Even better than I ever could have imagined

Our trip to Ireland was even better than I ever could have imagined. I have lived in Arizona my whole life and have traveled to quite a few states here in the US but nothing can compare to the beautiful landscape that Ireland provides. I felt like I had stepped into a whole new world (in a sense I guess I did), one filled with hopes and dreams. I was happy to find my writers block gone while in Ireland and I now have tons of poems about almost every aspect of Ireland and of the culture. It’s no wonder that such amazing writers and poets come from Ireland! The land itself is a great muse for any artist.

However, I was shocked to realize how much I truly did not know about Ireland’s history. I always knew that there were things that I was unaware of but to learn about Ireland’s history with England and to find out that it had only been resolved nineteen years ago was astounding. The day we went to Derry City was emotionally taxing. It felt similar to how I felt when I had visited the site where the Twin Towers had once stood. The energy around the area was filled with pain, change, and rebirth.

I had went into this trip with the mindset of “try everything and do everything” and so I do not have any regrets. It makes me happy and excited when I speak about how I conquered my two biggest fears of heights and the ocean while in Ireland. Conquering those two fears helped take a lot of weight off my shoulders that I had not even realized I had been carrying. To me the most powerful aspect of the whole trip was the sense of positivity that everyone in Ireland seemed to carry. Before we had left for the trip I had been going through a couple of rough weeks and to come to Ireland and experience this positivity was amazing. I came back from Ireland with the same positivity and peace that every person I had met while there had carried and I am extremely grateful.          -–Marhiya Ontiveros