Ireland Journal
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Liz Weir visits Study Abroad Ireland!
The participants in Study Abroad Ireland had the pleasure and privilege of hearing Liz Weir in class on Monday, June 27th. Liz stayed with us for the whole morning, and during that time she told us 18 stories, provided us with her wisdom on the art and practice of storytelling, responded to questions, and gave…
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Orla McGovern visits Study Abroad Ireland!
Orla McGovern visited Study Abroad Ireland in Athlone on Wednesday, June 23, 2022. Orla is an actor, writer, event organizer, and storyteller based in Galway. The participants were captivated by her compelling style of storytelling and how they felt pulled into her stories. Here are some of their comments: Isabel Abadia: I observed the way…
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Delicious Day on the Antrim Coast
Saturday and Sunday, June 9 and 10, 2018 After the bus left Loughcrew to take the students back to Athlone, I drove up to spend the weekend with Liz Weir at Our third stop was at Ballygally Castle in Ballygally and on Ballygally Bay. Clockwise from the top left: tapas and gin cocktails and two…
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Free Weekend!
Saturday and Sunday, June 9 and 10, 2018 The students returned home from Loughcrew late afternoon on Friday. With Saturday and Sunday completely open, many of them ventured out into the country. On Monday we heard reports from Cork, Galway, and Westport among others. I had driven my own car to Loughcrew so that I…
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Loughcrew
Friday, June 8, 2018 The first Friday of the program is the day we go to Loughcrew in County Meath. It’s part of the Boyne Valley Neolithic ceremonial complex that includes Newgrange. As Jean McMann notes in her book, Loughcrew: The Cairns, “People have probably been telling stories about the Loughcrew Hills for more than…
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First Week of Classes
Tuesday, June 5, 2018: The Irish Storytelling Tradition meets from 9:00 – 11:30 a.m. Monday through Thursday for the four weeks of the program. Since the first Monday of June is a holiday, our first class was on Tuesday. I met the students in the carpark outside our apartments at 8:45 a.m. to walk them…
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Excursion to Emo Court and The Rock of Dunamase
Monday, June 4, 2018: The first Monday in June is a Bank Holiday in Ireland. (Christopher Gettens – aka Christmas Glasses – followed by Nancy Wolter and me at Dunamase.)
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Orientation and Walking Tour of Athlone
Sunday, June 3, 2018 We use one of the apartments in the complex as a computer lab. It’s on the ground floor in the block across the parking lot from the one we stay in, next to the manager's office. We met there at 10:00 on Sunday morning for our on-site orientation. Jet-lag was much…
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Where Are We?
Study Abroad Ireland is based in Athlone, Co. Westmeath, in the Midlands of Ireland. When we meet Irish people who don’t live in the Midlands, and we tell them we stay in Athlone they are astonished. They almost always ask, “Why?” Why would we come all the way from America to stay in Athlone? In…
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Getting Settled
Saturday, June 2, 2018 Goal for the day: Stay awake until 8:00 p.m. without taking a nap. We arrived in Dublin at 8:00 a.m., which is midnight Arizona time. I didn’t sleep on the plane this time, so I was worried about driving from the airport to Athlone. In some past years, I’ve had to…
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Travel
Friday, June 1, 2018 This is my twelfth Study Abroad Ireland trip and I’ve given up on the idea of packing light. First, since we usually experience all the seasons during an Irish June, we have to pack for sweltering to freezing, soaking to semi-dry. I always tell students to bring one of everything from…
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My Biggest Irish Storytelling Tradition Class Ever!
“Storytelling is a thorny business.” (Saint Patrick, upon encountering the complexity of Irish stories.) I have 28 students in my Irish Storytelling Tradition Class this summer. That is my biggest class ever. In fact, that’s the most people I’ve ever had in any college storytelling class. Previous summers I’ve had anywhere from nine to seventeen…