i´d just like to make it known that it is 65 degrees here, and i walked around in a tshirt all day.
also, i ate snails. and rabbit.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Thursday, January 22, 2009
a quick hola
so as it turns out, i'm not very good at updating this. surprise.
i've been here almost 3 weeks now... so weird. last night i had a dream that it was all over already and i was coming home, and it was one of those dreams that when i woke up, i was scared was real. i guess that must mean i'm enjoying myself !
so, in the last 2 weeks i...
went to madrid (north)
went to granada (south/ absolutely amazing)
went on 3 different tours of toledo
absent-midedly wandered onto the completely WRONG bus, destination: middle of nowhere
started liking "fama! a bailar"
picked up on some swear words that bea uses pretttty often...
ate 2 big macs
ate fish that still had bones and a tail
drank a 1 euro box of wine
was interviewed by spanish radio about our new president
have not cried
i think that's a pretty good summary... sorry so short. gotta pack and then off to valencia for the weekend - warmer weather, authenic paella, and a BEACH... yes katie, that means you're getting some spanish sand.
hasta luego
coming soon: people watching, the civil war, and how not to look american
i've been here almost 3 weeks now... so weird. last night i had a dream that it was all over already and i was coming home, and it was one of those dreams that when i woke up, i was scared was real. i guess that must mean i'm enjoying myself !
so, in the last 2 weeks i...
went to madrid (north)
went to granada (south/ absolutely amazing)
went on 3 different tours of toledo
absent-midedly wandered onto the completely WRONG bus, destination: middle of nowhere
started liking "fama! a bailar"
picked up on some swear words that bea uses pretttty often...
ate 2 big macs
ate fish that still had bones and a tail
drank a 1 euro box of wine
was interviewed by spanish radio about our new president
have not cried
i think that's a pretty good summary... sorry so short. gotta pack and then off to valencia for the weekend - warmer weather, authenic paella, and a BEACH... yes katie, that means you're getting some spanish sand.
hasta luego
coming soon: people watching, the civil war, and how not to look american
Monday, January 12, 2009
te gusta jamon?
hokay, soo...
a typical day in toledo =
i get up around 730ish for class and thus far i have yet to sleep through an entire night... still working on that time change thing. i get ready really quick and then walk about 2 blocks to my bus stop. i think out of everyone in the group i live the farthest but it's not terrible, kate and adrienne are close. i still havent mastered the bus schedule yet, i seem to miss it. a lot. but one way or another i get on the bus and its about a 15 min ride into the casco and the main plaza called zocodover (restaurants, shopping, etc) from zocodover it's prolly another 8 min to walk to class. however, this city is like a MAZE. actually i always think about the movie labrynth when i'm walking around and wonder if a muppet is going to pop out of nowhere. but yes, apparently it was a way of protecting the city from invaders. well when i get clipped by an oncoming car i'll have 9th century builders to thank. anyway, i either have class til 11 or til 130 and in between class we hang out in the cafeteria in the university and most people use the internet there cause their host families don't have it. well lucky for me, bea steals it from the neighbors.
so, in spain the biggest meal of the day is lunch just like ours is dinner. at about 2 pm, everything closes (stores, banks, etc) and everyone goes home to eat a big lunch and then takes a siesta. everyone. and around 5 things reopen and no one eats dinner til about 9. even MORE mind-boggling... people here don't go out til around midnight and bars stay open til 6 in the morning. we always leave around 3 and bea tells me i come home early. but i'm pretty sure she only knew that because i woke her up the first night i went out and couldnt get back in with my keys... real smooth.
but zocodover is usually our hangout... we meet at mcdonalds a lot and you can get BEER there. incredible. we also love this sandwich/coffee/pastry place called naca naca. we've adopted it as our hangout i'm almost positive they're sick of us already.
soooo thats the deal here. lemme know if i missed anything.
here's a few random excepts from my own journal from the first days...
Jan. 7
We had a tour of the university (universidad de castilla-la mancha) and the buildings have a lot of history. Part of the school is a church from the times of the Spanish Inquisition… pretty cool.
I’m really nervous for classes. It’s very frustrating because even though I’m a Spanish MAJOR, I feel like I know nothing. But every day I can tell I understand a little more..
After the tour they had tapas (tapas = appetizer-like foods that are common everywhere in spain) and sangria for us. Sangria = good. The tapas were different… salmon, CAVIAR, weird cake-looking things that look like desserts but definitely aren’t desserts, Spanish tortilla (different than mexican tortilla. spanish tortilla is like eggs and potatos), weird things that look like cheese sticks but really have weird potatoes inside, bread, goooood cheese, and JAMON. These people love ham... a lot. Actually, they love pork products in general. They pretty much add either ham, bacon, or hot dogs to whatever they can.
Jan. 8
Came back to the apartment around 1230, I finally got the locks right!
Went back to Zocodover at 5, met up with kate and adrienne at mcdonalds as per usual. We did a lot of walking around the stores and whatnot, and met up with a bunch of the girls. We all went to naca naca for chocolate and snacks and then came home for dinner. Went back out to O’briens (irish pub haha) where EVERYONE met up, the whole group. I love them!! Then we went to circulo de arte (art museum by day, discoteque by night)and did the usual – cervezas, chupitas (shots), daaaancing. Met a lawyer from Uruguay that I think is in love with me. Yikes.
Jan 9th
Slept until 2! Yikes. Bea came home and we had the weird lentil bean stew again. Watched the news.. half the news is soccer and the other half is about snow. oh and sometimes theres 5 min about israel/palestine. now watching "Fama! A bailar" ...extremely long reality show about dancers. tv is so weird here. but they sure do loove the simpsons, and house (which you think would be "casa" but nope).
OK, from now on i'll keep current. hasta luego......
a typical day in toledo =
i get up around 730ish for class and thus far i have yet to sleep through an entire night... still working on that time change thing. i get ready really quick and then walk about 2 blocks to my bus stop. i think out of everyone in the group i live the farthest but it's not terrible, kate and adrienne are close. i still havent mastered the bus schedule yet, i seem to miss it. a lot. but one way or another i get on the bus and its about a 15 min ride into the casco and the main plaza called zocodover (restaurants, shopping, etc) from zocodover it's prolly another 8 min to walk to class. however, this city is like a MAZE. actually i always think about the movie labrynth when i'm walking around and wonder if a muppet is going to pop out of nowhere. but yes, apparently it was a way of protecting the city from invaders. well when i get clipped by an oncoming car i'll have 9th century builders to thank. anyway, i either have class til 11 or til 130 and in between class we hang out in the cafeteria in the university and most people use the internet there cause their host families don't have it. well lucky for me, bea steals it from the neighbors.
so, in spain the biggest meal of the day is lunch just like ours is dinner. at about 2 pm, everything closes (stores, banks, etc) and everyone goes home to eat a big lunch and then takes a siesta. everyone. and around 5 things reopen and no one eats dinner til about 9. even MORE mind-boggling... people here don't go out til around midnight and bars stay open til 6 in the morning. we always leave around 3 and bea tells me i come home early. but i'm pretty sure she only knew that because i woke her up the first night i went out and couldnt get back in with my keys... real smooth.
but zocodover is usually our hangout... we meet at mcdonalds a lot and you can get BEER there. incredible. we also love this sandwich/coffee/pastry place called naca naca. we've adopted it as our hangout i'm almost positive they're sick of us already.
soooo thats the deal here. lemme know if i missed anything.
here's a few random excepts from my own journal from the first days...
Jan. 7
We had a tour of the university (universidad de castilla-la mancha) and the buildings have a lot of history. Part of the school is a church from the times of the Spanish Inquisition… pretty cool.
I’m really nervous for classes. It’s very frustrating because even though I’m a Spanish MAJOR, I feel like I know nothing. But every day I can tell I understand a little more..
After the tour they had tapas (tapas = appetizer-like foods that are common everywhere in spain) and sangria for us. Sangria = good. The tapas were different… salmon, CAVIAR, weird cake-looking things that look like desserts but definitely aren’t desserts, Spanish tortilla (different than mexican tortilla. spanish tortilla is like eggs and potatos), weird things that look like cheese sticks but really have weird potatoes inside, bread, goooood cheese, and JAMON. These people love ham... a lot. Actually, they love pork products in general. They pretty much add either ham, bacon, or hot dogs to whatever they can.
Jan. 8
Came back to the apartment around 1230, I finally got the locks right!
Went back to Zocodover at 5, met up with kate and adrienne at mcdonalds as per usual. We did a lot of walking around the stores and whatnot, and met up with a bunch of the girls. We all went to naca naca for chocolate and snacks and then came home for dinner. Went back out to O’briens (irish pub haha) where EVERYONE met up, the whole group. I love them!! Then we went to circulo de arte (art museum by day, discoteque by night)and did the usual – cervezas, chupitas (shots), daaaancing. Met a lawyer from Uruguay that I think is in love with me. Yikes.
Jan 9th
Slept until 2! Yikes. Bea came home and we had the weird lentil bean stew again. Watched the news.. half the news is soccer and the other half is about snow. oh and sometimes theres 5 min about israel/palestine. now watching "Fama! A bailar" ...extremely long reality show about dancers. tv is so weird here. but they sure do loove the simpsons, and house (which you think would be "casa" but nope).
OK, from now on i'll keep current. hasta luego......
primera semana / first week
well friends, i've survived 7 days in spain and it's been quite the roller coaster. i've been keeping notes/thoughts on paper and also doing some journaling in a word doc so i have a lot to share. here's a basic intro ...
after 2 longs days of delayed flights, missed flights, and not whole lot of sleep we finally made it to madrid where we took the bus to toledo. as soon as we got here our host families basically kidnapped us almost immediately. as many times as i had gone over things in my head to say to my, i found it pretty much impossible to talk. definitely felt reaaal stupid. my host family is actually just a young woman, her name is bea (pronounced bay-uh) and her boyfriend angel (on-hell). they are incredibly nice and laidback.
toledo is a beautiful small city built into the mountains about an hour south of madrid. what it lacks in size, it makes up for in history and aesthetics. it is known for being a center of religious coexisence in the middle ages - christianity, judaism, islam - and therefore is full of neeeat old stuff.. the medieval part of the city is called "el casco" and is proctected by a stone wall all the way around.
the first few days were extremely difficult. not only is it 6 hours later here, but spanish people run on a completely different time frame than americans (i'll explain later). it was so hard to be hungry at the right times, because i also did not want to offend them by not eating. they take pride in what they cook! and they eat SO much! those who know me well know that i can definitely eat, and usually pretty quickly, but i honestly blinked twice and these people cleaned their plates. ridiculous. beyond the time change, we've been thrown into a foreign country and expected to find our way around. even after bea showed me how to take the bus into the city i still had to take it around twice when i came home by myself because i couldn't remember where i lived!! very traumatic. by the time last monday was over all i could do was lay in bed and CRY. was definitely ready to jump a plane back home. even several days later i still felt like i was constantly on the verge of tears. but nowww i'm finally comfortable and enjoying toledo.
ok, prolly gonna be a triple post today because i have so much to talk about. sooo, gonna knock out some homework and be back in a few hours.....
hasta luego amigos
after 2 longs days of delayed flights, missed flights, and not whole lot of sleep we finally made it to madrid where we took the bus to toledo. as soon as we got here our host families basically kidnapped us almost immediately. as many times as i had gone over things in my head to say to my, i found it pretty much impossible to talk. definitely felt reaaal stupid. my host family is actually just a young woman, her name is bea (pronounced bay-uh) and her boyfriend angel (on-hell). they are incredibly nice and laidback.
toledo is a beautiful small city built into the mountains about an hour south of madrid. what it lacks in size, it makes up for in history and aesthetics. it is known for being a center of religious coexisence in the middle ages - christianity, judaism, islam - and therefore is full of neeeat old stuff.. the medieval part of the city is called "el casco" and is proctected by a stone wall all the way around.
the first few days were extremely difficult. not only is it 6 hours later here, but spanish people run on a completely different time frame than americans (i'll explain later). it was so hard to be hungry at the right times, because i also did not want to offend them by not eating. they take pride in what they cook! and they eat SO much! those who know me well know that i can definitely eat, and usually pretty quickly, but i honestly blinked twice and these people cleaned their plates. ridiculous. beyond the time change, we've been thrown into a foreign country and expected to find our way around. even after bea showed me how to take the bus into the city i still had to take it around twice when i came home by myself because i couldn't remember where i lived!! very traumatic. by the time last monday was over all i could do was lay in bed and CRY. was definitely ready to jump a plane back home. even several days later i still felt like i was constantly on the verge of tears. but nowww i'm finally comfortable and enjoying toledo.
ok, prolly gonna be a triple post today because i have so much to talk about. sooo, gonna knock out some homework and be back in a few hours.....
hasta luego amigos
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