RAG Week

RAG week, incase you don’t know is Raise and Give week. There are many functions around campus and the town that raise money for charity. While charity might be the reason RAG week occurs, the students use it as an excuse to skip class and get really drunk. Professors hardly lecture and everyone skips class.

This week the pubs have been packed every night and there are lines of at least an hour to get into every club. Basically, everywhere you go is packed, or jammers, as the Irish say. Our RAG week went like this:

Monday – we went to a HUGE club with 4 venues including 2 live bands and 2 DJ’s. Each room played different music and had a bar. There was a ton of people and it was a ton of fun.

Tuesday – Reline went to speed dating, but it got cancelled and I had a hockey game.

Wednesday – we planned on going to “Freakscene” which is a large club and pretty popular, but the queue was about 200 meters long. We ended up at a local pub.

Tonight – plans are pretty much up in the air still

I took some pictures at The Lough and Bird Sanctuary today on the way to buy groceries. I also took a short video of all the birds going crazy. It wasn’t long because I was right in the heat of things and didn’t want to be the recipient of any bird droppings.

I mentioned that I had a hockey game as well. Basically, I got in contact with a few hockey players in Cork and got invited to go play with them a few times. Long story short, my mom shipped my gear over and I play on 2 teams. There is the UCC college team and an adult house league. The UCC team is basically practice and goofing around. The adult league gets pretty serious, but is really fun with 6 teams competing in 3 on 3 hockey every Tuesday night.

There is a big trophy for the winner of the league and our team is 2-0 right now. My team is pretty hilarious. There is 7 of us and only 2 of us speak fluent English. We have an all Russian top line that I can hardly understand anything they say so I try to stay off their line. My line consists of a Canadian, who I compare to Gary Roberts because he is like 50 years old but an absolute monster at hockey. On the other end of my line is a Swede who has a cannon shot, but can’t skate. The last player is from Switzerland. We don’t talk much during the game, but we are pretty good. So far I have 1 goal and 4 assists in 2 games.

The UCC team is mostly Irish lads just learning the game so its much more relaxed. There is a Czech fella who plays and is from the same town as Jaromir Jagr. I’m not 100% sure what he says all the time, but I think that’s what he was trying to tell me at least.

After my game on Tuesday I got invited to play on the Cork Revolution in a few weeks. The Revolution is like the traveling team that plays in various cities on weekend tournaments. I probably won’t get much time because I’m going to be on the 3^rd or 4^th line and the guys are pretty good/big—I’ve got knocked on my ass a few good times already—but it’s free travel to places like Dublin and Belfast.

I’m really glad I joined hockey because I made a ton of new friends. It’s pretty awesome to meet people from all over the world, not speak fluently to each other, but be able to play the same sport and understand what each other is doing.

So check out The Lough pics and video! We are trying to go to the Jamesons Distillery on Saturday so look for an update on Sunday!

Cheers,

Travis