First encounter with the 'Place of Shells'

Yesterday it was time to say goodbye. Goodbye to the view that I now have ambivalent feelings about, excitement and frustration. Goodbye to the vacation rental where I spent the last 14 days and goodbye to the boredom.

We have finally moved into the school and that leads me to reveal what I am actually doing here in Ireland.

I am here with the Gudrun Frey Foundation, which sends Teaching & Boarding Assistants to England, Northern Ireland, Thailand, and Ireland every year. The organization is based in Jena and I became aware of it through an acquaintance, as it seemed like something for me. Now I am employed at the Sligo Grammar School and will help with German lessons and work in the boarding house, where the students sleep and live while attending school.

I now also live in this boarding house, since our move yesterday. My room is quite small, but I am already used to little space from my old room at home. I feel a bit like Harry Potter in his 'Cupboard under the stairs', as everything here is also very noisy. However, I am happy with my little retreat and fortunately, there is no Dudley Dursley living above me, jumping around above my head for fun.

Everyone here has welcomed us warmly and is happy about the additional help. There is also another staff member living in my house. Carla is 29, from Chile, and helps in the neighboring church and the boarding house. She is glad that someone is finally living in the house again, as she has been here since January and couldn't really have contact with others during the lockdown. So now we are waiting for the arrival of the girls who will keep us company here.

Since we are finally allowed to go out again, Marco and I have started to explore our new hometown. Sligo has about 20,000 inhabitants and is therefore much larger than my small village in NRW, where everyone knows each other and pretty much everyone is related.

Here, there is the perfect mix of small-town flair and the feeling of anonymity, where you could disappear into the crowd at any time.

Sligo translates to the 'Place of Shells' and I can now completely understand that, as there is really a lot of water here. I can see the river from my window, it flows right through the city, so you can walk over numerous bridges, you can hear it in the city center, and the Atlantic coast is just a stone's throw away. Since my favorite element is water, I have absolutely no problem with that and enjoy the change from home, where I have to settle for the Dortmund-Ems Canal.

With so much new happening in the first few days and all the changes falling upon us like Irish drizzle, I start to compare my old home and my temporary home."

In Ireland, you drive on the wrong side, at least from our perspective. Two hands are not enough to count how many times I have almost been run over because I remember my elementary school days: left, right, left. However, everything has turned out fine so far and I hope that I will get used to the fact that this island does everything completely differently from the rest of the world.

In addition, the traffic lights here take forever. Marco and I have already cheated a few times and just crossed the street at red (sorry, Mom), as it really takes a long time for the pedestrians to finally get their turn. I would say that in Germany for the past 19 years of my life, I was spoiled by traffic lights. So from now on, I have to be patient and try to avoid traffic accidents.

Another criticism from me would be the useless switches on the power outlets that are everywhere here. You can't just use the power outlet; no, you have to additionally operate a switch to activate the power outlet. Over time, I have become better at unconsciously pressing the switch, but I still often think that my cable or the power outlet is broken.

However, Ireland's advantages outweigh all this, and I stop getting upset about such trivial things.

The landscape here really shows why Ireland is called the Emerald Isle. Everything looks like something out of a J.R.R. Tolkien fantasy novel and I look forward to seeing more soon. More sheep, more mountains, more meadows, and more water.

Marco and I still have a few days before school starts here and we are now exploring the surroundings. Sligo offers a tremendous number of opportunities to take thousands of photos and fill up our storage. But it's not just our phone galleries that are expanding, but also our walking distance. Since Thursday, we have been racking up our step counters again after sitting and lying down for the past 14 days. It is a wonderful change and I am excited to finally walk through the streets, observe the local people, and integrate into the city.

So far, the weather is still cooperating to some extent. After mostly initial rain, the clouds are slowly clearing and the sun is coming out. It is not really warm, as the wind from the coast still blows, but it is a nice change from the rain, which is really quite present here.

The next entry will be when school finally starts, and until then: Tabhair aire (Take care) and God bless.