Today was like a normal Thursday besides the fact that Italian class was exceptionally long and difficult. Somehow Nadia (teacher) thinks that explaining all of the grammar sections in Italian makes it easiest for us to understand. I, however, disagree. She got so frustrated with us and we were so frustrated with her that noone left class happy campers today. After class I ran up to check the status of the laundry I had thrown into the dryer right before Italian. I found my dark load, which consisted of all of my sweaters and jeans for Ireland, still wet. My light load, however, with nothing important at all in it, was very, very dry. Figures.

I went back down to my room and listened to my music while I mentally packed and decided all of the items of clothing that I wanted to bring along on the trip. Eventually the clothes were dry so I packed up and headed downstairs to meet up with the group (9 other girls… yeahhhh my kind of group). You may be asking yourself why I would ever go on a trip with that many females. Well! The answer is that I didn't have a choice in the matter if I wanted to go to Ireland. I was supposed to go with Natalie but she didn't end up having the funds necessary for the tickets and such. Anyways, I'm downstairs before most of the rest of the people going on the trip which was DEFINITELY a first.I was downstairs a little before 530. Most everyone was there at 540. It was then that we decided to tell the porter to call us our taxi. Who knew that it was a common occurrence for taxis to just not be in the area ready to be hailed. Well, we waited for a taxi until about 6:10. We finally were able to get one to come to our school and we were on our way. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 8:30. It takes about an hour to get to the airport. We were nervous but confident we would make it there. We ended up taking a crazy way there and made it with enough time.

We have to check in at the ticket booth before we go through security. It was about that time when one of the girls in our group realized that she bought tickets for the wrong weekend. She had tickets for Dublin for next weekend… after trying, unsuccessfully, to change her ticket we had to part ways; we went through security and she got into a taxi to go back to Rome.Apparently, unbeknownst to me, that has been a reoccurring issue through past travels.

We made it through security and had just enough time to get a sandwich before heading through passport control to wait by our gate. We took the bus to our plane, in the usual RyanAir fashion, took our seats and were off.The flight was basically uneventful and consisted of a 1.80 euro half-can of 7up and some sorting of pictures. It was about time to start our descent when we started to hit some turbulence. It ended up being one of the most turbulent descents I've ever experienced. Apparently Dublin, Ireland is experiencing some 30 mph winds and there are some places where people are told to stay inside. Perfect.

I won't let apparent hurricane-level winds ruin my experiences. Cliffs of Moher here I come!

Our hostel ended up being pretty nice for being 9 euros a night.The guy at the desk was awesome and very helpful. We got the sheets on our bed, went out for a late-night snack and while the other chicks (minus Ashley) went out to a bar I came back to the Dublin hostel to try to cancel my hostel in Galway and just take the girl's spot who wasn't able to make it. After that mission was a success, Ashley and I stayed in and watched TV in ENGLISH which was very refreshing. We met some French guys in the lobby, watched BBC, and went to bed. Guinness Brewery and Galway tomorrow!! :)