Thursday, December 27, 2012

Day 27: Howth Hike

So today was spent on the beautiful isthmus oh Howth the eastern boarder of Northside congregation's territory. We were a little worried at that we wouldn't be able to finish as it started raining during our journey and we had to turn back. A brave few continued on in the rain and some more after the rain let up.

My legs were on fire after all the walking and I wanted to go home. We however ended up going to s sister's house, muddy and all. It was her first party since she just moved in and was happy to have all us muddy folk.

We played a  couple rounds of Mafia and ate good food. It was a good day!











Hanging Around

Dirty Dogs
A scene off the beaten path



The Trail

Two sisters in bear hats!


Rachel > Janela - Rachel is awesome







Having fun at Rachel's

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Day 26: Wicklow Mountains

So today was the start of our exploration of the countryside of Ireland. We went to Sugar Loaf mountain for a hike with the brothers and sisters from various congregations in the area as well as two sisters from Italy and 2 sister from Philadelphia PA.

We had an awesome time and I must say I was so tired going up the mountain. It looked like a straight shot all the way to the top but this was not a leisurely stroll by no means. We had to avoid the dangers of mud, "poo-piles", rocks and brambles. All in all we had a lot of fun and being with the friends makes it all the better for one traveling.

The two sisters from Philadelphia Gloria and I forget the other sister's name are "back-packing" it across Europe spending a week in multiple countries going by train, bus, and Euro-rail. Gloria told me they only spent about 750$ for their flight here and 300+ for their Euro-rail across Europe which is pretty good.

I thought what an awesome experience to see people our age and younger traveling like this and getting to know the congregations as they do so. I will have to say that if you can save up and afford to do so it is well worth the trip.

I have to say that after going up and down the mountain I was very cold and hungry and tired especially since we have the meeting tonight.

So enough yapping and time for some pictures!


















Monday, December 24, 2012

Day 19-25: Broken Camera


Wednesday


Was spent primarily in he ministry but no really good experiences to share except a chance to speak with a young man that had never read the Bible but believed that there had to be something else out there else it would really be a boring existence.

Oh if you put in your email address at the top of the page you will be alerted when I post something new to the blog.

Thursday

Used to twist my hair

I found out that my camera was not working, which is very upsetting and resulted in a decrease in pictures that would be taken for the rest of the week. Thursdays tend to be our day off to relax we spent most of the day sitting in bed watching Tron:Uprising which is a pretty good animated series based on what happened in between the first and second movie.  I was a bit disappointed that the first season wasn't over as it now requires me to wait for series to end before I can start watching it again.

I twisted my hair also so I wouldn't have to do much with it the rest of the week.

Friday


Spent another long day out in service and I am almost done with my time for the month HURRAY! Hopefully next week we will be able to go to the West part of Ireland.

I received an e-mail from the recruiter regarding the job and he said that it looks like they want a person that speaks Spanish for the position even though the woman I interviewed with really liked me. He mentioned that he won't know for sure until next week.

After service John and Zaha came over as they are leaving for Germany for the next week or so. We had a great time and they've had some very interesting adventures in the Middle East. We hope to one day visit them in Germany!

Saturday


Was extremely busy we spent a nice time out in service (1.75 hours remaining) I had an opportunity to show a man the jw.org website out in service on my tablet with another sister. She noticed I'm putting menus in the door for a restaurant and she thought he may be Chinese so she was going to offer him a tract. After sometime we finally were able to catch up with hima dn offered the tray and told him he could find out more on the website. This gave me a chance to show him the site which he appreciated in his own language. It was an awesome experience considering our lesson for the service meeting Tuesday"

 and then went to spend time with the Bumaglads (spelled very wrong) I made arrangements with the girls to watch Japanese and Korean Dramas on Sunday (very excited).

After lunch we headed to the City Center to meet up with Aiden and go to the Portabello congregation which means beautiful port in Italian. This congregation is super small and there was another meeting (Portuguese) going on at the same time as the english. They have 2 English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Chinese, and Italian that meet at the kingdom hall. There isn't a parking lot so the friends have to find parking on the streets.

The brother giving the talk was the same brother that gave the talk last week when we visited the Finglas congregation so needless to say the talk was a repeat but still good!

After the meeting we went to a pub to get a bite to eat before going to a superquinn (like walgreens/supermarket mix) to get something we would like to drink for a dance party a brother was having.

Now I must say we had an awesome time but we ended up leaving relatively early considering we hadn't been back home since we left for service that morning. The music was nice a lot of house and techno and we met a sister from Boston who invited us to come visit her anytime. She was visiting her sister who has been loving in Ireland for 7 years. Their parents go to the Windermere congregation I think.

Sunday


I ended up taking pictures with the phone I use in the US which is ok but not the great. After the meeting I made food for the Japanese and Korean drama night but didn't need to as the family cooked a major Philippine, Korean, and Japanese dinner. Needless to say I was very full after that I ended up making guacamole for dip.

Preben, Luca, and Emmele ended up going out with some brothers and sisters to a pub for association and traditional Irish dancing. If you haven't already noticed you go to pubs for everything.
Singing Beat it

Before they left we had a little bit of Kareoke fun with Janela and Jense and their parents.
Jensen
Janala
We ended up watching a variety show called Running Man which was quite funny, Kimi wa Petto Episode 1,  Zettai Karashi (I read the manga but it was very depressing the drama seems a little different) and Koizoro. We didn't finish any of them except for a couple of the variety shows.


Monday


Joel - A dancing Diva

Was spent out and service and typing up the days I didn't get to finish during last week on the blog. Also my camera is no longer broke (HURRAY). Thursday we are heading off to the west side of Ireland to spend a few days in Galway then go to Doolin and Connemara a major thank you to Eileen Leedy for the great recommendations I hope to get some goo pictures.

We book our tickets back home this week hopes to be one filled with lots of site seeing. We are possibly planning a trip to Italy in January and we have found the secret to traveling through Europe Ryan Air . This site is crazy cheap I found a round trip flight to Italy for both of us for 36 Euros. That isn't 36 Euros each but all together. Its like taking a bus so don't expect much on the flight.

Dublin is apparently one of the main hubs for this airline.













Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Day 16-18: A Potential Change in Plan

Sunday  


We had an opportunity to visit the Figlas congregation, this was the kingdom hall the Aiden's sister Yvonne went to. All the elders were gone for the elder's school so the ministerial servants handled everything and they did an awesome job. There were a lot of children that gave great comments in this congregation!

So far we've been in three congregations where the elders were going to school and they all handled it differently.

1- Had the meeting on a different day during the evening
2- Cancelled the meeting and said to study at the Watchtower at home
3- Had the ministerial servants take care of the Public talk and Watchtower study

It was interesting to see the differences. The Finglas congregation was newly renovated and beautiful I think all the congregations have a kitchen built in them but no water fountain.

Emily and her baby
After the meeting we spent the rest of the day at Yvonne's house and watched movies E.T and Pay it Forward. I met a sister Maria that recently visited Florida and we had a lively discussion on the different views of race between the US and Ireland. She also mentioned that almost every American she spoke with always says that they are Irish and when she asks them where were they born they respond that it is their grandfather/mother or distant relative and she responds "Well the means you are American".
Jasmine and her mother
Jude and his mom

Preben and Drahoshk
I think often Americans hold on to their past heritage instead of acknowledging that their nationality is not the past but where they were actually born and that is America. I think that from this point forward if someone asks me my nationality I am just going to say I am American, not black, african-american, just American.

Monday


The day was spent out in service. I'm not sure if I mentioned this before but we were freezing cold Saturday because we ran out of gas in the heater. I was not a happy camper. So while that was fixed by Monday I was still cold and woke up in a bad mood.

However I worked out in service with Gary Doyle and we met a man at the door that had a problem with Adam and Eve he could not agree that all humans came from the same parents there had to be more people in the gene pool. Also felt that Judas did not have freewill because he was predetermined to turn on Jesus.

We explained that it was prophesied that Jesus would be betrayed in that God looked into the future to see what would happen and had his prophet write about it but Judas had a choice and manifested a pattern of behavior that led to Jesus' betrayal.

We spent good amount of time speaking with him and Gary explained that the account about Adam and Eve is beneficial to explain how we arrived where we are now.

The man had to go but he agreed to speak again which was nice and put me in a better mode. I didn't want to go home after that but I needed to get back to prepare for my interview. I figured it was best to stay out as long as I could though and we did calls for the rest of the day finishing about 4:00pm which was nice.

The interview went well but I won't know if I have the job until Thursday. I need to speak fluent spanish (which I don't) but I can understand it. I will have to learn it in a year and may potentially have to return to the US early. If so I may not be able to come back to Ireland for a year but this may work in our favor to come back we will see.

Tuesday


Was spent relaxing and walking around the area we lived which is what some would call "posh". We got ready for the meeting and a few friends asked how the interview went. All in all not too much happened today. We look forward to a long day out in service tomorrow!