Things We Could Learn from the Irish

So, the last few weeks we have been learning lots of new things in Galway. There are some interesting things here that I think we (mostly referring to Americans) could learn from.

First, recycling here is huge! Everyone recycles everything. Seriously. We have 3 "bins" for our trash service: one for organic waste, like food or degradable items; one for recyclable things like tin, plastic, etc. that must be clean and dry; and one for other trash. When we signed up for trash service there were very detailed instructions on what to do. On top of all that, the trash service doesn't collect glass. There are "glass banks" all over the town and people bring all of their glass to them. There are several different bins that require you to even sort the glass by color! I know lots of people recycle in the US, but it is truly a way of life here.

Another thing.....the police here are called Garda. I just read an article yesterday stating that no uniformed Garda carry weapons! Can you imagine??? A police officer not carrying a weapon??? Outrageous, right? Well, it said that since the 1922 the first commissioner stated, "The Garda Síochána will succeed not by force of arms or numbers, but on their moral authority as servants of the people". There are, apparently, other non-uniformed detectives around the country that do carry guns, but clearly this is not a gun culture.

Lastly, and possibly most impressive, is that government services/employees here are just fantastic. Both Marco and I have been blown away by the efficiency and the friendliness of government workers. I mean, it's almost as if they like their jobs. :) Everyone from immigration to the tax office have treated us so well that we almost didn't know what to do. Even when things don't go as expected with the process, you leave feeling happy and respected. Just amazing.

I guess that's all for now. Now it's time to go outside and enjoy the bit of sunshine we have before the rain sets in.

Blazing Trails and Other Things......

Well, we have now been in Galway for 3 weeks, but there is still so much to learn! Marco is really enjoying his job. I think he is a gem on both a personal and professional level and they are lucky to have him. Anyway, Marco's work permit is through a program that Ireland just started in October to make it much easier to bring foreign researchers to the country. They don't have to go through the normal steps for a researcher to come, and it also allows the spouse (that would be me :o)) the right to work. So, I've started looking for jobs and I have been getting all sorts of different advice about the process of actually securing the work permit. I finally called the national employment office in Dublin today to learn that I am a trail blazer! Although there have been many researchers that have come under this new program, I am officially the first spouse to ever try and secure a work permit through the program. Even the guy who was the official point of contact didn't know what to tell me. So it seems that I will be helping the country of Ireland to figure out the process! haha. I know that I can work, it's now just a matter of figuring out the right paperwork and getting the right stamp in my passport. Maybe it will just take a little more time than we planned. Oh well, for now I'm going to try and get involved in some volunteer work. I have an appointment tomorrow with a volunteer organization to see what I can do. And I'm still enjoying sleeping in and walking around the city to find all of the good shopping centers. :) Life is good! So, I thought I would post a few pics of our new apartment. The first pic shows the outside and we are the one on the ground floor. Here you can also see the living room, dining area, kitchen and the master bedroom. We have lots of space (except for the kitchen!) and tons of windows. We also have a spare bedroom that is waiting for its first visitor.

Our First Home :o)

So, we got all moved in on Friday! Had a taxi van come and pick us up (and all of our luggage) at the B&B and drive us to our first home as a married couple and our first home in Ireland! We can both say that we are extremely happy to have our own place after a couple of weeks of living out of suitcases and sleeping in hotels. We immediately went to buy groceries so we could actually cook a meal. Actually, I have to admit that I am an extremely lucky woman. The first two nights in our place Marco cooked for me!!!! I did help with chopping, but he cooked a couple of really delicious meals and you can see a picture here to prove it. Anyway, we have two bedrooms and two bathrooms (by the way, 2 bathroom apartments are not that common here.) We have a very large living room and dining area and a tiny kitchen. We are trying to learn all of the little things that come with living in a different country. For instance, heat is a very important thing here (it was 39 degrees this morning....uggh!), but it works completely different than what we are used to. We have electric heaters that are called "storage" heaters. Supposedly you can set them to run at night during off peak hours to save money. They store up heat inside some little blocks that are in the unit and then release it throughout the day. Well, that all sounds nice if you can figure out how to set them without a manual. :) And the water heater.....well, that's a whole different story. Apparently we have to set it to come on at certain times of the day to heat water, but we haven't quite figured out the control unit yet. We must have done something right because we've had hot showers, but we may cry when we see our first electric bill. And, the laundry situation is a bit different. There is one of those combination washer/dryer machines that is supposed to do everything for you. Well, it washes, but would probably need to run for 2 hours to dry anything. Most people hang laundry out here, but we don't have a place to do that right now. Plus, it's raining a lot of the time! Anyway, we have wet clothes on racks all over the living room right now that are taking about 2 days to dry because of the humidity. Oh yeah, we also have 2 portable dehumidifiers here that we have to run every couple of days to prevent mildew. Ahhhh, the things we take for granted in the USA. But we have a comfy bed to sleep in and enough comforts to make it feel like home. And the rest of it we will just get used to with time. Tomorrow we will actually get cable and internet, so we'll be living like kings! Once we get all of our laundry cleaned up and get organized a bit I'll try to take some pics of the place and post them here. We also went for our first run here this afternoon. We have a great little trail that runs through some green areas, along the river and near some old castles. It's really beautiful! If summer ever arrives it will be even more beautiful. :)

We Got an Apartment!!!

Got some good news this week that we got the apartment we wanted! We meet with the property managers tomorrow morning to sign the lease and pick up the keys. So, moving day is tomorrow....woooo hoooo!! Finally we can unpack all of these darned suitcases and settle into our own place. And do laundry! And buy groceries and cook a meal at home. I think it's all of the simple things that we are looking forward to the most. The location is really close to Marco's office, only about 7 minutes walking. It's a good 15 or 20 minutes to the city center, which is really easy and a very pleasant walk. Once we get settled we'll post some pictures of our first home together. :) On a side note, I started sending out my resume yesterday. I already got contacted by a couple of agencies and have a lead on a possible job. We'll see what happens.

Spectacular Cliffs of Moher

Yesterday we did our first day trip in the area surrounding Galway. We took a bus that made stops at several interesting historical and otherwise beautiful spots. But the main event of the day was a visit to the Cliffs of Moher. The views were spectacular and it's definitely one of the most beautiful natural wonders we have ever seen. The pictures you see here don't do justice at all. We had an incredible weather day, but the winds were very strong on top of the cliffs. They say that 10-12 people per year fall and die, sometimes due to rain or winds and being too close to the edge. Most of the people on the tour bus were from other countries. We met a French man on the bus who was cycling around Europe for his vacation. We asked him what his favorite city was and he humbly replied in his heavy French accent, "I am sorry to say this because I am French, but it is Paris." Needless to say, Paris is definitely on our list of places to visit while we are here!

Funny Thing About the Weather.........

So, it's Saturday and we didn't have a whole lot to do today. Nobody works on the weekends here, so we couldn't do anything productive, like apartment hunting. We decided to take a long walk to check out a neighborhood in the Galway area called Salthill. It's right on the ocean and is absolutely beautiful as you can see from these pictures. When we started out it was a pleasantly chilly morning with clear skies. The sun was actually shining, and those moments are to be treasured here for sure! Anyway, we walked along the Promenade for quite some time and saw lots of other people doing the same. Along the way we saw something that resembled "the polar bear club"......people actually going for a quick swim in what must be absolutely freezing water. As we got closer, the funny thing was that most of them must have been at least in their 70's!!! Amazing...Marco says it's good for circulation, but I'm not willing to find out. :o) We walked a bit further and noticed the sky darkening in the distance. Even that was beautiful, until the rain started to fall. It started coming down pretty hard and we still had a long way to walk to get back. Let me just say here that those compact travel umbrellas that are so handy and easy to carry don't provide much protection. By the time we got back to the city, we were both pretty drenched. Then, just when we thought it was letting up, hail started to pour down! Amazing!!! We took cover under a little alley archway and waited it out for about 5 minutes. (If you look closely at the last picture you can see the white stuff on the ground behind Marco.) The nice thing here is that people don't let the weather stop them. Everyone just goes about their business no matter what is happening. So, after a nice lunch, it was back to the B&B for some warmth and rest. This brings me to another funny point about Ireland.....we flipped on the TV to see what was on. There are only about 11 channels here on cable, but no matter what time of day, you can always find some episode of Friends and The Simpsons. Seriously. Tomorrow we are hoping to go on a little tour outside of Galway. Maybe up to see the Cliffs of Moher or across the bay to the Aran Islands.

Apartment Hunting.....

Well, not much to report except that our search for an apartment continues. We are still learning how everything works here in Galway and one thing is for sure, that apartments go really fast! Also, heating is really important here and there are several different types of heating...gas, oil, electric. Fridges are really small, I mean really small. In order to have a TV you have to pay an annual "license" fee of 150 euros....that's about $230! That's just to have a TV, cable is totally separate. Anyway, we have seen about a dozen or so places so far, but most of the ones in our price range are what Marco affectionately calls "rat holes"! They are either really tiny or in really bad condition. (The ones we really want are way out of our price range, naturally.) We are trying to find a furnished place that is in a decent location....close walking distance to Marco's office and close walking distance to the city center. We did see one this afternoon that seems to be a great option. We will put in an application, but if other people are interested they may do a lottery. Interesting process.....so we will keep looking to have backup options. We are keeping our fingers crossed and we know that things will work out!

First Week in Galway

So, we got married on March 29th and got on a plane to Ireland 5 days later! With 8 full suitcases in tow (that was an adventure by itself!) we arrived with very little trouble. We decided to rent a car for all of our luggage, so Marco got his first experience with driving on the left side of the road. After a couple of close calls in the parking lot, he was almost a professional. :) We arrived to our hotel right off of the main square and spent a couple of relaxing days and nights just exploring the city. It's not too big, so we have been walking everywhere. On Sunday we moved to a bed & breakfast closer to where Marco's new office is. He's working for the National University of Ireland, Galway, but the research institute he works in is off campus. He started on Monday, but we have spent quite a bit of time this week looking for apartments, opening a bank account, getting registered for an identity card, etc. So far, the weather has been the biggest adjustment! It's really cold here compared to LA. And the weather seems to change pretty quickly. When the sun is shining, it's absolutely beautiful, but there seem to be more clouds/rain than sun so far. And this is Spring. We hear that there should be about 2 months of "Summer", but we'll have to wait and see. The people are so friendly here and everyone is making us feel very welcome. We hope to find an apartment and move in by this weekend if all goes well. I am waiting on my work authorization, but I'll start looking for a job soon. Not sure what I'll be doing yet, but for now I am just enjoying my time off. I am keeping very busy just finding my way around the city and learning how things work. Marco and I are already planning where we want to travel first! I think we'll start with other parts of Ireland, but we are also looking forward to visiting other places around Europe while we're here. Each day is a new adventure and we are both so happy to be here.