Blog Post for July 29 - Lara De Beer

We are now down to the last few days of our trip. There are only two more days until we shall all be reunited with our families once more. Everyone is feeling very bitter sweet right now. We are all super excited to finally go home and see our family but nobody wants to leave Ireland either.

In the morning though, tensions were high as everyone was doing their last minute cramming for our exam. By 9am, everyone was gathered outside of the exam building… to find out it was closed on a Sunday. Luckily, we had resourceful Susan who quickly found us a substitute building to write the exam within minutes.

For the next 3 hours we were all working feverously away to complete 6 passage analysis and a comparative essay. By the end of the time limit, everyone had successfully completed their exam.

It must’ve been quite the sight for all of the other people on the UCD campus for you could easily pick out the Georgia Hardy kids dancing, singing or jumping for joy down the street. Although we still have to do the Literary Café tomorrow to complete our ENG 4U course, we were all elated that we have completed our Grade 12 English credit.

For the rest of the day, we were rewarded with free time. For most people, this meant it was time to get all of the last minute shopping for gifts done. Most of chose to venture to Grafton Street, which we were told by Susan, was the best place to do all of your shopping. Once we got to the area we discovered that Susan was 100% correct. There were hundreds of stores to choose from to shop at as well as a market in the local mall. One of the highlights while shopping was definitely when we found a milkshake shop that could blend any type of chocolate bar imaginable into a milkshake. They were all super sweet and filling, but so worth it.

After our shopping adventure, we all broke up into smaller groups to search for somewhere to eat. A small group of us decided to go to a local pub. The place was considerably busy but we found that there was a roof top garden seating area. It was a lot nicer up on the roof because we had the fresh air and there was a T.V with the Olympics playing on it. After our dinner we head back to residence so we would make it back for curfew on time and still have time to spare to play cards. After a few rounds of president we had to call it a night.

It’s sad to think that this was our second last night before we leave. The planning for reunions in August has already begun. We all plan on keeping in touch for a long time after this trip ends. Parents, brace yourself for a lot of tears on Tuesday.

- Lara