Spanish Swear Words

Tuesday February 26, 2008

I can now officially curse in Spanish. Today in class we learned all about the curse words in Spanish, which is actually pretty exciting because now I can tell all of the creepy men off and actually sound serious. We got to talking about these words because in our literature class we are reading a contemporary Spanish novel that is about a female detective who cusses frequently, so instead of being confused with the words we had a huge discussion about what the “bad” words actually meant. Between classes I checked my e-mail and I received Aarons flight information, he is going to be here tomorrow and I can hardly believe it. I can’t believe that I have been in Spain for this long. It seems like it is flying by. At the beginning of the semester the days went by slow and now the days and even weeks fly by.  After school I got a bunch of homework done and then headed to my ONG. We played a lot of pool games to night and it was a fun night. I think one of the children has it out for me because I swear his goal in life is to peg me in the head with a pool toy. He was unsuccessful this week, but I’ll keep you posted on how I am defending my honor. Tonight I packed for Conil, Allison, Sam and I are going to the beach with Aaron tomorrow for 4 nights and 5 days, how amazing. We don’t have class on Thursday because it is “El Dia de Andulusia,” which is considered a holiday. All I know is that we get an extra day at the beach, woohoo! Allison bought the bus tickets to day as well as the sunscreen. Ironically enough, the bus ticket was cheaper than the sun tan lotion. It costs about 15 Euros for one bottle here…and we can get like 23 gallons at Wal-Mart in the US for $3.98, yet another odd cultural difference. I leave you with this final “Spanish phrase of the day” from my host mom, “Dejame en paz.” Which translates into “leave me in peace,” just incase you ever have a creepy Spanish man come onto you, now you know how to combat your aggressor. You’re Welcome. 

Hi I’m Marco, and I Work with People who are “Freaky”

Monday February 25, 2008

I woke up this morning exhausted from all of the travels and dreaded having to go back to an actual classroom, yuck. From Paris to classroom there is a large contrast and its not one that I particularly enjoy. Today class was all right and in our last class we had a “gitana” (gypsy) come and talk to us about the stereotypes and segregation involved with being a gypsy in Europe, especially in Spain. It was all pretty interesting to learn about. We came home after school for lunch and headed to our “intercambio” (exchange) where we were to meet Spanish speakers who are learning English. I met four new people and it was great taking to them in English and then in Spanish. I think that I learned more from talking with them for an hour than I have this whole trip (oops!). Afterwards a group of 10 or so of us headed to a bar and got coffee and sodas. I had a pretty interesting conversation with Marco, my new Spanish friend. I asked him what his job was. He was telling me (in English) that he worked for the city and worked with people who were “freaky.” I looked at him and just started to laugh and I was really confused. Freaky? Really? I asked him how they were “freaky” (yeah, kind of a racy question) and he said its because they were different than other more normal people. I think that he meant to use the word strange but instead he used freaky. I then explained to him that freaky is a word that is frequently associated with sex and people that you are scared of and he became bright red. He had no idea! It was hilarious. Ah, the trials and tribulations of learning a new language. I loved having these “intercambios” because it almost felt like a safe haven where I could use my language. These people are learning a new language as well and they know how it feels, so it’s really good to talk to them. It’s also really interesting to find out more about Spaniards and their culture in general, plus now I have more Spanish contacts within the city. I gave my e-mail address to Marco and the three other girls that I talked to. Hopefully we are going to meet up a few other times. Marco told me that in 4 months he is going to have great English and I’m going to have great Spanish, how exciting! It was nice taking to someone and feeling like I accomplished something. AND I made the group of Spaniards laugh at the café, which pretty much made my life. It wasn’t because they didn’t understand or because they thought I was awkward, they actually laughed at a joke that I made. After the amazing “intercambio” experience I went to República to check my e-mail and then headed home for dinner and homework. 

If Leaving Paris Wasn’t Fun Enough…

Sunday February 24, 2008

Today I woke up at 4:10am and rushed to put on clothes and pack my bed for our trip back to Spain. We had the concierge hail a cab for us and we left around 4:30am to head to the bus station. We took the shuttle back to the Beauvais Airport, which was really scary because there was an immense amount of fog on the road. You probably couldn’t see more than 5 feet in front of you. After going through security and waiting for the flight, there was an announcement (in French) that said that we had to take a new bus to another airport to fly from there because the visibly was so bad. We quickly made friends with a younger French girl who spoke broken English and figured out what was happing. We took a bus for 2 hours to the north of France, very close to the boarder of Belgium, and finally caught a flight to Madrid. We were now close to 4 hours behind schedule and had already missed our bus from Madrid to Seville. I knew that we were going to be in for a long night after our first flight had been rescheduled. It was 4pm and we were in the Madrid airport. We checked all of our options to get back to Seville. At least these people spoke Spanish, a language that we could actually understand. We could take the Ave for 70 Euros, fly for 220 Euros, or take a bus for 20 Euros. Being the cheap students we are, we opted for the bus. We took the Metro for an hour and headed to the bus station. By the time that we had arrived we had missed the 5pm bus (which keep in mind it still takes 6.5 hours from this point to get back to Seville) and we were going to try for the 6pm bus because the only two busses left were the 6pm and 10pm. For some completely lucky reason, we got the last 4 tickets on the 6pm bus to Seville. We were the luckiest people ever. If we had to take the other bus we would have gotten home right before class on Monday. After buying tickets we frantically searched for food because we hadn’t had any food since last night and it was already 5pm. We got on the bus at 6pm and rode for 6.5 hours until we got to the bus station in Seville. We walked home (20 minutes) from the bus station and to our surprise Encarna had dinner waiting on the table for us. Have I mentioned that she is the best host mom ever created? We ate and finally went to bed after traveling for 21 hours. We could have come back to the States in that amount of time, Lord. But it was a good trip and everything ended up working out well. Paris was amazing and it was worth every penny!

Notre Dame and The Arc de Triomphe

Saturday February 23, 2008

We woke up and headed down for our continental breakfast around 9:30am, which to our surprise was amazing. It was probably because it was Paris, but they had the most amazing croissants ever made. We filled up with the free breakfast and then headed out for the day. On our way to the Notre Dame Cathedral we ran into a flea market on the street that was pretty cool. I ended up getting three necklaces and then we headed on our merry little way again. We took a pit stop in Starbucks, they are everywhere in Europe, and went to the bathroom. Close to the river we saw a small stand and we all ended up buying something from the man, I bought a sweet Moulin Rouge poster. Next we found our way to the Notre Dame Cathedral and walked around for a while and took a lot of pictures. There is a circle on the ground outside of the cathedral that has a superstition that if you step on it, you will someday return to Paris…I figured why not? I took full advantage of that superstition. After the cathedral we found a little shop and I ended up finding a painting that I really wanted, so I bought it because it seemed more practical than a cheesy souvenir anyway. Although, the smiling beret wearing stuffed Eiffel Towers were tempting (NOT! They were pretty creepy). For lunch we stopped at a small café, got some food and took a break for a while. The prices weren’t actually that bad in Paris, you could find places that aren’t as expensive as others. After our sandwiches we took the Metro to the Arc de Triomphe and walked the 284 steps to the top. My legs were on fire by the time I had gotten to the top. After taking more pictures and enjoying the view, architecture and The Tomb of the Unknown Solider, we hopped onto the Metro and headed towards home. We stopped at a supermarket and bought a bottle of champagne for later in the night. When we arrived at the hotel we all took our Spanish “siestas” and then headed out for some souvenir shopping (postcards). We ended up walking to the Moulin Rouge and taking some pictures and stopping for dinner at the best little French café in Paris. The waiters were amazing, the food was exquisite, and the view was gorgeous. It was the typical “perfect night” in Paris. The food was a little pricy but we decided that we deserved it. On our way home I tried to buy a Coke bottle and failed. Ironically a few minutes later we saw/heard some men at a table that were yelling at us and right away I noticed that one had a coke bottle. Jackie took it upon herself to ask them for their Coke bottle and they actually gave it to us. Thus, the international Coke collection lives on.  We went back to our hotel and opened our bottle of champagne (I almost put a hole in the ceiling) and talked about our trip and experiences of the day. Afterwards we went to bed and crashed hard, its tiring being an international traveler! 

 

The Eiffel Tower and The Louvre

Friday February 22, 2008

After being herded like cattle onto the airplane, there aren’t assigned seats with Ryan Air, I slept for a while. When we got off of the plane we had to stand in line to buy tickets for the shuttle bus to Paris because we flew into the Beauvais airport which is a couple of hours outside of Paris. After freezing in line, I could see my breath in the air for the first time in weeks, we finally got our tickets and were bused to Paris. We arrived in Paris around 9:30-10am and were on a mission to find a bathroom. That took us a while but afterwards we were much better off and we used the Metro to head to our hostel. We found our hostel without a problem and it was amazing, despite the fact that we didn’t have electricity in our “studio.” We left the keys with the guy at the front desk who spoke English, thank God, so we could get our electricity fixed before we came home for the night. We left the hostel and went to our first French café. The owner was amazing and we called him Jean “le shit” Pierre because it was all we knew of French minus hello, goodbye, and thank you. With food in our stomachs we headed to the Eiffel Tower. We saw the tower and just followed in the general direction and it took almost an hour to walk to the tower. We went up the tower when we got there and it was an amazing view. I was surprised that the place was packed, but apparently it is a national monument. I think that I heard 8 different languages just standing in line and waiting. We took a lot of pictures and the view from the top of the tower was incredible and of the entire city. It was a little creepy being so high up, but it was almost a euphoric feeling. We found a couple from Wisconsin who took our picture on the top of the tower; it really is a small world. Afterwards we walked to a café, which took us forever to decide upon mostly because we were all a little moody and tired at this point. We ate our Panini’s and the world was better so we started our walk to the Louvre. If you have ever seen the Da Vinci Code it looked exactly how it is in the movie. We went down the glass tri-angle looking thing and headed into one wing of the museum. The Louvre is free on Fridays for students so we took full advantage of that. We saw a lot of famous statues and paintings, one being The Mona Lisa…I don’t know if you’ve heard of that one or not? After the Louvre we went back to the tower to take pictures at night. Interesting fact: not only is the tower glowing at night, but it sparkles as well. For ten minutes every hour the tower twinkles like a Christmas tree, its amazing and very fairy tale-esk. After the twinkling ceased we decided to be complete tourists and got crepes close to the tower, mine was strawberry and banana. The crepe man thought that I wanted “ham and bananas” instead of “jam and bananas” so that was almost a disaster, but everything worked out well. We hopped onto the Metro to our hostel to find out that we still didn’t have electricity. They ended up finding another hotel for us and we packed all of our things to move. We found the hotel up the street a while and arrived at The Prélude Hotel, to find that the hostel had paid the difference (30 v. 110) and included breakfast. The switch around ended up being completely in our favor and for some reason everything worked out really well. Luckily the guy in the hotel spoke English as well. It was different being in Paris because I am so used to hearing Spanish and English. Everytime someone said anything to me in French, I immediately switched to my “Spanish brain” and responded in Spanish instead of in English. For the record, they don’t understand Spanish at all, but they do understand English so that was a comfort. Apparently charades is an international game as well because we frequently found ourselves playing. At the end of the night we brought our things upstairs and then headed to a store for some snacks. After returning home we headed to bed after a really long day. 

Look Out Paris!

Thursday February 21, 2008

Today I didn’t want to go to class because all I could think about was going to Paris, oh and the fact that we had a huge literature test to take didn’t really help either. After I survived my literature test I headed to the Internet café to print off my flight confirmation. Yes, I know this is probably surprising because it was only a couple of hours before the flight, but I’m starting to change a little I think with things like this. I came home afterwards and packed my backpack to leave and had lunch with the family. We left for the bus station at 5:15pm and Encarna kissed us goodbye. She frantically and very maternally told us to be careful and safe. She’s cute. We said goodbye to Rocio as well, who had made us amazing “bocadillos,” a sandwich with grilled chicken, tomato, and a sauce, to eat on our travels. After a 6.5-hour bus ride we were finally in Madrid at 12:30am. We had to run to the Metro, an underground train system, to take it to the airport. After taking 3 different lines we arrived at the Madrid Airport at 1:26am. Our flight didn’t leave until 5:45am, so we had a few hours to sit around and talk, eat, do nothing. Allison and I played cards for a while and finally went to the terminal and left around 6:00am.

 

Out Of The Country

I am leaving for my trip to Paris tonight at 6pm. I'm not very excited for the 6-hour bus ride to Madrid, but hopefully everything will work out well. If you don't hear from me in a couple of days, its because I'm out of the country. Don't worry, I'll eat a crepe for you :)

Rain Drops Keep Fallin’ On My Head

Wednesday February 20, 2008

Yet another rainy day, eh. I personally could do without the rain but I guess it is better than other forms of precipitation, such as snow…humm…Today’s class was completely frustrating and that’s to say the least. Let’s just say that by the end of class I was hugging and crying with our teacher. We are learning really difficult grammar right now and all of the students on our trip are on different levels; therefore, it’s really hard to teach a grammar class that everyone is going to understand. Yaye, our teacher, thinks that its her fault and that she’s a bad teacher, which is not at all the case, we just need more time to practice and learn. Today’s “class” was nothing but the equivalent of a circle of misunderstanding and frustration. I felt really bad for her, she was crying, so I went to talk to her about it. I told her that it wasn’t her fault at all and that she is amazing, and I ended up crying with her. After our Culture class I decided that I needed a break and I went down to check my e-mail on our 15-minute break. I had gotten an e-mail from Jessie Cotton and a Facebook message from Jessie Ernst (o.k., Springer); apparently the Jessie’s were out in full force today. I checked them and started crying again. I love getting messages from back home but sometimes is hard to read them, it makes me miss people even more. At least this cry was a happy/I miss something cry, not just a frustrated one, and it made my day better. After lunch I went to call Aaron to finalize the details of his visit (ah!) and he helped to calm me down. I’m glad that I had an excuse to call him today, for the sake of my sanity and the health of everyone around me. He seemed to be able to listen to my rant and then calm me down, as always. After the call I headed to the agency to get my new student I.D. card. The machine was up and running today and after about 20 minutes I had a new I.D. card. On the way home I bought myself a Coke because I needed one and then I got ready for my study group. We have a test for Literature tomorrow and a group of three girls and myself decided to meet up at a bar in the Alameda to study. We got a lot accomplished in our two-hour jam session and now I’m more confident about our test. After dinner I did more homework and now I’m calling it a day, a very long day.

Random update: The number of Spanish bugs that have taken the opportunity to bite me in my sleep has increased. I have 5 bites on my right arm alone and I think that I might possibly itch the entire limb off soon if I don’t find help. I told our “Momma Española” about this today and I tried to explain that I’m just too sweet and that’s why the bugs liked me. Her response: “It’s probably all of the Coke and chocolate in your body.” Ah, yet another tidbit of sunshine from Encarna.

Want to Know About the Republic of Spain? Yeah, Neither Do I.

Tuesday February 19, 2008

We had the biggest thunderstorm last night, I think that the thunder and lightening shook the entire country of Spain as a whole. I, being the amazingly light sleeper that I am, woke up randomly and frequently through out the night. It wasn’t much of a surprise to me when I didn’t want to get out of bed today. Not only was it because of the rain, but because we were to have our first history exam today. I spent all last night studying for it, I actually feel asleep studying for it. I think the diffusion of the information into my brain worked quite well because I knew all of the answers to our essay test today(I think). After class and lunch today I headed to call Meridith for the first time since being in Spain. I haven’t talked to her in forever because she always has to work on the weekends when I have time and access to the Internet; therefore I decided to pay her a visit. It was good talking to her and knowing that she is going crazy without me as well. My second task of the day was to find by myself (oh Lord) the street and location of the office where I was to get my new International Student I.D. For some odd reason, I found the agency without any problems, I used a map and it was great, the only problem was that the agency was closed when I arrived. I decided to head back to the plaza by school and a lady in car stopped me. She asked me for directions, and I gave them to her. Keep in mind this is all in Spanish. What a success! After making a complete loop, apparently I didn’t fully understand where I was, I ended up back in front of the agency. Luckily there was a woman who had just halfway opened up the shop. I waited out-front and another girl showed up. She was clearly and American and from Wisconsin, the worst kind in Spain, and she was waiting as well. A guy walked up to us and asked us if we were waiting and why we were waiting. I was taken back because he was speaking English, but I came to find out that he worked for the agency and was from the United States. He told me that they did make new cards but that I had to return on Thursday or Friday because their machine was broken. I proudly threw in the line that I would be out of the country then (Paris!) and that I would probably have to come back next week instead. Afterwards I headed home and got stopped for a second time for directions. Two ladies came up to me and asked where a Plaza was, I told them that I wasn’t sure and I didn’t really know and then they realized that I wasn’t from Seville (as if the blond hair and rocky speech didn’t already give it away). I was just proud that I look like I know what I’m doing and that I look approachable. Overall, the events of the day aided in a win for Team Emily. I finally got home around 6:00pm and then had to leave for my ONG. I changed the dates of the next three weeks because we will be traveling the next two Thursday’s and then at a play, Don Juan Tenorio, on the third Thursday. Tonight my ONG went really well. I swam laps with Maria for about the first 30 minutes and then David, the director of the physical therapy program, decided that we were going to learn how to dive today. The first kid, Jose Maria (yeah, that’s a guys name), went up and aced it. Then we came to Maria. She put her hands down on her feet but wouldn’t jump, put her hands down again and still wouldn’t jump, therefore Jose Maria took it upon himself to push her headfirst into the water. It was one of the slow motion moments for me. She didn’t change her form the whole time. Let’s just say that it was the most awkward cannon ball-esk headfirst tuck-and-fall dive that I have ever seen. I had to laugh, I didn’t know what else to do. It was a good night overall and for the record I made to the pool and back, using public transportation, all by myself! When I got home, we had the most amazing Spanish lasagna ever created over some light dinner conversation. The conversation was about a misunderstanding that I had with David at the pool earlier in the night. David asked me where I was traveling in the next two weeks and I told him Paris and Conil. He understood Paris well but when it came to Conil, not so much. Apparently Conil is close to a “bad word” in Spanish and he thought that I had said that word instead! Lets just say that from his facial expressions alone I knew that I had said something awkward and wrong, go figure. After we jumped that hurdle together the rest of the night went smoothly, minus the diving lessons. When I came home I asked my host sister about the word that David had “heard” from me (after failing to find it in the dictionary). She busted out laughing at me and at the situation and tactfully explained the definition. Needless to say, the word is not a word that I would ever say in English, let alone in Spanish, and I would have been a lot more embarrassed if I knew what the word meant when I had apparently “said” it earlier. I find it enjoyable that my dealings with the Spanish language are humorous and awkward for all involved. Ahh…yet another great day in the Spanish life of Emily.

The Discovery of Piola

Monday February 18, 2008

Class wasn’t too bad today. I had a group speech in my Culture class, which went well or well enough. I can’t believe that we are almost to Midterms here, its crazy how the time has flown. Although, there are some days that never end, and some that feel like they never even began. Overall, the highlight of today was finding our way to La Plaza de Armas and buying tickets for the bus to Madrid on Thursday night. We are taking a flight out of Madrid (there aren’t any flights out of Sevilla) for our trip to Paris this weekend. We found our way, as well as the tickets, successfully so it was a good adventure. We found out that there is a strike in one, if not more, of the airports in Paris. This information is not exactly the thing that you want to hear three days before you leave for France. Nonetheless we booked the tickets Madrid, and at least we are getting that far on Thursday. After returning home I did a lot of history homework and studying, and now I think I’m going crazy (if I wasn’t already before). I needed to get out of the room so Sam and I decided to try a new bar to study at. We went to “Piola” which is in La Alameda, very close to our house. I decided that it is my favorite bar so far because it is clean, has pink wine, is close, and I like the atmosphere because it is good to study in. Also, Jack Johnson and Dave Mathews were the sounds calmly coming from the stereo, which never is a bad thing. After returning home from the bar we had dinner and then it started to pour. Encarna said that it never rains here and it is crazy that it has rained two times this week already.  Well, I’m off to study more about the Republic in Spain…what a joy. If this history test tomorrow doesn’t kill me, I don’t know what will. 

A Rainy Day

Sunday February 17, 2008

 Today was the first really rainy day that we’ve had since arriving in Spain. It was a little cooler here today, but nothing in comparison to the weather that Iowa has been having. I think that I picked the best winter to be gone for, and I’m not missing a bit of it. I headed to República today to talk to my parents and friends. There weren’t very many people out today, which is a lot different than many of the other Sundays. I think that the lack of Sevillanos was due to the weather. I didn’t let the rain get me down and I had a fairly productive day. In the next week I have a paper due and two tests, therefore I will be a busy girl. Good thing that I am leaving for Paris on Thursday night, it seems as though it is almost a reward for surviving the week. Since today was a rather bland day, I decided to include a few cheesy jokes to make it seem as if the day were more exciting:

 

Q: What do astronauts like on their sandwiches?

A: Launch Meat

 

And finally…

 

Q: If you were a spy, what kind of shoes would you wear?

A: Sneakers.

Disclaimer: These jokes are complimentary and brought to you by Quaker Oatmeal, on behalf of the package sent by Sam’s grandma.

What Makes a Spaniard?

Saturday February 16, 2008

For the record, it’s impossible to sleep-in in Spain. Every weekend morning at 9:00am I wake up. I think my internal clock is set to wake me up at this time, yet on the weekends it gets a little old. If you know how to re-set this clock, fill me in, I’d love to know. On the other hand, it’s a great way to get things done early in the morning instead of waiting until later in the day (a.k.a. homework time). After lunch Allison and I decided to go walking around the Barrio de Santa Cruz. We looked through about 20 or so different shops and stopped every once and a while to take pictures. It was a good way to break up the day from homework and to just get out for a while. Today was warm enough to get a sunburn, hence Sam’s shoulders, and it was great weather to just walking around in. I always like spending time with Allison. While we do have some similarities our personalities are very different. I’m glad that I have a good friend like her with me here. I think without that I’d be more lost but its nice knowing that our friendship is a constant here. In other news, a group of men called Allison and I Germans as we walked by them today! Woohoo, I wasn’t tagged as an American and I loved it. While I do love back home, the American’s that are here drive me completely crazy. Maybe its just because I’m used to living here now and how to act in public, but I can spot an American a mile away. I don’t think that they understand that you can look as “Spanish” as you’d like, but once you open your mouth and act uncivilized you are easily spotted. Personally I’ve given up the battle of looking like a Spaniard, the blonde hair is a dead giveaway, and have moved onto more acting like a Spaniard. There are many things that make up a Spaniard, but the following list highlights a few important factors:

1. Self-confidence is a must. I have never seen so many people wear spandex and leggings in my life. While some can pull it off, there are others who should never attempt but still wear them solely because they have the self-confidence to do so.

2. Shoes: You must have the right shoes on, always. Did you know that some bars and especially clubs won’t let you in if you don’t have the right shoes on? Tennis shoes are never a good option, unless they are designer.

3. Never move out of the way for anyone, you always have the ride away. When cars are coming at you, should you stop? No! Why not? Because you are a Spaniard.

4. Even though you don’t understand the English language, buy t-shirts that have incorrect English phrases on them.

5. Spaniards think that the mullet and the rattail are in. Wrong. They are sadly mistaken on this popular belief, yet 1 of every 3 males decides to sport one, if not both. 

6. Eat bread with every meal. “Pan del dîa” (bread of the day) is a necessity when consuming any Spanish dish. Forty cents for a fresh loaf of warm bread on the way home…who wouldn’t buy it?

7. Buy a dog and take it with you everywhere you go. Have I mentioned that this isn’t grass in Spain? Think about what problems that a dog and no grass create…

8. Finally, buy a pack of cigarettes and smoke them all in one sitting. Buy another pack and smoke some more. Realize that smoking is big here and go into the tobacco business or buy a bunch of Bic lighters to sell on the streets. 

The Dove Wrapper

Friday February 15, 2008

After running a few errands this morning I realized that I couldn’t find my International Student I.D. Apparently I had lost it last night because it was in my coat pocket and fell out. I wasn’t in a greatest mood after realizing that and I had to try and explain the story to my host sister. She went on the website on the back of Allison’s card to find out what to do about a lost card, hopefully I can get that all worked out soon. Today I received a package from the Jones’ and I loved every bit of it. It made my kind of crappy day a lot better. I was to the point of tears before I got the package and after I opened it I was laughing and in a lot better mood. I decorated the bulletin board more and hung up the cute calendar that was sent in the package. I think my favorite part of the package was Aaron’s senior picture from 5ish years ago because he might still look the same! It still amazes me every time that I get something in the mail how much it means to me and how much I really appreciate hearing from people and knowing that I haven’t been forgotten about. This afternoon I met up with my culture group to work on our presentation for Monday; it was frustrating to say the least. Homework in general here is not fun, and takes too much time. I could probably do without it. I think it’s that whole being in Spanish thing. On another note, I read a Dove chocolate wrapper today and it recommended, “Don’t think about it so much.” I think I’m going to take that advice and run with it. Being here it’s really easy to see the things that you miss and care about back in the States. Things that I thought were important before, I don’t think are now (and vice versa). If anything, this semester has been good for me to figure out who I am, what I stand for, and my own strengths and weaknesses. It’s easy to figure all of this out without distractions such as cell phones, TV, Internet, friends, ect. I think when I finally go back home it’s going to be sensory overload. Moral of the story: appreciate all of the people and little things in your life, its goes by quickly and things happen unexpectedly. Pretty deep all coming from a Dove wrapper I know, but it was dark chocolate, so I think that has something to do with it. 

Valentines Day!

Thursday February 14, 2008

After class today we had a Valentines Day party/February birthdays party, it was basically an excuse to ingest way too much sugar in one sitting. We had three cakes, one that was made only from sugar and marshmallows in the shape of a three-sailed ship. It was amazing to look at but not so great to eat. After our “fiesta” we headed home and had lunch. I got a card from my official “pen pal” Emily Kacere today and that was a nice surprise! For the record…I miss all of my girls. But I digress…Thursdays are my Fridays, and today was even better because we didn’t have our ONG   (volunteer work) today. I’m sure that sounds horrible but follow my thought pattern. For the past three weeks we have tried to go to a place called “Carbonerîa,” where there is a flamenco band and dancer on Thursdays. We haven’t been able to go, so this Thursday we finally had the option. Allison and I met up with a few classmates and we arrived at “Carbonerîa” at about 10:30pm. The atmosphere in this underground bar was unlike any others that we had been to before. All of the tables were low and were bench style seating, there was a fireplace just as you walk in, the walls and floor were all cobblestone, plants hung from the ceiling and a small stage sat at the back of the room. We watched the flamenco show that started at 11:30pm and lasted about an hour. After the show we headed out and found a pizzerîa. Allison and myself, as well as three other girls from class shared pizza in La Plaza de Alfalfa. While on the way to the pizzerîa we were handed free passes to “Catedral” a discoteca (club) and we decided to check it out. We got in easily and stayed for a while. We danced and had a good time until one Spanish/French man started creeping on me, so we decided that it was time to leave. Afterwards we talked for a while outside and then headed home. Allison and I shared some water and an apple and then headed to bed at about 3:30am.

 

Interesting Facts About Valentines Day in Spain:

-Valentine’s Day is only celebrated by “couples.”

-There aren’t cards or candy at school for any of the children. Personally, I think that’s lame. One of my favorite parts was assigning the Valentines messages to specific people in my class. (Don’t laugh, you did it too.)

-The front page of the paper was printed in all pink. The rest of the pages had pink headings and all of the statistics were in hearts.

-Avoid all men, they turn into complete creepers. To me, Valentines Day is not a valid excuse for your lack of sanity.

-You really appreciate all of the chocolate, candy hearts, warm wishes and socks that you get from home for Valentines Day.

-No one wears red or pink, I wore black.

-They don’t start celebrating Valentines Day until the actually week of Valentines Day, instead of directly after Christmas

-Valentines Day was good this year, minus not being in the States.

 

 

New Shiny Pencils+ ADD=Bad Combination

Wednesday February 13, 2008

Today I gave my speech in class and I think it went really well. I might have thrown some English in there on accident every once and a while, but other than that I think that it was an overall success. After school I checked my e-mail and took a little break before coming home. I didn’t feel well this afternoon and I’ve come to the conclusion that I have an iron deficiency. In the States I didn’t eat a lot of meat, and here I eat even less. So that must be it right? I’m hoping so. When I arrived home I realized that I had a package on the bed! The best part of my day is always when the mail comes and I have something! This box of love was from none other than Tasha and Meridith (I miss them a lot!) and was filled with goodies including: artistic pictures that Tasha had taken (I was surprised), a sweet homemade card, pushpins, shiny pencils (because apparently in Spain they don’t believe in making mistakes and pencils aren’t easy to find), colorful pens, chocolate, chips, cookies…you know, the essentials. It made me start to feel better and I immediately hung up my pictures and card on the bulletin board near my bed. I took a siesta after lunch, in hopes that it would help the pain in my head, and did homework when I got up. Allison came back from the store a little while after I had woken up and she was going to attempt to make cookies for our sweet February birthday party/Valentines Day party tomorrow after class. I use the word attempt because the baking didn’t go quite as planned. After substituting a few ingredients for ones that they actually have in this country, she started baking. About a half of an hour later the house smelled like charred cookies. Ah the joys of a Spanish oven. It took us three batches, two Spanish women, and three hours later to finally come out with a dozen decent cookies. Before “dinner” Encarna said that she had a surprise to show me. She led me downstairs to the first floor of her house and explained that this was the oldest part of the house where she was born and grew up and showed me a few things, such as a piano, from when she was a kid. She showed me a two-bedroom apartment/hotel looking room that was fully furnished along with amazing paintings, all done by her son. She told me that she rented the rooms out during festivals and such and then pointed out that if Aaron wanted to say there, he could! Have I mentioned yet that our host mom is…amazing? Apparently she has all of the hook-ups in Spain. After the tour and cookie experiment we had dinner and then finished the night out with homework. For the record, when you have mashed potatoes in Spain they aren’t mashed they are puréed. I would recommend opting for another form of potatoes while visiting, but that’s just for the record. Because if you don’t, you could end up eating a plate of potato mush that tastes like baby food.

 

Ah, Finally Some Emily Time

Tuesday February 12, 2008

I woke up this morning and was wide-awake for some crazy reason. I showered (with out a lizard spotting) and headed to school. School was relatively O.K. today, I think it is because I stopped at the supermarket and bought Coke and chocolate…but we’ll keep that one on the down low. After class I checked my e-mail (I received a pretty funny proposition from some friends in the form of a four (wo)man play) and then headed home at 3pm. Right when I got home I had lunch, papas con carne (potatoes with meat, its kind of like a soup), and then talked to the host family for a bit. After lunch I did some homework and then decided that it was time to have some “Emily time” today. I packed up my bag and headed out to the Plaza in front of the Cathedral and La Giralda. I sat on a bench and unpacked my new supplies. I decided that I wanted to just sketch today and my first victim was a fountain, which I spent 2 hours on drawing half of. As I sat people came up behind me and creped over my shoulder to peek and look at my drawing. It was quite humorous because could understand most of their comments and I just smiled at them and proceeded to draw. Man was it good getting out of the house and just doing something that I like to do! I think I’m going to get addicted to it. It was the first time that I had just stopped everything and done something on my own since arriving. After drawing I headed home and did some more homework until the roomies got home. We had a nice little dinner together and then we came back in the room to do some more schoolwork. I’ve kind of been avoiding it today because I have what’s due for tomorrow done and I just feel like a relaxing day instead of working ahead. Don’t worry I’m not ill, I just think Spain is making me realize what things are actually important to me and what things are not. Sometimes you just need a relaxing day every once and a while to do things that make you happy-I recommend it. And for the record, if you are reading this…you are still one of the things that are important to me…so do you worry. J

I Have a Package for "Emille Bekman"

Monday February 11, 2008

I didn’t want to wake up this morning but I forced myself to, ah another Monday. Class went really well today. Things seemed to go by quickly and in our last class we had a Spanish lawyer come and talk to our class about immigration. It was pretty interesting but it was really hard to understand what he said because he liked to leave off the ends of words and talk really quickly. After class I came home and worked on homework and ate lunch. I received a card from my Great Aunt Alice and Great Uncle Bill today wishing me a Happy Valentines Day! It was cute and I enjoyed it, like all other mail that I receive. I worked on homework for a while longer until 4pm when I went to call Aaron and tell him about our amazing trip to Conil. When I called, he didn’t answer. So I decided that that wasn’t good enough and I called twice more until I woke him up. (Sounds kind of crazy, but I was just really excited to tell him about the trip to the beach and that he needed to cancel a couple nights of his hotel.) He was confused when he answered, but he caught on pretty quickly when he realized that it was me. We talked for about 30 minutes and then I came home to work on my speech. My roommates had gone out to do other things but I was alone in our room writing my speech for Wednesday, what fun! While I was preparing my visual aids, the door buzzed. No one answered. The door buzzed again. Still there was no answer. So I went to the phone and picked up it and valiantly said, “Hola, quien es?” (Hello, who is it), which is always what my host mom and sister say when they answer the door phone. I couldn’t understand a word coming from the other end of the phone but luckily my host sister rushed to my aid. She talked to the man and found out that it was the postman, which I thought was rare because it was around 7:00pm and the mail usually comes around 12-2pm. She said that there was a package for me. I rushed downstairs to a little old man and a giant package. What was it? I could hardly wait. He asked for my passport number, after he had spelled my name “Emille Bekman,” which I laughed at and correctly later. I told him “one moment please” and I went upstairs to get my passport. I read him off the number and then signed the slip of paper and the box was finally mine. I carried the 15lb. package up the stairs and ripped it open. I read the tag and it was from Aaron. I’m sure that it was supposed to be for Valentines Day, but I honestly couldn’t help it. I opened the box and immediately burst into tears. Holy crap. I think this kid knows me better than I know myself. He had sent me an artists dream set full of paints, pastels, watercolors, paintbrushes, pencils, you name it and this box had it. I just stood and started at it bawling for a few minutes until Sam got home. She walked in and immediately asked what had happened/what was wrong. Through my wall of tears I think she deciphered that I got my package from Aaron. As I was showing it off to her I noticed the side of the box. “Emily Kay, Make Time For Yourself” was engraved on the side. How true, how perfect. For the next 10 minutes my world was a blur of tears and loss of words, which Sam pointed out that doesn’t happen often. When Allison came home, it all started again. I couldn’t concentrate anymore; I had to leave the room. Allison and I decided to go out for ice cream to celebrate “nice boys” and it was delicious. I came back home and a few minutes later Encarna popped her head into our room to tell us that dinner was ready…and then she noticed the box. Her son Antonito is an amazing artist and she has his artwork all over our/her house. She was in shock and couldn’t believe that she now had another artist in the house! (I love her.) We had dinner and talked for a while. She asked if the beach idea as a go and we told her that we definitely wanted to rent her friends apartment. She told us that we would be O.K. and that we were going to love it because it was three girls and our “guardaespaldas” (bodyguard)-how funny! Now I’m trying to accomplish homework. There aren’t really any words to describe the end of the night, just an overall sense of love from back home. Tonight is the one of the first times that I’ve actually said the words, “I want to go home.” But I think that I was pretty good holding out for a month. There have been other times, cards, e-mails, and packages that have put me on the edge, but this just pushed me over. I love, love, love Spain, but there are something’s back home that you just can’t replace. 

I Dislike the Spanish Internet

Sunday February 10, 2008

Today I woke up and did homework for 3 hours and afterwards we had a “going away” lunch that was amazing for/made by Fatima. After lunch I did a little bit more homework and then headed to the Plaza by school to get on the Internet to talk to my family and friends. While in transit I ran into Sara and Josh. After chatting for a couple of minutes Josh ended up coming with me to the Plaza for Internet. When we finally got to the Plaza the Internet didn’t work. I don’t know if they started to realize that the plaza wasn’t password protected or what, but the Internet connection had a password now. So it was already past the time when I talk to my parents and friends, and I was frustrated. We headed to a nearby bar that I thought had WiFi. When we arrived I promptly asked the bartender and they did so we ended up buying a couple of Cola Cao’s and staying. Josh got his Internet to work, but I didn’t have the same luck. I downed my Cola Cao, after moving to 3 different places/tables in the bar, and headed out in search of WiFi. I ended up sitting on the ground in the Alameda next to a huge pillar. I could pick up free WiFi from that place, so it worked for me. I acquired a lot of new friends, all small children, because they all play in the Alameda. The computer amazed them all, it was almost like some sort of freakish force field and I even had one child try to push a few buttons. Afterwards he insisted on showing me his doll and his brother’s truck, all while his mother begged him to move on. After finally making connection, an hour later, thankfully my contacts at home were still around. I checked my e-mail, updated the blog, looked for internships and talked to people from back home. After signing off the computer, I was in search for “victims” for my survey that I was conducting for my 15-minute speech on immigration in class this Wednesday. I thought it would be interesting, and the people, there were four of them, were pretty nice to me and answered my questions. For the record, whenever you ask a Spaniard their opinion be ready for a long and passionate explanation. After feeling successful I headed home and hung out with the roomies for a bit. We play a couple games of Phase 10 and then ate dinner a little later. After dinner Encarna came in and told us that she had news for us. Uh-oh…what did we do? She ended up telling us that she has a friend that has an apartment in Conil, which is a beach near Cadiz on the west coast of Spain, which she is willing to rent to us for 5 days, for 4 people, for only $160 Euros. SIGN US UP! We have a long weekend on February 27-March 2 because of “El Dia de Andalucia” and we are going to take full advantage of that opportunity! Aaron will be here then and for only $10 Euros a night…on the beach…how could you pass that up?  The night ended on that high note and now we are planning a 4-night 5-day trip to the beach! HOW EXCITING! (It’s O.K. to be jealous, I understand that a beach is much more appealing than a foot of snow.)

Lizards Eat Bugs Not People

Saturday February 9, 2008

This morning Sam and I woke up and had a nice little intimate breakfast together, since Allison had left earlier in the morning to go to Gibraltar. After breakfast we headed out to the main shopping streets to pick up a few things. I ended up buying some really cheap earrings and some jeans that were on sale; I obviously had to add a Spanish pair to the growing collection. We came home and had lunch with the family and then I started working on homework. After about 4 hours of homework, which I did on the outside patio because it was a gorgeous day, I decided that we needed to get out of the house for a while. Sam and I headed to Calle Feria (Feria Street) to look for a bar for a “tinto de verano.” We finally found a place called Bar Becquer and decided to try it. The little old bar man was really funny and it ended up being a cheap and good find. Afterwards we checked out a few other stores on the way home. We got home around 8:30pm and Allison came home a few minutes later. We talked about our days, listened to music and hung out for a bit until dinner. After dinner we talked to the family, it’s a lot livelier this weekend with Fatima here. There has been cousins, boyfriends, grandchildren, and all of Encarna’s kids coming in and out. We had a pretty long conversation with “the fam” after dinner and its nice knowing that we can actually communication and understand a lot better now than we have been able to in the past. I am staying in tonight because I have a 15-minute speech about immigration in Spain this upcoming Wednesday. I started making a survey today to ask people on the street. I’m pretty nervous about it but I think the results will be interesting to share and I got Rocio and Encarna to look over and correct my questions before I start hitting the street. I had a lot of other homework to do today but tomorrow I’m going out and actually doing the survey. Oh, and for the record, Encarna reminded me today that lizards eat bugs and not people so if I saw the lizard in the bathroom again not to worry. Just a little insight from our “Momma Espanola.”

El Museo del Bellas Artes de Sevilla

Friday February 8, 2008 

After the long night, Allison, Sam and I woke up around 11:30 this morning. We all ate breakfast at different times and Allison and I showered (separately) and got ready for the day. Allison and I caught wind that the famous painter “El Greco” had an exhibit at an art museum (El Museo del Bellas Artes de Sevilla) nearby, so we decided that we’d check it out. The exhibit was amazing and included the original works of the twelve apostles, along with other religious themed paintings. After looking at the exhibit we headed to the other two levels of the museum and looked at tons of other paintings and statutes. It was amazing seeing all of the different collections and works, but the thing that stood out to me the most was that almost 90% of the paintings and statues were religious based. I guess I should have expected it but I think I saw every way possible of painting baby Jesus with the Virgin Mary. After the museum we stopped by the post office where I picked up my Valentines Day themed package from my mom. Enclosed were socks, kitchen towels (for Rocio and Encarna), cards for my roommates, Encarna, and Rocio, and magic towels (you put them in water and they grow). Valentines Day came a little early, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. When I got home I had a card from Meridith and I enjoyed it thoroughly, as I always enjoy anything that is from her. We tend to have the same sense of humor so the comic relief was nice to have. We had another “family lunch” today and then I met up with Mary Beth to talk for a bit. It was fun going out with her for something new to do, for a new face and I like her a lot, so that doesn’t hurt. When I got back home I packed my bag and I left again with Allison and we went to another bar to do homework and to check our e-mail. We tried a new bar this time, and I really like it. It is a little more secluded, the guy working was really nice and actually started a conversation (many times Sevillanos don’t), and there was a lot more space. I think I found an internship that I’m going to apply for online, so that was a success. I think that we will definitely be going back there. We came home and I wrote a bit and then we finally had dinner at 11:15pm. Tonight is going to be a chill night because of the lack of sleep last night and because of the plethora of homework for tomorrow. 

The Prehistoric Animal

Thursday February 7, 2008

This morning I woke up and headed to the bathroom, as normal, to take my shower. As you walk into the bathroom the mirror and shower are on the left and the toilet is in the back middle. I walk into the bathroom, turn on the light, shut the door, look into the mirror and instantly become paralyzed. Why? Because I see (in the mirror) a dull colored orange and red stripy lizard scurrying up the wall behind me. I instantly sprint to my room in dead panic and wake up the roomies by exclaiming, “There is a prehistoric animal in the bathroom and now I can’t shower. I don’t want to go in there. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh….ah!” Sam and Allison immediately sprung out of bed and rushed to the bathroom, ready with their cameras, to spot the animal. We all walked in as if something were going to attack us, only to find that the lizard was no longer to be seen. After searching the bathroom for a good 5 minutes Sam declared that the bathroom was usable again. It took me a couple of minutes to work the nerve up to go back into the lizard’s cage, but I had no other choice. After showering, breakfast, and school, we returned home to find a gorgeous woman and man in the kitchen. The woman turned out to be Encarna’s daughter, Fatima, and the man was Juan Antonio, Fatima’s boyfriend. We all sat down, Juan Antonio, Fatima, Encarna, Angela, Sam, Allison and myself for a nice little family lunch. Fatima is a 22-year-old flamenco dancer studying in Madrid and she had come home for the weekend. After listening to the sisters, Rocio and Fatima, talk about their new buys at a local store, Allison and I decided to go on an adventure to find the store after lunch. After searching for a while we found the store and some great buys as well. I bought a couple of things but the most important, a black coat. I love it, and I needed it, so I figured…why not!? After dinner Sam and I headed to our ONG and for the first time used the busses correctly there and back. We returned home on time (thank you God) and after eating, decided to go out for the night in celebration. Sarah and Melissa, two girls from class, invited us to go out with them and their host sister from Spain.  Our first stop was a flamenco bar where a 3-man band played original Sevillano music while many of the women at the bar danced flamenco. It was cool going out to the bar to watch the natives do something that they love. The music and dancing was amazing, but we headed to a more “hip” and younger aged bar after a while. We danced for a while there, met some guys who tried dancing with us (tried, because they got turned down), talked for a while and headed to a club called Boss. This club was like a club that you see in the movies-doorman, plush couches, different levels and all. Here we acquired two new “friends” Valentino and Ollie. They pretty much followed us around the rest of the night and ended up buying all 6 of us girls churros and hot chocolate on the way home. While walking I gave Ollie English lessons, he really wanted to learn the days of the week and how to say, “I am a waiter.” He started out only knowing, “I waitress” and ended up knowing the days of the week and how to say that he is a male/waiter. I think it was a fair trade off. We got back to our house at about 5am, which is very normal in Spain, if not a bit early, and went to bed. The whole night didn’t cost us anything because we got into all of the dance clubs for free and I didn’t have anything to drink. Overall, it was a good/random night.

Ash Wednesday Mass at the Cathedral

Wednesday February 6, 2008 

Today was another normal day with classes and the such. After lunch and homework I went to the Internet café to call my grandma for her birthday. She answered and we talked for a couple minutes about all the snow, which Mother Nature gave her for her birthday (how lucky) and about Spain and life in general. It was good talking to her; there are some things that I miss about home and she is definitely one! After calling her I decided to call Aaron because I hadn’t talked to him in over two weeks because of unpreventable conversation cancellations. At first he didn’t have a clue who I was, but then he caught on and warmed up. It was kind of a surprise call, so I’m lucky that he even answered a call from such a strange foreign number! Later in the evening Allison and I decided that we were going to go to the Ash Wednesday service at the Cathedral. The mass was at 8pm and we left around 7:20 to walk to the church. On our way we ran into Josh, a classmate, and he decided that he wanted to come to the service with us as well. Both Allison and Josh aren’t Catholic so I had to break them into how a Catholic mass works. (Pretty “brave little toaster-esk” for your first Catholic mass to be on Ash Wednesday, in Spanish, and at the Cathedral in Spain.) We walked into the church and the lady security guard stopped us at the gate and told us that the church wasn’t open for tourists at this time. I explained to her that we were there for the 8pm mass. She looked surprised that A. I could speak Spanish and B. that her assumptions were incorrect. I was the winner of that Spanish conversation, probably for the first time since I’ve been here. Mass was really interesting with a similar structure as at home, the biggest difference being that mass was in Spanish. It was a little frustrating knowing the mass parts and responses in English, but not in Spanish. A bishop, as well as a bunch of other priests, celebrated the mass and it was a good experience as a Catholic and as a Spanish student. After mass we headed home for dinner and finished up homework.  

The Bearded Man and the Intercom

Tuesday February 5, 2008

The weather was nice on the way to school this morning or at least to me it felt that way. One the way to school we got our three free newspapers (that we get shoved at us every morning) and the first thing that I read was the sports section to find out who had won the Super Bowl. In the states, I would have known even if I didn’t want to know, but here its different…not one had a clue until the morning after. I continuously look for articles on the elections and on random cultural events, such as the Super Bowl, from home. After class (which was confusing today) we headed home for lunch. Today felt like Christmas when we arrive home because Allison got a package, Sam got a package, and I got two cards in the mail. How exciting! My two cards were from Aaron Jones and Tish Lavrenz. It is always a good day when I get mail. It is crazy the difference a card makes in a day here. You can really be having a bad day, or missing something from home and then when you have a Valentines Day card or funny dog card waiting for you at home, the world seems to be OK again. After lunch Allison and I decided that we needed to find another place besides our room to study, so we headed out to find the nearest library. The library that we found was really small but it did have a room with for tables for studying. Allison and I worked on homework for a while after failing to figure out the WiFi password for the library. After we left the library we decided to explore a little more and then headed home. I stopped at an “Estanco” (kind of like a really mini-convenience store) where I bought stamps so I can start writing to people. We arrived home and we dropped off our books and computers and then headed out again. We decided that we wanted to check out the gardens across the river, maybe for a potential study spot or study (sanity) break. We ended up figuring out that the huge gardens were either closed or under some kind of work after talking to a pleasant security guard who was blocking our entrance. We ended up walking to the second bridge and back and then we ended up somewhere that I knew (yes!) and I found our way home. Being able to find our way home made the garden trip a little more successful/productive. I wrote a few letters when I got back home and Allison headed out to the café for a while. After she had been gone for a while (I was doing homework at the time) I heard someone trying to open the front door. I immediately assumed that it was Allison and I picked up the phone to the downstairs intercom and creepishly whispered, “Alllliissoonnn.” The voice on the other end of the line was not Allison, and the conversation proceeded as follows: (keeping in mind that this is all actually in Spanish)

 

Emily: Alllisssoonnn (sounding like a creeper)

Bearded Man: Hello?

(I hang up the phone in dire panic)

(Two seconds later the phone starts ringing, so I pick up the phone timidly)

Emily: Hello…

Bearded Man: Hello? Angela? Is Angela there?

Emily: Umm…no. (insert panic here)

Bearded Man: Is she with her mom?

Emily: Si, si, si.

Bearded Man: Gracias.

Emily: Gracias. I mean…si…I mean…de nada.

 

And thus ended the most successful conversation with a Spaniard ever. Later I realized that the bearded man was one of Encarna’s sons, and Angela is his daughter. I’m glad that I’m really good at creating awkward situations. Needless to say, my wanting to creep on Allison via intercom ended up not being the best idea, but it was comical none-the-less. 

Scotcharoos Equal Happiness in a Box

Monday February 4, 2008

Today I woke up with a bloody nose. Nasty, I know…that’s what I thought. Not the best thing to wake up to but I guess it could have been worse? After breakfast we headed to school for another fun-filled Monday’s worth of classes. I gave a presentation in my culture class today and apparently I don’t know roman numerals. I was talking about the nineteenth century and it came out XI on the dry erase board, apparently I forgot the other X, my bad. History has never been my thing anyway. After class we headed to Casa del Libro for Allison and Sam to pick up their books that had finally come in. After obtaining the books we headed for home and were greeted with a surprise…there was a package! Who could it be from? It was from none other than the infamous Grandma Beckmann and her cohort (and activities director), Grandpa Beckmann. AMAZING! I think that it took me a total of 2 seconds to rip into the package to indulge in the goodies. It was homemade heaven in a box. Grandma sent homemade goodies such as her famous Scotcharoos, which was later hilarious to hear our host family try and pronounce. Now I understood how we sounded to them everyday. The Valentines Day card, treats and overall packaged cheer made the previous five hours of class seem nonexistent. After lunch and homework Allison, Sam and I headed to “Café de Indias” because I had a meeting with Tracy, our Spanish professor from Simpson. We have been looking for places to study/do homework at that isn’t our room, so this café was a nice change of venue. I met with Tracy for about an hour and a half to talk about the questions that I had, to address my concerns with the trip and life, and to get her overall advice and maternal care. It was good to sit down and talk to her and tell her my side of the story while she shared hers. She gave a lot of good advice and she helped me set some pretty good goals for my future days in Spain. I sent a few postcards on the way home and we returned just before dark. After doing homework for a while longer, dinner was ready. We had “tortillas espanoles,” my favorite meal in Spain, and fresh fruit. I shared the joy of Scotcharoos with my host family and it was more than hilarious to watch them indulge with enthusiasm and pure awe at the use of peanut butter (and more or less its existence). After dinner I did more homework and now its time for bed. Tomorrow is Grandma Beckmann’s birthday; I think she’s turning about 27 now, so wish her a happy birthday!  

Sunday’s=Lame

Sunday February 3, 2008

To spare you the pain of writing about an extremely boring day, here are the basics in an outline:

n               I woke up and had breakfast.

n               I took a freezing shower, and broke the curtain rod, again.

n               I loaded pictures from Carnival onto my computer and we laughed about the    adventure that we had yesterday.

n               I talked to people from back at home, checked my e-mail, and did homework.

Sundays are always kind of a recuperation day from the previous week and a day to catch up on schoolwork and e-mails. Thus ends the day and now its time for bed. I’m sure this is too much excitement for you, so you might want to go and take a nap now as well. Adios from Spain. 

Pirates, Gnomes, and Monks, OH MY!

Saturday February 2, 2008

At 6:15am the alarm clock went off and I did not want to get out of bed. After finally pushing myself to move, I headed to the bathroom to shower. Breakfast preceded my cold shower and I was off to start our trip to Cadiz. We collectively threw together sack lunches and headed to the bus stop. I’m going to conquer this bus system even if it kills me. We hopped onto the C1 bus headed for the train station. Our train left at 9am but we didn’t know how early we needed to be in the station before we left, so we planned in about an hour of extra time. While waiting for our hour to go by we spotted a group of guys dressed up in neon yellow suits (I call them the highlighter people) that were also going to Cadiz. They asked me to take their picture so I did to kill some time. We quickly learned that we had tourist class tickets without assigned seats so it was up to us to get onto the train and find a seat. Thank goodness we did because we would have been standing for 2 hours if we hadn’t. We finally arrived in Cadiz at about 11am and we were off to find Carnival. We didn’t have any maps with us so we took a picture of the huge map board in the train station as a reference if we needed it later. We head towards the city and to our surprise we stumbled upon Carnival! It was a lot of people dressed in crazy costumes, venders (kind of like at the fair but with better food, cheaper prices, and more teeth), lights and chaos. We walked around for a bit and then went on an adventure up a road, when we happened upon…the Mediterranean Sea. It was gorgeous, bottom-line. There is a large stonewall about two feet wide that borders the water. We were up high but we decided that it was a perfect place to indulge in our sack lunches. We took a few pictures and then decided that we were going to come back to Cadiz at the end of February to go to the beach, which we could see just up the road. After we were done eating we decided to walk up the coastline. On our way, Sam spotted some ancient Roman ruins so we decided to explore. There was a lady at the entrance who gave us brochures and we headed down the stairs to join up with the tour (in Spanish) that had just begun. We got to go down inside the old Roman theatre and ruins into a set of underground tunnels and rooms, one of which was used as a jail cell for Christopher Columbus back in the day. The best part was that it was a lot of culture and it was all for free! We headed back into the center of Carnival and decided that we were overdue for some ice cream. We got our cones and headed to the Cathedral stairs. Apparently the stairs are where all of the groups of people and young people gather to hang out and drink. I have never seen so many people drinking from bottles. They don’t have an open bottle law during festivals, so it was somewhat of a free-for-all. Some where in there a group of guys tried to stop me and guess where I was from because of my blonde hair. They guessed Poland, Switzerland, and Germany before I could walk away from their chaos. I was kind of happy that for the first time someone didn’t distinctly pin me as an American. After our ice cream was gone we walked around some more to warm up and then decided to stop at a café called “Catedral” (Cathedral) for drinks. While we sat and talked I got out the face paint and I painted Allison and Sam’s faces. After sitting for a while two old men, who were probably in their 70-80’s, came up to us and wanted to take pictures with us. We learned that these men were actually from Seville (small world) and we chatted with them for a while. After traveling the entire city to find a bathroom, they don’t believe in public facilities here, we finally found some nasty port-a-potties to use. We walked around and looked at shops some more and decided to stop at “100 Montaditos” for mini sandwiches. As we were walking out of the store we ended up running into Kathy and Jackie, 2 students from our program, and we went to talk with them for a while. While we sat on the steps talking there were these 3 guys in neon Afros that kept trying to talk to and bother us. I just turned my back to them, until one of them poked me. I thought I was going to kill a Spaniard at that point, but I ended up just telling them off and they left shortly after. After being stressed/annoyed about the creepers we decided that we needed some chocolate. We stopped at a vender and got chocolate covered apples and headed to the beach again. A group of three drunken Wisconsin kids came up to us and talked to us for a while and annoyed the crap out of us. They are the reason that Europeans that hate Americans, I’m almost sure of it. After walking around for a bit while window-shopping, we decided to get some churros before we left for home. I know that it sounds like all we did was eat, but lets be serious A. its part of the culture and B. we were there for 9 hours! We headed to the bus station around 7:30pm right as all the crazy people started showing up. There were thousands of people getting off of the trains now and they were all dressed in ridiculous apparel. Our costumes, which consisted of bright colored tops, scarves, masks and face paint, were bland compared to these peoples. Some of my favorites were: the Duff Beer men, the old hairy man in the belly dancer costume, the monks (who were drinking beer), and a group of guys who were dressed up as different Tetris shapes. The big “party” scene is at night and I am glad that we went home before all of that chaos started. As we started towards the train station we ran into about 7 other classmates from Simpson, they were in for a long night, and we chatted for a bit. We kept walking and just as we had arrived to the train station we saw a group of guys dressed as nuns, so we decided that we needed to get pictures with them. They were more than friendly and I had to block party my face from them. After that whole experience we were good to go home. I got a Coke while waiting for the train and we went to our platform for our train…and there were the highlighter guys again. This time they came up and asked if they could take a picture with me so I dragged Sam and Allison along. We ended up talking to them for a while and figured out that they were from Seville. We took the train back, which was 30 minutes late, and arrived at the station in Seville at about 10:45pm. We caught the packed bus back and got home a little bit later. When we got home we made hamburgers and then headed to bed! It was a long eventful day filled with our first Spanish festival and lots of crazy happenings. 

Blue Sparkles, Scarves and Face Paint

Friday February 1, 2008

Today we woke up around 9:30am and went to the kitchen for breakfast. Encarna was in the kitchen and was making freshly squeezed orange juice. What a great way to start the day off! It was already a better day than yesterday. During breakfast Encarna asked if we had made our minds up about going to Cadiz for Carnival yet. We hadn’t decided yet, but Encarna decided to make the decision for us, she said that we had to go. “You are in Sevila! Why not?” So she offered to drop us off close to the train station, so we could get tickets, on her way to the doctor. We gladly accepted the invitation and were headed to the station 20 minutes later. We went inside, figured out how to actually get a ticket and we were booked to go to Cadiz from 9am to 8pm the following day. Cadiz is a huge version of Mardi Gras/Halloween that lasts for about two weeks long. There are parades, shows and tons of people come dressed up to Cadiz for the celebration. We came home, ate lunch and then headed to Republica to book a hostel for Paris. I also had a group meeting for History at 6pm, which didn’t even start until 6:45pm because that’s when everyone actually decided to show up. After booking a hostel, with literally one-minute left before my computer died, I met with my group and then we came back home. We still needed to get costumes for Carnival. We were thinking about being schoolgirls with shirts that our host sister found around the house for us, but we had trouble finding ribbon and neon tights that were big enough. We finally decided that we would get sparkly masks, bright colored shirts, scarves, face paint, and call it good. After searching for a while we assembled our costumes for less than 15 Euros apiece from a few different discount stores. We went to the grocery store next to get sweets and more importantly Coke. We returned home and showed our sister our costumes. She liked them so we are set to go for tomorrow! Tonight we are having a chill night because we have to leave our apartment around 7-7:15am to get to the train station in time for our departure. 

Do Not Use Public Transportation

Thursday January 31, 2008

Today was like any other day. After our first two classes we headed to “Casa del Libro,” a large bookstore, in search for a book to buy for our Literature class. For class we have to read a novel throughout the semester and then towards the end of the semester we have to write a paper analyzing the book. We could pick whatever kind of literature that interested us; the only catch is that it has to be a book by a Spanish author. As I wandered around the bookstore I quickly noticed that this wasn’t going to be easy to find a book. I have trouble picking out books in English, let alone in Spanish. After some suggestions and about an hour later, I finally found a book that sounded interesting (from what I could understand of the back cover). The book is entitled, “El Maldito Amor”- “The Cursed Love.” It is about 330 pages, so now I have something to do to fill any downtime that I may have. We left the bookstore frustrated and hungry and headed home for lunch. After lunch we worked on a little bit of homework and took a siesta before Sam and I headed to our ONG, where we volunteer doing physical therapy in a pool for disabled children. We left our house about an hour before our ONG started and we took bus number 5 to get where we needed to be. We were still a little iffy about this whole process since last time we ended up getting lost. Our professors had told us to take bus numbers 5 or 6 and it should get us close to the pool. With a leap of faith we hopped on bus number 5 and began our ride. We got dropped off somewhere near the pool and I ended up asking a lady for directions. We found like pool just before we were supposed to arrive. It was a rocky start, but at least we found our destination. Today we worked with Maria and there were 3 of us volunteering. I’m pretty sure that we swam laps for at least 30 minutes straight. Needless to say I wasn’t thirsty on our way home because I think that I drank a good three-fourths of the pool. The other challenge in the pool was keeping my swim cap on. Every time we go to volunteer they give us swim caps to use and I got an infant sized one this time. Every time I went underwater, the thing fell off. I think I spent more time actually trying to put the cap back on than anything. Just as we were about to leave, Antonio, the lifeguard/swim lesson teacher, showed up. Just as I had expected, except this time he was clad in a Speedo. I couldn’t help but bust out laughing and point him out to Sam. I think he was trying to show off, but I’m sure that we killed his self-esteem laughing at him. But we weren’t the only ones because the other lifeguards had taken notice to his fashion show and secretly made fun of him as well. We got out of the pool and headed to the showers. There is nothing better than fighting off 7 year olds who are running around half naked for a shower. We waited a while, finally showered and then found a plug for the hair dryer. The place had significantly cleared out and a lady came in and started mopping the floor. She impolitely informed us that the pool closed at 8:30pm and that we needed to leave. So we threw all of our things in the bag, finished getting dressed and basically ran from the lady with the mop. We were walking to the bus stop when we saw bus number 6 approaching. “CRAP-that’s our bus, we need to book it.” After sprinting across the street to our bus we finally got on at 8:20ish and sat down with a sigh of relief. We started riding around and after about an hour had passed we still had no idea where we were. Sweet, we were completely lost at 10pm at night, no phone, no map, no numbers, and no money. We sat for a while and plotted what we should do; to us the bus seemed like the safest option. We rode around for about another half hour and finally went up to the bus driver (the only other person on the bus) to tell him where we thought we were going and where we wanted to be. The conversation went as follows:

Sam: Hi, sorry but I have a question. Our Spanish teacher said that we should take bus 5 or 6 to get to the Alameda de Hercules, are we close to there?

Driver: No, this is the wrong bus.

Sam: Ok, well...do you know what bus we should take?

(Silence)

Sam: Hello?

Driver: (more annoyed this time) No.

And that was the “helpful” conversation with the driver.

So image us: stranded on this bus that we’d already gone in circles on for about an hour and a half, we are late for dinner, we are cold and hungry, without any way of knowing how to get home, and no one is on the bus to ask for help except our driver, but he is a complete jerk. It was a really pleasant situation. I was freaking out, I wanted to scream and cry at the same time. Then the bus driver’s shift ended and another drivers shift began. I don’t know if that gives you any perspective of how long we were actually on that bus or not? But it was a while. We decided to keep riding, what else could we have done? I finally saw a fountain that I thought that I knew, so we got off. I ended up knowing exactly where we were when we got off…but we still had a 35-minute walk home. We finally arrived home at 10:45pm and threw our stuff down and went to the kitchen. Remember how I said I wanted to cry and scream early, insert those emotions now. I just went off explaining the story to Allison, who thought we were dead, and I think my host mom look scared. Allison was trying to listen and to translate and it was a horrible mess of tears and Spanglish. I didn’t eat dinner because I couldn’t even think about eating at this point. Rocio came up to me and gave me a big hug and they collectively tried to calm us down. The said that tomorrow they would get a bus map for us and show us how to use it and gave us their numbers to always have with us. I think I’m going to get it tattooed to my arm after what happened tonight. The first thing that Encarna said when she figured out all that happened was, “Oh my poor daughters! I would have come and gotten you in my car. I think Emily needs chocolate and Coke. Where’s the Coke? Do I need to buy some?” I couldn’t tell at this point if I was laughing more than I was crying or if I was crying more than I was laughing. After talking for a little while we decided that we needed some American food tonight and Sam went to go get her jar of peanut butter so we could make PB and banana toast. They don’t have PB here so it was fun sharing it with Encarna and Rocio. Encarna even got out chocolate and cookies to eat the PB with. After a long, frustrating, stressful night, somehow everything seemed to be all right thanks to our host family and peanut butter. After looking back on the day I have learned a few things:

1. I completely dislike public transportation.

2. Peanut butter is not only a delicious snack but can inter-culturally bind people.

3. Our host family is amazing.

Look Out Paris…Here We Come!

Wednesday January 30, 2008

On the way to class this morning Allison and I realized that we had forgotten to do our homework for our Service Learning class. Our homework was to ask anyone, “Who is an influential woman in Spain and why?” Allison and I planned that we would just ask our host mom and sister, but apparently it slipped our minds. Normally on the way to school we walk past a small group of construction workers near our house. This morning they were the targets of our homework. We figured that they always talk to us, yes catcalls count, so why not talk back. We walked up to them and just before they had started their daily routine of calling us “guapa” (pretty) we interrupted with, “Who is an influential woman in Spain and why?” Their reactions were priceless; they didn’t know how to respond. After looking dumbfounded for a few minutes they finally answered. Their answer was La Duquesa de Alba, a woman who is Paris Hilton-esk except 85 years old. Amazing. I don’t think that they could have given us a better answer, but we had to run with it. Apparently it slipped their minds that the Vice President of Spain is indeed a woman. But lets be serious, she doesn’t have any influence…right? After completing our “homework” we headed to school. Needless to say, after five hours of Spanish class my brain hurt and I couldn’t wait to get home for lunch. After consuming spinach pasta with tomato sauce and chicken we decided that it was time to read for class. Have I told you how much I love homework here? After a while Allison, Sam and I set out on an adventure for a study break. We bought stamps, and then headed to Lidl, the cheap grocery store near our apartment. I must have been craving anything with salt or sugar because I decided to invest in fruit snacks, chocolate and chips. How American! Also, I finally found some hairspray and mousse that my hair greatly needed. We walked around Feria, a busy street near our apartment, to browse and explore for a while. After returning home we read for class some more and shortly after, we needed another break. Today we started a novel for Literature class entitled, “La Barraca,” which has been an adventure getting into.  We put down our Spanish novels and headed to Republica to search for our tickets to Paris. Allison and I decided earlier that day that we were going and that was the bottom line. After searching for flights we finally found one that was in our price range and within the dates that we wanted to travel. “Ok, click ‘book your ticket now’ on three? OK? One…two….three…” The deed had been done. We are officially going to Paris February 22-24! There are two other girls from our group that are going with us. Now we just have to figure all of the smaller details out, oh ya…and book a place to say! It was almost a relief finally booking the tickets after debating about it for so long. The question that kept running through my head was, “When am I ever going to get this opportunity for this cheap ever again?” I think I had my mind made up from the beginning. It only took time to convince my hands to log on and finally book the tickets. We returned home excited and antsy but we finally settled down enough to read the rest of the chapter in La Barraca for class and head to bed before midnight. 

Take Life a Paragraph at a Time

Tuesday January 29, 2008

Today went really well. I swear its almost like being on a rollercoaster here in Spain. Some days are really good while others are really bad, but I’m sure that is what’s expected in a four-month program. Class got out at 12:15pm today instead of at 1pm, so I felt like a million dollars because of those extra 45 minutes. It’s the little things in life, right? After class Sam and I set off to find the Post Office. After searching for a while we finally found the building. The line was about 25 people deep, so we decided to just find a small store that sold stamps. We wandered around until we found one and apparently we just happened upon just the right store. We bought our stamps and the guy even had a conversation with us! Many times people are too busy to talk to us or they think that we just don’t understand so it was nice to have a Spaniard strike up a conversation that didn’t start with a catcall. He asked if we were here on vacation and we said that we were studying for the semester and then he pointed us to the closest mailbox. It was all around a win for team Sam and Emily. After leaving the shop we headed in what we thought was the right direction towards home. We finally came to a point where we didn’t know where we were…until I spotted a street that I knew. We followed my instinct (Lord only knows why) and we actually ended up in the right spot! I actually helped out when it came to finding the way home, you can only imagine how stoked I was. I think for the next 5 minutes that’s all we talked about. Sam and Emily-2, Spain-0. After lunch we all worked on homework for a while. I learned today that you have to take life in Spain one paragraph at a time, and that is now the new motto for the trip (its more relative to the homework side of things, but it works overall). While the big picture and goals look overwhelming at times, I need to remember to focus on the little things that make me happy both here and back in the US. One of those “little happys” came in the form of a singing birthday card from Tish Lavrenz today. I was super excited to get the mail and then when it sung to me I just died. I think my host sister things I’m crazy because the moment I opened the singing greeting card she peaked her head around the corner and looked lost. I explained the card and reaction to her and I think she loved it too. Sam got a package today so we are rollin’ in the sweets. Nick called around 4:45pm and wanted to meet at Republica to find flights for a potential trip to Ireland. Allison and I met Nick around 5pm and we both began to search for trips, Allison for the Paris trip, Nick and I for the Ireland trip. I’m excited to travel but with the difficult academic schedule I don’t know when it’s going to be possible! Tonight is going to be a chill night because it has been a good day and we don’t want to ruin what we have going for us.