I’ve never blogged before. I’ve also never moved to a different country before either, so I figured I might as well do the first as I’m experiencing the second.

I moved to Dublin, Ireland, on September 2, 2016 – ten years after I first got it into my head that this was something that I might want to do. I first visited Ireland on an amazing holiday vacation with my mom back when I was in college, and I immediately loved it. I came back several times on vacation, always thinking that one day I’d like to move here.

I work as a Management Consultant for a global technology and consulting firm, and in the fall of 2015 I was finally able to make the right networking connection to put me in touch with leadership in Dublin and start the transfer process (which took about a year).

I used to journal a lot in high school, and I always liked looking back on my old journals from time to time, remembering what I was thinking/doing/feeling at particular points of time in my life. Sadly, this fell by the wayside in college, and so there’s basically a 15-year gap in my “life story” if someone were going looking for it. So since I’m here in Ireland, with so many new experiences, friends, food, and places to explore, starting a blog is my way of preserving my memories and also sharing my new adventures with family, friends, and Internet strangers.

I also have this back-of-my-mind-dream-job where I get paid to travel around the world – exploring new areas, meeting new people, trying new food, learning new languages, and passing along all my experiences to other people – and a blog is my way of dipping my toe into the travel industry.

In terms of what you’ll find here, I definitely plan to provide helpful travel tips and recommendations. But you’ll also find good recipes I tried  (I’m trying to improve my woeful culinary “skills”), cool bars I visited, pictures I took when trying to match my youngest sister for artsy-ness, and generally just a blog about life in another country.

In Ireland, the word “craic” (pronounced “crack”) means “fun” – as in, “That bungee-jumping was good craic!” or “Stephanie is great craic!” However, it can also be used as part of a greeting, as in “Any craic?” or “What’s the craic?” – which basically mean “What’s up/what’s going on?”

So, since my blog doesn’t really have a specific focus per se, I thought “What’s the craic?”  would be an appropriate title, as I hope to convey both “fun” things as well as what is actually “up.”

Okay no more quotation marks. Enjoy!