Here it Begins

I'm a student from Willamette University about to begin attending the National University of Ireland in Galway, currently recovering from a throat bug I caught at orientation three days ago. Before retiring to my bed and an endless stream of lozenges and Nyquil, though, I had my first Irish Guinness at Taaffe's bar. Recipient of the James Joyce "Real Irish Pub" award and recommended to me by anyone who had spent any time in Galway, there was a sign hanging behind the bar which read "Irish Spoken Here; English Understood."

Since I've been in Ireland, everything has been similar to America, but just a bit off. People drive on the other side of the road, the toilet flushes in a waterfall, and I have to warn the shower if I want hot water after ten. NUIG is a bilingual school, and everything is written in Irish before English. When people ask me what I'm studying they look at me funny when I reply "English," because "why would you study English in Ireland?" I'm going to take a class in the Irish language, in addition to my classes on Irish literature and history in an attempt, sometime in the coming months, to become more than just someone who is understood but someone who can speak.