Suzanne Visser

Galway – Kennedy Park surrounded by Eyre Square

The last week of my internship was a tough one. In just four days I had to revise my whole report of almost 50 pages with the last comments on about half the document only two days before the deadline. On Monday I could only work until 4:00 [...]

From 1824 to 1923 Cork had a prison at the north side of the river at Sunday’s Well Road. It is now open for the public to experience the prison life.
It was not as spectacular as I expected but still being in a former prison does something with you. It confirms how importance it is to [...]

On Sunday 17 January I went to Bantry. Bantry is a small village on the west coast of Ireland overlooking Bantry Bay. The area is heavily influenced by the Gulf Stream creating a mild climate with heavy rainfall allowing semi-tropical plant growth. With the ocean on one side and mountains on the other side this village [...]

As the snow and the ice melted away and the normal Irish weather (= rain) is back into place my stay is coming to its end. Six more working days at my internship place in University College Cork, 2 more weekends and 1.5 day and I’m flying back to Holland. A mix of positive and negative [...]

While winter stroke hard everywhere in Europe and parts of America, Ireland and Cork also tried to cope with it. Cork experienced its coldest winter in about 60 years. That meant that it was around zero during the day and a few degrees below freezing point in the night for more than a couple of days [...]

After the nice weekend with my parents a few weeks ago it was now my brothers turn to visit me. On Monday 28 December they flew to Dublin to rent a car there. In the mean time I took the train from Cork to Dublin, where they picked me up from Heuston train station. During the [...]

My first Christmas without family I spend in Cork. Ireland, and Cork, prepared already for a long time for this feast. Just the day after Halloween, so from 1 November, all shops were decorated with all sorts of Christmas decoration and also the streets were one by one transformed with lights and Christmas trees. Santa officially [...]

I am working now just over three months at the Centre for Research into Atmospheric Chemistry at University College Cork in Cork. It seems ages since I first arrived here in an unfamiliar city in an unfamiliar country. But now after living in Cork for almost four months everything is familiar. I know my way in [...]

From 4 till 7 December my parents visited me in Cork. They stayed in a bed and breakfast only ten minutes walk from my house. On Friday late in the morning they arrived and were welcomed with a high tea. In the meantime they notified me of their arrival and so I finally met them again [...]

Is it Ireland, is it coincidence; it is just very annoying…

Four weeks ago I was diagnosed with swine flu and had to take Tamiflu. After a couple of days I also got a bacterial infection which kept me home for one and a half weeks (after already missing the first week of my internship due to [...]