No Longer Kelsea in the UK...

I'm waaay over-due for a name change, Monday marked the end of my first month living in Ireland. I've gotten all settled in with my new host family and have had my hands full watching their four lovely little girls, Cassidy (9), Elora (7), Jenna (4) and Odessa (2). I'm staying with the family on their farm in County Galway, complete with cows, narrow winding roads, and rolling hills greener than anything I've ever seen- it's unreal. The nearest town, Athenry, is a 10 minute drive (I've been driving...on the left!), and has a population of something like 3,000 so this is definitely different for me. Luckily we're also a short drive/train ride from Galway, one of the biggest cities in Ireland, where there's lots of shopping, clubs, cinemas and even a small airport so I'm not totally cut-off from civilization. (The red marker is Athenry:)

View Larger Map

Regardless of where it is I'm living, I'm so happy just to be over here. When I was 13 I read Frank McCourt's memoir Angela's Ashes telling about his childhood in Limerick in the 1930s and 40s and I absolutely fell in love with the idea of Ireland; I definitely never thought I'd end up here someday. So far it's been everything I expected: endless rain, charming (hard to understand) accents, cozy little pubs, a general dislike for the English, and lots of Catholicism, potatoes, and Guiness. Here's a few things I didn't expect:

1. The island is ITTY BITTY: I knew it wasn't massive or anything but just to give you an idea, the state of Kansas is a little over 82,000 sq mi and the entire island of Ireland is just over 31,000 sq mi. The drive from Galway to Dublin, west coast to east coast, is 130 miles!

2. The official language isn't English: I had an idea that they spoke Irish (no, not Gaelic) in some places here but its actually a really big part of their culture. Pretty much any signs in a public area (street signs, signs for bathrooms, etc.) will be in Irish first with English below it. The first time I heard it spoken was over the loudspeaker on the train from Dublin to Athenry on my first day here and I must've pulled the weirdest face- I swear it sounds like they're talking backwards. The best is watching cartoons like Spongebob Square Pants with Irish voice-overs on the Irish channel...hilarious.

3. They absolutely LOVE American county-western music: They even have a country radio station! The amount of Garth Brooks on the pub juke boxes around here is enough to make you think you're in Texas, but at least they understand my love for Johnny Cash...

Since my last update I've gone on some lovely trips...June was so amazing for travel. Here's some pictures of Portugal and Italy, and of course some pictures from my first month here. Since my laptop is broken I can't make them look super pretty like I used to but its betta' than nothin':

This is right across the road from the house, the cows are always making the weirdest noises! Maybe they're speaking Irish...

Moooooo

Galway bay and the Atlantic

Galway, Saturday afternoon shopping

A good depiction of a Saturday night at one of the Pubs in Athenry...hehe. The girl to the left of me is my neighbor Paula, she's been my buddy since my first night here and is really good about giving me the low-down on everything and introducing me to people.

Obligatory touristy photo in Pisa, Italy...the pose was a happy accident!

There were cute litte fountains like this everywhere

The view from Cortona, the cute little village we stayed in

Florence

Michaelangelo's David...definitely wasn't supposed to be taking pictures of this!

Lovely Portugal. This was the beach next to our hotel in Lagos...soooo beautiful.

Wish I was there now, It won't stop raining here!

This weekend I'm off to Dublin so I'll definitely be adding some pictures soon, in the meantime here's my new address:

Kelsea c/o The Mahons

Newcastle, Athenry

Co. Galway, Ireland

Love love love,

Kelsea

Hooray hooray

June???

Good news...did some major recovery on my hard drive and it turns out the hundreds and hundreds of pictures from my trip aren't gone forever...PHEW. I've literally been having nightmares about them being gone for good! That means a post complete with pictures from Ibiza, Cambridge (which was absolutely beautiful) and the pictures I'll be taking next weekend in Portugal (last minute trip!) will be coming soon. Here's a glimpse of Lagos, where I'll be visiting:



Should be a really nice weekend, and one of my last before I move to Ireland, then I'll be "Kelsea in the ROI" (doesn't really have the same ring to it...). I am a bit sad to be missing out on my Mom's birthday and Father's day in the next couple weeks, but it's fun sending cards home...definitely never had to do that before. AND I've offically pushed my return flight home back from June 27th to November 22nd...exciting! See you at Thanksgiving, America.

Love love love,
Kelsea

Ireland!

Hey buddies.

I am officially the proud owner of a 5 month Ireland work visa! I was getting pretty worried about finding a job but not too long after my last update I got message from a family outside of Galway, Ireland looking for a nanny for their four (!!!) girls to start in July. Our schedules matched pretty well and after a few weeks of email correspondence they offered me the job. Sorted!

I've decided that I'm definitely going to be sad to leave Eton. I've made some lovely friends over the past 5 months and it's been really great being so close to London. At the same time going to a whole new place is going to be fun, it'll be like the excitement of January all over again. And I'll be living on the west coast which is from what I've heard the most beautiful bit of Ireland:

I have tons of photos to post from my birthday and Ibiza but I am currently computerless and cameraless...they both decided to stop working...lovely. Hopefully my laptop can be fixed considering every photo I've taken on my trip is saved on there.

I'm off to Cambridge this weekend to visit Lauren, luckily I have a camera I can borrow. Also I just booked a flight to Italy for the end of June to go visit my Dad and his wife who will be on holiday there, check it out:

Can't wait!

Love love love,

Kelsea

Mom's Visit and Amsterdam

Ok so it's definitely been toooo long since I've updated, but I'm a busy girl! Since my last update, my lovely Mah has come to visit from Wichita and I've been on a visit of my own to see Anouk in Holland:


A lovely view of London from the top of the Monument to the Great Fire of London (we had to climb 311 steps for this beaut!). Mom had never been to London before so that was the first thing on our agenda.


St. Paul's Cathedral. A lot of it was under scaffolding (just like the rest of the country) but the front was looking very nice.


Mom and myself, chillin by the Big Ben clocktower.


Westminster Abbey. We wanted to go inside but the line was enormous, so we settled for just snapping some pictures outside.


Buckingham Palace


God save the Queen?


View down "The Mall", the road leading to the Palace.


A beautiful shot of the English countryside. After seeing London, we rented a car for a little road trip up to Liverpool and past Stonehenge. Luckily we had GPS in the car, but that didn't help with driving on the left side of the road! Mom handled it wonderfully, with maybe just a tiny bit of stress, hehe.


Stonehenge! I had heard that it was just a bunch of big rocks...it was. But it was still really cool!


What does one do in Liverpool but go to the Beatles museum of course!!! It was really really cool and I wish I could live there.


Penny lane is in my ears and in my eyes...So great!


Let me take you down 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields...Loveee it!


Mom at the Carpenter's Arms Pub with her first Fish and Chips and a half-pint of Strongbow Cider (and mushy peas). Best!


Cute.


The day my Mom left to head back to the states, I caught a plane to Amsterdam meet up with Anouk and Lauren. Anouk used to live down the street from me in Eton but moved back to the Netherlands in March, so of course Lauren and I had to go visit. Here we are, myself, Anouk and Lauren enjoying some champagne to celebrate our reunion!


Our first night in Amsterdam. So much fun!


Cute canal. They're evvverywhere.


At the top of a huge swing in Dam Square, with a nice view of the Royal Palace (yeah, who knew Holland had a Queen?)


Klompen! We went to a shop with wooden shoe (not clog apparently) making demonstrations and about a milllion you could buy (or just pose with).


Me and a windmill


More windmills bein cute


Canal in Amsterdam. We rented bicycles and rode around for hours one afternoon in the sun...so nice!


Lovely flowers in the Dutch countryside.

What a nice month. And another nice one ahead of me! Lauren and I leave Saturday morning to go to the island of Ibiza off the coast of Spain for my 20th birthday. Unfortunately it might be one of my last abroad (for now). My return flight is set for June 27, two months from today. Though I'm looking forward to a summer in Wichita, there's still a possibility that I can find a job in Ireland a move on to work there on a 4 month visa and come back in November. It's all pretty up in the air right now and it hurts my brain to even think about what I should do and what will make me most happy. Finding a job right now is pretty tough, so I might be back in time for the 4th of July...?

Love love love,
Kelsea

I now know that...

Continued.

I've decided that, having gotten past the excitement of being here, I'm really starting to enjoy myself in a not-so-touristy kind of way. I'm all settled in with my job, I've made great friends and I know the Eton high street like the back of my hand. I can find my way around London without looking like a lost kitten and when I get on the tube I no longer clutch nervously to my map. I've learned a lot about myself and I've learned even more about the ways of those silly British people and their silly kingdom. For example, I now know that...

...if you go to someone's house, they will try to make you tea. This is not a stereotype. I have come to accept this and will take milk and two sugars, please. Also, if you have someone over and don't offer to "put the kettle on", they may think you're weird.

...rugby is superior to American football (sorry Dad!). Not only do the guys not wear heaps of pads (or even a protective cup), but they also don't stop the clock every 2 minutes and walk in circles with their hands on their hips catching their breath while the referees do some silly arm things. Oh, and rugby players are also, as a whole, cute.

...in Mary Poppins, Dick Van Dyke's attempt at a cockney accent sounds absolutely ridiculous and may or may not be offensive. Genuine cockney accents, however, are lovely (much in the same way that rugby players are cute.)

...if you answer a question in the affirmative with "uh-huh" like I tend to do, people will probably think you're making strange grunting noises and become too embarrassingly confused to go on with the conversation. Is it an American thing? Uh-huh.

...if you ask for a sack in which to put your purchases at a convenience store, the clerk, the person you're with, and anyone else within ear shot will probably laugh at you. It's actually very embarrassing (apparently only Santa carries a sack...)

...what we call "chocolate" back in America is pretty much cardboard compared to what they have here. Seriously, it's almost Easter, go buy enough Cadbury to last you until next April! I don't know how I'll ever go back to Hershey's...

Lastly, I now know that if everything works out, I'm definitely not coming back in June!

Love love love,
Kelsea

Fancy garden, Oxford, and Yorkshire pudding.

Heya dudes.

So, not only has the sun been out recently in this silly little county, but I think it might actually stick around for a while! It's about 2 miles everyday walking to and from school with each of the boys so having some sunshine makes it lovely, lovely, lovely. Also, my pictures are so much nicer when it's not depressingly (and characteristically) gloomy outside...


Making biscuits with Thomas. Here they call cookies biscuits so I had to carefully explain to him that they were special fluffy American biscuits.


Our lovely picnic in Luxmoore's Garden, a private garden only open to the Eton College community (fancy shmancy) that is actually on an island in the middle of the Thames. Honestly, it looks fake when you're there. It feels like you're either dreaming or in a movie. We ended up being told off by one of the many groundskeepers for having Tilly the dog with us and for playing frisbee. We told the kids that he said "No fun allowed!" and everytime we go back Thomas giggles about the man who wouldn't let us have fun.


Lovely.


The entrance to The Queen's College in Oxford. Our friend Johnny did his undergrad and masters here so he gave us a great tour. Apparently, you can't walk on the grass except for once a year when they play Croquet or something silly like that.


This is where Mr. Darcy from Pride & Prejudice would live were he a real person, we decided. It's amazing the looks you can get when shouting out for a fictitous character... "Oh Mr. Daaaarccy where aaaaaare you???"


Repping next to the math door in the Bodleian Library Quad. They have a door for every subject nearly and they used to lead to lecture areas but now its just library space or something. I just like math, is all.


More of the Bodleian Library Quad with the Earl of Pembroke, who was apparently important at some point.


Being dorks with a fancy gate.


The next day Lauren and I marched down to Tesco and gathered supplies to make an English Sunday Roast for Johnny and his roommate. Here you can see my Yorkshire pudding hanging out with the lamb. I had never actually had Yorkshire pudding before but it was so so so easy to make and so so so yummy.


Yum yum yum. (Check out the Oxford hoodie, a.k.a. the most comfortable article of clothing I own.)


Lauren being a domestic goddess with some peas, broccoli, taters and Tesco brand instant gravy.
(Tesco is the Walmart of Great Britain...hah.)


Thomas and myself. I can never decide if he looks really sweet and cute or really sneaky and evil...hmmmm.


This is the Lego house that Thomas and I built the other day. We built a cooler one the day before but Nicholas got jealous and smashed it when no one was looking (he's six). I am seriously considering buying some Legos of my own.


Changing of the guards outside the castle. I was minding my own business, smoking a ciggy, and trying to concentrate on a particularly difficult Times sudoku outside the train station when I heard the terrible sound of tourists gathering. Needless to say, I joined them. I can never take the foot soliders seriously, though. The army barracks are in Windsor so a lot of them drink in the same places I do and they're always completely pissed (that means drunk!) and obnoxious and ask us to marry them. Some of them have cute Northern Irish accents though, so they're ok. Usually you would see them wearing the traditional red uniforms but they wear the grey ones in the winter.

I'm not quite ready to stop typing but this post is getting a bit lengthy so...

TO BE CONTINUED

love love love,
Kelsea