Ireland Weekend Two: Epic Fail

This weekend has by far been the hardest ones here. I'm trying to stay positive and optimistic, but struggling big time. It started out with our second weekend to Ireland. Four of us girls decided we just didn't get enough of the Irish atmosphere and planned a trip to Shannon and Galway for Thursday through Sunday. We stayed in a hotel on Wednesday night by the airport because we had a 7am flight to Shannon on Thursday morning. When we got to the airport we went through security and I got a frisking that would never be allowed to be done in the states! awkward! Then we went through to get our passports checked and on to board. 2 of the girls were let through, but they told Brigette and I that we needed to go get our passports stamped at the Ryanair desk. So we went and got our passports stamped, all is good and then head to our gate. There was a long line and it was early so we sat on the benches and waited to board the plane. When we walked up, they let Nicola through (she's German and part of the EU) then Brigette, me, but they stopped Leah and told her she needed to get her boarding pass stamped by Ryanair which is what Brigette and I did. They said there is no way she is going to make the plane and it will cost us each £100 to change our flights. Which, is about 170 USD. Leah ran to try and make it to the plane and the three of us were left to decide what to do. We didn't want to leave Leah, but it was stupid for us all to pay, so I sent the other two and hung back with Leah. She made it back 3 minutes after they closed the door and Ryanair would not let us on. They were soo rude. Leah and I decided since the next plane wasn't until 10:45 about 12 hours later that it wasn't worth the cost we would have to pay of a new plane ticket, new bus ticket and only getting about 2 days in Galway. We were crushed. We tried to get our money back through Ryanair, but they would not give us ANY grace. We were also told by many airport workers that this company will try to do this on purpose so they make money off of people with the flight changes. I hate this kind of injustice. We're looking into contacting some kind of better business bureau here. Ugh! What a start to the weekend.

Then, last night my computer hard drive decided to crash. fantastic. I might have lost all of my notes, itinterary planning, and pictures from the last 2 months of being here. The pictures is what gets me the most. Thank the Lord I have mobile me so my contacts and calendar was synced to that. I am praying feverently that Apple will be able to salvage something from the hard drive. Ugh! Another huge bummer. I have an appointment on Friday at Cambridge so hopefully those geniuses can work some magic! To top it all off, I turned an entire load of whites gray. Not sure at all how that happened.

What a weekend. It can only go up from here!

Meliss