As many of my loyal fans know, (Thank you, all five of you.) I am studying abroad this semester in Dublin, Ireland. As the summer drew on, I both anticipated and dreaded the new experience.     I had never been to a place where I had to start from scratch since I was in kindergarten. I had never been away from my mom for over two months, and I was embarking on a sure-to-be difficult long-distance relationship with my significant other. After exploring Dublin, I have gotten to know the city and appreciate it, but what I have found more is how much it makes me cherish the United States.  I have never been a huge fan of America; I was more of an idealist who thought Europe had it all figured out.   But since arriving, my views have changed. I realize every place is just a place, and the people inside are what make it. Seeing old architecture, vast farmlands and antiquated cobblestone streets is surely a valuable experience, but it is just a place.   It is the experiences in that place that matter, and that is what I plan on pursuing while here.  There are a few things I have learned about Dublin so far that largely contributed to my initial culture shock. I thought, going to an English-speaking country, culture shock would be minimal, kind of like going to New York City for the first time, but I was wrong:  Everything is really expensive. In Starkville, I looked forward to Walmart grocery trips. Here, I crumble in a ball and cry each mealtime because a box of cereal can typically cost the equivalent of $8 or $9. Not quite everything is expensive; I was exaggerating. The bread is a decent price.  Public transportation is not all it’s cracked up to be. Ever since my first time in New York City many years ago, I have questioned why public transportation isn’t everywhere. It gets you where you need to go, is environmentally friendly and puts people together who wouldn’t normally interact.   What I concluded in my mind earlier this week while waiting over an hour and a half for a bus that comes every 10 minutes was it is really inconvenient. It is costly (See bullet number one.) and for people who have to be places at certain times, it is rather unreliable.   You have to allow yourself a huge time buffer, which then costs your time, in order to assure you arrive someplace punctually.  Everything is really tiny. I really can count the number of overweight people I have seen on one hand. And no wonder! Everything at the grocery store is sold in such small quantities, and people here do a lot of walking.   I am all for portion-control, and I do think Americans are served oversized portions. But portions don’t have to be represented in the grocery store; I feel for all the moms here who have to buy groceries every day or in mass quantities just to have enough.   If I were raised here, I would be scary skinny from cowering from purchasing food, having everything in such tiny portions and walking 12 miles to go to a department store.  Their cell phone plans are awesome. I have to give the Europeans kudos on their cell phones. They are affordable and allow you to easily communicate with people from other countries, unlike many American cell phone companies.   I have a smart phone now that costs me the equivalent of about $26 a month, and that allows me virtually unlimited calling to Irish landlines and mobiles, unlimited texting to any network in the country, 1GB of data (which allows me to text people from home using the Whatsapp application) and two cents a minute to call any U.S. mobile or landline.   But, to be fair, a lot of those perks are within the country, which is roughly the size of Indiana. The U.S. is so much larger that it may be more difficult for cell phone companies to offer these kinds of deals.  Old stuff is cool. I’m American, so I’m not spoiled when it comes to seeing old buildings from, say, 1204. It’s neat to see the real thing, if you do feel like you’re at Disney World and it’s fake. (Side note: It’s not! The walls and churches are real here; they are not made by Disney or Universal even if it does make you feel like you are in Harry Potter World.)  Like any responsible journalist, I’ll report more from over here as more truths (or shattered realities and perceptions) are revealed to me. Until then, thanks a million! (Everyone always thanks people times a million over here. It makes my “thanks so much” seem weak and insincere.)