Learning Experience #2

242 South Union

My apartment on 242 South Union brought not only partying, but a sense of reality. In-order to live comfortably in the world, one needs basic necessities, like water and electricity. I now realize that these utilities require payments and those payments need to be payed.  

My worst personal trait back then was that I didn’t open any of my bills. I liked to leave them on the counter and pretend that they didn’t exist, or would just go away. Its funny when I look back, because I didn’t even have to pay them. I would just send them to my parents, who would send the payments. I was just uber lazy. 

It was late January, on a really cold day and I was watching television with my roommate, when all of a sudden the power cut out. My initial reaction was a blown fuse, but after spending an hour flicking different switches we realized it wasn’t. It was then that I looked at the counter and saw the Burlington Electric bill. We learned the lesson about paying bills the hard way. We froze our asses off for two days, with no television and light. 

  How will this lesson learned help me? Since them I have been really good with paying bills. Nowadays, I have numerous bills and they all need to be payed, if I want light, water and heat. That one event really turned me into a good bill payer, which is essential in a professional life. 

Champlain Abroad

The Champlain College Ireland program, showed me an Emerald Isle I thought didn’t exist. From talking to ordinary Irish citizens and readings from class, I learned that Ireland was facing the same problems as America and that we are both extremely common. 

Since I went to Ireland, I was able to witness the aftermath of one of the worst credit and housing bubbles in history. Before the burst, Ireland’s economy was growing at the same pace as India and China, it was called the Celtic Tiger. This all came to a crashing halt, leaving vacant developments and thousands struggling. I was able to walk around vacant home developments, which had around twenty homes and they were all vacant. I saw unfinished highways, tunnels and bridges, the construction companies ran out of money, packed up and left. There were so many shutdown pubs and a ton of beggars. I felt like I was living in another great depression. 

 
  This turned out to be an extremely cool learning experience. This exchange program gave me the opportunity to witness first hand, what happens to a bankrupt country. Seeing whole developed towns that weren’t sold, because everyone lost their money over night, was an eye opener. This experienced showed just how intertwined modern society has become. The Irish credit and housing bubble sent a shocked wave, which not only ravaged Irelands economy, but E.U in whole.