Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Already an adventure...

11 September 2006

Already an adventure.

Once again, I survived the flight and not the landing. (this same thing happened when I landed in Jamaica.) There’s nothing quite like getting sick on a plane. A professor whom I had met in March picked us up form the airport. He took us first to the school (Kevin Street) and then finally to our house in Rathgar.

Our landlady is Kathleen. She’s probably about Mom’s age and very friendly. The house is yellow with white trim. There are several blooming rose bushes in the front yard. Cut roses were in a vase on the dining table. Cheerful, don’t you think? Inside, the house is nice, but a little bit dated. Most of the furniture is hand-me-down, but there are little touches everywhere to help perk it up; pillows on the chairs, pictures on the walls, mirrors, etc… The fireplace in the living room has pretty ornamental tiles on the sides. Funny having two TV sets - one set won’t hook up to the VCR/DVD player, the other does but doesn’t receive any programs. Crazy.

The kitchen is small, but has all the basics. The backyard is really beautiful. There are two or three apple trees. No fruit this year, because they were pruned. The yard is very secluded and Kathleen assured us that the fence is tall and sturdy for safety. I’ll have to take her word on it as the fence is covered by trees and shrubs and other green things.

The bathroom might be the biggest adventure. I’m wondering how many days it will take before I break my neck getting into or out of the tub! It’s really deep! We have to turn the hot water heater on 20 minutes before we want to shower and worse yet, we have to remember to turn it off before we leave the house. I guess electricity is expensive here, but having to turn the water heater off and on seems kind of dramatic.

Katharine and I share a large bedroom. We each have our own desk and our own closet space. I have a bedside table with drawers and my desk has drawers. Since Katharine’s desk doesn’t have drawers we agreed that she could have the chest of drawers. (appropriate also, because Katharine brought about three times as many clothes as I did!) Our room is chilly. We’re hoping that it will warm up if we leave the window shut for a while. I’m wearing jeans, a t-shirt, long sleeved t-shirt and a fleece and I’m still a little chilled!

Brian is our only current roommate. He studies classical guitar. I’m not sure how often he washes his hair. Looks like the rubber band has been there for more than a day or two. I got to talk with him for a bit. His mom teaches nutrition classes somewhere in Dublin, but I didn’t understand where. Brian will help get the broadband internet set up and we’ll all share the cost. That will be nice.

We might be getting two more roommates from the graduate program. Mr. Mulvaney was all frazzled, because many of the other students are Muslim. Muslims aren’t permitted to live in a co-ed situation, I guess.

I’ll take pictures of the house and post them soon. Take care. Keep in touch!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I really think you should have said the garden was awash with roses. :) Glad the house is nice.