The day started like the usual day, specifically just like yesterday. I went through the daily routine followed by the walk to Sancta Maria College. I started the day with Jenny to get used to her 1st Years, 3rd Years, and 2nd Year students. From there, I took my lunch break to introduce myself to the athletics "chairman" just to see if there was any opportunities that I could be part of or help out at least. The lady I talked to was Denise. She was so grateful of me stating that I have a minor in coaching and even played several sports. She explained to me that they had a GAA training session this afternoon at 13.00 and that if I wanted to see how it goes to go to the "pitch" around that time. Also, she said that Suzanne was an advisor for the students who wanted to play basketball on Thursdays around lunch time. I told her that I would be willing to help in anyway that I could and that I would attend all if not most of the sessions that I could. Denise was so ecstatic and said "You are only here for four weeks??? Darn!"
After talking with Denise, I went and ate my lunch a little ahead of time to see about catching the GAA training session. Sure enough...due to the bad weather (very seldom to occur) the session was cancelled for the day. This allowed me more time to look up math related content in Ireland while also looking up certain events to attend during our stay. After lunch I went back with Jenny to finish the day of observations. This time was well spent as I was able to work with individual students on problems or any questions that they had during the time spent in the classroom. Jenny had 4th years (or transition year students - even though they have 6 years of schooling, only 5 years truly count; the 4th years do very little work and most of the time is spent in a vocational setting or working outside the classroom with little or no homework given), followed by 6th years. She also has a period where she is on call, but is able to go to the staff room and work on stuff (somewhat like a planning period).
After finishing the day off, my roommate and I walked back to the house to get ready for dinner. Sure enough a couple of our friends mentioned that they were in Dublin and was on Henry St where a variety of stores and restaurants were at. We decided to join them and eat dinner there - we talked to Catherine about leaving for the evening and we then went off to the bus stop. Now they say that all the buses have free wi-fi that you can join so that you know where you are going. Rule of thumb: do not sit at the extreme areas on the bus, make sure you sit near the middle of the bus whether above or on the first floor. We found this out the hard way. The entire way into the city we had no wi-fi and couldn't really tell where to get off.
By this time it was already around 19.00 when we actually had a good setting of where we were at in Dublin. We walked past several stores and restaurants including movie theaters, video game stores, fish & chip restaurants, Pennys (or as I call them "JC-Less Pennys"), and even an ALDI's. Also, we ran as far down as the Jameson factory. (The map below kinda shows our progress last night...to say the lest we easily hit 15,000 steps or somewhere around 7 miles of walking!). We finally stopped at one Fish & Chips place that seemed fairly packed for the time. As we walked in sat down and was waited on. Sure enough we waited too long as they were out of serving fish. Therefore, we moved on to another Fish & Chips place just down the corner on O'Connell Street just before the Spire. Fresh haddock and chips with a grand original Bulmers Irish Ale, just around 12 euro. It was very delicious and well worth the extra walk.
At this point, we saw that the time was just about 21.00 and figured we should call it a night and head back home. When we got on the bus this time we made sure to sit near the middle of the bus. The ride home this time was a lot easier because the weather in the evening was fairly nice so we did not have to worry about listening to the names of the stops compared to just looking outside the window. The day before Catherine gave me a key to their house or front door just in case we stayed out later than they were up. So we were able to get home and inside warmth with no problem. By the time I checked my emails and my typical routine of bookmarked sites to check it was already 23.30. It was for sure time for bed. Tomorrow is another observation day with a great opportunity to work with some students during lunchtime who would like to play basketball!
