TWO Sundays ago I was on the top of a mountain in Austria. It was my first ever time skiing and I became a ski-bore within a week.
There's no hope for me.
I'm Hungarian and I came to live in Ireland nearly four years ago, initially to work for the Hungarian National Tourist Office. After a few years, they wanted me to move to London but by then I had fallen in love with Ireland and didn't want to leave. That's when I came to work for Topflight.
Since joining Topflight, work has been very busy because instead of just having one destination to market I now have many and I've been doing a lot of travelling to familiarise myself with all the different places. Hence finding myself up a mountain in Austria a couple of weeks back. I'll be back there next Sunday with a group that we are bringing over in conjunction with Today FM, who'll be broadcasting from the slopes for the week. So instead of a straightforward skiing holiday, these people will be getting a whole programme of activities including quizzes, parties and . . . this is the one that I'm most excited about . . . speeddating in the gondolas.
If I'm at home in Dublin then Sunday is really for Nora-time. People assume there's an Irish connection because of my name but there isn't . . . I didn't even realise Nora was an Irish name until I came here. I think it must have been my destiny to be in Ireland and that's why my mother chose an Irish name. Anyway, I'm usually out late on Saturday night . . . I love the restaurants in Dublin, and I like to dance so we often end up in Spy.
My best friend here, Erika Repassy, used to be my boss at the tourist office but now she's a yoga teacher and she taught me a iyengar yoga sequence which I do on Sunday mornings. Iyengar is very slow and precise and I find that it wakes my body up and brings balance back after a busy week.
Then I'm ready for a cup of my favourite Irish tea . . .
Barry's Gold Label since you ask, and no they're not paying me. I like the Sunday papers, particularly the travel sections and fashion and beauty. I'm taking an astrology class at the moment and sometimes I'll take time on Sunday to look at the planetary positions and interpret how these might affect whatever I have coming up.
In the afternoon I like to go for a long walk with my boyfriend Cedric, who's French. We might go to the Wicklow Mountains or Glendalough. In the summer I often buy organic strawberries from the market in the People's Park and eat them walking down Dun Laoghaire Pier. I love the sea air.
Sunday evenings are my time for entertaining at home. I cook Hungarian food . . . goulash, chicken paprika, in Hungarian cuisine everything starts with onions and paprika . . .
and my friends come over to eat and watch a DVD. I'm usually in bed by 11, which is early for me.