Drinking Habits in Ireland

Since my sister recently moved to Dublin, I have now a first hand source for all kinds of funny, intersting, strange cultural differences between us Austrians and the Irish. First thing she noticed on the green Island was that she, a lover of wine, was completely lost. Of course given the meteorologic preconditions (not so sunny, not so warm, lots of rain) she did not expect to find tons of great wines in Ireland. Unfortunatly she really despices beer and therefore she feels kind of an alien. After several weeks of drinking soda on the weekly pub evening with friends apparently some of them felt sorry for her and started a risky expedtion: finding a pub, that serves "good" wine for Anna. And look, what they found:

 

First step towards feeling at ease with the new home.

Discovering the world of Apps that help you study - gFlash+

Until two months ago I was strictly against Smartphones. I saw no good in them. Constant ringing, having to text all of your friends all the time, never stop looking up things on wikipedia --- uah... horrifying.
But now that my good old phone, with a battery that lasted for 5 days (yes, those still exist) died (RIP); and my sister moving to Dublin (I can not just text her the old way or I will have an enormous bill every month) I decided to join the dark side. I purchased a Smart-Phone.
As it turnes out, those things are not so stupid after all! It can even help you studying. Last year I spent hours and hours and hours producing flashcards with english and russian vocabulary on them. Just to go through them once and then never look at them again because producing them had already taken all the time I had to study them. This year I discovered gFlash+.

This simple App makes it possible to simply turn a google spreadsheet with your vocabulary into flashcards witch you than can learn with your smartphone whenever and wherever it pleases you. Fantastic! I am not yet a master in gFlah+ but intend on becoming one very soon. Of course I will share all my experience with you guys.

Have a nice Weekend!

"The Awful German Language" by Mark Twain

Just in case you don't know who Mark Twain is/was:
Whoever heard about Tom Sawyer and Huckleyberry Finn, has heard about Mark Twain too. Samuel Langhorn Clemens, how Mark Twain is actually called, is the author of this two fabulous books. He lived in the second half of 19th century and is an important American Author. So important that William Faulkner called him "the father of American literature" once.

Maybe you already knew who Mark Twain is. Maybe you even know all this information already. But I am pretty sure that there are not so many people out there to know this about this great man:

somewhen between is birth in 1838 and the publishing date of his book “A Tramp Abroad” in 1880 Mark Twain payed Heidelberg a visit. Staying in Germany for several months he took the effort to learn our complicated language. After wards he wrote about it in his book mentioned above. He wrote about all the little quirks of German.

First is frustrated by the many exceptions to every rule. Next he is completely lost in the cases-jungle. Later tells about him being taken aback by the, to english ears/eys, unusually long sentences. And at somepoint he talks about the very strange habit of us german speakers to talke about little girls in the neutra.

Should you now be as curious about looking at our language from the perspective of this great American Author. Please be my guest and check this out.


Have fun!

ASL - American Sign Language

For many, many years I thought, like many, many other people, that Sign Language is an international the same. By now, I know that's a ridiculous idea. When my friend started to work at a kindergarten for children with hearing disabilities, I first got in touch with signing. Together with her I started to learn some useful signs and it got very funny pretty quickly. When we were on a night out we would start to signin in discos. I acutally thought about taking sign language as my second language. But it was not until last week that I really dug in deeper into this matter.

I discovered this new TV-series "switched at birth" where many deaf and hard of hearing people act. One of those Actresses caught my attention and I started researching. Marlee Matlin lost her hearing nearly completley when she was 18 months old. Nonetheless, did she manage to start an acting career. Today she is the first and only deaf Actress to have recieved the Acadamy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. Moreover, she acted in more than 15 movies and several Television productions. In her book "I'll scream later" she writes about her interesting life.

Thanks to this TV-series I now found out that in the US there is actually the world wide first, and unfortunately onliest, University for deaf and hard of hearing students. The Gallaudet University in Washington offers both undergraduate and graduate programms. I also tried to find out something about the educational situation for deaf and hard of hearing people in Austria and Germany. But all I could find, was that people in Germany try now already for several years to start a similar University in Bad Kreuznach. Unfornuately they still didn't manage to do that. 

Global Village

We all know that there are many ERASMUS Students in Graz. But how many do we actually know? Besides the exchange students in our courses of cours.

I didn't know many, but a few weeks ago my friend tragged me to this event.Global Village. I hadn't heard about it before and didn't know what to expect. The moment we arrived at the Meerscheinschlössl I noticed, it had to be something special. There was a long cue lining up outside waiting to be let in.

At the entrance we had to pay € 3,50 entrance fee and than inside there was a big room full with food. Many exchange students who are currently studying in Graz had prepared meals from their home country. The had set up tabels and the visitors could walk arround, taste the food and talk to the students who prepared it. It was really great fun. I tasted stuff I had never even heard about. Sometimes it was delicious and sometimes I just realized that if I am ever going to vist this country, I will have to make a big circle around this meals.

All in all it was a wonderful evening. I talked to people from many different countries like: the Philipines, Jordania, Mexico and many moor. They were very eager to tell me about their country and I was very curious to find out what an impression they have from austria.


I found out that this kind of event takes places two times a year, so once per semester. Next time I'm going to be there as well and I kan just recommend you try it.

Russian How I Met Your Mother

This post is for all How I Met Your Mother fans and my fellow russian students. For those of you who are not that into HIMYM it is fun too.

First of all I am pretty sure everybody at least knows what HIMYM is... And now I am happy to announce that a small russian TV-Channel has made a hilarious low-budget remake from our favourite TV-Series. In the russian version our five friends Ted, Marshall, Lilly, Robin and Barney turned into Dmitri, Pawel, Lucy, Katja und Jura who no longer live in New York but in Moskau. The Bar they spent most of their time in and the upstairs apartment look a lot like the original. Even the camera angles seem similar if not the same. The script follows an exact translation from the english version with a few jokes that had to be addapted. Thanks to working together very closely with the producer of the original series the costumes, accessoires and furniture look very alike. All in all, even without speaking russian fluently it is possible to follow "kak ya vstretil vaschu mamu" if you know the original. And more than anything else it is great fun. See yourself!


For those who would like to have a closer look on this, here is a link where you can watch "kak ya vstretil vaschu mamu" online. Have fun!

Irish Philosophy

I found this printed on a postcard when I first went to Ireland. Ever since that moment this is kind of my pazifier. Whenever something does not work out the way I want this saying tells me not to worry about it.

I hope you like it as much as I do!

Wallis Bird - an extraordinary Irish singer

"The sheer visceral energy could kick-start an entire economy…” - The Irish Times

 I decided to start this blog with a guote because this is just the most striking way of describing Wallis Bird I have ever read. And I am pretty sure however saw her on stage just once will agree.

Wallis Bird (31) is an remarkable singer and songwriter. She grew up in Wexford, Ireland but later moved to Berlin, Mannheim and currently is living in London. From childhood on she was really into music. Nothing could stop her from going her own way and creating amazing music. Neither that she once had all the fingers of her left hand cut off by a lawnmower (four could be sawn back on, only the pinky is missing today) nor that she, a born left-hander, is playing a right handers guitar upside down. All this are feautures to her unusual, extraordinary way of making music.

Until today she has released 3 Albums (Spoons, New Boots, Wallis Bird). In all three of them you can hear and feel the many different styles she is combining. In her songs you can find traces of traditional folk music, jazz and funk but also an energetic handmade rock sound. Her extraordinary voice makes her songs what they are.

Listen yourself:

 

Thanks to the fact that her Manager is a guy who grew up in my neighbour village and studied in Graz she is in town for concerts every now and than. I'll let you know the next time she is here.

Shepherd's Pie

As one of our main topics this semester food is going to be the thing our life revolves around. So this is my first post about it:

I first heard of and ate Shepherd's Pie in Great Britain. Now I found out that it is also very well known in Ireland. I do not know much about the history and the origin of this simple and delicious dish. Most certainly I do not know whether it was first cooked in Ireland or Great Britain.But what I do know about it, is that it came up at the very first beginning when the potato was introduced as an edible and cheap crop for the poor. Since than it spread and is now a very well known tradition in both countries.

From the very beginning this delicious disch was meant to be made from leftovers and that fact didn't change until today. Ofcourse you can prepare it with fresh ingredients, and I think many people do that. But for me it is really a great way of using upt leftover meat loaf, roast or mashed potatoes. That are basicly all the ingredients you need: Some kind of meat that is turned into some kind of sauce with vegetables, especially tomatoes, and mashed potatoes that come as a crust on top of it.

If some of you are now hungry for Shepherd's Pie, here is a very good recipe I can recommend.