Once Upon a Time Travelling on My Own

by Rita Cordeiro (Portugal)

A leap into the unknown Ireland

This story is about my Erasmus year in Ireland. It was the first time I was alone on a foreign country at the age of 20. I studied, I wrote, I met new people and most of all, I felt independent! But the most wonderful the sense of adventure running through my veins. Not everything went perfect but it taught me to overcome obstacles no matter how I do it. I stayed in Maynooth, a small town 25 minutes from Dublin. It was fascinating for it's medieval roots and people were very friendly.In the town and on campus it was possible to see ravens, crows and squirrels across the campus! The food was delicius (despite they use too much potatoes, lol!) and the way how seasons seem to go slowly by: the colour of leaves in the Autumn, the white and grey in Winter (I saw it snowing for the first time!) and the rainbow of flowers in Spring (daffodils, tulips,)... My accomodation was next to a farm, the fence had a hole and one afternoon I looked out of the window and there were two sheep, calmly eating the grass; the following semester, were five dunkeys which appeared outside with the same purpose! I went to see the New Grange and other historical places on a field trip organized by the university. It was in November and it was quite cold already. Dublin was absolutely magical with it's bookshops, churches, bridges and historical buildings! I loved to visit the Trinity College exhibition of medieval manuscripts and the Book of Kells was gorgeous! However, I could not go everywhere I wanted because there the life cost is much higher than ours, per example, a train ticket there at the time was about 4€ just one journey, which means that it wasn't possible for me to go to the city more often; even a coffee was like 1,20€! But the funniest part of this trip was when me and Anna, a French girl I met in my accomodation, went to the zoo, in Phoenix Park. We walk from the train station to the zoo, it took us about an hour (good thing the way was all straight), bought our tickets and went in. When we arrived at the Gorila's cage we couldn't see any of them. Then we saw a big grey form and stopped for a while questioning if it was a gorila or not because it was really still; and suddenly in the middle of our "Is it a gorila? Not its a rock. It seems like a Gorila" kind off discussion, it moved! It turnned out to be a Gorila and on that day I learned that the Gorilas also get grey hair! In May, after the exams were over and before it was almost time to come back home we had one last adventure and went to Cork for the weekend. We planned it al, form where to sleep to where to eat and there we went on Friday morning, running to catch to bus to Dublin (we were so close to lose that bus!), where we catch the bus to Cork; it was a 4 hours trip, the longest I ever went on bus! We spent that weekend relaxing, seesight and bonding and before we knew it, it was time to pack and go home. I really want to go back there and see everything I didn't the first time!