how great thou art

O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made; I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder, Thy power throughout the universe displayed.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art.Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art!





When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art!




And when I think, that God, His Son not sparing; Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in; That on the Cross, my burden gladly bearing, He bled and died to take away my sin.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art!




When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation, And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart.Then I shall bow, in humble adoration, And then proclaim: "My God, how great Thou art!"

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee, How great Thou art, How great Thou art. Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,How great Thou art, How great Thou art!

hurling....

Hurling is freakin' intense! It's an ancient Irish sport that involves a stick, a ball and lots of violence. NO sport is better than that! Basically you have 2 teams competing to score goals by either hitting the ball into the goal net (looks like a soccer goal) or hit it through the goal posts (looks like a football goal). The goals post are attached to the netted goal. The ball can only be picked up from the ground with the hurl ( the stick) and if you catch it and run with it, you can only do that for 4 steps before hitting it or placing it on the end of the hurl and running it up the field. You hit the ball like a baseball to your who team tries to keep it alive and score. The game is fast, intense, sweaty and bloody. I got to go the the County match last weekend. John, a friend of the Rays, is the coach for the Roscommon Gaels. They lost their match in the county final but the cultural experience was amazing! The crowd was wild and intense with the mouth. (They're Irish) Okay so in the states we joke that the "F" word can be used as a noun, verb, adjective, pronoun, command, preposition etc and it's a horrific swear word. The mother of them all. Well in Ireland, that word is a natural part of their vocab. It is not really considered a taboo swear word here like it is in the US. Well, at this match all around me the crowd was dropping the "F BOMB" left and right. They were using it in more ways than I knew it could be used. It was great! I laugh at the taboo emphasis we place on the word and at the contrasting difference here with the Irish. They really know freedom of speech.

donegal part 2

Donegal County is beautiful. There are no other words to explain mountains, vibrant green landscape, coastlines and the edge of the earth. My travel group arrived on Thursday evening to our thatched roof cottage. We enjoyed a dinner then had our team meeting where we shared our goals for our time here. Friday we spent exploring the area around our cottage. We traveled to several beaches and coastlines. My favorite coastline was Port. You really feel like you are at the edge of the earth, the edge of reason. The shore just stops and the ocean begins. The cove just opens up into the unknown. Saturday we explored some more and later returned to Port and the cove. The interns and I then climbed up a steep mountian covered in sheep crap. What a liberating experience! Standing on top of a mountain with the edge of it dropping off one side into the ocean, the sea in front of you and more mountains behind you. Standing on the edge. Just you and the wind. All thoughts are gone and all you hear is your heart and all you see is into the great unknown. Nothing but you and adventure at your fingertips. What liberation. What freedom. What treasure.

donegal part 1

We are headed off to Donegal today, to a thatched roof cottage in the middle of nowhere. I am already loving the thought of 'nowhere'! Tonight at the cottage all the interns will be sharing our personal goals with each other. I have 2 goals currently and 1 irrational fear. It will be interesting to hear everyone's goals and to see where each of us are coming from and hoping to get to. Overall, I am excited to spend time with Erika, Jeremy, Jon (interns), Mark & Brenda . Good team bonding to come! And also to get away from it all, even though Ireland is away from it all--I am away from the States and my everyday, jam packed life.

The Turf...

So this past Saturday, I got a cultural experience! A lot of Irish homes, their main rooms are heated by a fireplace and what you burn is called turf. Turf is organic compressed earth that used to be a oak forest before the glaciers moved through a long, long time ago covering the forest and making it into bog land. In the ground turf is referred to as 'pete' and when being cut, dried and burnt; turf. If the 'pete' were to remain in the ground and compressed, it would become coal and later diamonds. Anyways, there are no diamonds that I know of but the Concar's (friends of the Rays), own a section of a bog (where turf come from) and we went and moved 4 wagon loads of it. The turf has to be cut, then stacked and laid out to dry. The process takes a long time! They used to do all the cutting by hand however now there is a machine that will do all the work. The Concar's still have at least 8 more wagon loads out there in the bog. It was good hard work and it was a satisfying job. The work was "down to earth" as Mark put it. (No pun intended) The company as fun and the meal that the ladies prepared for dinner was amazing!

Images of Ireland, My Home

This is a street in the neighboring town of Athlone. The Irish buildings are bright and notice that the cars drive on the left side of the road.

This is Roscommon castle. Yes I have a castle in my town! It is the 2nd largest castle in Ireland.

Celtic Cross

This is a view from the mountian not far from Mark & Brenda's house. The countryside is beautiful and the green is amazing!

There are sheep and cows everywhere! I am a fan of sheep!

The Full Irish Breakfast

The Full Irish Breakfast is the name that I have choosen for my blogspot. I choose this name for various reasons. In Ireland, the Full Irish Breakfast is a feast of random flavors and unique combinations. While the breakfast does contain some traditional United States elements like eggs, sausage and toast; the full Irish breakfast has so much more. For instance, fried tomatoes, rashers (Irish bacon), baked beans, brown bread, bacon and black & white pudding. (This really isn't pudding.) This meal goes well with tea, coffee or a beer and can be served anytime of the day. The meal is a feast and it's full of flavor, spices and ingrediants. For me this traditional Irish meal is a mirror image of how Ireland is; a unique blend of flavors, experiences, stories and life. Add some love, sheep and people and you have something so amazing that you only want more of it. You want the whole feast and you want to eat it all. I want all of Ireland and all that this experience can offer. All the tastes, the sounds, the smells, the craic, the people and the culture. I do not know exactly what my time here be like but I do know that the experiences will be great, the love much and the flavor indescrible. I want the Full Irish Breakfast.