My third week in Dublin started off quite nicely! I went to Howth, a small coastal suburb of Dublin, with my friends Amanda and Kai.
We took two buses to get there, one that brought us to the city center and another that brought us straight to the Howth Summit. From there, we began the Howth cliff walk. It was absolutely stunning. The nature and the water were beautiful. The views from the cliffs were worth it a million times over. From most points on the walk, we could see the Baily lighthouse! We also got to see the heads of two seals pop up in the ocean. There was a part where people could climb down, and we saw people swimming and hanging out on a tiny hidden beach, but the climb down was a little slick and steep, so we decided not to do that.
We then walked down into town and checked out the Howth market and also went to a little seafood place where I got fish and chips!
Our trip to Howth might be one of my favorite things I’ve done so far and it was the perfect way to start the week.
My work week has been quite successful! There was a lot going on in the office and they needed to post the June Pride calendar of events on social media, but the post hadn’t been made yet. None of the staff really had time to do it, so I offered. I’m decently experienced in Canva, so I made the post and they were quite pleased with my work!
I also got trained and was able to begin putting my articles into the WordPress so they could be reviewed and then published. On Thursday, my first bank piece got to be published, which was very exciting! They also asked me to work on a piece that they needed done for the next day, to ease into being on dailies. But then their publishing content plans changed and they needed the piece for that day and I delivered! So by the end of the day, I had two pieces published!
After work on Thursday, I went to a pub called The Hairy Lemon! I got a mushroom pasta that was very yummy.
My publishing success continued on Friday. During the content meeting, they asked me to work on a daily piece! Friday continued to be very enjoyable! After finishing my piece, I went on an errand to the post office with one of my coworkers to ship out copies of the magazine along with GCN merchandise. We then went to a Pride hub to pick up GCN’s wristbands for the parade. When we got back to the office, we got pizza to fuel up before we headed out to Phoenix park for the Pride Run we were stewarding. Phoenix park was absolutely gorgeous and so huge! The Pride Run was very successful. Afterwards, two of my coworkers invited me out with them!
Saturday was also very pleasant! I went with Kai to the National Gallery which was this huge art gallery. It was nice, although a lot of the art was very old. I want to check out the Irish Museum of Modern Art to see some contemporary pieces. We then went to Nando’s for lunch, inspired by my sister’s favorite singer, Niall Horan! I thought it was going to be more fast food vibes but it was honestly quite nice and very delicious! After, I got ice cream at Murphy’s ice cream, getting chocolate and Irish strawberry. Also delicious!
My third week in Dublin has been fantastic. I had a really great time in and outside of work and felt very proud of all that I did. When it comes to problem solving at my internship, I have to do a decent bit of problem solving for each article I’ve written. There is not direct guidance for an individual article obviously, so I often have to try to figure it out myself. My typical routine is to try to gather enough research for the article to know what I’m talking about and then see if there’s anything similar on GCN’s site. And then I try to just start writing! I can always expand more or fix things up in the second draft. It can be a bit tiring, but it is also very exciting because I am seeing myself grow as a professional writer by doing it on the daily. My older sister sent me a screenshot on Friday of the page of the articles with me as the author and she said she can’t wait to see what that image will look like at the end of my internship! This is such an exciting time in my life for growth, personally and professionally, and I’m just so grateful!
Until next week!