First Day of School

Pond on campus

Unlike everyone celebrating MLK Day, I started school today. Ok, I only had one class and it started at 3, but I still had to start school.

My only class was Financial Institutions Management, which will tranfer for my Finance degree. We talked about the problems with the Irish economy now. Ireland went from being the second poorest country in Europe to having the second greatest GDP. Now they have fallen on hard times like much of the world. One of the speakers at orientation said that this is the best time in the past 15 years to come to Ireland because its future is being decided now. There is a lot of talk about what happened to the Irish people when they had all this money, and how their priorities switched and they became less friendly.

So far classes really aren't that different from the US. My professor did arrive ten minutes late and his cell phone kept going off. I will keep you updated after I have a few more classes.

Considering the number of questions I get at ICS on how to print, I thought U of I had the hardest print release ever. False: UCD has the most complex printing system ever. It took me the whole day to print a bank statement proving I have enough money to stay in Ireland (one has to show they have at least 1000 euro to pass immigration). I had to get a card, which I later find I couldn't use unless my document was on a USB, fill my other card (the machine kept rejecting my money!), get a password, and finally print. Brittany had to get special software installed to print her stuff. I'm thankful I don't work at these computer labs or I would never be able to beat Mario Bros level 8 during work with all the people asking me how to print.