"Normal" life?

I noticed just know that I haven’t written a blog story for about ten days already. Too busy to do so? I wouldn’t say; even though I regard my leisure time well-spent I couldn’t say I am terribly occupied. A more likely explanation to me is that Dublin life starts feeling really normal; I still enjoy tremendously but the novelty is gone – which I regard as a good thing all in all, as it means I’m integrating well and I truly have found a new home. Scanning the evenings since my last blog post confirms this; drinks & Italian / English classes with Sara & her Italian friends, watching champions league in warm twilight that almost felt like a Mediterranean summer night one day, watching it inside a pub because of the pouring rain the next day (Dublin’s capricious weather), Friday night drinks with my colleagues, practising my golf skills on the driving range with Pieter, having Johan and Joeri over for the weekend (loved to have them over – didn’t do much else than drink and catch up though), …. . Awesome stuff, but not the kind of things I’ll keep on writing about, cause it’s basically what’s become my ‘normal’ life here. A bad thing? No, not at all. The feeling of becoming part of another culture, feeling at ease in a foreign capital’s streets, knowing the shortest route to your favourite pub down town, running into familiar faces on a random Saturday night; those are among the things that make you happy. Consciously happy, I would stress, because the things people tend to take for granted are not always there. You miss family and friends who are back home, but the times you do get to see them you enjoy their company more intensely now that you are away from them. And the thrill of a foreign city, a foreign country, a different culture, that excitement will linger for some time to come, as Dublin has so much more to offer that I haven’t even thought of, as every week I discover new places, people, lovely spots along the river and new restaurants with delicious food. The domestic and international journeys I plan to undertake the upcoming months will of course be colourfully depicted in words and graphics, but the detailed descriptions of day to day events will dwindle along with me feeling more and more at home. But hey, I never manage to stay long in one place, so prepare for some trips. The tickets have been booked, the cars rented, and all that remains to be done is to go out and enjoy.