A Belle in Belfast City...

Our morning correspondent is Vince Matia:

Hello from Northern Ireland!After two weeks of studying, two flights, rain, thunder, lightning and a ton of coloring books, we are finally here.

Our Ireland adventure began Sunday afternoon. I got to the Cleveland Hopkins Airport around two o'clock on Sunday. They say that Sundays are the best days to travel because Sundays are the least crowded, but I say nay nay. Wow! it was swamped with travelers. The line stretched as far as the eye could see! Individually we were greeted by Mrs. Duarte, who informed us to check in. We all eventually got into the ridiculously long line to check our 44 pound bags. Then a Continental worker who took his job way to seriously began to escort us around and continually, and annoyingly asked if anyone needed help. First he was in a yellow, yes, yellow sport coat and directing people into the “check bags” line. Everyone in that line had large 45+ pound suitcases that would never fit anywhere besides the cargo area of a plane. But he kept asking, “Is anyone not checking their bags? Anyone?.....................Anyone at all?...........Checking you bags?”

Sir! you have directed these people by yourself into the “check bag” line because they had such a enormous bag. And on top of that, you can visually see the large luggage items we have. Yes!!!!! We are checking these bags! Stop asking!

After the yellow sport coat man cooled off, we all said our last goodbyes to our families and headed toward security. The lot of us were excited to begin our journey to Belfast, Northern Ireland. All of us waited in line to be serviced by one of the charming TSA workers. Why is it that the TSA security people are the nastiest, meanest, grumpiest people? Yet, you walk about one hundred yards an onto your plane and the flight attendants are extremely happy to be accompanying you to sunny Newark, New Jersey (or anywhere else for that matter).

The plane ride to Newark was... interesting. Some of us were next to each other and some were not. Emily, Colleen and Myself sat in the same row and I promptly browsed through the magazines. Sky Mall is my favorite with all its wonderful and completely useless items. Anyone want a $975 suit of armor? Anyone want a $1050 sarcophagus? If you do, Sky Mall is the place to go.

We taxied for a little while before the heavens opened up and it began to storm. Meanwhile, Emily is sitting next to me watching the lightning come closer and closer and louder and louder. She was, to say the absolute least, a bit frazzled. So I directed her to the emergency pamphlet of our plane to clam her nerves. Needless to say, we were delayed a few minutes. However, once the skies cleared up, it was smooth sailing to Newark, not including the few minutes of terrifying turbulence.

There we had dinner at a diner in the Newark Airport before hiking ten miles to our gate for our flight to Belfast. Once there we waited for the extremely nice flight attendant to inform us to board the plane to Belfast, Northern Ireland. While on the 5 ½ hour ride there, Nina came up with the most ingenious way of silencing awkward strangers. If someone next to you is annoying and you wish to be left alone, just pull out any children's coloring book and begin to color with your box of 124 Crayola crayons. And if they continue to talk, just start coloring outside the lines. Anyway, the long plane ride to Ireland went smoothly. The entertainment on board was very convenient to have, most of us watched a movie or two before falling asleep for the rest of the flight. Only to be awoken by the sudden diarrhea from that high quality airplane dinner! Our plane landed in one piece, we all made it through customs safely (no illegal immigrants here!) and we met up with Mr. Bizga outside the Belfast Airport.

We then got onto a bus and it drove us to our dorms at the Queens University. Did you know that they don't have stoplights in Ireland? Most of the intersections are roundabouts. And on top of that they drive on the opposite side of the street. This is going to take a little while to get used to!

Belfast is really beautiful! The countryside is so green! When our bus dropped us off at our dorm at the Queen's University, we got our keys and unpacked our bags. The dorms are nice, we each have our own bathroom with a sink, water closet and shower. Its quite nice but really small. I have to bend over to get my hair wet! We all had sandwiches for lunch/breakfast in the common room, and we started to drift to sleep. Mr. Bizga wanted us to keep moving to prevent jet lag, so he took us on a tour of the area. Although we were tired, we were excited to finally be in Ireland!

Our afternoon correspondent is Sarah Cifelli:

Good evening from Queens! Sarah here, with news on our first full day from remarkable Belfast, Northern Ireland. All of us are extremely tired, I must say, but we are forced to stay awake until at least 7:00 p.m. because otherwise we will completely screw up our sleeping schedule. Mr. Bizga expressed that the first day will be tough and miserable making the adjustment to the new time. The majority of us have not slept in approximately 33 hours which is honestly a rather enjoyable feeling... We’ve had rather gloomy weather today with lots of rain and clouds; a lovely welcome that completely proved to us our previous assumptions of Irish weather. This afternoon, after eating a nice lunch of sandwiches, soup, and crisps, we each received our weekly stipend of pounds: what we’d all secretly been waiting for since we arrived this morning. Pleased with our stash of strange yet cool-looking money, we suited up in our walking shoes and raingear and clearly looked like a group of American tourists. Mr. Bizga led us in prayer and then we were off for a tour around the streets of Belfast, partially to see the city, and mostly to keep our bodies moving to fight the tremendous jet-lag.

First we saw the massively impressive Queens University, a place straight out of Harry Potter. Then we walked many blocks to the city centre, stopping across from Robinson’s and The Crown, two of the oldest pubs in Belfast. These pubs are across from the Europa Hotel that was a common target for bombings during the Troubles and has been rebuilt numerous times. Our next stop was a quaint library, Linen Hall, holding a myriad of books by, on, about, and of everything Irish. It is said that it has the largest political collection in the world. We quietly climbed the creaky stairs to the main library and then proceeded to pick out the biggest and most ancient looking leather-bound and golden paged books and took some pictures. We made our way back onto the street and saw the very impressive Belfast City Hall. We eventually entered the glorious Victoria Square, my soon-to-be favorite place here. This heavenly place (a shopping mall) is complete with limitless swirly staircases and escalators and a huge glass dome overlooking the city. We didn’t have time to stop and browse stores today, but we will return on Thursday. After taking a ridiculous amount of group photos in the glass dome, we departed for the next length of our walk.

Our last stop was the lovely Merchant Hotel, a place we all felt slightly underdressed. We enjoyed high tea and it was amazing. I enjoyed three cups of merchant tea blend from a cute little teapot, and then treated myself to deliciously rich scones. A few others ordered beautiful mocha cappuccino grande latte something-or-others that looked rather pretty in their tall, clear glasses. Mind you that this entire time we are all fighting to keep our eyes open, keeping ourselves moving so that we do not just collapse to sleep in the street. All that tea did help a little though, keeping me conscious for a few more hours. After high tea, we caught some cabs home. I consistently forget that the roads are opposite here, so I get extremely confused when getting into cabs, crossing roads, etc. Four to a cab, we rode back to the Elms Residence halls and drudged inside. At 5:45, we hopped in our cabs, and a short drive later we arrived at Pizza Express. Although this sounds like a fast food restaurant, it was an extremely chic pizza joint. We each enjoyed a delicious pizza, leaving were hardly any leftovers. At first, Sami’s order came out wrong with chesse (she is a vegan) and she had to sadly wait for a new pizza, leaving us happily with an extra pizza to take home. We walked in the drizzling rain back home to Elms, went in to hang out a bit, and finally went to sleep. Lexi, Katie Bolas, Nina and I walked down to the BP gas station, just down the street, in search of more plug converters for the computers. We found none, but did return with Jones cream soda, gummy worms (snakes, actually), and other snacks to enjoy. After a day of jet-lag, walking in the rain, caffeine, and having mishaps with my room key 3 times (yes, already all on my first day here), I was sure to sleep for basically the rest of my life. Quite an adventurous day, I must say. Belfast is going to be an interesting place to be sure. Well, I’m off to bed, friends. Cheers!