Arrival & First Day in Cork, Ireland

After anxiously waiting for four and a half hours in New York's JFK Airport, I boarded the plane to Shannon, Ireland at 10pm (20-08-08). Instead of sleeping as I had planned, I watched The Other Boleyn Girl, which I had wanted to see for quite some time. It was a really good movie. I fell asleep for about 2 hours before the cabin began to fill with sunlight and I removed my airline eye mask. The flight crew served us croissants and bananas, which I happily ate. We landed around 10am, or 5am in MA.
The process of coming into the country was painless; I showed the man my documents and chatted about UCC. Once my bags finally arrived on the carousel, I noticed something was missing. My purple suitcase was rather beat-up. The front zipper was ripped open, revealing nothing inside the front pocket where I had placed the calendar Julian made me, photos of friends, a travel journal, notebooks and a few novels. A surge of panic subsided when I heard my (butchered) name called over the intercom. I went to the service desk and a friendly woman gave me all of the aforementioned items. I asked where the bus station was and a worker pointed me in the correct direction. The stop was right outside the airport and the bus arrived minutes after I went outside- perfect timing.
Staying awake on the bus was initially no problem, for the scenery proved to be enthralling. However, the jet lag soon caught up with me and I dozed for a few minutes. I turned my iPod on and took pictures out of the window, which kept me occupied and awake. Five or six older French travelers boarded the bus and I had now another diversion from sleep: bilingual eavesdropping. Unfortunately I overheard nothing exciting.
Even though the areas we drove through were not very remote, I still saw green hills with grazing cows and sheep. Limerick was a nice city to see. I love all of the colors in European cities; you never see that in America.
As I arrived in Cork, and unloaded my luggage, I noticed the purple demon had deteriorated even more. Now traveling was somewhat awkward, as the suitcase became quite cumbersome without the wheeling function. Nevertheless, the transition from bus to taxi was smooth. The driver asked, "Where in the states are you from?" to which I replied, "MA." He nodded and said, "Oh the New England Patriots, right?" I said,"Yes."
"You had a tough year.." Feigning more interest in football than I actually have, I laughed and said, "Yep." Chuckling, the driver transitioned by saying, "Ya like Guinness?" then shortly after continued, "Well you will by the end of the year." (I'm going to venture a guess and refute his claim.) Pulling up to my apartment building, he stated, "Ya picked the best city in the country."
I checked into my building quickly, anxious to find a pay phone to assure everyone I had arrived safely. Entering my suite, I was impressed with the amenities, but displeased to find two other empty bedrooms. Apparently my suite-mates will not arrive until September, which means I don't have built-in friends. I'm excited to meet people tomorrow morning at orientation. I then walked to the shopping mall, left messages for Dad and Mom, and spoke briefly with Julian. It was nice to hear a familiar voice. At the mall, I was hungry and thus bought a salad for lunch. However, much to my dismay, they do not use salad dressing. Instead, they use mayonnaise. When she asked if I wanted mayo for my salad, I said yes, because I thought they may called dressing mayo. Thankfully she gave me packets instead of putting it on the salad! So I ate it plain. I bought yogurt, grapes, apples, cereal and quiche at the grocery store. My room is all set up and my quiche is in the oven; so I'm going to see what the Irish watch for television while it's cooking.