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Spring in Ireland

In this blog Izzie discusses the culture events (Irish and further afield) that have been celebrated on campus recently.

Spring is slowly starting to show its head here in Ireland, and I was surprised that it seems to start earlier than it does at home. The 1st of February here in Ireland is St Brigid’s day and as well as being a day to celebrate the women in your life it represents the start of spring! Across Dublin there were markets and parades and on campus there were a few events too. I attended one where the Gaelige school showed us how to make Brigid’s crosses, a traditional weaving activity and apparently one done mostly in primary schools across the country.  We sat listening to the trad music and weaved our rushes into the crosses, it was pretty fiddly but once you got into a rhythm it wasn’t too bad! The event was open to everyone across the uni, staff and students so we had a lovely mix on our table of nationalities and ages, the one thing we all had in common though was that our crosses definitely weren’t the prettiest! Supposedly you’re supposed to hang them above your door but as I didn’t have enough space I hung mine over my mirror so now every morning I get to think about the promise of spring and warmer weather!

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The Six Nations tournament has also given everybody a bit of pep in their step and watching it with friends from the countries participating has been really good craic, however my bank account balance was slightly hurt by having to buy consolation pints of Guinness when England beat France! The whole of Dublin is really starting come alive with Irish pride even more so than usual, adverts in train stations are all about supporting the Irish team, corner shops have big graphics of the Irish team on the windows and it seems every single pub has decorated for it with either banners or window art. It’s given the city a really lively atmosphere and makes me wonder that if this is how patriotic they get for the rugby what is St Patrick’s day going to be like!

Interestingly it’s not been all traditional Irish culture recently, the city has also celebrated Lunar New Year and the University had a celebration of its own. UCD is very connected to the local area and the celebration attracted everyone and anyone from students themselves to families from the local area. It was really lovely to see the Irish kids chasing and playing with the lion dancers and families lining up together at the food stalls! The UCD Confucius centre hosted the event, so their mascot was out and about interacting with everyone too, and I don’t know if it’s the grin plastered on its head but he seemed very very excited to be there!

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