Monday, December 29, 2014

Tis the Season

This Christmas marks the second Christmas I have spent abroad. I have been living in Bundoran, Ireland for just under two months now and have made some pretty good friends here. However, most everyone seemed to go home or travel elsewhere for Christmas and the town became deserted. 
When Christmas morning came around I slept in, had breakfast and then headed to main beach for the annual Christmas day swim. I didn't think there would be many people there since the town was so quite but to my surprise I it was probably the biggest gathering I have seen thus far in Bundoran. Just after noon we all ran to the waters edge and submerged ourselves in a bone chilling water that was 8 degrees Celsius.  



In the evening I face timed my mom and brother and then my dad, brother. We were even able to include my grandma on the call just through a regular phone call while my dad and brother were on face time with me. It is a tradition for her to always come up with fun puzzles and trivia for everyone and we did them over the pone and face time. Although this year the questions were different from previous years. Usually if we were at her house for Christmas everyone would pay attention and count decorations scattered around to try and be prepared for questions like, how many snowmen are in the bathroom or how many saints are in the living room.
This years questions included things like:
What is known as the "stinking rose"?
Who wrote the Star Spangled Banner? Year?
How many stores does Kroger have?

Overall I had a good Christmas and have amazing people in my life.


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