my three day week

After a week of NO CLASSES during Semana Santa, coming back on Monday took quite a bit of motivation... Luckily, I only have one class in the morning. After class I ran straight the the Stationary store to buy some very belated birthday cards. First off, it needs to be said that Spanish people must not really care about people's birthdays because birthday cards are nearly impossible to find. Once I found the store it was quite the ordeal to find it when it was actually open. Finally I did it and was able to buy, write, and mail all the birthday cards. Afterward, I joined Kendra and Brittany for a much needed hair cut. Only 5€ and done by a student... all things considered, it's not bad. Believe it or not the errors have nothing to do with my Spanish skills. (Thank you wordreference.com for helping me find the correct term for "bangs" in Spanish-Spanish) After our haircuts we walked a couple streets over back to a cafe next to our house for a tostada and cafe con leche that we had NEVER been too (delicious, but AWFUL service). Then to wrap up the day... I cleaned my room! Don't be so surprised, I mean it's SPRING. That means: Spring Cleaning Time!

Nikki's mom and aunt were in Sevilla to visit so I joined them for dinner. It was wonderful - and the food wasn't that bad either. Having visitors in Sevilla makes me love the city even more. When I first arrived here and should have been in awe of the city's beauty I was a bit preoccupied with the whole, "Holy Hannah. I'm in Spain and am going to be living here for the next 5 months!" But really the best part was just getting to know them and laugh at Nikki with them and just have a nice meal, with good conversation - in English!

Now I have to admit something that could be a bit embarrassing: I fell down the stairs. That was my Tuesday (a week and a day ago). Thanks to my graceful nature I now have a bruise that covers a good quarter of my butt. It's gross. I've made Kendra help me monitor the color-changing-spectrum/progression. It's been an array of shades from red, blue, purple, and finally, now, a week later, almost black. So after coming home and whining to Kendra about my tragic injury I had a meeting at the CIEE Study Center where I learned all about how I should prepare for our trip to Morocco. I made it home around 10:30 and there was no sign of dinner or our Senora or either of her daughters, so we headed outside. We were going to go to a place with Brittany and Inez (Brittany is from Kendra's program and Inez is from Monaco and lives with Brittany) and we followed Inez for a good 30 minute walk only to end up at a semi-sketchy bar with NO FOOD. So we made the trek back from Alameda at about 11:15 and into Plaza Alfalfa where we had the BEST Italian food I've had in Sevilla. We were also about to see: ¡A PASO! I was SO excited! They were covered with tarps and I'm assuming were being carried to wherever it is that they are stored but it was after midnight on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning and the costaleros were hard at work bringing their pasos to where they needed to be. It was like Semana Santa was still going strong!

Wednesday was far from exciting. I had my class, studying for a couple hours, attempted to go to my professor's office hours even though he wasn't there, ran home, studied some more and packed for Morocco. Then I met my friend Chris who is in a different program but whom I met on the flight to Sevilla for some ice cream. We hadn't talked since our third or fourth week in Sevilla so we were able to swap stories. This was also my first time having ice cream since the pathetic cone in Triana during Semana Santa - and let me tell you, this was MUCH better. It was FULL of ice cream. Then I went home, studying a bit more, made sure I had everything ready for Morocco (triple checking that I had my passport packed) and went to sleep since I had to be ready for the bus at 7:30 am (a rather un-Godly hour in Sevilliano terms).

¡Por Fin! My Semana Santa Post!

This has been unbelievably difficult to write. I hope that with the picture I posted earlier (and if I'm lucky, a few videos that I'm hoping to put up later) you'll get a slight picture of the great festivities of Semana Santa in Sevilla.

The Wednesday before the start of Semana Santa I went on a tour/information session called, "Conocer la Semana Santa" with a small group of students from by program. This was more or less my crash course in all things Semana Santa. Here's what we learned:

Semana Santa in Sevilla is a really big deal. Not only is it a week of celebration but it is the largest system of processions in the world. Every day of the week there are numerous of processions that run more or less all hours of the day. A procession is more or less a parade. Churches from all over Sevilla create a "hermandad" or brotherhood.

The standard structure of a procession is:

La Cruz de Guía: the guiding cross, which leads the procession through La Carrera Oficial (Official path for each procession through La Campaña and Plaza de San Francisco, down Avenida de la Constitución into and through La Catedral out into Plaza del Triunfo and back to their church).

Nazarenos: although at first these guys can be a bit intimidating, since their outfits resemble those of the KKK, their actually really nice - some hand out caramels during the day and at night they will let the wax from their candles drip down to for a ball that other nazarenos add too so that kids literally have a ball of wax bigger than their heads before they move out of their parents' houses (which happens in their earlier 30's here in Spain.) The pointed hood is called a capirote. Each hood and cloak is a different color based on the hermandad and the nazarenos walk in sets of two, carrying candles that are a good 5 feet long. There are anywhere from hundreds to a few thousand nazarenos in each procession and are broken up into tramos - I'm not 100% sure of why but I do know that each tramo is marked by a flag and the fifth tramo is the last tramo and is marked by a flag that looks like a fish and is called, bacalao (That means cod and was my high school Spanish teacher Sr. Smalling's favorite word).

Then, between the last tramo there is usually a group of church clergy, altar boys, tons of incense, huge candelabras, all sorts of craziness leading the way for the...

PASO: floats made of wood, covered/plated in silver or gold, with a large sculpture of either Christ depicting the events proceeding His Death and Resurrection, or the Virgin Mary praying, crying, or simply looking extremely pained/depressed for the loss of her Son.

Underneath the Paso are the Costaleros. These guys are the ones that make everything happen - well sort of. They're the ones carrying the paso through the narrow streets of Sevilla. They're allowed to rest when they set the paso down and for the processions that take a really like time, costaleros will switch out with one another (there always seems to be a relief nearby in the crowd).

Penitentes: a group of more people from the hermandad that wear the same cloak as the nazarenos but without the hood and carry wooden crosses to mark their penance. Many of the penitentes walk barefoot (oh, a lot of nazarenos also walk barefoot).

Musica: after the penitentes or sometimes before the penitentes immediately after the Paso there will be a band or a choir as a part of the procession. I'm definitely thinking about downloading some Semana Santa music from iTunes - it's really makes the procession a rather moving experience.

Then, the structure repeats itself - each hermandad usually has 2 pasos - one of Christ and one of Mary. but the entire procession structure happens for each paso - so Christ has his own set of of nazarenos and penitentes and Mary has her own set of nazarenos and penitentes.
Other things we learned while on the tour:

• no two pasos are alike
• Mary's insides are hollow but her face, neck, arms and hands are real (well, in terms of a sculpture they're "real")
• Her cloak is made of velvet and stitched and embroidered with strands of gold and EXTREMELY heavy
• The canopy or palio that covers Mary is decorated differently for each paso and is always very very very elaborate - usually with more plated gold and silver, lots of mirrored surfaces, more embroidered heavy fabrics, and often times tassels that hang down.
• All of the flowers on the pasos are real - other cities in Spain with inferior Semana Santa festivities use silk flowers (hence their inferiority)
• The traditional Semana Santa snacks are pestiños (Sort of a pita like chip soaked in honey and then folded) and torrija (Think french toast, only not. It's a piece of bread soaked in honey/milk/sugar/wine/???).
• Processions last forever - at least 4 to 6 hours, some go on for more than 12. Very crazy.
  
• umm and lots of other random facts about Semana Santa that I sadly, cannot quite remember.

So the next weekend you couldn't go anywhere without seeing someone prepare something for Semana Santa. The bands were out in the plazas and by the river practicing, groups of costaleros marching with the band to getting their time right for swinging the tassels. It's also tradition for everyone to dress up during Semana Santa - church clothes nearly all week long. That meant that on Friday and Saturday proceeding Palm Sunday (or Domingo de las Ramas) every single Sevilliano was out in el centro or in Nervion Plaza shopping for a new outfit. (Myself included.... sadly, I didn't find anything¡)

Finally Semana Santa began!

Domingo de Las Ramas (Palm Sunday)
Nikki and I dressed up a bit, went to mass at La Catedral and then sat in Puerta Jerez (right outside of La Catedral) for a good hour and a half and people-watched. There were a ton of cute little kids in wonderful frilly dresses, and little suits and ties, and sisters that were matching. There were cute old couples walking around holding hands. And, well, there were MORE than enough teenagers wearing dresses that reminded me more of compression shorts than anything else. After a quick lunch and a trip to the park to read some of my Bible (it was my goal to read through all of the Gospels during Semana Santa) we began the Paso watching.
We somehow managed to sneak through the crowds to the corner of Calle Placentines and Calle Aleman which is the corner next to where the pasos exited the Cathedral. It was a great way to start off the Semana Santa-ing experience. We had more or less front row (there was one group of people in front of us but we could still see just about everything) and we were RIGHT BY THE CATHEDRAL. We were able to see: La Paz, La Hiniesta, La Cena, and San Roque.
Getting away from our corner was a bit of a trial - but my Type-A personality came through and according to Nikki, I "controlled the heck out of that crowd." After we escaped the massive swarm of people and had a bit of room to stretch out we bought some Semana Santa snacks from a guy with a cart and headed in for the night.

Santo Lunes (Holy Monday)
Monday afternoon, after a lazy morning in the park, I seemed to just walk into one Paso after another. I think I ended up seeing ------ Everywhere I went there seemed to be a Paso.
That night Juanma joined me for the Paso-watching fun so that I could have a "true Semana Santa experience." Well... Sadly, Juanma is one of those Sevillianos that leave Sevilla for Semana Santa to avoid the crowds. After pouting about having to walk (rather than drive) into el centro, and walking in every direction imaginable to try to avoid La Avenida de La Constitucion since it's completely blocked off with pasos coming from every imaginable direction. I had faith that Juanma knew what he was doing... yeah right. At one point someone stopped us to ask for directions. He was no help- At all. At that point I knew it was going to be a long night. It didn't help that we couldn't seem to get very far without running into one of his friends, or a friend of his families.
One woman that he knew ended up rescuing me from whatever attempt Juanma was making to "show me Semana Santa" and took us through Plaza Nueva and down Calle Sierpes to catch a paso: Las Penas. While Juanma's friend and I (whose name I sadly cannot remember) were getting to know each other and excitedly talking about Semana Santa, Juanma decided it was appropriate to make an array of jokes and started whining about: how difficult it was to stay standing, how much he had to walk around - his solution was that I should be carrying him, or at the very least pushing him in a stroller. There was a pretty big crowd so all we could really see at first were the tips of the capirotes but once the paso got closer we could smell the incense and hear the drums. At this point Juanma compared the sound of the drums to the footsteps of the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park and I was slightly afraid that his friend was going to kick us butt, but like all things of God, the paso through just in time to distract her.
After the paso went through I decided Juanma have behaved well enough to finally receive his "Día del Padre" McFlurry. While eating our ice cream we had a lovely "father-daughter" chat about what sort of clothes are and are not appropriate to be worn out of the house. Don't worry - I have yet to fail the test. Instead we both sat there shaking our heads in disbelief: "How did their fathers let them out of the house!?!"

Santo Tuesday (Holy Tuesday)
On Tuesday morning Little Maria and I decided we were going to try to watch the salida (when a paso leaves their home church to begin the procession) of El Cerro in the morning. Well, turns out the church was a bit further away than we had anticipated. Instead we ended up catching in right in front of the business school where I take classes 4 days a week! It was really amusing to watch the groups of nazarenos and costaleros walk into my school's cafeteria for a quick cafe as the rest of their group stopped trying to deal with the lovely mess of construction just a couple blocks away from the school. This was probably one of the largest (in terms of numbers) processions I had seen. There were just SO many nazarenos. As we waited Maria and I taught each other the Lord's Prayer in Spanish and English respectively, and took some silly pictures.
After our adventure I met up with Nikki for our Semana Santa adventure with Javier care of, CIEE. Javier (for some odd reason... I'm guessing our program pays him) decided that he wanted to take a group of Americans around to watch pasos for the evening. So off we went. Running all around el centro. We started in Plaza Alfalfa by Jesus de Las Tres Caidas where we saw San Esteban. After that we went to a place in an area of Sevilla I had never been to before in a tiny little street where everyone was smashed together. We were entertained and slightly annoyed by two little boys that were getting frustrated by all of the people that were trying to cross the street, through the nazarenos, and get from one side to another. (This is one of those things that is much easier said than done.) Finally, Los Javieres (I'm assuming this is why Javier dragged us all the way through Sevilla to see it) brought their paso through. From there we headed back into the heart of the city, and saw Los Estudiantes. Los Estudiantes is a hermandad created from students from the Universidad de Sevilla. It is proud to have the largest number of penitentes in all of Semana Santa, and has representatives from every college/department in the university system. From there we all went our separate ways into the massive crowd and went home for dinner.
Nikki and I had plans to meet at midnight to watch her hermanita as a nazareno en La Candelaria. Well somewhere along the way I got confused at thought we were meeting at 11... so I sneaked into her homestay and we made fun of the Aladdin poster that is more or less her headboard and read a coffee-table book about Minnesota from one of their former study abroad students. Very entertaining. At midnight (our originally scheduled time) we headed back out onto the streets. As soon as we turned off of the street Nikki lives on we ran into her host family - turns out her hermanita was done for the day :( But we had plans to see the paso so we continued on. We were planning on watching the paso go through los Jardines de Murillo, but we could see a paso just about to turn around the corner so we ran ahead to see it - for once a procession was on time rather than a good half hour behind. We ended up catching up with la Virgen and got to stand right next to the paso and walk along side of it for quite a bit down the street. Then we realized that if we were standing next to Mary, Jesus had already been through so off we went running after Jesus. Our first goal was to cross to the other side of the procession so that we could run through the park rather than get pushed up against the walls of the streets. The nazarenos were standing still so we thought it would be a good time to sneak through. Well, the moment we had both stepped into the middle of the lines of nazarenos, they lifted their candles and began to walk so we ran for a few yards in the middle of the nazarenos under the archway of the huge candles until we were finally able to dip out between two nazarenos that were spaced apart a good distance and got into the park. From there it was madness. It was pretty much pitch black in the park and we were running in between and around families, trying not to step on dogs that were playing catch, jumping up and over benches, and finally - we see Jesus!

Santo Miercoles (Holy Wednesday)
Wednesday morning both Nikki and I were exhausted - and quite frankly a bit paso-ed out. We decided we wanted to have a slow, Spanish day. After quick taking care of a few errands, we spent some time in a park and then headed into el centro to find a cafe that had chocolate croissants, tea for Nikki and coffee for me. Well, we should have know better. We didn't make it more than two or three blocks before we ran into La Sed. After watching the Virgen come across the bridge of los bomberos (firefighters - their station is underneath the bridge) we continued on our adventure only to run into the Virgen of San Bernando a few blocks further. From there we decided to get adventurous and head over to the area that Javier took us to in search of our croissants. Naturally, we ran into another paso. Actually, it wasn't a paso - it was a group of people waiting for a paso to start. We were waiting for a salida! After a good hour and a half, standing with some not-so-nice Spaniards, we finally saw El Buen Fin exit their church and head out to walk in the streets of Sevilla.

Santo Jueves (Holy Thursday) y La Madruga
The plan for Santo Jueves was pretty much to take the day nice and slowly since I had plans to watch La Madruga which is pretty much the best night in all of Semana Santa. The processions go all night long and consist of the most famous pasos: La Macarena, El Silenco, Los Gitanos, El Gran Poder... Well, that morning Nikki and I got together at McDonald's to use their WiFi and get to work on a group project we had coming up. Then I spent some time in a park reading my Bible, and headed home for some lunch and a nap. Well, I guess all of the paso watching from earlier in the week caught up to me and I ended up sleeping through my alarm until Friday morning! :( So, I failed and ended up missing La Madruga.

Santo Viernes
On Friday I was able to meet up with fellow Iowa Hawkeye, Kate Singer. We spent the day on the river watching pasos go over el Puente de Triana. We watched El Cachorro and La O and in between the two, (in an attempt to get out of the huge crowd and the hot sun) we walked through the neighborhood of Triana in search of some ice cream. We did indeed find some ice cream - however the woman that served us our ice cream could have used a Coldstone Creamery employee training session. Not only did the concept of, "Service with a Smile" seem entirely foreign to her (like us), but she gave us the most pathetically sad scoop of ice cream that has ever been seen on the face of the Earth and called it an ICE CREAM CONE. I was shocked and dismayed. Luckily we were able to see La O right afterwards, and we watched a Spongebob Squarepants balloon float up into the sky. After the pasos we spent the early evening walking through El Parque Santa Maria Luisa.

Santo Sabado
Kendra returned from her trip to Italy late Friday night so she and I spent Saturday catching up. We started with a study session at Starbucks, did some window shopping in el centro (while surprisingly managing to avoid pasos) and then headed down to the river. We sat out at a little cafe for a couple of hours and enjoyed the warm sun, and then went to El Corte Ingles to buy some snacks for our movie night. Then the pasos came full force. When we were walking out of El Corte Ingles en the plaza el Duque we were literally surrounded. There was no escape. There was one paso that covered one side of the store, and another blocking the other two exits. After a lot of weaving in and out and walking way out of our way just to be able to walk we were on our way home. As we walked back along the river to el Torre del Oro and up to Puerta Jerez we ended up running into yet another paso: El Sol. We watched it for a good half hour and then made our way through it and back home. Just when we were about to sit down to eat we heard what sounded an awful lot like a Semana Santa band. And guess what, it was! And we got to watch all of it from our patio. It was really cool to watch it from up above.

Pascua (Easter)
The plans for my Easter involved waking up at 4 am to watch the salida of the final paso, El Resucitado. That didn't quite work out as planned. Instead I ended up rolling out of bed around 10 am, and sat around with my Bible and some homemade cafe (not delicious) and went on a walk with Kate and explored the parks of Sevilla. It was a very nice, slow, and wonderful day in Sevilla.


.... and that was my Semana Santa. I've realized now that I'm done writing this that it's probably going to seem super boring to you as you're reading it, but I insist- it really wasn't. It was awesome and I am so glad I stayed in Sevilla instead of traveling for the week.

¡Yay for Jesus and Parades!

April's Fools!

Okay all - so all though my post about Semana Santa (the one that said something like, "Look at the pictures because I'm not going to tell you anything") wasn't on April Fool's Day it was meant as an April Fool's Joke. Sadly the Spanish sense of humor doesn't quite embrace the holiday like we do so that was my lame attempt at having a bit of April Fun!

... I'm still working on writing all about Semana Santa in Sevilla. It's taking awhile, as I bet you can all imagine since concise-ness isn't my strong suit. But it's on it's way!

Semana Santa

Click here to view these pictures larger

Semana Santa en Sevila

Awesome.


That's all I have to say.

Sorry for those of you expecting one of my novel-length blog posts.
Words cannot describe Semana Santa in Sevilla. Therefore I'm giving you one word - Awesome.

... and a Shutterfly album is above. If a picture is worth a thousand words, and there are 149 pictures, that's 149,000 words worth of Semana Santa.

¡Feliz Pascua! ¡Ha resucitado! ¡Ha resucitado de verdad!

End of Exams & the Start of Vacation

Well, exam scores came in this week. I got a 9.69 (aka 1 wrong) on my International Negotiation & Conflict Resolution exam, and a 9.25 (aka 2 wrong) on my Marketing exam, and a 6.5 on my Finance exam - what happened there was that I had the right answers, just not quite the way the professor wanted them... so a lot of half-credit on individual questions meant my score went down quite a bit. Oh well, next time I'll just memorize the slides instead of trying to learn the content like other students did. I spent the rest of the day in Puerta Jerez enjoying the sunshine and reading for mi clase horible. And that night a group of girls from my program and I made a spontaneous trip to La Carboneria for a Flamenco show.

Tuesday was a day full of classes. Lots of learning as usual. And it was Julie's BIRTHDAY!!! Sadly, I wasn't with her to celebrate BUT I did sing "Cumpleaños Feliz" in her honor to her Facebook page :) On Tuesday night I went for a run by the river with Sarah and then Kjavascript:void(0)endra FINALLY came back from visiting her boyfriend in Oxford so we caught up and talked all about our weekends.

On Wednesday I had my Marketing class and then went on a tour with a called "Conocer la Semana Santa" - Know/become familiar with Semana Santa. It was fantastic and got me all excited and ready for Semana Santa. (I would have a ton to write about this but I'm hoping to apply all of my freshly gained knowledge during the actual Semana Santa and therefore am going to save it all until I write about Semana Santa itself)! After "Conocer la Semana Santa" I had to race from CIEE in el centro all the way back to FCEYE (a good 25 minute walk) in order to go to my International Marketing Seminario - aka a presentation with a worksheet that we had to complete with some poor Sevilliano students that we forced to be there for part of their grade. Afterwards we had a social at the cafeteria across the street. Sadly my Spanish partners didn't want to deal with me anymore so I made Antonio (one of our wonderful CIEE program directors) and one our the year-long students speak Spanish with me, and in Antonio's case promise to teach me how to Salsa. (I'll be sure to keep you all posted on if/when this happens and how it all plays out!)

Now normally, I dread Thursdays. Not quite as much as Tuesdays since after Thursday I'm usually guaranteed a weekend to recover, but I dread them nonetheless. However, this Thursday brought quite a pleasant surprise. I woke up with an extremely strong craving for Perkins. Now, this is a bit odd considering I'm really not a breakfast person... I think it was more of a craving for coffee. American coffee. A true, bottomless-cup-of-coffee. When class started I still hadn't had any coffee so I casually mentioned it to my professor. About halfway through class she decided we may as well wrap things up (since half of the class was gone for a visit with our program to Morocco - don't worry, I'm going in April!) and we walked across the street to the Coffee Corner. It was awesome. We have two students from Morocco in our class who came with, along with the professor, and about 8 of us CIEE students all crammed into a booth with a small table and four chairs at the end of it. Sadly, I had to run after a quick cup of cafe con leche to go to mi clase horible (where the professor just happens to be the husband of the professor I had coffee with - I'm going to refer to them as Gloria & Antonio). So, clase horible begins - and as I hit the first hour mark I silently pray that God will help me plow through the next hour of class and help me to understand everything that is being said around me (since the day before at the seminario I found out (from the year-long student who just so happens to be taking the same class as my clase horible only at a different time and with the same prof) that all of the Sevilliano students spend most of the class making fun of me) and all of a sudden, people start packing things up and the professor says we can leave. What?! TWO half classes? So, since class was over I decided that I should take the opportunity to go talk to my professor, ask a few questions to clarify some vocab that I didn't understand, and set a date for my final exam since the scheduled date isn't until the end of July. Well, next thing I know I've been in his office for over a hour, I was given a delicious caramel from the town where his wife grew up (My plan is to get even more of these the next time I visit one of their office's) and a pretty little daisy.

After that, my 10-day weekend officially began! My Friday and Saturday were pretty much the same. I played Monopoly with mi hermanita española, took a nap, walked around Sevilla, attempted to shop for new Semana Santa clothes with all the Sevillianos but got annoyed with the crowds and gave up. (Sidenote: last night, well walking through the crowds to watch los Pasos with Juanma, he spent a good half hour mocking me because when someone would bump into me I would say some sort of phrase equivalent to "Excuse Me" or "Pardon Me"... He then had his little tirade that I shouldn't be apologizing for something that wasn't my fault since I wasn't the one that was bumping into people (except for when I bumped into him after trying to avoid bumping into other people, but as well as no, that's one of the hazards of being at intercambio.) That turned into a discussion about how I'm "too nice" and Thank God we ran into someone he knew so we were able to change topics.) Anyways, the weekend was great - very relaxing and a wonderful time of preparation for the great festivities of Semana Santa!

Now it's already Martes Santo, and I have TONS of stories to share about Semana Santa BUT they're all going into a different post! Get your eyes ready, and for those of you who need them, your reading glasses on! It's going to be a long one :) AND, If I can continue to have success (like the awesome photos I've been attempting to upload to previous blog posts) with technological components and the internet you just MAY be able to see a VIDEO of part of a Paso! (If not, I'll give you a Youtube link!)

A Wonderful Weekend Wandering in Sevilla

Last Friday I went on a company visit to the La Gitana winery in Sanlucar. The drive there reminded me of the drive from Minneapolis to Iowa City (only in less than half the time). I got to see a ton of wind turbines! One of our CIEE program directors grew up in San Lucar and came along and provided excellent commentary throughout the day. The winery visit was more a storage facilities of the all the casks and barrels instead of us being able to run around and pick grapes. My allergies didn't enjoy the experience very much since most of the place was damp and musty, but we learned the story of the family that started it and talked about their financial statements and then played a few rounds of tag and hide-and-go-seek while walking through the aisles of barrels.

That night when I got back to Sevilla I had a "date night" with my Señora (Maria) and my hermanita (Maria pequeña). We went into el centro to a book store and I helped Maria pequeña pick out a book to buy. Then Maria pequeña decided she wanted to go to McDonald's for dinner. I'm still confused about the Spaniards obsession with McDonalds. People love it. I mean sure, back in the US there are some die-hard fans. But you have to FIGHT for a table in these places. And they're huge. I have yet to go into a McDonald's here that doesn't have a second or even third floor, and people don't take the food to go. They sit there, and eat it. It's MCDONALDS?! And it's always busy. You're guaranteed to have a line. And they always have 4 or 5 registers open. It's just insane. I don't understand it. I mean sure, I've been there a few times but it's been for a McFlurry... not for an actual meal (except for my first night in Sevilla since there was nothing else open, and once with Juanma (but I had ice cream, not food) and then again with las Marias...) but people are there all the ti me. Spaniards are there all the time. I just don't get it. We made it back home around 11:30 and I pretty much turned around and walked out the door to meet up with Juanma to join him, Juan, and Rafa for their trip to the casino. I spent the first hour or so being a good luck charm - and then eventually tried my luck at roulette. I left 5€ richer! Sadly, Juanma left more than 5€ poorer. But it's his own foolishness. He had made quite a profit and at the end of the night he decided to put it all on red. It ended up being 35, which is black. I won, since naturally I had to go against him and express that I had NO faith in him.

On Saturday morning I slept in until nearly 1. (We didn't get back from the casino until after 4 am.) Then I talked to Julie on Skype for a couple of hours and helped her prepare for their trip to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico to see Dennis and Donna. After a brief Spanish refresher we discussed plans for her manicure so I'm confident they're having a great time. After our chat I went to the CIEE Study Center for an event we had planned with some students who were visiting Sevilla from Morocco. It was great. They played music, brought a ton of clothes we used to play dress-up in, made us some traditional desserts and teas, and held a mock-wedding. It was a ton of fun. We danced and clapped and ate sugary treats. Afterwards I was able to steal my care package from home (complete with running shoes, jelly beans, Swedish Fish and PEANUT BUTTER!!!!!!! Gracias a mi Familia!) from the reception office at CIEE (turns out we're not supposed to have our packages sent to the CIEE office... oops!) and then I had a surprise card from my dear friend Lauren. It was a great day for mail for me! Speaking of mail, I apologize to all of you who are anxiously awaiting a postcard. Many of you have probably given up all hope... rightfully so. I've been very disappointed with the postcard selection here in Sevilla, they are all the same and they really do nothing to capture how wonderful Sevilla really is. What's worse, the post office seems to be hidden and it's the best place to buy stamps. Rumor has it it's across from the Catedral. I think they're wrong... I'm buy the Catedral nearly every day and have yet to find it. However, there are plans for tomorrow to continue the great search for a post office!

On Sunday, Maria pequeña and I spent the morning listening to Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers and making up a dance to "Party in the USA." Later I went to church with Nikki and heard all about her great adventure in Malaga that was supposed to be a weekend trip to Birmingham, England. The church we went to was essentially on the other side of Sevilla so we had a nice walk through el centro, over to la Alameda (one of my favorite plazas in Sevilla) and down a small side street to a church called, "Encounter." It was a pretty good time. I have yet to be moved by the message but I can understand everything that is being said, and singing worship songs is a ton of fun and really entertaining. Most of the songs we've been singing are the same that we would sing at campus ministries back home so that makes it a bit easier to sing it in Spanish since I can somewhat anticipate what's going to come next. After church Nikki and I stopped for a McFlurry and ate it like the Spanish people would by sitting down at a table and talking for a hour while our ice cream sort of melted.


... And that was my wonderful weekend wandering Sevilla.

Study! Speak Spanish! Be Sung to...?

well, now I'm once again a week behind - I guess that is what happens during midterms...

Spain = Mars?

On Saturday of last week my program took a day trip to the town of Aracena. We started the morning at las Minas de Rio Tinto which is essentially a mine in the middle of the hills/mountains which is currently being investigated/explored by NASA since the conditions are similar to what they're finding on Mars. (From what I've been able to gather NASA is convinced that if there can be life in España then there can be life on Mars... Not sure what that says about the Spaniards?) After the tour of the minas we went into the little town of Aracena where we had a delicious lunch of tapas and walked around the small little streets for about a hour before we went into la Gruta de las Maravillas - which is a huge cave. It was really cool. Sadly we weren't allowed to take pictures but if you're ever in Aracena you'll have to see it for yourself. It almost made the Mars theory seem more plausible though since many of the rock formations in the cave seem to be.. well just impossible to create and therefore must be from an alien life form.

Saturday night was Elysha's birthday so a big group of girls went out for Italian food. I have to admit it was a bit disappointing - Spanish dishes are pretty bland, and sadly, the Italian food made here seems to be similarly cursed :( But Nikki saved the day and had brought a box mix for cookies with her from Minnesota and baked a cookie-cake. Best dessert ever! (Okay, maybe not the best ever since I've had some pretty delicious desserts both here in Spain and back home but it was wonderful!)

¡estudiar en el sol!

Sunday marked the start of la Semana de Study. (The week of studying.) I had 3 midterms last week, 1 on Wednesday (marketing) and 2 on Thursday (Negotiations and International Finance). So I spent all day Sunday with Sarah sitting at Starbucks in Puerta Jerez out in the sun studying. We did the same after our morning class on Monday - only I branched away from the Starbucks when she had to leave for a different class at 3 and spent some time in the park by my house. Luckily we had beautiful weather last week and I was able to enjoy the 70 to 80 degree warmth! (Take that icky rain that was here for a MONTH AND A HALF!) I got a tiny bit sun-burned on Monday. Oops!

On Tuesday I had classes pretty much all day (from 11 to 4:30) and therefore missed out on the prime-sun-studying hours. But leaving la Facultad at 4:30 and being able to have some nice fresh air was amazing. Rumor has it the building we're in used to be a prison... I definitely believe it... and it some ways think it still might be. Tuesday night my friend Sarah and I studied at our Starbucks in Puerta Jerez and had a bit of trouble focusing. You see, there is this man who lives in Sevilla and well... we're not quite sure what he does. I've seen him almost every day since I've first been here. He just walks around Puerta Jerez, by la Fabrica (the main Universidad de Sevilla campus), and up Avenida San Fernando all the way to la Facultad. It's a bit creepy. He just walks up and down the stretch of the street... and does nothing else. He's always wearing some sort of "exercise" clothes/wind suit which is NOT a Spanish thing to wear at all... and making matters worse he has approached most of the girls studying here in Sevila and tried to start conversations and become our "friends". Well, I think it's entertaining and have begun to keep a tally of the number of times I see him. I have yet to talk to him (and don't plan on doing so any time soon) but I see him enough I feel like I know him well enough to write about him in my blog. He's taken a special liking to my friends Sarah and Nikki, and while Sarah and I were trying to study he walked by the Starbucks and saw her through the window and smiled and stared at her while he continued on his walk. About 10 minutes later he walked by again. We couldn't figure out how he possibly did that because he was walking in the same direction he had been earlier but we never saw him turn around. He's a rather odd man. Luckily our friend Armando was out in the area running (read: running along side/racing with the Tramvia- light rail) and came into Starbucks when he was done to walk back with us so we didn't have to have any interaction with "Walking Man." However we told Armando about him and now Armando wants to meet him...

Wednesday was a big day of speaking Spanish for me - I started with my marketing exam It seemed to be okay, I'll let you all know as soon as grades are up. (Okay, maybe not that soon since my posts seem to be about a week off but soon-enough!) After my exam I had to head down to the CIEE Study Center to meet with one of my program directors Virginia to talk about my university class (normally referred to as mi clase horible). Since I was able to meet with my old professor (I now have new one since we're doing a new topic...?) last week after the awful exam I've been feeling a lot better (since I think I know now what exactly I'm supposed to be doing for the class.) and talking with Virginia helped a lot. Actually, talking with Virginia always helps - it's like it's her job to make us feel better/less overwhelmed about being in Spain or something :) Anyways, while I was there I also talked to Antonio about potentially accessing the wifi network at la Facultad. So quite a bit of Spanish speaking there. Then I went back to la Facultad (about a 20 minute walk) to meet with my new professor of la clase horible. After waiting for a good 20 minutes (oh how the since of "time" changes from culture to culture) I finally got to talk to my new professor. Turns out (as I had heard through the grapevine aka through Virginia) he is the husband of the professor of my Negotiations class. While he and I were talking about how the class was going for me and he was answering a few of my questions from the lecture the day before my Negotiations professor came in. Next thing I knew I had been in his office for more than a hour and a half and talked about everything from whose class was better (her's or his.), her love of the English language, their sons, and how they are going to plot against one another and give me the answers to each others exams. After that it was time for more studying - only I was by myself and ending up talking to some Spanish people trying to get into the bathroom at Starbucks (you have to use a code that comes from your receipt).. so YAY FOR SPEAKING SPANISH!

Exams and Embarrassments.

Thursday was quite possibly one of my longest days in Spain. Okay, that isn't entirely true. I mean Barcelona had me waking up at normal morning hours and staying up until 5 in the morning the next day... and really, I woke up at 7 am on Thursday and was in bed by 12:30 am but it FELT a LOT longer. The time span from 9:30 am (I went to the Facultad early to study some more) until 4-ish pm truly felt never-ending. I guess that's what happens when you have 3 classes with no reprieve. My first midterm went pretty well. It was a lot longer than I anticipated but I felt like it went okay. THEN I went to mi clase horible. Now I was feeling pretty good about it since my meeting with the professor went so well the day before but as always, being the only American in the room I get a little intimidated. I made the mistake of telling my professor this the day before, when I also mentioned that I felt as if I understood everything he said in class but that it was very difficult for me to follow what was going on when he would ask a question to one of the students and they would then have a little discussion. Not only is it hard to hear them since it's a fairly big lecture hall and they usually talk pretty quietly but they all speak rapid-fire Andalusian Spanish so I really don't stand a chance. At one point the Professor had a really awesome side-conversation going (I know it was awesome because the entire class broke into laughter numerous times throughout the few minutes of dialogue.) and decided he should check in with me to see if I understood what was being said. So from across the room he said, "Kassandra, entiendes?" (Kassandra do you understand?) And I replied, "No. As you know between the volume and the accent it's much harder to understand." (Only don't worry, I said it in Spanish.) So then he explained that this student he was talking to had a song he wanted to sing (I'm assuming it was in some way related to something the professor had mentioned earlier that I just completely missed)... so I asked if he would be singing to the professor or to the class, and the student stood up and said that instead of singing to the professor he wanted to sing it to me... so I told him to sing... and He Did. Now, naturally it was a bit embarrassing. I believe my skin grew to a bright red color as the song went on considering I had no idea what he was singing and the entire class (including the professor) was laughing throughout all of it. At the end of the class I asked the professor if he could explain the song to me... he said it was better that I didn't know. And, then I went off to take my Finance exam.

Finally at approximately 4pm I was done with my exams and able to step outside of the Prison and into the warm Sevilla sun. That night to celebrate I went to a driving range and putting green with Juanma, Juan and Juan y Medio (aka Los Juanes)... I'm not sure how that really a celebration considering they spent most of the night making fun of me but it was nice to be outside.

... okay, so I haven't quite caught up to speed but it's now officially Monday and I have class in 8.5 hours so it's off to bed for me!

Stories about my weekend are on the way! Including: Company visit, Friday night date with the Marias, sleep-in Saturday and the Moroccans, and finally Sunday's Dance-a-thon! Get excited!!!

Almost Three Weeks of Stories from Sevilla (and other areas of Spain)...

Well... below I've tried to summarize everything that has happened since where my last post left off. I apologized for the length, the babbling, the divergences, and well, just the lack of readability. More or less you should just give up now before you feel committed to read all of it.

¡19 DAYS AGO!

IF I remember correctly on Tuesday nearly three-weeks ago, was a whirlwind of classes and homework and being completely overwhelmed and frustrated with my clase horible. So nothing too exciting there.

Baloncesto

On Wednesday, I went to a basketball game with Juanma. He's a referee and I was able to tag along. The game was in the city of Écija, which was a good hour and a half (with all of the taxi stops Juanma made on the way) outside of Sevilla. We carpooled with the two other refs Bélen (which means Bethlehem) and Txime (pretty sure I spelt that wrong... I guess that's the price he has the pay though when your family insists on naming you something like "Juan" or "José" or well... another variation of something ridiculously common and Spanish.) The car ride was quite an experience - I understood about 70% of what was said, which everyone else seemed to find entertaining. The "pop-quizzes" that happened when someone would stop in the middle of a conversation and ask me what they just said to see if I was listening/paying attention were a ton of fun... Not. The game itself was more or a less 2 hours of vocabulary. Luckily the teams weren't very good so it went pretty slow which was a huge benefit for me since I was trying to learn Spanish rules and the language.

Viaje a Barcelona

On Thursday night my friend Calli and I headed north to Barcelona. My wonderful taxista Juanma brought us to the airport (and carried my bright pink bag through the terminal- sadly I did not get a picture...). Our flight was supposed to leave a little after 9 pm but we ended up being delayed until 11-ish and arrived in Barcelona around 12:30-ish. After trying to figure out the bus into the city from the airport and then the metro to our hostel it was close to 4 am when we finally were able to lay down to sleep.

We met with my best friend Laura and Calli's best friend Kristen at 10 am for coffee and croissants. Then we had what felt like a whirl-wind tour of the entire city. We took pictures of the Arc de Triomf:



Then walked through the Parque de la Ciudad (where I met my pet elephant):


Next we saw where Laura and Kristen go to school, ate lunch in Barrio Born (where we wear entertained by street musicians play songs by the Eagles), admired La Sagrada Familia: (we skipped the tour because the church isn't complete and it was 12€)



... and then explored Parc Guell.


After all of that Calli and I went back to the hostel to change clothes and start Phase II. That started with an amazing dinner of excellent tapas and a fantastic light show at the fountain of Montjuic, and my first experience in a disco... Let's just say there is a reason I've been avoiding it and will continue to do so.

On Saturday we took a train to Montserrat.





(This was probably my favorite part of the weekend, especially since Kristen brought us all Dunkin Donuts coffee!)


Montserrat is a beautiful mountain just outside of the city and it is home to the Benedictine abbey, Santa Maria de Montserrat. It was absolutely beautiful. A wonderful church built in the early 1900's... which made it even more amazing since it was a a breath of fresh air from the many other churches we've been walking around, touring, and worshiping in.














That night we meet up with a whole bunch of British people, I got to watch curling and sing "O Canada" and witnessed a trans-sexual prostitute get asked "How much?" (... in English.)

Sunday was study day – Laura and I spent nearly six hours at Starbucks:



Then I played in the sand on the beach..




After that Calli and I adventured on our own through the streets of Barcelona to find a place to eat for dinner. Our walk was fantastic! We heard a man singing beautiful opera songs in the middle of a plaza, spun around on the wet stones in the street, and managed to find our way to the restaurant without getting lost! (Even though we had Juanma on the phone doubting our intelligence every step of the way.) Our dinner was fantastic! We went to a place suggested by the wonderful Mr. Rick Steves- (Many Thanks to D&D for the wonderful guide book!).



It was a Mediterranean restaurant and I got to eat Pizza Fondue! It was delicious. A fondue pot full of melted cheese and tomatoes and then I had little pizza-crust-pita-type chips to dip into the sauce. Yummm :) After dinner Calli and I hung out on the beach with the other people that were staying in our hostel. We had quite the mix. 3 Australians, an Irish-man and his French girlfriend, a guy from Czech, someone from Upstate New York, and a guy from Chicago who was studying in Versailles.



Our last day was started by eating a semi-real breakfast of fried eggs with bacon and toast :) (I ate the whites... Calli ate the yolks since I'm afraid of them.) After that we visited the church, Santa Maria del Mar and the cathedral of Barcelona



And then I spent the rest of the day on the beach with Laur studying:



Tuesday’s return to Sevilla was far from pleasant. Thank you to some delightful errors on my plane ticket I got stuck in Barcelona until 3pm on Tuesday afternoon. That meant I spent more than 10 hours in glorious BCN since my original departure time was set for 7 am. On the bright side I was able to have an extended stay in Barcelona.

Once again Juanma came to the rescue and picked me up from the airport – in an attempt to return his kindness I joined him to pick up his new suits from El Cortes Ingles… since we were shopping I really won both rounds :)

The British Are Coming! The British Are Coming! …Actually, the British Came.

Last Wednesday night Juanma and I adventured back to my 2nd home aka the Sevilla Airport (SVQ) to pick up Laura Poczatek and her friend Jamie Lane for them to begin their wonderful Spring Break adventures in Spain! Sadly, it was rainy pretty much all weekend so their Spring Break was far from warm and sunny and they returned to London just as pale as they were when they left. The pick-up at baggage claim was rather amusing. Juanma asked why I didn’t make a sign to welcome them (since that’s what they do in the movie “Love Actually”). I told him it was because Sevilla doesn’t sell poster board and that the best signs were made from poster board. That “excuse” wasn’t good enough. So off we went using the back of my lecture notes and an array of pens and highlighters that were floating in my purse to write, “LP y Jamie: ¡Bienvenidas a Sevilla!” After “arts & crafts” Juanma and I played a game of: “Guess Where They’re From!?” and we said “Sevilliano” o “Extranjero” for each person who walked through the door from arrivals into baggage claim… My judgment was way off and I lost, but once LP & Jamie came I got 2 points!

On Thursday I had to spend the day in boring classes and LP & JL explored La Catedral. Afterwards we walked through El Centro and met up with Juanma and Juan y Medio at Plaza de España for a tour of the plaza and Parque Maria Luisa. Between LP & JL’s audition video for Amazing Race, playground equipment, mud puddles, singing Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours” to prove to our Spanish friends that the rain was NOT the angels crying in pain because of our singing), scaling a small mountain to enter the gazebo instead of just using the stairs, and my “translator” job it was quite the night.



Our tour guides:


From there I dropped LP & JL off at a restaurant for dinner, and went to eat with mi familia… then for dessert we joined forces for a FREE FLAMENCO show at La Carboneria (I dragged my roommate Kendra along for the fun). Now the last time I saw a Flamenco show I nearly feel asleep – it was on our second day in Sevilla and I was still jet-lagged and the day’s adventures of “Gymkhana por los Guias” (A scavenger that required us to find various CIEE staff members in different locations in Sevilla) left me dozing off to the guitara in the dark patio we were sitting in. That was definitely NOT an option in La Carboneria. First off, the place is packed every night. Secondly, it’s essentially a bar with a stage and benches…. There are a ton of locals that go making it a very loud and smoking environment. Thirdly, a true flamenco seems to consist of three phases, the guitar, the guitar and singing, and then the guitar, singing, and dancing. You can most definitely NOT sleep or in anyway really relax through the singing and dancing portions. The dancing is a march/tap type routine and the singing… well, it’s unique and sadly the voices of men that I have heard sing for Flamenco shows have made me want to cry (I found out who was making it rain so much!) – and not in a good/happy way that the Dzubay men and or really good contestants on American Idol and performers on Broadway make me want to… but instead in the bad way. After Flamenco we walked to the river and ate churros con chocolate for dessert. Yum.



Friday was a day for firsts – my first trip to Real Alcazar (the Royal Palace of Sevilla).


Alcazar was amazing, and since my first visit I’ve already returned 3 times. (Since I’m a “student” at the Universidad de Sevilla I’m technically considered a “resident” of the city and therefore have free admission!) Honestly I have yet to set the entire palace though. On our first visit, which was supposed to serve as my official tour (complete with commentary by Rick Steve’s) but LP & JL needed to use the bathroom, so Nikki and I decided we were going to wait in the gardens and play with the ducks. (I’m going to try to upload a video of my conversations with the ducks).

While LP & JL struggled with their lack of Spanish vocabulary and took nearly a hour and a half to find, use and eventually return from the bathrooms, Nikki and I made friends with a peacock:


And then climbed a tree, walked on a ledge that gave a pretty good view of the building I live in, and ran into a girl who I went to high school with (Taylor Esau). Since Nikki and I got bored with the whole “waiting” thing it took us awhile to actually find LP & JL but we did it! That night JL & LP took it easy and watch Friends in their hostel. (I was supposed to join in the fun of Central Perk but due to some frustrations with the dinner schedule of mi familia I ended up missing out – luckily Juanma took mercy on me and invited me and my friend Nikki over to his house to eat pizza and play air hockey/ping-pong/pool/darts and poker. Sadly I lost 3€ but I got free pizza and 2 new Spanish friends, Jamie y Rafa. I was also able to meet 2 of Juanma’s sisters and am working on plans to make them become my intercambio instead of him since they both speak English and have more clothing in my size than he does!

Saturday started slowly and we didn’t actually get moving until 1 in the afternoon. We started a bit earlier at Starbucks where I studied for my horrible exam that I had the next week and the girls ate some muffins. After that we separated for lunch so I could eat with la familia and then got back together to visit El Museo de Bellas Artes Now, for any of you reading this- if you decide to studying and/or live abroad for awhile definitely have friends of yours who have absolutely no knowledge of the language and/or culture come to visit you. It’s the best – it forces you to not only learn enough about it to share it with them but it encourages you to go visit all the silly touristy things you might not actually do. For example, El Museo de Bellas Artes. It’s the THIRD MOST IMPORTANT in Spain and while I had been meaning to visit I never actually went (probably because it’s a bit far away) until LP & JL came – now I’m planning on going again and again (Thank you CIEE/Universidad de Sevilla for free admission!). We went a little bit later in the afternoon than we would have liked to and were therefore only able to see a the first set of rooms which all contained variations of paintings/statues of the Nativity, the Virgin, Jesus as a Child, and some saints but it was wonderful. Afterwards we did a little bit of shopping and I bought a pretty cute purse for 5€. That night after I returned home for dinner I went back to the hostel and hung out with JL & LP. JL wanted dessert so we ran across the street to a Starbucks (How American of us!) and arrived at 10:56 (they close at 11 so just in the knick of time!). Well, after spending a few minutes entirely amused at JL & LP’s feeble attempts to order in Spanish I stepped up and took over. The guy at the counter then wanted to know what I wanted which was nothing since coffee late at night a bad idea, I explained I was only along to serve as a translator for my silly British friend. Somewhere in the process of ordering we forgot to mention that LP didn’t want whipped cream on her Frappuccino. So when she got it I asked the guy for an empty cup we could use to scrape the whipped cream off. Something must have gotten lost in my translation-abilities though because next thing I knew he took her frappuccino and began flicking the cup over the sink to get rid of the whipped cream. Now that would have been perfect but he didn’t stop there. Next, he grabbed a Grande sized cup and took out the whipped cream and began filling it. I tried asking what he was doing but he just responded with “No preocupes.” (Don’t worry.) Naturally it made me worry even more. The first can of whipped cream ran out about half-way through filling the cup so he grabbed another and topped it off. Then he grabbed caramel and squeezed about half the bottle on top of the whipped cream, and asked if I wanted chocolate. I said no. Next thing I knew, I had a huge cup of free whipped cream and was getting “shooed” out the door so they could close. I took about 8 bites and that was all I could stand.

On Sunday we walked along the river, saw el Torro del Oro (Golden Tower), toured la Plaza del Torro (Bull Ring), had lunch in Alameda, and the best orange juice and desserts ever, and then called our taxi (aka Juanma) and adventured back to the airport to say goodbye. The time at the airport was entertaining as always. We argued with Juanma, laughed at him speaking English (in all fairness he started it by laughing at our attempts to speak Spanish), had an arm-wrestling contest (I BEAT JL!) and explored YouTube- I shared The First Semester of Spanish Love Song and LP & JL shared Charlie the Unicorn (episode 2 since it includes some very necessary Spanish vocab.) Finally we had to say Farewell and sent the girls back to the land of Fish & Chips and ___ .

Comfort Food: KitKat McFlurry.

On Monday, except for the 2 hours I spent walking to/from and attending a Bible study, I spent all of my free time studying for the exam on Tuesday in mi clase horible. On Tuesday I took the exam and well, it was horible. It was based on the all of the material we’ve learned so far and consisted of 10 multiple choice questions. Now considering I’m the only American in the class we’ve gone through everything rather quickly, and in all honesty, I’m not quite sure I had all of the material that the test covered. BUT I studied extremely hard and felt okay about it… Okay, I felt extremely nervous the night before but after calling Juanma freaking out the night before the exam and listening to his “father-like” advice and attempts to calm me, I decided I really did know the material and since my professor was going to take mercy on me for my disadvantage of being a foreigner and let me use my dictionary I really did feel okay. Unfortunately, the test didn’t go very well for me. We were given the 10 questions on a piece of paper (which had ridiculously small font) and had 10 minutes to read all of the questions and answer them. Then we were shown all of the questions on a Powerpoint and had to use our remotes to enter our answer for each question. Honestly I think I would have done fine if I had more time, but I was only able to read the first 7 questions in the 10 minutes. Making matters worse I tried to read the last 3 questions in the time that each was up the screen and depended on “Female Intuition”… Not my best plan. Turns out, Spanish exams work like the SATs and you lose a quarter of a point for each incorrect answer… so with the 3 questions I guessed on, and another question that I got wrong I failed the exam. Oh well…? I talked to the professor immediately after and she told me not to worry, that she had confidence in my Spanish abilities and felt that if not for the time issues I would have been more than fine… Hopefully the next one will go better.

After my exam on Tuesday I enjoyed some sunshine in a park with Sarah, and then thought I was going to get a celebratory McFlurry with Juanma to comfort my broken heart from my awful exam. Well, we started on our way to McDonalds (with Kendra in tow) and ended up making a detour to help Juanma’s best friend Juan and his two business partners Miguel and Laura pick out and transport furniture for their new office. We ended up staying there until it closed without buying anything – I tried making an “executive decision” but since I’m not actually a part of the business I wasn’t taken very seriously. By this point McDonald’s was closed and we ended up getting dinner on the other side of the river from where I live at a delicious place I had never been to before. It was great – delicious food I rarely get to eat (since my Señora seems to only know how to cook frozen meals/items and salads with lettuce, cabbage, and corn) and I made more Spanish “friends.”

Wednesday marked Try 2 for my comfort-McFlurry but instead it resulted in another trip to Ikea and 3 hours of following instructions to put everything together. In all honesty I only put two table legs together and then bothered Laura with questions about what I should do with my family when they come to visit (since I had received about a trillion e-mails earlier that day/week asking what the plan was) and then asked the group for grammar-help with the note I was writing to my professor about my exam (asking for more time on the next one.) The night ended with a cardboard fight using Ikea boxes as weapons.

On Thursday I had a day full of classes, studied and read my Bible at Starbucks (my sanctuary) and went on a hunt for sunglasses with Nikki. We failed. Well, she failed, I still have Mama Juve’s glasses that I borrowed the summer after my freshman year of college so I’m set!

Money and Monkeys!

On Friday my International Finance class took a Field Trip to the self-autonomous British territory of Gibraltar. We visited the European Finance Center of Gibraltar and I’m completely confused as to how exactly Gibraltar economically survives. After our visit we had a few hours of free time to see the sights – aka panoramas of the Mediterranean Sea, the coast of Morocco along the horizon (only 16 km away) and the south of Spain which surrounds the peninsula, a cave, and MONKEYS. Because we were short on time we took a tour van up the mountain to hit each site and end up at the monkeys. Our driver’s name was Alaster, and is Irish by heritage and has lived in Gibraltar his entire life. Our tour was great – and his commentary about everything was even better. Plus, he had a pocketful of peanuts he used to get the monkeys to climb on all of our heads so that made it a lot more fun. After we returned to Seville, Nikki and I join Juanma, Juan y Juan y Medio for the Long Sought after McFlurry! After going through the McAuto we went to Juanma’s to eat, play darts, ping-pong, air-hockey, and SceneIt (in Spanish… not EASY at ALL!)

…. And NOW I’m only 2 days behind! BUT it’s late and I need to get some sleep so I’ll have to write about Saturday in Aracena, and Sunny Sunday tomorrow!

Repaso del que pasaba y Little Lessons I'm Learing

All of you know I talk too much - that is sort of what has been happening with the blog. When I write it's be a complete explosion and babble-fest and I quite frankly haven't been able to write regularly. THEN when you add a semi-sketch Internet connection (thank you friendly neighbor with the open connection titled, "default" that I've been able to steal from time-to-time) and frequent overwhelmed nights with homework and or being out of the city well... It's been awhile. I'm going to try to quick list everything that has happened since the last post and for those of you who are my loyal followers and are dying for more detail just comment on the blog and I'll willing expand :)


Ash Wednesday
What a beautiful day :) Actually there was quite a bit of rain but every once in awhile the sun would break through the dark clouds and cast it’s beautiful, bright, warm rays onto the narrow streets of Sevilla, and onto the Cathedral itself. Before going to Mass at La Catedral I made a quick stop at Starbucks where I ran into my friend Armando – if you’re ever looking for someone who speaks English just find the nearest Starbucks and you’ll be set. It was definitely an experience. Being in a MASSIVE church that is breathtaking, and following the service in Spanish makes it a bit difficult to focus on the service itself. Language aside I felt extremely disconnected from the service – the altar is made of gold and because of that it is blocked by a huge fence, and that pretty much just makes it difficult to really connect with any thing. The best part was what Sarah and I have titled the "Spanish Line." It was essentially a massive swarm of Sevillianos that bunch together instead of forming a line to receive the ashes and communion. The first time it happened I stepped back (into Sarah) and must have had a look of shock/fear... she simply whispered, "Spanish line" And now... that's what it is.

Meeting Mi Intercambio

On Thursday (after a poopy day of classes and even more RAIN) I finally got up the courage to meet my intercambio. (Vocab lesson. Intercambio (n): a Spanish person [commonly a student] who has expressed interest to CIEE that they want to meet with American students to help them learn Spanish and/or learn some English themselves.) Now considering my class with the Spanish students was making me want to cry it was a pretty big deal for me to actually go meet my intercambio. Let's just say, BEST DECISION OF MY LIFE. I could not have been more blessed by God with my Intercambio. His name is Juan Manuel (Juanma) and is a law student at the Universidad de Sevilla (his first degree was from La Facultad de Cicenias y Economicas Empresariales - aka the business school I'm currently taking classes in.) Our first meeting was eventful -- there was a ton of rain and he wanted to meet in a metro station (to avoid the rain)... Well, I have YET to use public transportation here in Sevilla so naturally I was beyond lost. Fear Not though. Juanma came to the rescue (after waiting for me to try to pull myself together and get my bearings back on straight.) and drove me around Sevilla to show me just how lost I was.

Carmona

Group trip to Carmona - a small town outside of Sevilla. Highlights of the adventure include Nikki (formerly known as my crippled friend who was dumb enough to run in Duluth, MN the day before leaving for Spain and broke her foot) was finally cast-less and able to play with us! The Roman Necropolis made me channel Mrs. Donna Dzubay and I made sure to touch every plant, snail, and caterpillar I could find- the tour guide referred to me as a 6-year-old boy. We also saw some beautiful views (since Carmona is up on a hill/baby mountain) and La Puerta a Sevilla (aka a fortress that protected the city from invasion from Sevilla since those Sevillianos are LOCO) and the Parador de Carmona (Parador is a chain of resorts in Spain that has renovated a ton of monuments in Spain and created hotel rooms from them- I did a project on it last Spring in my Advanced Business Spanish class [THANK YOU PILAR MARCE FOR TEACHING ME SUCH PRACTICAL THINGS!])

After we returned from Carmona my Gymkhana (Scanvenger hunt team) Calli, Elysha, Niiki and I ate... ¿Mexican Food en España? ¡Olé! We even got to wear sombreros. Afterwards we had dessert at McDonalds and even though we had intended to get started on our Gymkhana (which consists of clues describing locations in Sevilla that we have to decipher and then find and take a picture in front of) we ended up all going back for a nap.

So I went back home expecting to be able to update my blog and MY COMPUTER WOULDN'T TURN ON!!!!!!!??????????!!!!!!!!! Terrifying. My computer was completely non-functional from Friday until Sunday and I was deathly afraid that there would be no more blogging/emailing/Skyping/communication with the English speaking world – but alas, by the Grace of God we’re back in business! After freaking out and calling Juanma (asking if he could go to the Apple store in Sevilla with me since my Spanish isn't quite up to par for the stressful situations of computer repairs) and he told me not to worry since his best friend (Juan y Medio- aka Juan but he's taller so I'm supposed to call him Juan y Medio) is a computer guy. Well, somehow it worked on Sunday afternoon (not sure how or why but it did!) and instead of adventuring to the Apple store Juanma and I watched a futbol game.

I was able to go to a church service on Sunday that reminded me a TON of 24/7! It was way on the other side of el centro near Almeda de Hercules (coolest plaza ever simply because it's REALLY big) and we had a group of 20+ students that all meet up in one of the plazas and walked through el centro together. I met a ton of new people, and we sang a ton of songs that I knew in English, in Spanish. When I'd start to get caught up in all the Spanish and found myself tongue-tied I just gave up and would sing it in English. No one seemed to mind.. too much :) The way back through el centro was extremely entertaining. I had Armando and Alan as my body guards and they choose to ward off any sketchy people by singing. Armando sang country songs. Alan rapped. I laughed the entire way home. (Reminds me of the Little Piggies nursery rhyme.)

Exploring Sevilla sin un mapa = Bad Idea.

We were able to get most of our Gymkhana stops on Sunday morning but we had one left for Monday night after our classes. Biggest obstacle- finding it. The clue told us it was the location of a tree as old as the United States of America.... Well, El Monestario de la Cartuja is just the place... but it's on the other side of the river and essentially in the opposite direction of everything we're familiar with. My classes were done before Calli and Elysha so I went and sat by the river for a hour or so (we FINALLY saw some sun!).. but then the clouds came and Elysha and Calli decided to just take a taxi there... and I was left to walk on my own. Well, that's USUALLY okay.. but I didn't have my map and ended up being on the back side of La Cartuja without any idea of how to get to the front. Luckily, Juanma and I were supposed to meet later that night and he called to confirm our plans... Instead he left work, drove all the way to Cartuja (used his GPS and my awful Spanish descriptions to actually locate me) and then helped us convince the security guard she should let us in for our Gymkhana (even though it turns out it's closed on Mondays...) and then bought us churros after and brought all of us home. In edition to being my Spanish best friend he has also become my taxi driver and would be a pro at "Where's Waldo?"


.... Well, I only made it to 8 days ago and now I have to run to meet with my group for a project but I PROMISE that this next update will come much sooner.

What's to come? More adventures with Juanma, mi clase horible, trip to Barcelona to see Laur, and an array of random updates. Get excited!

Better Late than Never

Apologies in Advance: 1. I hate that it's been 2 weeks since I've updated this... I've been writing a little bit whenever I can (aka whenever my internet isn't failing {I'm currently using the neighbors!} and when I'm at home not bogged down with homework or bonding with la familia/roommate) and I'm pretty sure this is going to be a long one!

Way Back When Two Weeks Ago = MESS!

My intensive class became even more intense. (I didn't think it was possible... but it was.) The combination of more surveys, at least one 100-word summary based on an article we read that day, two 600-word essays, and a group project made the week seem insufferable. Luckily the final wasn't as horrible as I feared it would be so my hours of studying on Thursday night ended up being worth it. And, the feeling of walking down the stairs of FCEYE (la Faculitad de Ciencias Economias y Empresariales) and into the warm sunshine of Sevilla was beyond joyful! All in all it wasn't an awful experience though - I loved my professor, and learned a ton of ridiculous phrases and grammatical errors that really will serve me no purpose in life other than for my own entertainment/amusement.

The rest of the week wasn't horrible though - on Monday I had a meeting with my program director about the class that I'll be taking through direct-enrollment with Spanish students and I received some really good news :) Originally I was supposed to stay in Sevilla until the final scheduled for July 23rd. Then I heard I could probably get the professor to let me take the exam in mid June at the start of their finals session instead of on their scheduled date. But on my meeting on Monday Virginia told me that if I pass all of their weekly quizzes I don't have to take to final and will be done with the class at the end of May. On Thursday I toured la Catedral:



When we were standing outside waiting for our tour guide I was harrassed by a gypsy. Luckily, I still look/seem/am American and was able to play the "No Hablo Español" card that Samantha pulls out whenever I try to tell her I love her in Spanish, and that made her leave. Our tour guide gave the tour in Spanish and I have to admit, I felt sort of cool walking around the site and being able to understand the entire tour as well as I understood the British guy giving the tour for a group behind us. The Cathedral in Sevilla is the third largest in the world and was truly beautiful. Christopher Columbus is buried there and it's main altar is made of gold. The coolest part of the tour was la Giralda-



(Yes. I climbed up that. Be impressed!)
La Giralda is an old Moorish tower that is the highest point in the Cathedral - it had 34 levels of sloped inclines that we walked/trudged up and then an absolutely beautiful view of the entire city! (Not going to lie... my calves just about died at the end of it though...) On Friday I had my final for my intensive class - finally, and spent the afternoon napping, and the evening walking through the city enjoying ice cream... it was great way to end a rather stressful week!

I'm in NO WAY a Hippie but I <3 NATURE

My plans for the weekend (as of Friday afternoon) involved adventuring with Calli and Elysha to the cities of Ronda and Marbella. Little did we know, our group grew from 3 to 15, and there were an additional 10+ Americans who I knew (c/o my roommate Kendra and her friends) who were headed towards Ronda but not as hard core as we were to adventure all the way to Marbella. Ronda is a city about a hour and a half outside of Sevilla in the mountains - it was absolutely beautiful! There were horses walking on the streets, and goats in fields off in the distance - I really couldn't have been happier :) We toured everything in a mad rush so we could catch our 6 o'clock bus into Marbella. We saw the Arab baths, a museum of the history of Ronda (complete with cavemen!), and a Moorish Kings museum thing that included a mine tour which really just meant we climbed down hundreds of really steep stairs that we're wet from the condensation and water dripping from the ceiling of the cave/cliff/rock we were walking inside down to the base of the gorge. We walked through a ton of beautiful plazas that were on cliffs/overhangs that let us see the entire countryside. After the first round of running around we stopped for lunch. Half the group went into a plaza to eat and the rest of us found a little restaurant down a semi-dark alley. The 8 of us had a great time and ended up taking nearly 2 hours to eat... Oops! It was a good thing we rushed through everything earlier in the morning or we wouldn't have been able to follow the directions of fellow group member who forgot where we were and said "Relax... You're in Sevilla!... or wherever we are!" After lunch we went to the FIRST BULL RING ever to be in Spain! It was really cool - they let you walk out into the ring and run around like you're a bull. There was a group of Spaniards out in the ring with us who were hilarious and kept running at us and taking group photos with us. (PS: Spaniards in NON-TOURISTY places are a LOT nicer/friendlier/more helpful) than Spaniards that have to deal with stupid tourists (read Americans) on a daily basis)

The bus ride to Marbella from Ronda started out with more action than we could hardly stand. From what Josh (and the rest of us trying to listen in from the back) was able to figure out (he didn't know what bus we were on and got stuck waiting to get on the bus during this fight) there was a woman sitting in one of the front seats who was on the route from Sevilla to Marbella (the bus stops in Ronda to get more people/drop people off) and another woman sat in her seat and wasn't planning on moving... Well, Spaniards appear to be exceptionally particular about their bus seats and wonderful yelling in rapid-fast-venemously-accented-Spanish commenced complete with the required hand gestures :) At one point Armando decided he needed to go run and try to Save Josh from the madness and ended up getting frozen mid-rescue by all the commotion and started yelling, "¡Por Favor!" ... While a valid effort it really didn't phase them at all. Anyways, we left the bus station with the yelling still going strong and ended up stopping about 4 blocks away and the police joined us for the fun aka to get their names. The ride itself was quite fun too though - we were driving down the mountains with super crazy curvy-spiraling roads. Thank God for Jesus (aka Life after Death) and Dramamine! Once we got into Marbella the 15 of us lined up like little ducklings and followed the Mama Ducks (Calli and Elysha) to our hostal. So I stayed in a hostal and didn't die! The owner of the hostal was a Scottish man and there were two Australians, a Russian, and an American (a writer who has actually been publish - I found his book on Amazon.com) and it was surprisingly cleaner than I expected.

The next morning we spent a good hour and half eating breakfast - fresh OJ, delicious cafe con leche, and wonderful toast with marmalade. Afterward we walked down to the beach and watched a little girl throw the squids that her father was snorkeling/diving for on the rocks to knock them out and then shove her fingers in their suction-y mouth things so they would suffocate. Seriously - this girl was insane. Rambo style. There is NO WAY I would have ever done that. In fact the guys in are group were even a bit skiddish of the whole thing. I think the best part of it though was that the family had their pet Yorkie with and it was wearing a sweater and just barking whenever the girl threw a squid down and would try to catch it in it's mouth. Strange sight to see. From there we took a taxi (well 4 taxis because there were 15 of us) down to the marina which was about 6 miles away. Now I would like to say all went well but sadly this was the worst part of my trip. The taxis dropped us of in a round-about type of intersection and naturally our four cars held up traffic and the honking ensued. In the process of paying and getting everyone out of the car I more or less dumped my bag out in the car... and I thought I grabbed everything and ran across the street out of traffic, and a second later I realized I didn't have my camera - at that point my taxi already left and I managed to stop one of our other taxis and got the business card for the company and have called at least every other day asking for news about my camera - so far no luck. Luckily everyone with me had more or less taken the same pictures as me and a few people we're willing and able to give me a much needed hug! The marina was beautiful and the boardwalk-esque area was surrounded by beautiful quartz rocks that had wild-house-cats living in them. A few of the brave cats could be found sunning themselves on the roofs of different yachts (which were huge by the way).

Eventually we managed to pull ourselves away from the beautiful Mediterranean Sea and made it back to the bus station (after making a few more attempts to track down my camera by harassing every taxi we saw) and we were on our way to Sevilla. Of course our departure was dramatic with the bus driver who was determined to get a head start on the long and terrifying drive decided he wanted to leave when his watch said 4:35 rather than when the clock in the station said 4:35 and we pulled out of the station without 4 of our 15 compradres. Luckily, (read: By the Grace of God) the bus driver was distracted by all of the "Americans" yelling, "¡Espere! !Espere! !Hay más vienen!" and nearly hit them as they were running across the street out of the station to chase the bus, and he rather reluctantly let them on. The bus ride wasn't awful. I sat night to a nice Spanish man who spent most of the time sleeping and I was able to read my Bible and just listen to music on my iPod and napped a bit.

Sunday Nights in Sevilla and the ¿Superbowl?

Then I made it back into Sevilla just in time for dinner (9-ish) and while eating I discovered that my Señora and mi hermanita falsa (fake little sister) were going to go to the movie theater to see "Tiana y Sapo" aka the Disney movie "Princess and the Frog." It was a ton of fun. I got to eat popcorn, and they have candy stores outside of the theater where you fill up a bag with gummy candy and you can bring it in with you :) The whole movie-watching experience was a bit exhausting but entirely entertaining. Naturally, the movie was in Spanish and while I understood the gist of everything (I mean seeing that it's a Disney movie based on a Fairy-tale I've definitely read I sort of had a headstart) however I know I missed a lot of the comedy - mi hermanita falsa would turn over to me every 10 to 15 minutes after laughing hysterically and ask me if I thought it was funny, or if I was afraid (when the weird voo-doo spirit things came out), or if I wanted to share my popcorn/candy or if I wanted some of her popcorn/candy. After the movie we went to a restaurant called VIPS where I watched my hermanita falsa turn into my favorite cousin Katie as she completely demolished/polished off an adult sized portion of ribs. After the meal we went back home and I more or less grabbed my keys and left to go watch the Superbowl (at this point it was already 12:30 and well into the first quarter).

I made it to the Irish pub called O'Neills which is right next to my school at the end of the 1st quarter. I was warmly welcomed by pretty much everyone who had been on the Ronda-Marbella trip with me and nearly 80% of the students in my program, along with another million Americans. The game wasn’t all that exciting in the beginning as most of you should know. At half time we all got free hot dogs… which most people were excited about (not me, since hot dogs = gross!) until they found out that the hot dogs came with ketchup, mustard, and MAYO… Even grosser. I stayed until the end of the 3rd quarter (approximately 3:30 am) and crawled into bed for some much needed sleep.

¡…and the REAL(?) classes begin!

On Monday I had my first “real” class at 9 am- International Marketing. It went pretty well, the prof just read through the syllabus and since I had it right in front of me and could read along as he spoke rapid-speed Spanish. After class on Monday I called the taxi company a few times until the woman finally just started hanging up on me, and then I took a siesta and went to Starbucks to read for a little bit. That night I met a nice Portugese woman who trusted me enough to watch her stuff things while she used the restroom. I was a bit disappointed though when she asked me since she asked me in English - I mean do I REALLY seem that out of place/look THAT American? Then I realized the book I was reading was written in English and I was by myself at a Starbucks which really only foreigners do. Oh well.

On Tuesday I had my next set of “real” classes – International Negotiation and Conflict Resolution and International Finance. I loved my INCR professor – a really beautiful Spanish woman who is beyond nice and likes to laugh at us silly Americans when we try to answer her questions. Then I went on a grand adventure during my three hour break (since my REAL REAL class that I’m taking with real Spanish students doesn’t start until Feb 16th) with my crippled friend Nikki to find a present for her Mom for when she flew back to the US this past weekend to get her cast off! Then I went to my next class where my IF professor was MIA so the man that teaches the same class in the Fall semester came and presented the syllabus – nothing too exciting there. After I went to buy my textbooks and oh boy does the US have a lot to learn. I mean sure paying 18€ for a three ring binder with colored tabs is a bit outrageous, but seeing as the professor prints off all of the material we need (ie: lecture notes, articles, readings, etc) I think I actually got a pretty good deal. AND my Marketing book was a steal too! Only 8€ for the entire book with includes all the of reading materials, powerpoints of all the lectures and any/all case studies we'll be doing. Seriously Iowa.... get with the program. After classes on Tuesday I met up with Nikki again to continue our shopping spree. We went into pretty much every store on Calle Sierpes and Calle Tetuan that appeared to sell either watches or necklace and when that appeared to be fruitless we began checking all the touristy stores on Avenida de la Constitucion. Sadly we ended the night sans presents... and I was not feeling well.

When I got home I got really sick and skipped dinner (since I didn't think I'd be able to keep in down) and slept. I forced myself out of bed the next morning for class (which was a dumb idea) only to come racing home as soon as the professor starting closing his powerpoint. I spent the rest of Wednesday in bed. My Señora made me grilled cheese and a cup of warm milk with sugar. On Thursday things still weren't looking great but I made it through my first class. Napped during my break. And made it through my finance class (with my awesome and new favorite professor!!!). I was MUCH more excited about things and felt a bit better after IF. We talked about the EU (and for ONCE didn't talk about the depressing Spanish economy) and the different international markets and all things that made me happy. It was a similar feeling to when I visited the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and was on the floor when the market opened and got SO excited I needed to run off to the bathroom... only this was WAY cooler because it was all happening in Spanish! I went back home, slept some more and by dinner I was feeling much better.

Best Friend = Bad Weather

On Friday morning I woke up and went to a Subjunctive Workshop that my much beloved and missed intensive class professor.... I'm not sure if I learned much but it was great to hang out with Miguel again. I was treated to NOT only a showdown of "Miguel vs. Technology" (the man can't use a computer to save his life) but the patented sweater removal, his Paris Hilton imitation and Brad Pitt comparison. After the workshop I ran out into the pouring rain to find my best friend Laura Hauser who had arrived to come visit for the weekend with her study abroad program in Barcelona. Although she brought the awful cold and rainy weather with her it was wonderful to see her - she had left for Barcelona in the end of December and considering I see her at the very least every other day while at Iowa (and about as frequently back in Orono) there was some hardcore separation anxiety I had to recover from. Luckily her hotel was only a block away from my home-stay. We braved a Noah-esque flood trying to find somewhere to eat lunch, and then she had a tour of la Catedral and I took a nap (still trying to recover from previous illness and make up for the fact that I spent the last 2 hours in 37F rain! GROSS WEATHER SEVILLA!). We meet up with my roommate Kendra and a few of her friends for dinner at a sushi place in Triana (the neighborhood across the river). Once again we braved the rain and the cold but we made it and had a great meal complete with Toblerone and KitKat McFlurrys from McDonalds for dessert.

Saturday I was solo since Laura ditched me for Cordoba and Kendra ditched me for Grenada. I spent a ton of time half-napping/recovering and doing some homework and booking a hotel for my Aunt's visit in April. That night we had planned on getting tapas for dinner but all of the tapas places were full so we ended up getting sushi at a Japanese restaurant by the cathedral. It was DELICIOUS... and much more fun than the night before. There were 5 of us (at a table for 8) and we naturally wanted a group picture. So we asked the two Spanish men waiting for a table since we were sitting right by the door/hostess stand. They obliged (and even took one on more than one camera) as long as they could sit at our table with us. We said sure. The rest of dinner involved English lessons, and all of us pretending to speak Spanish. By the time we had finished and were paying our bill 3 of their friends had come to meet them which meant we made 3 new friends. Once they finished their dinner we left and went on our own merry way - speaking English of course. Laura and I walked through Sevilla for another hour or so before retreating to my house/her hotel for warmth and sleep. On Sunday morning we went to Starbucks for Valentine's Day muffins and coffee and began planning our trip for Semana Santa (sadly the location is still unknown!) and then braved more cold drizzle as we walked through the market of Plaza Nueva and had gross tapas for lunch. Shortly after she headed back to Barcelona and I headed home to warm up. Kendra came back from Grenada later that day and we spent Valentine's Day evening eating Oreos and watching The Holiday!

On Monday I had my Marketing class which was a bit boring, and then spent a couple hours braving the FLOODS with Kendra to try to find notebooks and a cord for her iPod. Instead we found a cute little tea cafe and saved the notebook adventure for today (Tuesday). Later I went to McDonalds with Calli to use their wifi and began planning our trip to Barcelona for the weekend of the 25th. I am officially in love with the Cono con KitKat :) It's only 1€. After doing some quick Google and Wikipedia-style research (PS: I hate that the Financial Times only lets you read ONE article for free a day!!!!) for my classes I watched Practical Magic with Kendra and went to bed... and now onto Today...

martes, el 16 del febrero, 2010. Well, today wasn't exactly great. Mother Nature is hardcore PMS-ing. Seriously, I walked to my first class this morning and was greeted by sunshine... only to find myself walking into a wall of pouring rain a block later (yay for having my handy-umbrella!). My first class was INCR, great professor... enjoyable class. (However I'm beginning to learn that the way to resolve conflict isn't by force? Boy are things different in Spain!) My next class wasn't as great... It was my first session of my class with TRUE SPANISH STUDENTS! Things didn't go so well. Of course I couldn't find the correct classroom and for a minute was about to walk into a HR class until I got up the nerve to ask the girl standing next to me. Then I found my class and walked in just as the professor began to talk. Being the ONLY American in the class everyone stared at me... NOT COOL. And I TRIED really hard to follow everything she said but honestly I don't think I succeeded. I stayed after she finished to ask a few questions (which she didn't exactly answer) and then of course I felt beyond overwhelmed by all of it and felt like crying. Luckily I had a hour before my next class and was able to sit on a bench and write in my journal (in ENGLISH) but OH BOY was it a rough one. Then I had my finance class which made me a LOT happier and I came home, met up with Kendra for our adventure to the Chinese Super Market (read: ultra sketch convenience/grocery/hardware store) and we had some delicious ice cream at a Heladeria. I had the Philadelphia Cream Cheese kind and she had "Crema Cataluna" aka more or less like Creme Brulee. Her's was better.

... AND NOW I'm finally caught up on my blog!

Coming SOON (promise much sooner than the last update!): Ash Wednesday at La Catedral, Round 2 of trying to NOT fail in my Spanish class aka trying not to feel like the New Kid all over again, AND kicking the KitKat McFlurry habit!