Great news!! Crack open the champagne!! Bring in the dancing elephants etc etc etc!!! Brace yourself.....
I GOT WIRELESS IN MY DORM!!!!!!!
Yes, thats right!! It finally happened!! After weeks of emails, badgering and just being a general nuisance, they finally fixed the problem and now I can surf to my hearts content.
Modern technology, ya gotta love it!!!
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Monday, October 29, 2007
Song de jour!!
See this boy dance!!! Jamiroquai - Love Foolosophy at the 2003 Fashion Rocks concert.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
The Royal Library, Copenhagen
While I was on my trip to Copenhagen I took a walk in whatever direction I fancied and came across this building. Now it's not just any building! This is the Danish Royal Library!!
It's nicknamed the 'Black Diamond' because most of the building is encased in black marble and glass. It was built in 1999 and is attached to the original royal library built in 1906. It's one of the coolest buildings i've ever seen and after a long walk trying to figure out how to cross the river, I got inside.
The architects, Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen, used the Northern Lights as their inspiration for the interior.
It's attached to the old library by a bridge over the road. Pretty cool.
Inside there's a massive library (obviously), theatre, restaurant, etc, and a fantastic atrium that gives great views over the river. The coolest thing about the building itself is when you walk beside it on the the other side of the river. Because of the materials they used to build it, you can see the water reflected on the outside walls, which make sthe whole building seem to shimmer.
You really have to see it for yourself to get the proper effect. But one of the most interesting things about the library is it's theft record. Between 1968 and 1978, the library saw one of the largest book thefts ever. Someone had managed to steal some 3200 historical books worth more than $50 million and some of them were pretty important. No one figured it out till 1975!!! The thief was an employee of the library's oriental department and he had been selling the books at auctions. He left the remainder of the books to his family. But they ended up being arrested and imprisioned when the police coped on. Have to hate that!!!
It's nicknamed the 'Black Diamond' because most of the building is encased in black marble and glass. It was built in 1999 and is attached to the original royal library built in 1906. It's one of the coolest buildings i've ever seen and after a long walk trying to figure out how to cross the river, I got inside.
The architects, Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen, used the Northern Lights as their inspiration for the interior.
It's attached to the old library by a bridge over the road. Pretty cool.
Inside there's a massive library (obviously), theatre, restaurant, etc, and a fantastic atrium that gives great views over the river. The coolest thing about the building itself is when you walk beside it on the the other side of the river. Because of the materials they used to build it, you can see the water reflected on the outside walls, which make sthe whole building seem to shimmer.
You really have to see it for yourself to get the proper effect. But one of the most interesting things about the library is it's theft record. Between 1968 and 1978, the library saw one of the largest book thefts ever. Someone had managed to steal some 3200 historical books worth more than $50 million and some of them were pretty important. No one figured it out till 1975!!! The thief was an employee of the library's oriental department and he had been selling the books at auctions. He left the remainder of the books to his family. But they ended up being arrested and imprisioned when the police coped on. Have to hate that!!!
Monday, October 22, 2007
From Limerick to Berlin, and every disco i've been in.....
Made it back from my flying visit to Ireland in one piece. Well just about!! Arrived into Dublin early on Friday morning all set for a 21st down in Limerick city. After a quick lunch with Amanda we (Me, Nicki and Aoife) pointed the car in the direction of Limerick. Well actually we headed a good bit in the Galway direction first and then realising our slight miscalculation we schwung it round and went cross country. We arrived eventually, about 4 hours later, and got ready for the party. The 21st was for one of the girls that was with us in San Diego over the summer. It was the first time since July that i'd seen some of the people there so there was plenty of catchin up to be done. One of the highlights had to be a big glass of Nashs Red Lemonade half way through the night. I hit the wall around 1 which wasn't too bad considering i'd been up since 5 the morning before!!
The next day we hung around for a while then got the bus back to Dublin. I was shocked that it was only €10 one way from Limerick. Its €13 one way to Castleblayney which is not even half the journey it is to Limerick! The injustice of the world!! Anyway, we were pretty wrecked so we had a quiet night in and got a good nights kip. Sunday then was a day of faffin around Dublin and meeting people I hadn't seen in a while. All in all a good weekend, except for the ridiculously early Ryanair flight back to Berlin this morning!! Ryanair is not the best option for when you want to get some sleep during a flight as you have to be 4" 3 to have any leg-room!!
Thats all the travelling over for a while now anyway! I have the big bruv and Eva coming to visit next weekend which I can't wait for!! It'll be nice having familiar faces around for a few days. I'm gonna take it easy now for the next few days and recover from the weekend. Shouldn't take too long but it's a good excuse to be lazy!! I leave with Roisin Murphys, of Moloko fame, new song. It's a cracker!! Enjoy!!
P.S. Thanks to Mary for the directions on the way down. We would've ended up in Galway if it wasn't for her!!
The next day we hung around for a while then got the bus back to Dublin. I was shocked that it was only €10 one way from Limerick. Its €13 one way to Castleblayney which is not even half the journey it is to Limerick! The injustice of the world!! Anyway, we were pretty wrecked so we had a quiet night in and got a good nights kip. Sunday then was a day of faffin around Dublin and meeting people I hadn't seen in a while. All in all a good weekend, except for the ridiculously early Ryanair flight back to Berlin this morning!! Ryanair is not the best option for when you want to get some sleep during a flight as you have to be 4" 3 to have any leg-room!!
Thats all the travelling over for a while now anyway! I have the big bruv and Eva coming to visit next weekend which I can't wait for!! It'll be nice having familiar faces around for a few days. I'm gonna take it easy now for the next few days and recover from the weekend. Shouldn't take too long but it's a good excuse to be lazy!! I leave with Roisin Murphys, of Moloko fame, new song. It's a cracker!! Enjoy!!
P.S. Thanks to Mary for the directions on the way down. We would've ended up in Galway if it wasn't for her!!
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Back in Berlin!
Got back into Berlin from Copenhagen on Monday night around 10ish. Had a great weekend! Copenhagen is a beautiful city and everyone speaks English so its easy to get around. I put up a load of pictures which you can find on the right hand side. Bear in mind that I didn't really know what I was looking at when I took the pictures so please excuse me if I missed something really important or took a photo of something irrelevant!!
When I first arrived in Berlin, the people I talked to were proud to infrom me that Berlin is the city with the most trees in Europe. Well it was something like that but the jist of it is that there's loads of trees!! So as Autumn moves along the whole city is turning into a very colourful place. At the bottom of the road where we live is a small park, which houses Biesdorf Castle. Me and two of the girls from DIT (Kate & Orla) went for a walk through it and took some pictures.
The pictures don't really do it justice. It really was incredible and we had great craic kicking leaves and trying not to get caught by the park warden who just swept them up!!!
When I first arrived in Berlin, the people I talked to were proud to infrom me that Berlin is the city with the most trees in Europe. Well it was something like that but the jist of it is that there's loads of trees!! So as Autumn moves along the whole city is turning into a very colourful place. At the bottom of the road where we live is a small park, which houses Biesdorf Castle. Me and two of the girls from DIT (Kate & Orla) went for a walk through it and took some pictures.
The pictures don't really do it justice. It really was incredible and we had great craic kicking leaves and trying not to get caught by the park warden who just swept them up!!!
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Copenhagen bound!!
Just a quick post to update everybody. Not much happened this week. Leaving for Copenhagen tomorrow night so if anyone has any suggestions of things to see or do please leave a comment or email me!!
I'll post again when I get back with lots of pics!!!
I leave you with this. Has to be one of the funniest menus i've ever seen!!! Knackers and Dicke Knackers!!
I'll post again when I get back with lots of pics!!!
I leave you with this. Has to be one of the funniest menus i've ever seen!!! Knackers and Dicke Knackers!!
Friday, October 05, 2007
1 week in!!
Just finished my first week as a FHTW student and overall it was pretty god. Now this wasn't your stereotypical week and I doubt i'll ever have one like it again. It started fairly slowly. I didn't realise my German Language lectures didn't start till next week so I wasted most of Monday waiting around in college fo nothing. Tuesday on the otherhand was a full 10-5 day. Started with a bit of International Management and finished with an intro to my Corporate Finance course. Both are set to be pretty interesting as i've never really done either before.
Wednesday had to be the highlight of the week though!! The 3rd of October was German Re-unification Day so it was basically like a midweek bank holiday. So instead of lectures we headed down to the Brandenburg Gate for a massive free concert, courtesy of Coca Cola. Now all the acts were in German but the atmosphere was great and over half a million to a million people were there!!
After that we went for a few drinks in an Aussie pub run by Germans (kinda weird) and headed back to the dorms. Thursday was fairly quiet. The first lecture on a Thursday, Innovation and New Technology, doesn't start for another 2 weeks so I wasn't in till 5 when I had Cross Border Invetments and Taxation. What that, you might ask?? Well I don't really know, but I plan to by January!!!
So thats week 1 down, only 16 odd more to go!! We're planning a trip to a lakeland area in west Berlin tomorrow so i'll let ya know how that goes. Gotta run so i'll post again when I can!!
Wednesday had to be the highlight of the week though!! The 3rd of October was German Re-unification Day so it was basically like a midweek bank holiday. So instead of lectures we headed down to the Brandenburg Gate for a massive free concert, courtesy of Coca Cola. Now all the acts were in German but the atmosphere was great and over half a million to a million people were there!!
After that we went for a few drinks in an Aussie pub run by Germans (kinda weird) and headed back to the dorms. Thursday was fairly quiet. The first lecture on a Thursday, Innovation and New Technology, doesn't start for another 2 weeks so I wasn't in till 5 when I had Cross Border Invetments and Taxation. What that, you might ask?? Well I don't really know, but I plan to by January!!!
So thats week 1 down, only 16 odd more to go!! We're planning a trip to a lakeland area in west Berlin tomorrow so i'll let ya know how that goes. Gotta run so i'll post again when I can!!
Monday, October 01, 2007
And so it begins!
My first lecture is starting in a few hours so i'm killing some time in the computer room. I was looking forward to a sleep in this morning because my class doesn't start till 2 today, but I was kindly reminded last night that there was a welcome meeting for all the new students this morning at 9!! So in we went and stood through an hour and a half of German people speaking German that none of us understood. Not a good start to the week.
I booked a load of flights on Friday for the next few months. I'm goin to Copenhagen in a few weeks to see some DIT friends on erasmus. Then there's the family reunion thing in Adare in December, as well as Christmas. I also found a rail card that will get me half price travel which will come in very handy over the next few months!!
I met up with my exchange buddy Christina and some of her friends yesterday to watch the end of the Berlin Marathon. We were just in front of the Brandenburg Gate, about 100 metres from the finish line. As usual the winners were either from Ethiopia or Kenya. There were people across from us with Irish flags but they never got excited about anyone. The place was packed and the atmosphere was really good despite the odd spit of rain.
I left Christina and her firends after a while to meet up with the Irish crowd to watch the match in the Oscar Wilde, a quality Irish pub. We sat down to our beans, sausages and chips and slowly slipped into a mild state of depression as the match went on. I'm not going to get into it now cause i'll only get myself worked up, but all i'll say is that Geordan Murphy is a legend and Ronan O'Gara should wake up. Unbelieveable!!! We had good craic though and there was an Irish guy, Tom, from Galway who had no shame in shouting hilarious vulgarities at the screen. It helped lighten the mood a little.
So from now on in i'm back in college mode. It'll be interesting to see if there are many differences between here and home. When I was picking my subjects I made sure to get some classes that aren't full of Erasmus people, just to mix it up a little. Anyway, i'm gonna run and get some food before I collapse. Slept in this morning and had to rush to make it for that feckin meeting thing. What a waste!!
I booked a load of flights on Friday for the next few months. I'm goin to Copenhagen in a few weeks to see some DIT friends on erasmus. Then there's the family reunion thing in Adare in December, as well as Christmas. I also found a rail card that will get me half price travel which will come in very handy over the next few months!!
I met up with my exchange buddy Christina and some of her friends yesterday to watch the end of the Berlin Marathon. We were just in front of the Brandenburg Gate, about 100 metres from the finish line. As usual the winners were either from Ethiopia or Kenya. There were people across from us with Irish flags but they never got excited about anyone. The place was packed and the atmosphere was really good despite the odd spit of rain.
I left Christina and her firends after a while to meet up with the Irish crowd to watch the match in the Oscar Wilde, a quality Irish pub. We sat down to our beans, sausages and chips and slowly slipped into a mild state of depression as the match went on. I'm not going to get into it now cause i'll only get myself worked up, but all i'll say is that Geordan Murphy is a legend and Ronan O'Gara should wake up. Unbelieveable!!! We had good craic though and there was an Irish guy, Tom, from Galway who had no shame in shouting hilarious vulgarities at the screen. It helped lighten the mood a little.
So from now on in i'm back in college mode. It'll be interesting to see if there are many differences between here and home. When I was picking my subjects I made sure to get some classes that aren't full of Erasmus people, just to mix it up a little. Anyway, i'm gonna run and get some food before I collapse. Slept in this morning and had to rush to make it for that feckin meeting thing. What a waste!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)