Spring travels: Portugal

This uni year I was lucky enough to be able to chose a place to go for a residential field course and when I learnt that Portugal was an option, the decision was quite easy to make. We left for it on the last week of our spring holiday by which time we had expected it to be nice hot weather in Portugal. We got lucky as the weather had just become nice when we arrived, sunny days and temperatures above 20 degrees (finally!). This was just what I needed after -4 in Lithuania, -2 in Tallinn, 10 in Dublin and 12 in Birmingham. 

Midnight tourism

The first thing that got me excited about going was the fact that we were to fly with normal airlines which was quite something. No stupid small limits on luggage, no people trying to sell me everything under the sun. It was nice. The sandwiches we got on the plane were so nice that I actually now make ones jut like them. Also, this little drink desert - 7 strawberries which is just what it is called - a little smoothie from strawberries.

The actual field work turned out to be pretty hard work and kind of intense. We did loads from identifying land uses and mapping put 100m by 100m areas around the city to conducting our own experiment. But.. we spent most time outside, had time to walk around and got taken around the areas surrounding Evora - the city we stayed in. We took a trip to this huge dam which when built created many new land-use opportunities for the region, but also caused many issues. Then we were pleasantly surprised by being taken to another historic town where we had a nice walk around, climbing over fences like the rebels we are and finally going to a vineyard where we received a tour and even got a chance to taste and buy some wine, an offer I did not refuse.

Dam...

Cosy restaurant we found where guests leave greetings

Leaving Portugal, the warmth, the flowers and sun to go back to rainy UK and revision that was waiting for me was not easy, but I guess I had to go back to reality... Just need to say, Portugal is a country I will definitely make an effort to visit again, after all Lisbon has yet to be explored. :D

Dance show

I have wanted to make a post about this for a while now, but was hoping that more pictures would be uploaded from it... Oh well, have a few which is better than last year anyway. Therefore, I shall proceed with the scheduled blogging. 

At the end of March together with a few friends (whose coming to dance class I take credit for :P ) I was in the dance society dance show whose theme was 'The Big Event' and so each dance represented some historical event. I did it last year as well, but this time was more fun as I had company and also did 4 classes in total, 2 more than last year (I'll be doing 6 or 8 at this rate in my final year). Anyway, the show was amazing, the dances all wonderful and I genuinely miss all of it so much now that I haven't been to a dance class in 2 months (darn you exams!). So, as I mentioned earlier I was in 4 dances these were 1) Modern 2) Street Jazz 3) Musical Theatre and 4) Contemporary. All were good, fun and full of emotion and so I'd like to write about each one a bit more.

1. Modern. 

The event for this dance was: The French Revolution. And boy were we revolutionary! The dance was full of turns, jumps and aggregation (hopefully we were able to project that, still have yet to see the video :P ) We danced to the song Children of the Revolution by T Rex:

2. Street Jazz

Miners Strike was the event we were to portray in this dance. I might even say this was my favourite to learn, it was energetic, filled with many moves with not so beginner level choreography for a beginner dance class. Again aggressive and fierce, but also very powerful. Had a love-hate relationship with the costume for this because even though I loved making the shirt and liked how it looked, my braces tended to pop off while on stage which was not something I wanted to happen. Anyway, we danced this to Antidote by Swedish House Mafia & Knife Party and I quite enjoyed it, would get stuck in my head after practice every time :P

3. Musical Theatre

Had a lovely dance to Hairspray for this one with the civil rights movement as our event. Was fun, up beat therefore had a great contrast with my other dances. Sometimes I would sing along when dancing it, just so much fun :)

4. Contemporary

This one would almost lead me to tears as it was a very emotional dance the event being the Iraq war and us acting as the soldiers leaving their loved ones. There was only 8 of us in the dance so the pressure was on not to mess up as everyone could notice pretty easily. We were also in partners, which made practising at home a bit tricky, but I think we pulled it of quite well. We danced to the song This is not goodbye by Sidewalk Prophets:

Now that it's over I miss it so much. The putting on make up rituals, the quick changes between dances, waiting on the stage for that moment when the music comes on and a different audience each night, the group warm ups and the bows. All these little things you remember along with the show are memories I'd like to hold on to and hopefully I'll be able to do the show in my final year again :)

Spring travels: Dublin and Galway

After our 1 day stay in Tallinn we were off to Dublin to meet up with more friends and enjoy another few days of freedom before having to go back to revision.

Of course, when in Ireland you have to try all the typical Irish activities, such as going to Temple bar for a pint of Guinness, listening to live Irish music, trying Irish  coffee and so on. So we did. That and so much more. 

After arriving and finally finding our hostel which I should call ultra mega hostel, which was really something different, differing completely from the cosy little one we stayed in in Tallinn, complete with it's own cafe, bar,   shower complex and multiple floors, we started to plan our trip (not like we had plenty of time to plan stuff before actually arriving in this country...). We decided to take a day trip to see the Cliffs of Moher and then stay the night in Galway, which was a good call. The cliffs were magnificent and Galway completely charming. Took a 'free' walking tour (they say free, but ask for a donation casually mentioning the amount it would cost to take a paid tour and slightly guilt tripping you into paying that amount) and learnt quite a lot about Ireland's history as well as Claddagh rings. These are cool as their position on your finger and depending on which hand you wear them on, lets others know if you are single, in a relationship, engaged or married. Two of my friends even bought ones for themselves, which I have to say are pretty cool souvenirs. The hostel we stayed in while there was... interesting... even had another LT guy staying there (told ya we're taking over the world) who had taught the other guests a bit of Lithuanian.

On the edge of the world

Back in Dublin we moved onto doing all those things on our 'must be dine in Ireland' list. Went on another walking tour and were practically brought to tears by the guide when she spoke of the famine in such an emotional way you'd think she was an actress. Had our Guinness on multiple occasions to the point that I didn't even want the free one they give you when you take the tour of the brewery. We also went on a pub-crawl where we were treated with an Irish dance by one of the bartenders, I tried an appletini (was delicious, J.D. was so right!) for the first time and had a great time (even with a bit of drama).

Irish coffee: nice to look at, not so much to drink...

The normal people and the crazies

One night we decided to just stay in and this predicted quite night turned out to be quite exciting, with long talks in the halls of the hostel in the early ours of the night and new acquaintances forming.

All in all, Ireland was complete with a mixture of experiences and time well spent with good friends. 

Photos by I. Cesnulaiyte