Today we had our first social work activity..It has been four days so it is probably time haha. We got to sleep in and met up with a professor at the University of Galway around 2. She talked to us about social work in Ireland. Specifically, she talked about the recession and what they call the "celtic tiger". Basically, that was when Ireland was flourishing and thought they could spend all of their money. When the banks got in trouble the celtic tiger collapsed and led to the position they are in now. She also talked a little about families and the rights of families in the irish constitution. She had some interesting facts on marriage in Ireland and divorce rates and a little on the rights of children. It was good to be able to compare that with US policies and rates. It seems like their recession is worse than ours. She said "we always say when the US catches a cold, we catch pneumonia". I thought that was interesting to see how globalization really affects Ireland.
After our meeting with her we had free time and then went to dinner with her and another professor from the university. It was a great little restaurant. We then went to a place called the Crane Bar. The professor sponsoring the trip has been there a couple times and liked it so we tagged along. They had good Irish music was it was tiny and with so many people it was hard to move around. 5 of us ended up walking back and didn't get lost this time at all!
Tomorrow we are touring a hospital in Galway which should be interesting because that is where my main interests are. After that we are having a lecture on child services and domestic violence. The person doing that lecture also went to dinner with us tonight and he seems to be fun and knowledgeable. Hopefully, all works out!
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