Visitors from the West

[Update]: Photoblog has also been updated--link can be found to the right.

The best gift I got this year for my birthday happened to be the gift of family--as much as I enjoy living here, it's definitely been hard living so far away from everyone else, despite the ease of communication. When I got an email from Grandma inviting me to dinner on my birthday, I was thrilled!

Grandma and Grandpa Dary arrived in Cork this past Monday, after two plane flights and a train ride. Once they were settled in the Gresham Metropole and we'd gotten the chance to talk a bit, I left them for the afternoon to unpack and get some rest before dinner. It was like Christmas, watching them unpack! As soon as I knew that they were going to be coming stopping over in the D.C./Baltimore area, I put together a list of things that I had forgotten or wanted. Most importantly (in my mind) out of all the things to come out of their suitcases were Jiffy Crunchy Peanut Butter (no such thing here), Macaroni and Cheese (I've only ever seen it in a can), and Tizzy (my stuffed rabbit, courtesy of Aunt Cris). Of course, there were other far more important things in there--recording equipment for class, wrist braces, cards from family, and my peacoat (it gets a little chillier here than I thought it would)--but the first three items definitely got my attention. After a little bit of sleep, we met up again in the hotel dining room to enjoy a lovely dinner before I headed back at the request of my Spanish flatmate--according to her, I just had to be home by 9 PM.

Funnily enough (who saw this one coming), I returned to a flat full of people and chocolate, all there to celebrate my birthday. I must admit that while I was suspicious of Barbara's insistence, I certainly didn't expect to see as many people there as I did. To top it all off, she'd even made me a violin cake! Barbara is such a sweetheart.

The next morning was an early start--I had fiddle class (for fifteen minutes) at 10 AM. After dropping my violin off in my flat, I met Grandma and Grandpa for lunch, which we had at Harvey's Cafe in the French Huguenot quarter of the city. After devouring sandwiches, we hopped on the 'Hop On--Hop Off' bus tour of Cork City--it gave Grandma and Grandpa a good idea of the city that I'm living in this year, and made it easy to get some really great pictures of places that would be hard for me to get to. Once again, I was astounded by the driving skills of the bus drivers here--too many windy roads!

After we had finished with the tour, we ended up in Marks and Spencer's for afternoon tea--a delightful affair, complete with tea sandwiches and huge tea cups (about the size of a cereal bowl). Over tea, we dicussed dinner options, and I decided that, rather than go out to a restaurant, I'd rather make dinner for the three of us and my flatmates at the apartment. Besides the fact that they hadn't yet seen the apartment or met my flatmates, cooking dinner for my friends on my birthday is a tradition that I started my freshman year of college and have kept ever since (yes, yes, only three years, I know).

Dinner that night was pasta with chicken, broccoli, garlic, and parmesan in a white wine butter sauce that I concocted on the spot. I had to give a considerable amount of thought to what I was going to make--I don't remember if I've told all of you this or not, but Barbara only eats meat and carbohydrates while Lauren is a vegetarian. It was amusing to watch Barbara trade all of her broccoli for all of Lauren's chicken. During dinner, I received many phone calls--most from friends and family, and one from a 'security guard' (read: guy upstairs) that we later found out was a prank call (this eventually lead to a full-out prank call war involving several apartments that eventually ended when we unplugged our phone. Mature, I know).

The next day was an incredibly busy one--good thing I had a full Irish breakfast with Grandma and Grandpa at the Metropole to get me through the day! After breakfast, I ran to my apartment to pick up my things for class, trekked up the huge hill to the music building, sat through two hours of lecture on twelve tone, ran down to campus to eat lunch and meet with students from my seminar, trekked back up the large hill, played bodhran for thirty minutes, ran back to the apartment to drop off my stuff, and then met Grandma and Grandpa for our last dinner together at the Metropole. Dinner was delicious, but the conversation afterwards was amazing. We said our goodnights, and I went back to my apartment to start on the reading for the next days class.

Luckily for everyone involved, I don't have class on Thursday until 3 PM, meaning that I was able to spend as much time as I could with Grandma and Grandpa before they commenced their long journey back to Oklahoma. After another full Irish breakfast (complete with rice crispies, the only american contribution to my plate), I rode to the train station to with them to wish them a safe trip and say my goodbyes. Saying goodbye is always hard, but it's made even harder when there's no one back at your flat to go home to--Lauren was in Paris; Barbara, in Amsterdam. While the Aero bar that I bought in the train station didn't provide any actual company, it did make me feel a little better.