Six Days Away!

Hi everyone.

My trip to Ireland begins only 6 days from now! I wanted to create a blog so that I can more easily share my experiences with everyone. I am going through IU's Cultural Immersion Project to finish my student teaching. I have been a part of this program since October 2008; since this time I have been studying Ireland and learning about their culture. My trip seemed so distant and not actually real when I started. It's crazy that it's all closing in so fast!

I will be staying in Cabinteely, Ireland (County Dublin). It's on the east coast, very near Dublin. It's an extremely beautiful area from what I hear and from pictures I've seen. Bono lives very close to where I'll be staying! I will be living with a host family. There is a husband, wife, 17-year-old son, and 12-year-old daughter. I am very much looking forward to meeting them.

The school I will be teaching at is called Kill-O-The-Grange. I love the name:) I talked to the principal on the phone last week, she of course had a beautiful accent! For the first two weeks of my visit I will just be roaming the school and observing all the different grades (they actually call them "Year 1, Year 2", etc.) Then I will have a two week Easter break because it's a Catholic school. After my break I will be able to choose what Year I would like to actually spend the rest of the time with. Here's the website to the school: http://homepage.eircom.net/~kogrange/

I will be traveling with my friend Stephanie. We met at IU through education classes, and became closer through the Cultural Immersions Project. Our host moms are sisters, and we will be living within just a few miles of one another. We will not be teaching at the same school though, but we do plan to spend some time together in the evenings and on weekends.

During my two week break I will be traveling to London to see Andrew!!! I am very excited:) He is on a world tour right now and will be in England, Scotland, and Ireland during my break. I am praying to be able to spend this whole time with him, but I'm waiting to hear from the travel agents. I haven't seen him since January 5th so it would be fantastic to get to spend a good amount of time with him.

Thanks for visiting my blog. I hope to have exciting pictures and posts for those of you who would like to follow. I have a picture of Ireland below. I will be in the Leinster province, County Dublin.

Kacy