Missed - communication...

It always amazes me what a difference a few words can make.

Take, for instance, my journey from Belfast to Dublin this weekend. After buying bus tickets in Belfast, I left my friends Mike and Ben on the sidewalk while I made a quick pre-trip pit stop at the bathrooms. As I sauntered onto the street, I was a bit surprised to see Ben standing alone on the sidewalk staring up at the buildings around us.

"Where's Mike?" I asked

"I dunno," he said, still staring at the Chinese place across the way. "He just ran off."

"Ran off? Where?"

"I dunno.. that way." Vague finger pointing.

"And you didn't think to follow him?"

Ben then turns, shooting me the blissfully blank gaze that I've found both endearing and infuriating during our time together in Derry. "Why would I do that?" he says.

Indeed. (In doesn't help, of course, that Ben is wearing the bright-orange Jagermeister hat from the night before -- pictured above.)

So, taking Ben's lead, I too begin soaking in Belfast's train station atmosphere. The Chinese place on the corner, the large advertisements for the £1 menu at Burger King. The stange statue of weary travellers on the street. I relax so much, in fact, that I take a bit of time to chat up a friend from the pub the night before, whom we ran into on the street.

Then, as Mike hasn't returned, I start to get a bit suspicious.

"Seriously Ben, he just ran off?"

"Yeah." As if it isn't the least bit strange that, while waiting for a bus, our friend simply turned on his heels and started sprinting down the street as far away from us as possible.

"And we shouldn't follow him?"

"I don't think so."

Still, I start walking in the direction of Mike's last known whereabouts. That's when my phone beeps with a text from Mike.

"RUN!"

Not knowing if this is bomb, bus, or bedlam, I take off running down the street, super-large backpack bouncing off my bum, hoping to be going in the right direction. After 7 minutes, I finally spot Mike, one foot wedged in the door of the Air Coach, frantically waving us on.

Turns out, he was running to hold the bus en route toDublin. As he started to run, we later discovered, he tossed back over his shoulder, "Ben, I'll hold the bus. Wait for Carie." But those words were lost mid-sprint. What a difference they'd have made.

Much like the £2 difference a little word called "from" made on our bus tickets en route. It turns out, those Air Coach officials in Belfast have made quite a killing by inserting the word "from" in front of their advertised fares, thus luring in weary Americans hoping to travel to Dublin for £8, when indeed it is only "from £8" and really costs £10.

Or the difference between the world "free pint" in a pub, which universally means a pint of Guiness, and "free bottle" which unilaterally means something less palatable like Coors Light or, retch, Red Dog. A lesson I learned quite quickly after taking to the dance floor on Thursday night in Belfast under the impression that the first ones on the floor would win a free pint.

After dancing quite feverishly to a bit of Irish music, my friend Mike and I were instead rewarded with a free bottle of the aforementioned Red Dog. It was a brew so insufferable that I had to wait until Ben had downed two pints and a shot of Jager (sold to his poor, gullible soul, at the price of £2 with a hideous hunter's orange fisherman's cap thrown in for good measure) to convince him that indeed, the Red Dog was purchased at the bar for him.

And our friend Brittany certainly learned the significance of even the smallest words when our prediction that we would meet her at the orchestra around 4:30 turned out to be closer to 5:30. Brittany, ever on military time, had taken 4:30 to mean exactly that so we bought her dinner later that night.

Missed communication aside, my second weekend abroad was quite good craic.

After class on Thursday (I'm actually sitting in on a class from Ben's program on "The Conflict"), Ben and I hopped a bus to Belfast where we met up with two other Mitchell Scholars, Mike and Geoff, who are both studying at Queen's University. We headed out to taste the Belfast nightlife with their group of international friends, finally settling for "The Egg," which is quite close to campus and boasts a rather intimate bar and dance floor.

The entertainment for the night - absolute crap our Irish companions claimed - was a local band playing a mix of Irish music and American rock covers. The music, combined with the intimate atmosphere and rather sparse crowd, made it easy to jump around and dance without creating that creepy, "everyone is banging into everyone" club-like atmosphere. So, although a bit out of my character, I was one of the first on the dance floor (earning the Red Dog) and I rarely left. Each time I'd retreat to the table for more drinks, the band would start playing a familiar song and I'd end up back on the floor, doing movements that - to the unsophisticated observer - probably looked like a combination of Irish jig, square dancing, and 80s hair-band headbanging. Still, it was a blast.

We finished up the evening at "Bishops," one of the best places for fish and chips in town. For some odd, two pint, reason, I thought chips with curry would be delightful at 2 a.m. and, much to my arteries dismay, downed the entire order.

The next morning, Mike, Ben, and I hopped the bus to Dublin to meet Brittany for the orchestra. After keeping her waiting for nearly an hour we took in a divine three-course, Lebanese meal in Temple Bar and then picked up student tickets for a mere 5 euro. Since the orchestra was playing fairly modern music and the Irish apparently did not approve, we landed in the sixth row for what was a grand performance.

We spent much of Saturday in Dublin wandering the streets in search of St. Patrick's cathedral (why we never thought to buy a 2 eruo map is beyond me). We didn't have much luck in that regard but it was an excellent opportunity to get to know Brittany, Ben, and Mike a little better. The more I get to know everyone, the more I'm struck by how similar we can feel on certain planes but how vastly we may view the world on others. Even if I can't keep up with Mike's musings half the time, I'm constantly enchanted by the way his mind works and how quickly he tosses out mind-blowing perceptions on life and intelligence and art. Likewise, although we don't have much common political ground, I'm inspired by the way Brittany always stands her ideological ground in a conversation. When I'm in hostile political territory, I tend to keep my mouth shut and tow a rather middle line. Brittany, on the other hand, makes sure we're also discussing and considering the other side. It makes for lively discussion.

We came back to Belfast on Saturday night to "que" for nearly a half hour outside the "Parlour," obviously one of the hipper clubs in the city. The que to get up to the dance floor was just as bad so we choose to pull up a few couches and just enjoy conversation and a few pints from the downstairs. The only potentially hairy situation arose when someone knocked my arm and I ended up dousing a girl in Guiness on the way back from the bar. Her boyfriend grabbed my arm and stared at me with such venom that I was sure I was about get decked and subsequently doused in Guiness myself. Fortunately, a few "sorrys!" and attempts to get napkins sorted the situation out quite nicely.

It's hard to be back on campus today after such a lively weekend. Besides my two classes, I've tried to keep my schedule rather light so that I'm free to travel on the weekends, but I'm discovering that so much free time just leaves me wasting time and money. So, this week, I'm going to talk to the BBC about some part-time interning. We'll see.