Friends, family and readers – I’m not doing too hot. Don’t get me wrong; I’m doing okay. It’s just that it is now Friday, and this week has been long and hard for me. When I wrote my last blog post on Sunday night, just hours before moving into my apartment, I knew the happiness I was feeling would not last, and I wanted to capture it in the moment. I’m glad I did, because even by Monday I was feeling more discouraged. The short explanation is that I have been applying to jobs all week, and the cliche is true: applying to jobs is a full-time job. To be more precise, it’s a discouraging full-time job where you don’t make any money, ha. I have new respect for immigrants in any country searching for work.

On top of this, I am having issues with the bureaucracy in Ireland. Even though I already have my Working Holiday Authorisation document – which in practice looks like a fancy, laminated sheet of paper – there are three more things I need to do:

1. Go to the Garda (police) and get a GNIB card (Garda National Immigration Bureau card; basically a government ID). Thankfully, I have 3 months after entering Ireland to check my WHA into the Garda. So, I have until mid-December.
2. Go the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection and get a PPS number (Personal Public Service number; basically a tax ID thing). This will be easiest to get once I have a job and a letter from my employer.
3. Go to an Irish bank (Bank of Ireland, AIB, etc.) and get a bank account. This will be easiest to get once I have a PPS number.

The order in which I listed these tasks is normally the order in which people complete them. However, the Garda now requires proof of address before giving a GNIB card, whereas before it just required a passport and a WHA document. They accept only three types of proof of address: a utility bill with my name; a lease agreement signed by myself and my landlord; an Irish bank account statement with my address.

I was so elated about my cheap, centrally located apartment with great flatmates that I knew there had to be a catch, and there is. My landlord is in his 70s, old-fashioned and doesn’t want to write a lease. Also, his name is on all the utility bills. I’m sure he doesn’t pay taxes on the rent he collects, but I can’t even blame him for this; he’s charging us half of what most landlords charge for city-centre rooms. And he is super nice! On Monday he brought us freshly picked apples from his neighbour’s apple tree.

However, on Wednesday I had a breakdown because I thought I would have to move apartments, and as I already explained, there is a nightmarish housing shortage here. Now I think I can get around this by getting a PPS number first, then a bank account, and then a GNIB card. But if that doesn’t work out, I WILL have to move in a month or two.

The point of all of this is that navigating my new life in Ireland is a struggle, and it requires a great deal of perseverance. And this is no surprise, but the weather can be a challenge! Sure, it really is the Emerald Isle –

but even the charming parts of the city can look somewhat dreary in the rain.

This ordeal makes me think about what building a life in a foreign country requires, on top of perseverance. It reminds me of what my boss at Rush, the Chicago hospital where I did psychiatry research last year, said to me when I told him I was going to switch careers from psychology to poetry. He was supportive, but he, eternally truthful, said that a move like that requires some amount of arrogance. I kind of agree! Perhaps confidence in yourself doesn’t turn to arrogance until you flaunt it, but whatever you call it, you definitely need it to try to be a poet and a creative writing professor, AND to try to build a life in a foreign country.

As I already mentioned, you need perseverance in addition confidence. The problem is that I feel like I’ve been persevering all my life, and I’m burning out. Yeah, I know I’m only 24, but in my defense I have been a workaholic for almost a decade. Going along with this, my life in Ireland so far has been mostly work and little play, and I am losing faith that I can keep at this level of hustle with minimal reward. The problem with a move like this, which is so full of uncertainty – will I get a job that allows me time and money to travel? will all my paperwork get sorted? will the current struggle be worth it in a couple months? – is that it, just like life itself, is governed by the inherently uncertain log of inductive reasoning.

Think about it this way: the sun has risen every day for billions of years, and therefore it will probably rise tomorrow. But there is no guarantee it will. By this logic, almost everyone I know of, either through word of mouth or WHA blogs, has built a life they loved in Ireland. But there is no guarantee it will work out that way for me! (Sure, I’ll probably build a nice life here, but probability inherently leaves room for uncertainty.)

You may be saying – Ayla, that’s not the point! Even if you don’t build a nice life here, you will have TRIED, saving yourself a lifetime of wondering  what could’ve been. Yes, I see – I am curing a different sort of uncertainty just by virtue of being here right now. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t difficult.

Perhaps, however, difficulty is the point. Your life and your identity are defined by what you are willing to sacrifice for – what you are willing to fight and experience pain for. Right now, I am sacrificing a lot of comfort to be here. Even if that doesn’t lead to the rewarding year I envisioned, it at least brings me closer to the person I want to be.

On that note, here are some last tidbits about my life in Cork:

1. There are Turkish barbershops EVERYWHERE. This blows my mind, as my dad is Turkish and I have been to Turkey many times, yet I have never heard the cliche of the amazing Turkish barber. (Perhaps this makes sense; perhaps the cliche exists only outside Turkey.)

2. I’m very grateful to the American expat who gave me free sheets, including this beautiful duvet cover, helping me feel more at home in my room:

3. I had Desperados beer (tequila-flavored beer – actually not so terrible) in Sevilla (shout out to Bethany!) and have always associated it with that city. But I saw an ad for it here!

4. I STILL have not been to a pub. In fact, I haven’t done much of anything fun, as I mentioned above. I have not even been to the famous Saint Fin Barre’s cathedral, which was pictured (from the back) in one of my previous blogs and which is seen from the front here:

5. I have also felt pretty distanced from my writing (meaning my poetry, not necessarily this blog) lately. This is discouraging, as I managed to get into a good rhythm in Chicago and write a fair number of poems I was proud of over the course of the past year. However, Cork is a city that certainly honours poetry. This is a small part of a street mural:

Also, Mouse Cafe, a nice Internet and printing cafe here, has bunch of notecard-sized poems pinned to a string on the wall with small clothespins. It is charming, but I don’t have a picture of it. (Taking pictures makes me feel self-conscious and super touristy!)

ALSO, tonight is Cork’s culture night, and the theme is poetry! I am very excited.

6. So, despite not having done many fun things and not having worked on my poetry, I have fun things planned. I will go to culture night tonight, a jewelry-making workshop tomorrow morning and bars with my flatmates tomorrow night, and hillwalking (the term for hiking) in the countryside on Sunday. And this morning I bought tickets to go to the Hozier concert in Killarney in December with my flatmate Sid!

7. Random food facts:

• Fortunately, in contrast to the warnings, there is PLENTY of peanut butter in Ireland. (I don’t remember much, or any, in Spain, but there is definitely some here.)
• Unfortunately, in accordance with the warnings, there is BARELY ANY filter coffee here. There is just espresso, espresso-based drinks and Nescafe instant coffee. Starbucks doesn’t even have filter/drip coffee!!!!!!! I plan to go buy a percolator or French Press today to fix this situation.
• At least I have Magnum ice cream bars. :)))))))

8. Last thing: fun terms and vocal tics from this side of the pond!

• “hillwalking” instead of “hiking”
• “grand” instead of “great,” and even instead of “okay” or “fine” (people ALWAYS say “grand”)
• ENDING sentences with “so” or “like”
• “Down at the local” means “Down at the local pub”
• “torch” instead of “flashlight”
• and of course “cheers,” which I knew people said but didn’t know was so often used to replace “thank you”

Cheers!