Thursday, December 31, 2009

I am dreaming of a white christmas

Kierans Mum comes from Ireland (Her mother and father migrated their family to Australia on a boat when they were young) so Kieran has many Cousins that live in this Emerald Isle. We had gone down to see them once, though this time we were going for christmas.

We woke up christmas morning and jumped in the car, drove 3 hours, Listened to "I am dreaming of a white Christmas" by Neil Diamond, and hit the snow, it was the first time I have seen this much snow, and we were pretty excited to get out and play in it




We got to Abbeyfeale and had roast dinner as soon as we walked in the door. Roast AND mashed potato (only in Ireland), home made stuffing, ham, turkey, Christmas cake, homemade custard, cream, trifle.....These Irish folk really know how to put on a feast.

Kieran had made home made Baileys, a bottle of that was consumed and then we went to bed around 1 in the morning.

Next day we hopped up and thought we would let our artistic sides show, so we created this.



We took a trip down to Castle Island the next night, and then went to visit Kierans Nans Sister, Aunty Nora, who lived up the hill.


She has a lovely little white cottage, and is an absolute Laugh. After that, we jumped in the car and drove back to Dublin. Christmas was over, but it was one of the best we have had.

Monday, December 28, 2009

Australia VS Ireland




I am through and through Australian, and Kieran is half Irish, Half Australia, Alas why this blog is called "One and a half Australians in Ireland"

So we learn that Australia Vs Rugby Match is being played at Croke Park, Which is quite close to where we live. Kieran wanted to go, but because our banks were quite that loaded yet, we decided to go watch it in a pub.

We were getting ready, and had an Australia Jersey, and an Irish Jersey. Kieran wanted to wear both and take the one off according to which team lost.........I thought that was a bad idea. We tossed a coin and I ended up wearing the Australia Jersey.

We jumped on a bus, and started going into the city to find a pub, but decided against it. It was my first pay week, so we thought, why not find tickets on the street and have a great time and blow all of our money! Very glad we did, we got cheap tickets of a random man (Kieran nearly causing a fight as he told two scalpers he would buy both of their tickets, but only went with one) , got nearly front row seats, got to see a match we will never see again, had fun and got a free flag.





On the 18th of October, My partner (Kieran) and I landed at Heathrow Airport , for what was going to be our big overseas Adventure. After roadtripping around the west of America for 2 months, we had just spent two weeks partying in Singapore courtesy of my partners Aunty, and we were quickly running out of money. We hot footed it around Heathrow trying to find a cheap bite to eat before our connection through to Dublin, and boarded our flight.

We landed in Sunny Dublin (not for long), picked our bags, hopped on a bus and got dropped in the middle of the city. Finding our hotel, we dumped our bags and started to explore.

Of coarse we found the Lacoste Shop (Kierans favourite Brand), drooled over some more expensive shops, tryed to work out which side of the footpath to walk on (2 months later, still haven't figured it out) got some sim cards for our phones, and crashed back at the hotel.

After the next 4 days we looked for jobs, thought "what the hell have we done", Shed a couple of tears, Went to the pub, but eventually landed on our feet. It was a city full of little hidy holes that you could explore. It was a country so small that we drove across it in 4 hours, and it was a little island so close to the rest of europe, that we knew we had so many adventures ahead of us.

We found a little Bedsit studio in a bayside suburb called "Clontarf" and I got a job as a nanny looking after 4 boys under the age of 6..... and on the day we moved into our studio I had an awful feeling that it was a wrong decision. Alas, 4 weeks later, after many many troubles with our landlord (Renting in Ireland is not quite the same in Australia..not in this house anyway) we moved into a one bedroom unit right around the corner.

Everything has settled down, Kieran got a job with Dublin Aerospace, we eventually found the asian section in the supermarket, figured out the irish way of speaking, found our favourite pub, found Wagamamas, and have started looking at some trips to go on.

We know we have heaps more to explore, and as the irish say "Just see how you get on"