Student Bloggers

Hello everyone! I’m Matthew Elmore Merritt, a rising junior from Bridgeport, Alabama, attending Yale University. I chose Arcadia’s STEM Summer Research Program at University College Dublin (UCD) because I knew it would enhance my goals of pursuing an MD/PhD and career in health research while allowing me to explore a new part of the world. In showing a particular adventure my new friends and I took at the start of the program, I hope I can show you just how fun, accessible, and beautiful Dublin (and Ireland as a whole) is. 

After settling into my residence right before our research began, several students and I decided to follow the recommendation of a UCD tour guide and venture to 40 Foot Beach. For any fans of James Joyce out there, you might know that his most famous work, Ulysses, began at 40 Foot Beach in the guard tower nearby, and you’d also be happy to know that Bloomsday takes place in June while we’re in Dublin. How cool! Luckily, Dublin has an easy-to-navigate bus system that drops students off about 5 minutes from our residences at UCD, so getting to 40 Foot Beach was an easy and direct ride. 

In the photo, you can see that 40 Foot’s name is a little misleading. The jump is nowhere near forty feet tall, but, what it lacks in height, it makes up for in frigid water temperatures. Being from the Deep South, where the average high temperature for the month of June is 90 degrees, I was quite surprised by just how cold the water was. But like any good Southerner, I believe I can handle just about anything. So my friend Stephen (from North Carolina), and I jumped in not just once, but twice, and had an absolute blast all the while. The cold water was well worth the jump. 

After sufficiently tackling 40 Foot, the group went to a nearby restaurant where I ordered what is perhaps the world’s best Shrimp Po’ Boy. After dinner, we made one last stop at a well-known ice cream stand in Dublin, Teddy’s Ice Cream, where they leave a tasty chocolate flake in the middle of your ice cream cone. Like the Po’ Boy, the strawberry sundae I ordered was worth writing a blog for in itself! 40 Foot, like all of Dublin, has an incredible and vibrant food scene to compliment its natural beauty. 

Our day at 40 Foot is just one of many experiences from my time here I’ll always remember. I’ve made countless friends through this program, and I’ve had the chance to live independently in a new country. I’ve learned how to explore, what my interests are, and even a few new recipes. I can’t wait to see what’s next on this adventure. Thanks for reading! 

Cheers, Matthew