![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
themegalooAs mentioned on my facebook status earlier (because updating that takes far less time and I WAS TIRED, OKAY?!), I am now LEGALLY living in Ireland!
By which I mean I spent all day at the GNIB, which if I ever have to do it again, it will be too soon.
Not that it was like, horrifically painful or anything because I was super prepared and all. Mostly it was waiting for many, many hours. I've had this Magic Red Folder since I left Georgia into which goes all vital paperwork. So things like proof of fees paid, bank statement, receipts of big things, letters from the college (those from home, those collected here), handbooks, you name it. It all went into the Magic Red Folder that I took to carrying around all week as I collected MORE THINGS. The bank is sorted, by the by. The account exists and the check is IN it but not cleared yet because it's from the bank ACROSS THE STREET. Oh, banks. How I despise you! I should get my ATM card on Tuesday OR SO (and the check should clear by then) and I will be able to PURCHASE THINGS like...dishes. And pay my rent. Apparently I word things just right so that the financial officer like, is really nice to me about it. This is not the case for all unfortunate souls with banking issues, as I frequently have to prop the door so Kali can get inside the flat. I have no idea what I said, but I'm glad I said it!
I was going to segue neatly into something of importance or interest here, but I can't remember what. [EDIT: I was going to talk about BANK HOLIDAY meaning NO SCHOOL on monday and go from there, doh!] Instead, I will move towards Living in Ireland Part God Who Know: In Which Megan Goes to School at a Tourist Attraction
I had this moment today and just past 8 after I got my lovely ticket that said where I was in the queue at the GNIB, I fled to Trinity to while away the hours. Take into mind that I began walking towards said GNIB at 7 am when it was dark, I was not wholly awake or in my right mind and it was uh, DARK. Alone in a city under these circumstance, I ensure that I completely aware of absolutely everything around me. And being as sleepy and everything as I was, it did not matter that the city was slowly waking up and bustling about like normal and expected and is fairly comfortable to me, I was still hyper-alert until I finally, finally reached the front gate of Trinity. Watch me steal pictures and explain.
Walking through here shouldn't be so comforting, but it was. The minute I was in that giant square of awful cobblestones that really DO want to trip you or impale your feet, I was good. And I realized that this MY SCHOOL. I claim it as my own now.
Have I mentioned the libraries (NOTE THE S) have over 4.5 MILLION books? Just as a nice non-requiter as I move to talking about CLASS.
I think that in walking across campus with my mini-library on my back, tourists get excited. Real students! There is a comic about that on the front door of the Hall. Entertaining, really. I see them lining up for walking tours and standing outside the Book of Kells exhibit, etc. It's funny and you can always tell who's a student and who's a tourist as there is one defining factor: CAMERAS. This is still not about class. Oops.
OKAY SO. All my classes are in The Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing. This is, in fact, the house that Oscar Wilde was BORN in. It's located on Westland Row, which is the back of campus, and in his day, he'd (well, mostly his family as he wasn't very big at all when they moved- the Merrion Square house is better known as being his) be able to look out the back window across the rugby pitch and straight up into the older parts of the College. I'm sure it was a great view. Times have changed a bit and it you look out the back window now, you're actually looking into the Hamilton Building, which it is now basically PART of. The front door is not usable, to enter the center you go in through the BACK door which is INSIDE the Hamilton building. My way of describing it is to say it's like a little indoor street. Glass ceilings and all. Kinda nifty, if very much the science part of campus. Inside the Centre we have Lillian and her office (she runs it and sort of mothers us all a bit. I love her, for she knows all things!), BATHROOMS, a common room with tea and coffee and couches and newspapers (clearly my favorite place ever), a computer room, a few seminar rooms and some offices.
I think it prudent to note at this point that everyone within my course takes the same basic classes. Major Authors, Contexts of Anglo-Irish Literature and one of two options-- though we all try to go to both just so we know more stuff. The Creative Writing programme is also in the centre as it's, well. New Irish writings! They also talk the Contexts course (which is a one hour lecture) and are allowed to take the option courses. Major Authors composes most of my class time, mind. It's two seminars a week on one author at a time. We just finished Swift who I have never studied so intensively in my life, but it was definitely interesting! The fun thing about Major Authors is that it's not taught by just one prof. They each teach their specialty. So having completed Swift, we get a new one on Tuesday when we move on to Edgeworth. Who I've discovered I think I like in GENERAL because I've been reading MORE of her stuff in preparation today and really thoroughly enjoying it. The Absentee. Excellent book. Though I sort of want to kick the main character and tell him to MARRY HER ALREADY, SHE'S NOT ACTUALLY RELATED! Which is funny by itself and also because he was even MORE enamored of her before he worked out that her mother's shady past meant that uh, they aren't actually first cousins. Which is apparently not a big deal in this age to marry except for the fact that it brings no new CONNECTIONS. And...that was very random, rambly and useless. But I think he needs to marry his cousin like, now, and stop being miserable. Clearly I need to finish the damn book. It would make a great movie, I think!
MOVING ON, NO, SERIOUSLY! I had this incredibly surreal moment in class last night. Which was a very fun class as DANNY IS BACK, I THOUGHT HE WAS LIKE GONE and it's just fun in general and we somehow started talking about producing the play we were reading (Dreaming of the Bones- Yeats) within the seminar room and bantering back and forth on how it could actually work. I like having another exuberant theatre-type person. And Terrence Brown (prof) is a lot of fun on the whole. BUT THE MOMENT, YES. And this, Gabby, is where things are really quite different.
I don't know how well-read in Irish poetry my flist is, but Seamus Heaney is a bit of a big name when it comes to contemporary Irish lit. To the extent that one of his collections of poems is one of the very few books I brought with my from home. Otherwise, I'm abusing my ten-book-allocation at the library of over 4.5 million books. In discussing Dreaming of the Bones, Dr. Brown brought up one of Heaney's plays that has very similar qualities and was produced in Derry some years ago (read this to mean during the Troubles and it's a difficult topic, etc). This is normal enough for any literary seminar or discussion, we always get to talk about how things relate to other things but what came NEXT is what had me momentarily flabbergasted.
He stated that he didn't know if Heaney was actually influenced by Yeats in this case because he never asked-- it seemed like too touchy of a subject. And proceeded to mention how they had had a nice conversation about religion and actually said very little as all true Irishmen do when they discuss such things (it was pertinent to the conversation, the religion bit). So realizing that my PROFESSOR, who I see regularly and often have a pint with, because he invites us every Thursday, can readily and easily talk to SEAMUS HEANEY, who I have studied and WILL be studying---uhm, yeah. Sort of an odd moment. Likewise, Prof. Ross, who was our prof for Swift recommended Avshi (friend and course-mate. VERY AWESOME PERSON) a Swift biography that happens to be WRITTEN by Prof McMinn, who teaches the Tuesday option course- Colonial and Colonized Imagination, because it was the best. When Avshi and I were in the library grabbing Edgeworth books (and he the biography), we glanced and saw another critical work by Grene, and suspect this may be the same Grene that is generally one of the heads of the department, but is on sabbatical for the year.
This entry is getting enormous, but I think you catch my drift. My professors are some of the people I read FOR my studies, not just the ones that guide me in classes. I sort of knew this would be the case, because hell, it's TCD and it's sort of a big deal, but it's not something that really SINKS IN until you hear your prof say things like that so off-handedly.
Okay, other notes of interest. My course is composed of eleven people. Four boys, seven girls. This is augmented in Options and Contexts by the Creative Writers, of whom there are about the same amount. It's a nice-sized group, really, and we all get on pretty well. Tomorrow a few of us are actually going over to Avshi's place to bake things and drink large amounts of tea. I'm excited. It's nerdy and fun and TASTY. And probably better for my liver. Haahaha.
Sometimes, when we have long breaks like Thursdays or even short ones like Tuesdays (long is 4 hours, short is 2), we go to lunch. My favorite place for this is actually the Dining Hall. The food is nor PARTICULARLY good, but it's cheap enough and the experience is well worth it. It's literally a bit like walking into the Great Hall of Hogwarts. Of course, food doesn't magically appear on the table, you have to go behind the hall to the kitchen/buffet area and get it and then pay as you reenter the hall-- but it's big wooden tables in chairs in the high-ceilinged, old building and the walls lined with portraits. I steal again! It's crowded, but it's good fun. And a bit cheaper/less noisy than the Buttery downstairs. @_@ (for which google images fails me)
Okay so since I have apparently not discussed it in HERE, now seems a good time to mention the POST-GRAD READING ROOM. Only us snobby post-grads are allowed to use it, and honestly, I've only been in once because it's just so weird. It is literally like they show in those period movies about colleges and stuff. It's the roundish room with bookshelves and the lowered centre area where there are tables and there's little alcoves of desks and the one main difference- computers! No pictures because google failed me here as well and I've only been in the once. I had to leave because it was during the Days of Illness which meant that I got GLARED at every time I coughed. It was awful. So I ran back to the Oscar Wilde Centre common room which is homey, yellow, and not so austere.
And I mean really, really yellow. One of the fun things is the random poems posted all throughout though. It's not like, a Harry Potter sort of common room here, mind. It's very simple and really just meant to be somewhere that we can relax, chat, read and drink tea in. I was in there in my long wait this morning for the GNIB, just reading The Absentee. One of the creative writers (Mike? Maybe? NAMES!) came in, laughed, and asked if we ever stopped reading. To which I don't have a good answer and so just smiled sheepishly. Lillian told us to make it our home so if I'm caught in City Centre with nothing to really do, you can bet that's where I'll be. Tea! Yellow walls!
But ALL THAT enormous amount of stuff being said, I think I'll cease. As I've been typing for rather longer than I meant to and I'm due to turn up across the hall in a few minutes. I hope a few of you actually made it through and enjoyed that enormous ramble of epic proportions and that I've maybe given the curious a better idea of what my schooling is like, BECAUSE I DO GO TO CLASSES: FACT! It's not all pubs. The pubs just make better stories. ;)
More next time!
By which I mean I spent all day at the GNIB, which if I ever have to do it again, it will be too soon.
Not that it was like, horrifically painful or anything because I was super prepared and all. Mostly it was waiting for many, many hours. I've had this Magic Red Folder since I left Georgia into which goes all vital paperwork. So things like proof of fees paid, bank statement, receipts of big things, letters from the college (those from home, those collected here), handbooks, you name it. It all went into the Magic Red Folder that I took to carrying around all week as I collected MORE THINGS. The bank is sorted, by the by. The account exists and the check is IN it but not cleared yet because it's from the bank ACROSS THE STREET. Oh, banks. How I despise you! I should get my ATM card on Tuesday OR SO (and the check should clear by then) and I will be able to PURCHASE THINGS like...dishes. And pay my rent. Apparently I word things just right so that the financial officer like, is really nice to me about it. This is not the case for all unfortunate souls with banking issues, as I frequently have to prop the door so Kali can get inside the flat. I have no idea what I said, but I'm glad I said it!
I was going to segue neatly into something of importance or interest here, but I can't remember what. [EDIT: I was going to talk about BANK HOLIDAY meaning NO SCHOOL on monday and go from there, doh!] Instead, I will move towards Living in Ireland Part God Who Know: In Which Megan Goes to School at a Tourist Attraction
I had this moment today and just past 8 after I got my lovely ticket that said where I was in the queue at the GNIB, I fled to Trinity to while away the hours. Take into mind that I began walking towards said GNIB at 7 am when it was dark, I was not wholly awake or in my right mind and it was uh, DARK. Alone in a city under these circumstance, I ensure that I completely aware of absolutely everything around me. And being as sleepy and everything as I was, it did not matter that the city was slowly waking up and bustling about like normal and expected and is fairly comfortable to me, I was still hyper-alert until I finally, finally reached the front gate of Trinity. Watch me steal pictures and explain.
Walking through here shouldn't be so comforting, but it was. The minute I was in that giant square of awful cobblestones that really DO want to trip you or impale your feet, I was good. And I realized that this MY SCHOOL. I claim it as my own now.
Have I mentioned the libraries (NOTE THE S) have over 4.5 MILLION books? Just as a nice non-requiter as I move to talking about CLASS.
I think that in walking across campus with my mini-library on my back, tourists get excited. Real students! There is a comic about that on the front door of the Hall. Entertaining, really. I see them lining up for walking tours and standing outside the Book of Kells exhibit, etc. It's funny and you can always tell who's a student and who's a tourist as there is one defining factor: CAMERAS. This is still not about class. Oops.
OKAY SO. All my classes are in The Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing. This is, in fact, the house that Oscar Wilde was BORN in. It's located on Westland Row, which is the back of campus, and in his day, he'd (well, mostly his family as he wasn't very big at all when they moved- the Merrion Square house is better known as being his) be able to look out the back window across the rugby pitch and straight up into the older parts of the College. I'm sure it was a great view. Times have changed a bit and it you look out the back window now, you're actually looking into the Hamilton Building, which it is now basically PART of. The front door is not usable, to enter the center you go in through the BACK door which is INSIDE the Hamilton building. My way of describing it is to say it's like a little indoor street. Glass ceilings and all. Kinda nifty, if very much the science part of campus. Inside the Centre we have Lillian and her office (she runs it and sort of mothers us all a bit. I love her, for she knows all things!), BATHROOMS, a common room with tea and coffee and couches and newspapers (clearly my favorite place ever), a computer room, a few seminar rooms and some offices.
I think it prudent to note at this point that everyone within my course takes the same basic classes. Major Authors, Contexts of Anglo-Irish Literature and one of two options-- though we all try to go to both just so we know more stuff. The Creative Writing programme is also in the centre as it's, well. New Irish writings! They also talk the Contexts course (which is a one hour lecture) and are allowed to take the option courses. Major Authors composes most of my class time, mind. It's two seminars a week on one author at a time. We just finished Swift who I have never studied so intensively in my life, but it was definitely interesting! The fun thing about Major Authors is that it's not taught by just one prof. They each teach their specialty. So having completed Swift, we get a new one on Tuesday when we move on to Edgeworth. Who I've discovered I think I like in GENERAL because I've been reading MORE of her stuff in preparation today and really thoroughly enjoying it. The Absentee. Excellent book. Though I sort of want to kick the main character and tell him to MARRY HER ALREADY, SHE'S NOT ACTUALLY RELATED! Which is funny by itself and also because he was even MORE enamored of her before he worked out that her mother's shady past meant that uh, they aren't actually first cousins. Which is apparently not a big deal in this age to marry except for the fact that it brings no new CONNECTIONS. And...that was very random, rambly and useless. But I think he needs to marry his cousin like, now, and stop being miserable. Clearly I need to finish the damn book. It would make a great movie, I think!
MOVING ON, NO, SERIOUSLY! I had this incredibly surreal moment in class last night. Which was a very fun class as DANNY IS BACK, I THOUGHT HE WAS LIKE GONE and it's just fun in general and we somehow started talking about producing the play we were reading (Dreaming of the Bones- Yeats) within the seminar room and bantering back and forth on how it could actually work. I like having another exuberant theatre-type person. And Terrence Brown (prof) is a lot of fun on the whole. BUT THE MOMENT, YES. And this, Gabby, is where things are really quite different.
I don't know how well-read in Irish poetry my flist is, but Seamus Heaney is a bit of a big name when it comes to contemporary Irish lit. To the extent that one of his collections of poems is one of the very few books I brought with my from home. Otherwise, I'm abusing my ten-book-allocation at the library of over 4.5 million books. In discussing Dreaming of the Bones, Dr. Brown brought up one of Heaney's plays that has very similar qualities and was produced in Derry some years ago (read this to mean during the Troubles and it's a difficult topic, etc). This is normal enough for any literary seminar or discussion, we always get to talk about how things relate to other things but what came NEXT is what had me momentarily flabbergasted.
He stated that he didn't know if Heaney was actually influenced by Yeats in this case because he never asked-- it seemed like too touchy of a subject. And proceeded to mention how they had had a nice conversation about religion and actually said very little as all true Irishmen do when they discuss such things (it was pertinent to the conversation, the religion bit). So realizing that my PROFESSOR, who I see regularly and often have a pint with, because he invites us every Thursday, can readily and easily talk to SEAMUS HEANEY, who I have studied and WILL be studying---uhm, yeah. Sort of an odd moment. Likewise, Prof. Ross, who was our prof for Swift recommended Avshi (friend and course-mate. VERY AWESOME PERSON) a Swift biography that happens to be WRITTEN by Prof McMinn, who teaches the Tuesday option course- Colonial and Colonized Imagination, because it was the best. When Avshi and I were in the library grabbing Edgeworth books (and he the biography), we glanced and saw another critical work by Grene, and suspect this may be the same Grene that is generally one of the heads of the department, but is on sabbatical for the year.
This entry is getting enormous, but I think you catch my drift. My professors are some of the people I read FOR my studies, not just the ones that guide me in classes. I sort of knew this would be the case, because hell, it's TCD and it's sort of a big deal, but it's not something that really SINKS IN until you hear your prof say things like that so off-handedly.
Okay, other notes of interest. My course is composed of eleven people. Four boys, seven girls. This is augmented in Options and Contexts by the Creative Writers, of whom there are about the same amount. It's a nice-sized group, really, and we all get on pretty well. Tomorrow a few of us are actually going over to Avshi's place to bake things and drink large amounts of tea. I'm excited. It's nerdy and fun and TASTY. And probably better for my liver. Haahaha.
Sometimes, when we have long breaks like Thursdays or even short ones like Tuesdays (long is 4 hours, short is 2), we go to lunch. My favorite place for this is actually the Dining Hall. The food is nor PARTICULARLY good, but it's cheap enough and the experience is well worth it. It's literally a bit like walking into the Great Hall of Hogwarts. Of course, food doesn't magically appear on the table, you have to go behind the hall to the kitchen/buffet area and get it and then pay as you reenter the hall-- but it's big wooden tables in chairs in the high-ceilinged, old building and the walls lined with portraits. I steal again! It's crowded, but it's good fun. And a bit cheaper/less noisy than the Buttery downstairs. @_@ (for which google images fails me)
Okay so since I have apparently not discussed it in HERE, now seems a good time to mention the POST-GRAD READING ROOM. Only us snobby post-grads are allowed to use it, and honestly, I've only been in once because it's just so weird. It is literally like they show in those period movies about colleges and stuff. It's the roundish room with bookshelves and the lowered centre area where there are tables and there's little alcoves of desks and the one main difference- computers! No pictures because google failed me here as well and I've only been in the once. I had to leave because it was during the Days of Illness which meant that I got GLARED at every time I coughed. It was awful. So I ran back to the Oscar Wilde Centre common room which is homey, yellow, and not so austere.
And I mean really, really yellow. One of the fun things is the random poems posted all throughout though. It's not like, a Harry Potter sort of common room here, mind. It's very simple and really just meant to be somewhere that we can relax, chat, read and drink tea in. I was in there in my long wait this morning for the GNIB, just reading The Absentee. One of the creative writers (Mike? Maybe? NAMES!) came in, laughed, and asked if we ever stopped reading. To which I don't have a good answer and so just smiled sheepishly. Lillian told us to make it our home so if I'm caught in City Centre with nothing to really do, you can bet that's where I'll be. Tea! Yellow walls!
But ALL THAT enormous amount of stuff being said, I think I'll cease. As I've been typing for rather longer than I meant to and I'm due to turn up across the hall in a few minutes. I hope a few of you actually made it through and enjoyed that enormous ramble of epic proportions and that I've maybe given the curious a better idea of what my schooling is like, BECAUSE I DO GO TO CLASSES: FACT! It's not all pubs. The pubs just make better stories. ;)
More next time!
