology has made it so easy to stay in touch.” He should know because he just spent nine months in Morocco.
Now, I write messages to people every chance I get, even if it is only to say hello or let them know I was thinking about them. It IS easy these days. I sent My Love’s mother an e-mail one homesick morning and she wrote back, “I guess the old saying absence makes the heart grow fonder is really true.”
I just keep reminding myself that it is only a few months—and that if it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t have been confident enough to travel to Dublin.

Just a few pictures...

A group of ladies and I took a day trip to Bray; No matter where I go, Vermont is always in my heart.




This quote is so true I felt I needed to dance when I read it! This is from our wonderful excursion to The Guinness Factory!

Labor Of Love

When we arrived in the Dublin airport, the group of nine of us were run down, but still smiling. After collecting our bags, we emerged into the city for the first time to see a “Champlain” and a smile in return. He packed us all into taxi cabs and shipped us to our apartments. When we finally arrived at our homes for the following four months, we met the lovely Claire Gannon. She took us to her apartment and explained things like how to get hot water and how to use the washing machine. Trust me, it’s not as easy as it seems. Not only are we spoiled with hot water back in America, but we were too jetlagged to figure out the timer! Stephen and Claire are only 2/3 of our right hand man/woman team. Lilly Johnsson, the Operations Manager, is the wonderful woman we get to see first thing when we walk into the academic center every morning, who is sending us to plays and on horseback riding adventures, who fills the stapler. She can do it all.
These three are only a few of the people who are telling us we can do it all.



Lilly, Stephen, and Claire

Stephen asked us what we had noticed about the city during our orientation. Seeing how we had slept most of the daytime we had in Dublin, we had spent our first few nights adventuring into restaurants, pubs, and dance clubs. Right?
I raised my hand and told him of my observation.
“Well, we went to a pub and I’m pretty sure we were the only females there.”
Its things like this that are explained in my courses here in Dublin. It is possibly the most glorious thing about studying Abroad with Champlain College. They didn’t send me to Dublin to learn about U.S. history for the fifteenth time in my life—they sent me here to get to know the country’s history.
I am taking two COR classes while studying abroad. They’re beyond interesting. Not only is the course material new and fascinating, but so are my professors. In Modern Irish Social History, our professor Anthony M. O’Halloran explained to us that women weren’t part of the social scene until the past thirty years. We will continue to learn about how Ireland has changed in the modern era as well as what it means to be Irish.
As a writer, the easiest way to engulf myself in the knowledge of a new culture is to read. And, I don’t mean text books. I mean literature, poetry, anything that gives my eyes the vision of a culture. To be honest, Champlain deserves a high five for providing me with a course that does exactly this. For Caroline Elbay’s, Cultural Immersion through Irish Literature, I have already begun to read into the past of this old country. We have started the course discussing what it means to be Irish, the Anglo-Irish literature class, and reading Wilde’s, The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Not only am I reading with Caroline, but I am writing, too. In her course, Writing the City, I am immersing myself in the culture Dublin’s streets are filled with. We are sent out into the city to review our experiences at coffee shops, restaurants, theatres, and even places like firehouses and charitable organisations. It is natural to me to write everyday that I live. I write about the things that I do to fill the hours of everyday adventure. However, I haven’t necessarily reviewed my experiences at the places I get coffee or see a play. I see this as a fantastic way to recall my time in the city as well as broaden my skills as a writer.
It’s always nice when a professor recognizes my writing; when someone says, “I read a bit of your creative work, and I enjoyed it.” On our first day of Jacinta Kendrick’s Cultural Immersion through the Fine Arts course, we took a stroll to The National Museum to study Bog Bodies, bodies preserved after years of sitting in Ireland’s bogs, Or—an exhibit dedicated to Ireland’s Gold, and The Treasury, a collection of secular and religious Irish artefacts. I stood in front of the Tully Lough Cross, sketching its intricate design and embedded amber stones when Jacinta approached me to check in on my progress. As she was still getting familiar with our names, she recognized mine and commented on my writing, encouraging me to incorporate it into our course. Ironically, I had spent the previous ten minutes pumping out an exhibit inspired poem.
I forgot how it felt to be refreshed in terms of my education. To have professors who know about things I’ve never learned about before is fascinating. Not to mention trying to grasp the accent! My professors have also encouraged us to go to their favourite places in Ireland which include places in the city as well as along the coast and into the country side. However, the best thing about having professors who are familiar with Ireland is that we get to tell them all about our homes. About maple syrup, life on the farm, the culture differences between the variety of states we all come from, and most of all, the weather! You should see some of the reactions we get when we discuss the 30-some inches of snow we received as a New Year’s gift!
We have received nothing but comfort from the rapidly growing family we have in Ireland. If anything, it’s nice to hear that our staff and faculty really want to help us get to know this city—to hear them say we can do it all.
Anthony M. O’Halloran told us the first day of class that he doesn’t have to be here; he wants to be here, because teaching is his “labor of love.”

Kindness Of Strangers

I really thought that Mother Nature would allow me to miss one winter of snow. Little did I know, she sent flurries across the Atlantic Ocean to follow our group of 20 from Champlain College. We were welcomed to Dublin not in it's normal weather of windy rainfall, but a fluffy, picture book like snowfall. If only Mother Nature sent a road crew with plows and salt, too! As part of our orientation to the Champlain College Dublin program, we took a tour of the old city. Locked into this area are years of history the United States has centuries still to create.
Just as the snow followed at our heels, we trekked across ice covered, unsalted cobblestone sidewalks at the heels of a wonderful Irish scholar named Pat Liddy. Between cursing the "slippy" sidewalks and laughing at our attempts to speak Gaelic, he described centuries of Irish history.



Pat being relatively impressed with Katherine's attempt at Gaelic.


Throughout the tour, we stood in the center of City Hall listening to Pat yell to show us the echo ability of the building, admired The Angels Beacons of Hope exhibit in the courtyard of the Dublin Castle, and looked vertically and wide eyed at three of the 200-and-some churches in Dublin alone. However, one particular landmark stood out to me, The Iveagh Market.
A few short steps down Nicholas Street is The Iveagh Market. Edward Guinness (yes, of the Guinness family, younger brother of Arthur) created this market to get street vendors off of the streets and into a market place.



Lord Iveagh's face was sculpted into the side of the market because of his generosity. He was known to be quite the jokester, hence the wink!


As much of the Guinness strived to become lords, this is what helped Edward conquer his goal. Surrounding this market are houses that the Guinness family built to give the less wealthy Irish a place to live. This generosity is not only present in Dublin's history, but in it's current population, as well.
On our first night in Dublin, we walked onto the cobblestone and into a pub to celebrate our arrival as well as a fellow student's birthday. As for myself, if you give me music, I will gladly give you dance moves in return. With drink in hand, and a smile on my face, we were welcomed into the pub and onto the dance floor. On that dance floor we found new friends whom we have seen since.



Dancing with our new friend, Darragh!


We shared dances with these friends to The Beatles, and even got a little funky with Rufus & Chaka Khan's, Tell Me Something Good; We toasted to President Obama and to the thirty inches of snow back in Vermont (which the Irish couldn't imagine). As we left, we smiled with each other and our new friends as the bartender invited us back for more live music and "craic" (it means fun!) on Friday.
My first week in Dublin has brought nothing but wide eyes and a smile to my face. We have already begun to assimilate ourselves into the city. As our group entered Ireland, the majority of us didn't know each other well. It has been six days and I have already found the trust that helps create a family within my fellow students. There is nothing like finding kindness in strangers, and we have already begun to find it within each other as well as rest of this lovely city.

Hello, Friends!

I am so glad you have found this blog! My name is Emma Marie Devine. I am in my third year of the Professional Writing program at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont. However, I have taken the opportunity to spend a semester studying (and adventuring) in Dulbin, Ireland!
I would love for you to use this blog to get a look into my experience. I have been here for six days and already wish everyone had the opportunity I have been given.
This is my first experience living outside of The United States, let alone Vermont! I grew up in the southern part of Vermont with my wonderful, encouraging mother and two older siblings. Burlington, the biggest city in Vermont, was a shock to me when I moved to College from my small town. However, the real shock was moving to Dublin! I now understand when my friends from bigger areas like New York and New Jersey laugh when I refer to Burlington as a city. Dublin, is a city! A wonderful, accepting, lively city full of history, character, and opportunity.
I look forward to telling you my stories! Please post comments, I would love to give you as much information as you would like.
Keep Smiling, Emma Marie Devine