The Holidays...

Its been awhile since I last wrote, so I figured it was time for an update.  For Christmas I was able to spend time with the Kingsleys, and had a great time.  My cousin Mike came back to Dublin from England for 2 weeks and I've had the chance to hang out with him quite a bit, its always fun to see him.  

On Christmas Eve I went over to Phil and Cheryl's house to help with cooking preparations (chopping stuff), and after a morning of that we all went into the city for an early dinner and stroll.  Since I was here last Christmas I had an idea what to expect.  Last year after dinner we went to Starbucks for a cup of joe but this year it was closed early, so we ended up going to Butlers about 10 min before it closed and got their famous hot chocolate.  It was a nice evening.

Christmas morning began for me at 10:30am (when I woke up of course) to Eoin opening my door checking to see if I was awake so he could open his presents.  I looked at him and said hi and looked right back and said "you look stinky", turned and walked down the stairs.  What a nice way to start the morning.  I slowly walked down the stairs to the kitchen for my daily cup of coffee, then to the livingroom so the mayhem could begin.  It was fun to see the excitement of Eoin and Moia's faces as they were handed each present.  The afternoon followed up with another family joining us for yet another early dinner, this time of the traditional ham, turkey, stuffing...the works, it was fabulous.  

The next day, known as St. Stephen's Day, is a day where you eat leftovers and take walks.  Another family joined us for the walks and later we were joined by yet another family and had a great time of just being in each other's company.  

I am so blessed 

Grace Days

We do this thing at UJ called Grace Days and what it is, is the staff going around the community to the all the houses and hand out chocolates or biscuits (aka. cookies) to say happy Christmas to the residents.  Its actually a fun time to talk to people that we wouldn't normally see and develop relationships with those we do know.  I was a little hesitant at first (as I am about most things) because I feel I'm not that great at talking to people, but I put my pride behind me and went off with Belinda.  We've been invited into homes by both people involved with UJ and those who aren't, and offered tea, coffee or what ever they have.  

We've only done Grace Days for two days so far, but I find myself humbled by God's love each time someone answers the door.  They aren't just someone living in a house, they are a creation of the Most High.  They are a grieving grandmother, a lonely father, a happy young man and so much more.  Sometimes people are taken aback by our offering and it takes them a minute to understand that we are doing this out of kindness and not for anything more.  We've been offered money (and refuse to take it), and my favorite was a guy in his early 20s was so surprised and grateful that he gave us hugs.  We have a couple more days of this and I'm looking forward to the unexpected.   

...after the mouse

So after I saw my furry friend roommate, I went down to Blackrock for work (we were doing a movie night for the 5-6class), afterward, I walked down to the dart station.  Emma and Adam stayed at Urban Junction to finish up some things (thank God they stayed).  I bought my ticket and walked to the platform, the time read 17 min until the next train, i figured it wasn't too bad so I waited, and waited and waited.  When the time got to 4min it stuck, and didn't change for about 25 min.  Then it changed to 10 min, then when that had run down to 8 min it changed again to 25.  I then had had enough and decided to walk back to UJ and get the bus with Emma and Adam.  What felt like hours at the dart station was probably around 45 min, but it doesn't end there...

Soon after I arrived at UJ and vented my frustration to my co-workers, we left for the bus stop.  The bus surprisingly arrived promptly 5 min later.  I thought it would be smooth the rest of the way home, oh I was wrong.  We got on the crowded bus and went up to the second story to find a seat.  We sat down amongst some unruley young people (younger than us, probably in their late teens), who had obviously been drinking.  A couple of stops down the girls got off and the boys kept making rude comments even after the girls were gone.  As the bus left the stop we started hearing raised voices behind us toward the back of the bus, all of a sudden we heard scuffling, and turn back to see two guys beating up on eachother.  Quickly everyone who wasn't involved moved to the bottom floor.  Someone told the driver what was going on and possibly called the police, I'm not entirely sure, but the next thing i know is that the driver missed our stop and the next 2 and wouldn't let people off the bus (we were assuming so the Garda could come deal with the situation).  This caused a problem of its own and people started complaining and yelling at the driver, cursing and swearing at him.  Eventually he let off the crowd standing by the door, we left at that time.  I don't know what happened in the end, hopefully everything turned out ok.  It made for quite an interesting evening.

A mouse in the house

So there I was in my room, sitting at my desk studying for the GRE (that's right I was studying), when I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. I was hoping it was my imagination, but knew it probably wasn't. I turned my head to see what it was and sure enough there was a little mouse standing under my radiator. I think my heart stopped for a half a second. We have been having a little mice trouble in our house, Emma can attest to that, but I hadn't seen any evidence of one in my room, although i had my suspicions. So yes, i have a mouse in my room and to be honest it kind of weirds me out. I'm not completely freaked out just slightly, but i'm sure i'll have some dreams tonight about mice crawling all over me. It looks like its time for a deep clean of my room. Mom and Dad, don't start laughing at that line...ok, you can laugh a little.

The good, the bad and being cold...

So again I know its been awhile since my last post.  I apologize.  These past few weeks have been kind of busy because of Christmas coming up.  For the Christmas season we have been putting on a lot of events for the youth and community.  This past weekend is a prime example, on Saturday we took about 30 youth to go ice skating (thankfully some parents came as well).  I being the "sporty" one was asked to be on the ice with the kids, gladly I accepted.  Although I didn't fall I soon figured out the skates given to us by the place we were at were absolute crap, and have the bruises on my ankles to show for it.  Thankfully, there were no major injuries to the kids.  One of the mothers that came got here foot stepped on by a man wearing skates, she ended up with a nasty bruise and sprained ligaments, but nothing too serious.  Overall it was a fun evening.

The next night, on Sunday, we had a community Christmas dinner, where we invited families from the community to Urban Junction to enjoy a meal together.  We ended up having around 80 people show up, it was a great time to get to know people and learn more about them.

Last week I also had the chance to go with my housemate Emma to here hometown of Kilkenny and stay with her family.  She was having a fundraiser dinner for a mission trip she is taking to India at the end of this month.  I got to meet some of her extended family (she has more cousins than I do, which is pretty impressive) and help with the preparations.  Its always nice to get a free hot meal (or two).

One thing that is not so enjoyable has been how cold its gotten in the past few weeks.  Grant it, its always been cold, but the temperature has decreased quite a bit since I first arrived.  What doesn't help matters is that the heating in my house is broken, so while we have space heaters for our rooms, we can't keep them on all day (they use a lot of electricity) or night.  I knew it was bad when i could see my breath while sitting in the living room the other day.  Ah well, it should be fixed today, but who knows.  Thank you for all you love and support.  I really appreciate it.