55 Hours and Counting

My father informed me a few hours ago that the 62-hour mark, where I began my blog, passed a few hours ago. It's now roughly 55 hours until I get on the plane that marks the beginning of my journey back home, back to America, back to Michigan, back to my family and friends and normalcy. I figured, in light of such an occasion, I ought to post something on my blog, even if I've neglected Rome and Florence and Paris (hey guys I went to Paris) and Feria and anything that occurred over the past two months. What happened was I went on those trips and got backlogged on stuff to write about and then suddenly in May I got slammed with actual schoolwork and a massive dose of reality and the whole blogging thing fell by the wayside. For the record, I still plan on writing posts about Italy and Paris and all that, they'll just be a little delayed is all. Okay, very delayed, but they will be written! I still want to be able to share those experiences with everyone who reads, so it will be done. Today, though, I took my final exam, finishing what I've been calling the longest semester I've had since elementary school. Seriously, I thought another one of the perks of turning 18 is that they're never allowed to keep you in school until June again, but maybe that's only in the States. Regardless, I'm now officially done with my semester school-wise, and in just a few days I'll be homeward bound.

Since I do want to write about those trips and trials, this isn't my last post, despite being the bookend to the first one. I still thought it appropriate to write a little reflection on things even if I'm going to do it all out of order. I'm only a few days away from leaving, and it's been an amazing, ridiculous, unreal, at times overwhelming, always unbelievable experience. I constantly feel as though I'm using way too many superlatives when describing everything I've done and seen here, but I can't help it. That's the only way to even come close to describing the study abroad experience.

I came here thinking that the most valuable part of this for me would be the vast improvement of my spoken Spanish. And while it certainly has allowed me to develop my skills beyond where they ever could've gotten without living in a Spanish-speaking country, I've found that language is only a part of the greater impact that these five months have had on me. You know, I always joked about "personal growth" as another benefit of the semester, writing it off as something overly sentimental only to be used in study abroad applications and scholarship essays. But to be honest, the amount of growing I've done has been substantial, and it's probably been the most worthwhile thing to come of this. I've become much more independent and, as a result, confident. My goals feel more clearly defined for me now. I have a much broader view of the world and a better perspective of where I come from and where I am in relation to everything else. Frankly, I've just learned a lot. And not even at school. In fact, school may be the place I've learned the least since being here. That and bars. Granted, that's probably an exaggeration, considering I can now name more influential French filmmakers of the Nouvelle Vague movement than ever before (thanks, Film History), but I do think the kind of learning I did outside the fábrica de tabacos is the most important, the kind that will stick with me. This is not new information; everybody knows life experience is almost always more useful than classroom experience, but life here is so different from everything else I've ever known that the experience is that much more powerful.

I could probably ramble about this for a long time, but nobody wants that, and you probably get the idea, so I'll just leave you with this summary: I've loved and cherished my time here, but I'm ready to head home. I'm going to really miss my host family, but I couldn't be happier to get back to my real one. I'm sad to leave a place where I've spent so much time and built a mini-life, but I know one day I'll be back. And if I don't eat anything made with olive oil for a while, I'll be okay with that.

Now, on to packing, the final goodbyes, and one long day of travel. America, I'll see you soon. Sevilla, it's been nice knowing you.

(Me, my beautiful roommate, and my beautiful city, at least for a few more days)

Postcards from Italy, Part One: Murphy's Law

No, I didn’t actually buy any postcards in Italy, that’s just the name of a relevant song that I really like. Something else I like: Italy. Actually, I love Italy. The people, the food, the language, the topography, everything. Throughout my week there I definitely came to love and appreciate the country. And now you get to hear about it. In the words of Sabriye and Natalie, that was a trip, not a vacation. Initially this was going to be one giant post, but since a) that's probably somewhat annoying for my readers and b) I've been too lazy/sick/busy with actual schoolwork to finish it and didn't want to go forever without a post, I'm just going to do part one. It was originally going to be a four-part post anyway (I might condense that into three to make it easier), so instead of posting them all as one, I'll do them separately because it seems to make more sense.

So, a bit of background to get started: I traveled with Natalie and Sabriye, but our friends Sam, Steph, and Kristen were also going to Rome for the same days as us and were on the same flight there. We spent four days in Rome, leaving by train for Florence in the afternoon. We took the train back to Rome heinously early on Wednesday for our flight, and by 5 PM we were back in Sevilla.

The trip got off to a rocky start, to say the least. On our way to the airport, Sam, who was already at the airport texted Steph who was coming with us to let us know that the flight was delayed. This seemed strange to us, since most of us are from Michigan and only used to delays due to blizzards. When we got to the airport, we discovered that the flight had been delayed from a 4:20 departure to a 6:55 one. Not ideal, but we hadn’t been planning on doing anything that first day anyway since we’d only be arriving after 7 PM. We waited around for a long time (spent watching I Love You, Man in the airport) and finally boarded the plane. Once on the plane, we waited some more until finally someone told us that they hadn’t actually diagnosed the technical problem with the plane that had initially caused the delay and they had to wait for the mechanic from Málaga to get to Sevilla, which would take over an hour. We then had to disembark from the plane and go back into the airport for further instruction. This resulted in going through security again and worrying that we wouldn’t be able to get on our flight. Needless to say everyone was freaking out a little bit. Thankfully, while we were in line for security round two, there was an announcement telling us that the problem had indeed been fixed and we’d be going to Rome that night.

In the midst of the chaos, some of us Americans were trying to stick together and figure out what was going on/what we should do, so in the process an American guy was talking to our group about what to do. As we headed to the plane, I somehow got in front of all my friends with this fellow, and he asked us where we’re from. Here’s how the conversation went down:

Random airport man whose name I later discovered was Dylan: “Where are you guys from?”
Me: “Most of us are from Michigan, but a couple are from New York. But I’m from Michigan.”
Dylan: “Oh, cool, I’m from Ohio.”
Me: “Oh. You don’t…happen to have any allegiances to any schools in Ohio, do you?” Going to give myself props here for being so civil from the get-go.
Dylan: (skeptically) “Yeah…I went to Ohio State.”
Me: “Oh. I go to Michigan. Nice to meet you.”
Dylan: “Really? Wow.” Or something like that. “What year are you?”
This is where it starts getting good.
Me: “I’m a junior.”
Dylan: “Cool. Are you ready to be done?”
Me: “Not right now, but maybe I will be by the time I’m actually finished. It’s kind of scary though.”
Dylan: “What, being done with college? That’s the best part!”
Me: “Maybe if you go to Ohio State.”

BOOM! Roasted. All he could say to that was “touché, touché” and sort of scoff while he repeated what I had just said to him. I have to be honest, I’m pretty proud of myself for that one, and that’s a story that my poor friends are going to have to hear over and over again because it’s just great. To show that I’m not completely heartless/prove that Wolverines are classy, I told him that the whole airport craziness was a good bonding experience, to which he replied that there were no hard feelings between us. Study abroad is helping me expand my horizons in so many ways. I made friends with a Buckeye during a 5-hour plane delay. And it was five hours, because the plane didn’t take off until about 9:30. We got into Rome after midnight instead of after 7 PM. But of course, this section being called Murphy’s Law and all, the universe wasn’t done with us yet…

We got to our hostel at about 1 AM, which we already knew wasn’t ideal from the Barcelona experience of getting there when everyone was asleep and having to make our beds in the dark and such, so we were already bummed about that. But when we went down to our room, we realized there were only two available beds, and three girls looking to sleep there. Problem. We went back up to the front desk to ask, and the receptionist discovered that a girl in the room had overstayed and was supposed to check out the day before. We expected that they might give us a different room for the night or something, maybe split us up and put one in another room while they figured out the situation, but instead the guy told us to come with him and we ended up getting our stuff settled as they kicked this girl out of the room at 1 in the morning. Awkward? Definitely. But they got her out, and Sab got a bed, and everything worked out, mostly.

That's the end of Part One because that's (pretty much) the end of our problems, though Murphy's Law does come back into play in Florence. You're probably wondering where all the fun stories about pasta and Michelangelo and Julius Caesar are. Don't worry, there are plenty of meals and stories about famous artists to come, and though I don't have much about Caesar, we did learn a lot about Nero and what a massive jerk he was. I just needed to cover all of the heinousness that occurred before we got to the actual trip. Tease? Maybe. But you're interested now, right? Coming up next, Part Two: The Lizzie McGuire Movie! In which I detail my jam-packed visit to Rome, the city in which the Lizzie McGuire Movie takes place, to highlight the relevance of that title. Sneak preview: lots of old stuff, lots of Catholic stuff. Lots of old Catholic stuff (i.e. the Pope). Get pumped. But who knows when it will be posted, because my friend Sarah is coming to visit me tomorrow (yay!) and the two of us are going to Paris from Wednesday until Sunday (double yay!), AND I have mountains of schoolwork to do now that exams start in about a month. Naturally. So, I promise to be working on these posts and to get everything up as soon as I can, so stay tuned.

We've Got Some Catching Up To Do

Has it been three weeks since I updated last? Yes. Do I feel bad about that? Yes. Am I going to make it up to you? Yes. Get comfortable folks, this is going to be a long one.

Part One--Help Me, Ronda: We took a day trip to Ronda with my program a few weeks ago, and if you're anything like me, you're wondering, just what exactly is IN Ronda that could be of any significance and/or relevance to my life? Well, while it may not be a huge well-known city, Ronda is actually a beautiful little town. "Quaint" is a word that comes to mind when describing it. It's topographically very interesting; it's built on a sort of rock, with a waterfall next to it, and then a bunch of hills and orchard-type plots of land and mountains in the distance. It's really a gorgeous place. Culturally notable: the bullfighting ring, which is the oldest in Spain! (Sevilla is home to the second-oldest.) Also, Ernest Hemingway and Orson Welles both spent summers in Ronda and were influenced by it, making it a part of their work. Hemingway based some of For Whom The Bell Tolls on Ronda and wrote several of his novels there. So, I guess I should've brushed up on my Hemingway before going there. Anyway, what's really important is the amazing time we had at lunch after our guided tours were over. A group of 10 of us went to a restaurant with outdoor seating overlooking the amazing view, and we got a terrace all to ourselves! It was a very slow meal, as is the case sometimes in Spain, but we were happy to enjoy some sangria and the beautiful Ronda landscape.

Pictured: Me with the awesome view from our VIP patio (my eyes are all squinty because I was still getting over a 24-hour virus)

Part Two--Vicky Cristina Barcelona: But instead of Vicky and Cristina, it was Natalie, Sabriye, and Kendra! And instead of Javier Bardem, it was nobody, which is tragic. I went to Barcelona from March 31 (well, barely) to April 3rd. I say barely because our flight left after 10 PM and we didn't get into our hostel until the wee hours of the morn when everybody else was asleep. Of course, we were happy to even have a flight. When the three of us went to check in online for our flights--the day before the trip--there was a slight issue. And by slight, I mean pretty freaking massive. Natalie was able to check in and had her itinerary and everything, but when Sabriye and I tried, nothing worked. We had also received itineraries, but we were unable to check in online. Upon actually reading an email we had gotten about our reservation, we determined that they told us they were unable to confirm the flight we'd wanted and asked if we'd like to purchase one that was slightly more. Now, we had thought this was merely another confirmation email, as it came directly after an email THAT HAD A CONFIRMATION NUMBER AND AN ITINERARY, so we thought we were fine. Safe to say we'll never make that mistake again. I'm going to thoroughly read every email I get from an airline/travel agency when I book a flight. Sabriye called the company we booked through, and they confirmed our fears: we had no flight reserved. So, we went into fix-it mode and found a new flight to book. Only about 20 euros more, not too bad. We went back to our homestay to book it since we needed our credit cards and stuff, get it all set up, and it doesn't work. It's giving us both the same error message, we have no idea why it isn't working. It was my turn to call, so I called the airline to see what the problem was, and they told me something about cleaning out the history of my browser and using Internet Explorer instead, as well as using the Irish website. After a few more frustrated attempts, we decided to go to our program center where the computers have IE to try it. FINALLY we were able to book the flight. It probably would've been exciting to buy tickets the day before leaving if we weren't so freaked out about the possibility of not getting to Barcelona.

But get there we did, and I know I use adjectives like "amazing" and "wonderful" and "awesome" a lot, but there's really no other way to describe Barcelona. I had this feeling I was going to get there and fall in love with the city, and my intuition was right. I loved it. The first day we were there, we went to see all the Gaudí architecture. If you aren't familiar with Gaudí, he's a famous Spanish architect (obviously) who is known for his quirky style. I've heard the buildings described as looking like they could've come from Dr. Seuss, and I would definitely agree with that. Wonderland popped into my mind as well, I felt a little bit like Alice wandering around Casa Mila. That was the first place we saw, an apartment building he constructed in which middle-class families used to live. From there, we went to the ultimate Gaudí piece: the Sagrada Familia, also known as simply the Gaudí church. Gaudí started it toward the end of his career and worked on it until his death in 1926. He knew it wouldn't be finished before he died, so he left behind plans and concepts for how it should be finished. There are three different facades to the church, representing different stages of Christ's life: the Nativity facade, the Passion facade, and the Resurrection facade. The Nativity facade is the one actually done by Gaudí. We went in the side door by the Passion facade, which was designed and constructed by someone else based on Gaudí's vision. They're still doing construction on the church; it won't even be finished for about another quarter century. (I wish I could take credit for knowing all this stuff on my own, but I can't. Rick Steve and his book about Spain are responsible for this history lesson. Thanks, Rick. Also, this is what I think of every time I mentally address Rick Steve. But I digress.) I'll stop boring you with technical information now and allow you to look at the pretty pictures, which are really the important part of this portion anyway. We spent two full hours there alone. We got to go up into the towers too, which was really awesome and felt kind of like part of a video game where you go up to the top of some mountain and it's all quiet because the music from the level stops when you're up so high. With that overwhelmingly nerdy comment aside, the church was really cool, and I definitely plan to go back when they finish building it.

Later that day we went to Park Güell, another Gaudí construction. It's a really amazing and beautiful place with a wonderful view of the city (look at how many adjectives I used in that sentence alone!). It's also notable because one of the America's Next Top Model season finales took place there. The runway show was through part of the park, so obviously my friends and I had to do model walks down the runway. The next day we went to the beach, a truly remarkable concept in April for someone from Michigan. We also visited Las Ramblas, a famous street market in Barcelona lined with street performers and various things to buy. We bought some fruit there for part of our dinner that night. The next day was uneventful apart from Sabriye and I running through the Barcelona airport to make sure we got to our gate in time to board. All in all, I loved Barça as much as everyone told me I would, and it's officially one of my favorite cities in the world. Also I'm a little obsessed with Gaudí now. Just a smidge.

Pictured (props to Sabriye and Natalie for these photos, they turned out way better than mine so I stole them): The rooftop of Casa Mila, my pretty friends and me with the Sagrada Familia in the background, the Nativity facade, the inside of the Sagrada Familia, Natalie and me workin' it on the Park Güell runway

Part Three--Momma Furry Takes Sevilla: The day after our return from Barcelona, a long-awaited moment came for me--being reunited with my mommy in the Sevilla airport. There were tears (entirely mine). There was joy. There was hugging. Lots of hugging. My dear mother came to visit me for a sunny and hot week in Sevilla, and we had a great time. The day she got here was pretty low-key because of her jet lag and my carryover exhaustion from the weekend, but we were able to do some fun stuff during the week. Tuesday she got to see some of Sevilla while I went to class, because I unfortunately had to go to some class while she was here. On Wednesday we went to La Carbonería, a bar where there's a flamenco show every night, so she got to see some flamenco. Beforehand we had a delicious dinner at a nearby restaurant, sitting outside and enjoying the warm weather. Thursday and Friday were the best days, I think. Thursday we had lunch at my homestay. My host mom, Ana, whom I adore and don't think gets enough well-deserved attention on my blog as she should, made a feast for my real mom, with all of the traditional Spanish foods represented: an appetizer of prawns, croquetas (little fried balls of deliciousness, ours had cod in them), and manchego cheese, then the main course of paella, gazpacho, and more of all of the appetizers. It was delicious, and seeing my two moms together was a real treat for me. She also got to meet Ana's 16-month-old grandson Israel, who is ABSOLUTELY THE CUTEST BABY I'VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE. Seriously, even my mom said he's the cutest besides my brother and me when we were babies, and she has to say that because she's our mom. (Although I won't lie, I was a pretty cute baby.) The interpreting was another interesting facet for me. Ana doesn't speak English, and Mom doesn't speak Spanish, so I was the go-between for the conversation. It was a nice taste of what it might be like if I choose to pursue a career in interpreting, which I've considered. It was really nice to get the two of them together and for my mom to see how I live/how spoiled I am.

Later that day we went shopping, a must-do when the Bank of Mom is in town. Sabriye came with us, and Natalie met up with us later. After some successful shopping, we went to dinner at Los Coloniales, probably our favorite tapas place in town. It's pretty cheap especially considering how much food they give you, and it's SO GOOD. My mom really enjoyed it because we knew all the best things to order and all she had to do was sit there and eat them. The whole time she was here, actually, we ate really well. The next day we went to the Plaza de España, built for the Expo of '92 in Sevilla and one of my favorite spots in the city. Also one of the new Star Wars movies was filmed there, fun fact. After that, we went to my actual favorite spot in the city, the river. We took a 1-hour cruise up and down the Guadalquivir, a really nice treat for me since it's not something I'd do on my own. Then we sat by the river for a while and just enjoyed the beautiful weather. Momma agrees, that's the place to be in Sevilla. After a somewhat hilarious dinner of a giant salad and burger (rather American, but Mom liked the experience of having a burger in Spain), we went back to the hotel. Saturday was pretty relaxed, which was good since we had to wake up at 4:30 in the morning on Sunday so she could get to the airport for her 7 AM flight. The week went by so fast, but I had a wonderful time with her, and I'm so glad she came to see me. Thanks for braving the Madrid airport for me, Mom!

Pictured: Plaza de España, me with my two mommies, view of the river/the Triana bridge from our cruise

So there's your three-week update. Was I kidding when I said it would be long? No. Is it worth reading? I think so. I wanted to make sure I posted it tonight, though, because tomorrow I leave for Italy! I'll be there for a week, in Rome and Florence specifically, and I'm sure I'll have plenty more stories and pictures for you upon my return! Ciao!

Dobles Españoles

I was actually personally asked by one of my friends to write a new blog post, so I'm heeding her advice and doing so. You're welcome, Lily.

Since SO little time has passed since my last post, I don't have much to discuss in the way of things that have been happening to me lately, so I'm going to take this opportunity to write about something I've been meaning to discuss for a while: Spanish doppelgangers (or as the title says in Spanish, dobles españoles).

I have developed a theory throughout my time here that every single person has a Spanish doppelganger. It was born first of seeing various celebrity look-alikes on the street, then graduated to seeing people who look like people I actually know back home, or just me thinking I recognize someone. Right away during our orientation I thought our discussion leader was someone I knew. That was actually feasible since she studied last year at Michigan while I was there, but I would've had no reason to meet her. I just thought she looked really familiar. This was only the beginning of what will probably turn out to be a presumably semester-long process of me seeing people who look like people I know. The only ones I've kept any real track of (meaning randomly typed their names into a word document) are the celebrities, which I will now list and explain to you.

Karl Urban: Actor. Best known for: Lord of the Rings, Star Trek (the new one), being from New Zealand. Spotted on Calle San Fernando (the street where my university is) standing with two other unidentifiable gentlemen. Caused me to literally do a triple take because I was so convinced it was Karl Urban.

John Turturro: Actor. Best known for: O Brother Where Art Thou?, The Big Lebowski maybe, Mr. Deeds (at least to me because that was honestly the first movie I ever saw of his). Spotted during the flamenco show we watched that first month here. The male dancer looked just like him. Or kind of like a cross between him and David Schwimmer, but two parts John Turturro and one part Ross from Friends.

Carson Daly: TV personality. Best known for: Last Call with Carson Daly, though is no longer really relevant to popular culture. Spotted at the Real Betis game. I mentioned him briefly in my rundown of the game, so I don't think I need to go much further with this one.

Jeff Bridges: Actor. Best known for: Crazy Heart, The Big Lebowski, Tron, True Grit, being awesome. Spotted I honestly don't really remember where, sorry for the let-down. Probably in a restaurant or something, nowhere too exciting.

Jason Schwartzman: Actor. Best known for: The Darjeeling Limited, Fantastic Mr. Fox, his middle name being Francesco (I actually don't know if that's a well-known fact or not, but I just read it on his IMDb page and am determined to make it a well-known fact about him because that's awesome). Spotted again I don't remember where, clearly these were less memorable doppelganger sightings but are somehow still worth blogging about.

Mr. Rogers: America's grandpa. Do I even need to tell you what he's best known for? And while I don't remember where I spotted him either, I do remember he looked EXACTLY like Mr. Rogers, to the point where I turned around to get another look/check out his sweater and told whoever I was with that we just walked by Mr. Rogers. Or rather, Señor Rogelios. I would be his vecino if he asked (just guess what that one means).

Lastly and most convolutedly (is that a word?), a cross between Stephen Root and Penn from Penn and Teller. Stephen Root: Actor. Best known for: Office Space (the stapler guy), Dodgeball probably since that's the only other movie that comes to mind that he was in. Penn from Penn and Teller: Self-explanatory. Spotted in O'Neill's Irish pub when he and some other Spanish guys came over with guitars and serenaded my friends and me for a little while. It was a positively charming experience, but I couldn't help but stare at him thinking "man he really looks like Stephen Root. Or Penn. Or both."

Those are the notable celebrity ones. I've also seen doppelgangers for everyone from friends of mine to parents of friends of mine to random people I know from somewhere. I have yet to see my own, but I kind of hope I don't because it might induce some sort of identity crisis. Seriously, it's a good thing I'm not a twin, because I can't imagine there being someone who looks just like me running around here. Or at least someone within my own country.

I hope this deviation from my usual method of talking about whatever I've done in the past week or two has been just as riveting as any other post. I imagine next time we'll return to our regularly scheduled program, since we're going to Ronda on Saturday and I'm sure I'll have things to say about it, but this was a fun special event. Stay tuned. And for more on the subject of doppelgangers, turn your attention to the How I Met Your Mother episode entitled, wouldn't you know it, Doppelgangers, in which the characters see doppelgangers of themselves, leading them to make life decisions of varying severity. Perfectly understandable, because who knows what will happen if I see my doble.

I leave you with this random thought that occurred to me while writing this post: why do you write something down but type it up? Go ponder.

When in Doubt, It's Tuna

So, as soon as I said I'd be updating more frequently, somehow over two weeks passed before I managed another update. Sorry, what can I say, I'm busy doing exciting and interesting things all the time and don't always have time for things like blogs and the internet. (Translation: I'm lazy.) I'll try to make this a good one, even though I'm not sure I have a whole lot to talk about.

The past two weeks have been spent just in Sevilla, and it was lovely. The weather was kind of crappy for a while, rainy and chilly (but chilly for Sevilla would surely be welcome weather in Michigan), but then it got SO nice. The past few days have felt like summer, 70s and sunny, just gorgeous. The problem with that--as if there could ever be one--is that it makes us NEVER want to do homework. On Friday, for instance, Sabriye and I meant to be productive, taking our homework with us to the river, but we just ended up meeting up with friends and sitting on the grass enjoying the weather. I know I've discussed at lengths how madly in love I am with the river, but I can never express it too many times. My friends and I discovered this area a few weeks ago where EVERYBODY hangs out on the weekends. There's a grassy area a little further down from where we usually go where a ton of students and people just sit around and talk. We were noticing how everyone here is just so social. They all just talk to each other for hours on end. As a talkative person myself, I love it! Anyway, it's really difficult to force myself to do anything academic; I've been getting by just doing what is required of me on a day-to-day basis, but that's not accounting for the fact that I have 7 plays to read by the end of April (oops). Hopefully I'll start to get used to the beautiful weather so I won't notice it quite as much and will be able to actually do all my work. Sound far-fetched? Yeah, seems that way to me too. But I'll figure something out, even if it's at the last minute. That's the Michigan Difference.

I had an interesting mixture of cultural experiences this past week: St. Patrick's Day in Spain. Now, I'm pretty sure the celebration of St. Patty's Day in the States doesn't make much sense because it's a lot of non-Irish people celebrating a very Irish holiday, but hey, it's fun, we do the same thing with Cinco de Mayo and Mexicans, whatever. We were under the impression, however, that other countries don't share this custom. You know, the US is a melting pot, we have to represent all of the different cultures within our country, or something. Why would Spanish people celebrate St. Patty's Day? Well, some of them do regardless of reason or lack thereof. I'm sure plenty of the people we saw around the Irish pubs were American, but there were certainly some Spaniards partaking in the festivities as well. There were plenty of people wearing green, though I don't think the pinching is a thing here. Lucky for me, I have basically zero green clothing so I was wearing a sort of teal-that-could-almost-be-considered-green shirt. People also had these great Guinness hats that said "St. Patty's Day 2011" on them. Apparently at Flaherty's, one of the Irish pubs, if you bought a pint of Guinness for 5 euros, you got the hat along with it. I didn't end up doing that, but I'm a little sad because that just would've been an awesome hat to have. Such a great memento! A few of my friends from the program actually went to Dublin for the holiday, which sounds pretty awesome and might be something I have to do at one point in my life.

On a not-really-related note, I can't believe it's already March 21st. I also can't believe that I'm going to have to do actual work pretty soon, after having just explained how terrible I am at getting anything done, cool. I have an exam next week (a midterm of sorts, if it can be said that this is the middle of the term) and another test at the end of the month sometime on a yet-to-be-determined day, and then I have a group paper/presentation due on the 12th, which is really bad timing because the entire week before that I'll be busy doing something much more important--spending time with my momma! She will arrive two weeks from today and I could not be more excited. I'm already planning all of the cool things we need to go see and all of the places I need to take her to eat and scoping out the nicer-looking restaurants that I'll finally have an excuse to go to and making lists for her of all the stuff I need her to bring me from home. I saw two different American families today that were visiting students here and it just made me so excited for my mom to come. Sevilla better be prepared!

Unrelatedly (I told you I don't have that much to talk about I've just been going to class and sitting in the sun and watching Gossip Girl with my roommate okay what's wrong with that), I have my first intercambio set up for this week! Explanation: The intercambio is this program where the university pairs up a native Spanish student who wants to practice speaking a foreign language with a visiting student who speaks that language so they can converse. From what I understand, you speak in Spanish for an hour, then English (or whatever other language) for the next hour so both parties get to practice. Right after getting the list, I got an email from a guy named Carlos who asked if I wanted to meet up on Thursday, so I said sure! I found out today that he's meeting with one of my friends earlier that same day, so I'm asking her to give me a little preview of just how awkward I can expect it to be. Oh well, new experiences, complete immersion, etc. etc. I'm thinking about emailing someone else to get another one, because you can never have too much Spanish practice!

The title is pretty random but refers to the fact that whenever you don't know what an ingredient is in a Spanish dish, there's a good chance it's tuna. Spaniards love their tuna. It was also relevant to dinner the other day.

Speaking of food, random food-related revelation that I made like the first week I was here but this seems like a good time to talk about it because this is the most random post ever: I AM OBSESSED WITH ARROZ CON LECHE. If you don't know (because why would you, I didn't before I came here), it's sort of like Spanish rice pudding, but more rice-y than pudding-y. Our señora makes it with cinnamon and it's one of the most delicious things ever. I told her that too, so now she serves it to us more frequently. We had it for dessert tonight and she acknowledged that I had said it was my favorite. Success! Now all I have to do is learn how to make it for myself because I know I'm going to miss it a lot when I go back to the States.

Well, this post was not that good, just long and random. Or at least not worth a two-week wait. Sorry. I'll try to do better (and sooner) next time. We're going to Ronda for the day on Saturday with the program, so that should give me something to talk about, and will provide exciting new pictures! (Haven't taken any new ones since Carnaval. Sevilla looks the same, just warmer, if temperature can be conveyed via photography.)

Irrational Behavior

I'm aware that I haven't updated in over two weeks, but for once that isn't entirely my fault. The internet in my house was broken from the Friday before last until two days ago, so for once I've been prevented from writing by outside forces beyond my own laziness. It was really frustrating for a while mostly because I couldn't talk to my parents or anyone from home on Skype. This is how the saga goes: It stopped working Friday night, and last Monday was a holiday here, so we couldn't call to get it fixed until Tuesday. On top of that, my roommate was in France visiting a friend from Thursday to Tuesday for the long weekend, so I was all alone and disconnected from the world in my sad little world. It actually makes you a lot more homesick not to have a roommate, in my opinion. I was experiencing what would be called "irrational behavior" by the program handbook. They tell us that we may experience irrational behavior occasionally while here, meaning weird moods and strange feelings. I also couldn't check the "Oscar scores" as I accidentally called them--I've clearly been watching more sports than awards shows lately--until Monday. Conclusion: I really need to see The King's Speech, apparently James Franco and Anne Hathaway sucked as hosts (although I'm convinced it's just a symptom of the world's under-appreciation of James Franco), and overall I didn't miss too much because everyone just complained about how terrible the show was. I did watch The Kids Are All Right on Sunday, which didn't win anything but was nominated 4 times, and I really enjoyed it.

Due to the lack of updates, I'm resigning myself to the fact that I'm not going to be able to cover everything, so I'll try to focus on the big stuff that's happened lately. Big thing: Gibraltar! I went to Gibraltar on Monday since there was no school. We went with Discover Sevilla, a really cool group that takes students around on various trips around Spain and the surrounding countries. It was a really fun day trip. A little Gibraltar history: It was colonized by the Spanish initially in the 1400s, then taken over by the British in the 1800s, so it's currently a British territory. Technically, it was leaving the country. We got really lucky with weather; our bus tour guide--a really cool Gibraltar native named Alan--kept telling us how lucky we got with the visibility. We could see the tip of Africa! So I waved at Africa, accepting that Gibraltar is as close as I'm going to get to that part of the world this semester. Gibraltar is famous for the rock, which we did get to see. There are really cool caves within the rock that we walked through as well.

Another main attraction at Gibraltar is the monkeys, or barbary apes, as they're called there (so British!). If you let them, some of the guides there will get them to climb onto your head! I just couldn't make myself do it, I got too startled, but my friend Natalie bravely did so, and it was a sight, let me tell you. There was one cheeky little one that kept jumping from person to person and onto the bus and then onto someone else's head, and that was just too much for me to handle, so I didn't get to have a monkey on my head. It's okay though, they seemed kind of dirty anyway. At least that's what I'm telling myself to feel better about my own lameness.

One of the most interesting parts of the trip for me was seeing the mix between Spanish and English there. Because it's an English territory, the official language is English, and British English at that. There were fish and chips places everywhere and red telephone booths and everything. Being there really made me want to go back to England. I don't know if I'll make it there this semester, though, since I'm placing priority on places I haven't been before. There's also a lot of Spanish influence too, of course, considering Gibraltar is geographically a part of Spain, I guess. According to Tour Guide Alan, everybody there is bilingual. He spoke to us in English, but our Discover Sevilla tour guide was a native sevillano, so when the two of them would speak Spanish, we could hear how Alan was fluent in both. Very cool.

Since I mentioned places I've never been before, another big development: Italy! I'm going to Italy in April! Two of my friends (Natalie and Sabriye) and I are going to Rome and Florence for a week when we have no school for Holy Week. We're going to spend a little more time in Rome than Florence because there's more to do there. Natalie is Italian so she's trying to get us family hookups for everything. We might take a boat ride out to Capri for a day. And I think we're going to get to be in Rome on Palm Sunday, which I've heard is amazingly cool, so I'm very excited. If any of you have been to Italy and have suggestions of what to do, let me know! I'm also going to Barcelona at the end of the month, and I'm so excited. I've been saying all along that I really want to go to Barcelona and now I get to go! Natalie, Sabriye, and I are going from March 31-April 3. Then my mom will arrive on April 4 to visit for a week, and then three days after she leaves it's Italy! April basically doesn't exist.

And one last trip to discuss: Saturday night we went to Cádiz for Carnaval! It was so crazy and so fun. You're supposed to dress up in a costume, but it doesn't have to make sense apparently, so what I wore is best described as business casual Aladdin with a punk mohawk. It sounds weird/slightly impossible, but there is the photographic evidence. This was another trip through Discover Sevilla, which was good because they make sure to get people back in as timely a manner as possible (public transportation doesn't get anyone home until the early morning). And it was Sabriye's birthday on Sunday so Carnaval was like a celebration just for her! There were just people everywhere in ridiculous costumes, live music, food, everything. I've heard it described as Spanish Mardi Gras, but never having been to real Mardi Gras, I can't say whether or not that's accurate, therefore the metaphor is useless to me. But if you've been to Mardi Gras, you probably have some idea of what Carnaval is like. There were food stands too with really good food. Sabriye and I shared a waffle with chocolate sauce on it that was delicious, and later we had a burger and fries. The burger was interesting, definitely not quite like American burgers, but the fries were delicious. It was a great time.

The next two weekends will be spent here in Sevilla, then on the 26th we're taking a day trip to Ronda with the program, and after that begins what I anticipate to be the fastest April of my life. And I'll be updating more now that my internet works again!

Pictures (from top): the rock of Gibraltar, Africa, the caves, as close as I was willing to get to a monkey, my friend Marni and my ridiculous/awesome "costume" for Carnaval (in which you can see two or three of the five shirts I wore under my costume--along with a pair of leggings and jeans underneath the pants--because it was supposed to be chilly. Marching band competitions in late October taught me to layer like a champ).

I'm from Michigan

Before we begin, I haven't updated in a while, so expect this to be a long one.

Today is the 23rd of February, which means in five days it will be my brother's birthday, which means that in six days it will be March, which is just plain ridiculous and difficult to believe. I have a feeling the time is going to start flying pretty soon here. I've gotten into something vaguely resembling a routine, and classes are really getting underway, so now I'm getting a little more into normal semester mode. Though it's hard when it's 72 degrees outside to believe that it's the beginning of the semester. (Sorry, Michiganders, I'm kind of a jerk about this whole bragging about our great weather thing. I've suffered through a Michigan winter every other year of my life so I think I deserve a break.)

Nothing much of note happened last week, other than getting further acclimated to my classes. This past weekend we went to Granada. Some background on my relationship with Granada: I almost studied in Granada. For a while that's where I thought we'd be going. Then, after discovering that the program goes a little later than I'd like and that Sevilla has classes more suited to my credit needs, I went with Sevilla, and so far I couldn't be happier. Going to Granada was going to be a true test of whether or not I'd made the right decision. I'm happy to report that while Granada is a beautiful city and it was really nice to be able to walk from the center of the city to the outskirts in ten minutes rather than 30, I wouldn't trade Sevilla for anything. What can I say, I'm loyal. There is one more great benefit to Granada: whenever you order a drink (alcoholic or non) you get a free tapa with it. This makes eating really cheap and often really delicious. I'm a little sad we don't have that here, but it's okay Sevilla I still love you for who you are.

On Friday, we had the day to ourselves to explore the city. I went with a couple of friends to the Parque and Museo de Federico García Lorca. If you don't know, Lorca is an iconic Spanish author from the 20th century. I've read a few of his works and loved them, so I was really excited to be in the area where he once lived. The museum is a house that he lived in for a few years and wrote some of his most important works, one of which I've read. I was really excited to go into his house and get to see where he composed these masterpieces, but Granada had other plans. The museum was closed (for ONE day, the only day we could be there) for some kind of hoity-toity intellectual conference, so we only got to take pictures of the outside. But at least I got to stand next to Lorca's house!

Saturday was our day to tour the Alhambra, which was quite amazing. I've learned about the Alhambra in school (it's a Moorish palace and fortress from the 14th century), and it's something I've always wanted to see in person. The tour took about 3 1/2 hours (!), but it was totally worth it. The Alhambra is HUGE and it's totally legitimate to spend that much time there. We also got to see the Generalife (pronounced hen-er-all-ee-fay, not general life), which is the summer palace. It was so surreal and amazing. The guy at the Lorca museum (whom we asked what other stuff in Granada we should go see) told us what I'm pretty sure was a story about Obama studying in Granada in college, because he said something about how he walked around "con su mochila," which means "with his backpack." And our tour guide told us about Michelle coming and staying in the really nice hotel that's within the Alhambra. The one disappointment about it was they're doing some sort of renovation on the lion fountains that are really iconic in the Alhambra, so they were in some room instead of in their original place in the fountain. I was really sad I couldn't see the original fountain and the area they're in was all blocked off and torn up. (No lion pictures because that was the one room where we couldn't take photos.) But there were lots of other fountains that are also representative of the Alhambra so I appreciated those. Overall, an amazing experience.

Besides Granada, not too much has been going on, except I think I may have finally made Spanish friends! First of all, I got all the classes I wanted, so score #1. Then, in my poetry class, we're supposed to have these work groups and the professor wants there to be 2 Spaniards and a foreigner. Yesterday, this girl came up to me and asked if I wanted to be in a group with her and another girl in our class because I'm American, so of course I accepted. Then today when I walked into class, she immediately waved at me and told me to come sit by her. I was a little surprised but incredibly glad that she invited me over. She introduced me to all of her friends and sat next to me and everything. I felt pretty special too because Spanish groups are known for being really close-knit and hard to break into, and this group seems pretty tight, so I felt privileged to be accepted. So much so that the situation actually kind of reminded me of the movie Mean Girls. And now, a comparison of the dialogues to illustrate my point (all Spanish has been translated so that the reader does not have to Google translate everything):

Mean Girls: "Wait a second! Sit down. Why haven't I seen you before?"
My life: "Hey! Come over here and sit with me!"

Mean Girls: "You mean you've never been to a real school before?"
My life: "How are your classes going?"

Mean Girls: "We have a new student, she just moved here all the way from Africa!"
My life: "Guys, this girl is from the United States!"

Mean Girls: "You can only wear your hair in a ponytail one day a week. So, I guess you picked today..."
My life: Thankfully there are no rules like this where I sat. I think. And I didn't even wear my hair in a ponytail today so I'm safe. These girls--at least, the one who invited me to sit with them, I didn't really talk to the others--are a whole lot nicer than Regina George, because she's a life ruiner. She ruins people's lives. (Note: title of the post is not only relevant but also a Mean Girls quote. I've got a million of 'em, folks.)

All in all things are going well. I have a four-day weekend coming up; I don't have class on Fridays anyway and we have the day off Monday, so that day I'm going to Gibraltar with some of my friends. Otherwise I'll just be kickin' it in Sevilla!

Photos (from top): why I love Sevilla (that's the river and it's basically my favorite place in the city), Lorca's house, view of the Alhambra and Granada, inside the Alhambra (sorry I don't know how to rotate pictures on here but I really like that one just tilt your head or something), Alhambra Moorish architecture, fountains in the Alhambra.

Everything Seems Different Until You Realize It Isn't

I would first like to say to all the baseball fans out there, Happy Spring Training Day, please enjoy it for me as baseball is not at all a thing in Spain. It is the complete opposite of a thing. If the ball isn't as big as someone's head, they don't really care about the sport. (EDIT: Except tennis. Thanks, Dad. EDIT #2: And golf. Thanks, Mom. My parents really want me to be thorough.) And that is the only significance of today that I am going to acknowledge (for the moment), thank you.

Now, relevant to the title: sitting up at 2 in the morning eating Lay's potato chips, drinking Diet Coke (though here it's called Coca-Cola Light), listening to music, and writing a Spanish essay. Sounds like my nights in Ann Arbor. Sounds like my night on Wednesday. We finally finished officially with our three-week orientation by turning in our final essay. I did something intelligent for once in my life and wrote the 5-page essay first, before classes at the university started, and only had the 3-page one to write. It was still difficult enough. In Spain, they use 1.5 spacing and longer paper, so it's even harder to finish a paper. Anyway, I couldn't help but notice that in some senses college here is exactly like college at home. I guess it's just the nature of us all being human, or something.

Speaking of college, classes have been going fairly well, considering. I've picked the 5 that I want definitively; now I just have to hope that they're all open, because if they aren't, I have no idea what I'm going to do. I just figured my classes would probably not fill up too much--apparently it's not so much the literature ones that fill quickly--so I didn't make a huge effort to go to backup classes. I have seen some other people looking for new classes this week, so hopefully it would be possible, I'd just rather not deal with it. Here's my ideal list of classes:

• Escritura Creativa (Creative Writing): At the program center. Since I love creative writing in English, doing it in Spanish should be fun too. I think it will really help my writing skills. My speaking skills are what need the most work, but writing is always a good idea, especially for me. This one was kind of a no-brainer.
• Métrica Comparada y Traducción Poética (Compared Meter and Poetic Translation): This one seems slightly challenging, but it's subject matter that really interests me, believe it or not. Usually when I tell people I'm taking that class their eyes get really wide and they just stare at me and pretend that it sounds interesting to them. It's okay, you don't have to lie, I know it seems awful to a lot of people, but I find it really interesting. I also took a class last year on Spanish renaissance poetry so I have a little bit of background in the subject. Plus we're supposed to do a translation later in the term with a partner/in groups in which there's at least one Spaniard and one foreigner if possible, and I'm foreign so it's perfect! All around pretty pumped for this one.
• Comedia Española: Ciclo de Lope (Spanish Comedy in Theater: Lope de Vega): This is the most confusing to explain to people. It's Golden Age theater, right around the same time as my pal Shakespeare (not sarcasm, I love Billy), but specifically looking at the author Lope de Vega and his comedies. I read a piece by Lope in my Golden Age literature class (Jorge Ledo, you will probably never read this but I cannot thank you enough for giving me the best preparation possible for these classes, and for giving me A+s in both of your classes, and for generally being so awesome) so I know a little bit about him as well. The professor is really cool too, so that always warrants bonus points.
• Historia de los Estados Unidos (hopefully you could get this one on your own but History of the United States): Okay. I have been questioned about this one on multiple occasions. "Why are you taking a US history class in Spain?" Well, for one, at this point I feel as though I know more about Spanish history than I do US history, but that's possibly because I've had classes about the former far more recently than the latter. I'm also curious to see whether things are portrayed in a different light when they're being taught in a foreign country; I'm inclined to believe they are, but we'll see. And on the first day of class, I couldn't find the classroom so I walked in half an hour late, but when I went to talk to the professor he was super nice about it and told me not to worry and then we bonded over how he lived in St. Louis for a while so that made me want to take it more. Also because the literary texts class I was going to take instead turned out to be awful so I'm really glad I discovered the kindheartedness of my history professor. And finally, some of the documents we're going to read are in English, which I didn't know going in and so is not why I'm taking the class (promise) and doesn't make a huge difference but offers me a nice bit of relief from the constant español.
  
• Historia del Cine (again, probably can get this one on your own, History of Film): This just appeals to me because I'm a bit of a movie buff. I took a screenplay class last semester and really enjoyed it, so I'd like to study film a bit more. We're looking at cinema all over the world and watching a bunch of different international films, so that should be fun. Some of them are American, so yes, some of them will be in English. I know it seems like I'm cheating because three of my classes involve English at some point, but I just see it as taking advantage of my full linguistic abilities. They're still all taught in Spanish.
  

The walking-into-history-half-an-hour-late saga deserves its own description: First of all, the building where my classes are held makes no sense. Actually, the first thing I should mention would be that the building where my classes are held used to be a tobacco factory, because that's just weird. It's a GORGEOUS building though. I would post photos of it if I didn't feel so weird taking photos of where I go to class. It's not like I go around snappin' pics in Mason Hall back in Ann Arbor. You'll just have to trust me on this one, there are statues everywhere and I've seen at least 3 fountains and the staircases are huge and marble and everything is amazing. That being said, the layout makes absolutely no sense. The literature department is in this building as well as history/geography, and all of my classes are within those departments. It gets weird when you realize that lit classrooms are numbered with Arabic numerals, but history classrooms are numbered with Roman numerals. So because this is a history class, it's in room VIII. I knew where room VII was, so I went down that hallway because I figured VIII should be right next to it, I mean it's just one extra I, they've gotta be close together, right? Nope. I walked down that hallway, found VI and VII but no VIII. Walked down the other side of the hallway, found different versions of VI and VII, still no VIII. After wandering aimlessly for a while, I finally saw some girls I know from my program and one of them knew where it was, so she gave me directions. Turns out it's on the second floor--because that's logical--in some random hallway with random numbers surrounding it. But I decided not to care about walking into a 4:00 class at 4:30 and marched forth. Good thing too because seriously, that literary texts class was a nightmare, and not just because my umbrella got stuck on the doorknob as I was walking in (that's a whole different story).

I said before that I wasn't going to attribute any more significance to today for the moment, and now is the other moment in which I acknowledge that last night I had a lovely dinner with my Valentine, Sabriye, and our double date partners, Natalie and Leann. We went and got some delicious sushi and had great conversation--nearly all in Spanish! It was really nice. And today we had stuffed roasted red peppers for dinner because our señora wanted to serve us something red in honor of the day. I mean, I'm pretty anti-Valentine, but that's just adorable. I hope you've all enjoyed your February 14th; I ate an entire can of Pringles by myself today so I'd say I made the most of it.

Super Bowl? In Sevilla?

Yes, that's right, I watched the Super Bowl. In Spain. At 12:30 in the morning. In an Irish pub with just about every other American in Sevilla. Even the bartenders spoke English (they were all from England or Ireland). We made friends with Peter, our Irish bartender. I tried to teach him about football. He said it was the first time he'd ever actually watched a football game all the way through. Sabriye and I got him cheering for the Packers! He thought Aaron Rodgers looked more like the quintessential quarterback than Ben Roethlisberger, and if anyone knows what a true quarterback should look like, it's an Irishman. We also enjoyed making fun of how they showed Bono with an American flag in his jacket as part of the pregame-patriotic-America-history-football-freedom show. In his words, "Not even Ireland likes Bono."

I was actually incredibly happy the whole time we were at the game. And we stayed the. whole. time. I got home at 4:40 AM and had to get up at 8:30 for class the next morning. It's like my mom said, I'm young, I can survive. And survive I did; I made it to class on time and I went to my first class at the university today! Success! But more about that later. This was one of the most American things I've ever done, made even more American because of the fact that I'm in Europe. We all came to realize that we're not very patriotic at all at home, but last night everyone was so pro-America. Everyone except Christina Aguilera, who apparently messed up the lyrics to the national anthem? I couldn't hear her over the noise in the bar, so I'm taking the internet's word for it. The deal we got at the pub was pretty good. There was a buffet included in the admission fee where they had wings, guacamole and chips, hot dogs, and french fries. Pretty much everyone was American and speaking English. It was probably bad, but considering it was the Super Bowl and the Super Bowl is essentially a national holiday I think it was warranted. I just kept saying how happy I was. I think it helped with homesickness; being around a bunch of Americans eating American food and watching American football was a nice break from the typical complete immersion. As I said, I was rooting for the Packers along with Sabriye, while Natalie and Leann were on the Steelers' side. Natalie's fandom was decided entirely based on colors--she had black and yellow she could wear, but no green. It was a fun little rivalry. None of us were so invested in the game that we would be upset either way. And it turned out to be a really good game, did it not? I'm just assuming everyone watched it because it's the Super Bowl. Even if it's just for the commercials.

Ah, the commercials. Fun fact: the US commercials do not get shown in Spain! And it's terrible! We ended up seeing the same 5 British commercials--all of which were dumb and not funny and not even trying to be funny and really annoying and some involved chipmunks--the entire time. It bummed me out a lot, everyone knows the commercials are super important. Well, everyone except Peter the Irish bartender. We had to explain that to him, too. Another downside was the halftime show. The Black Eyed Peas? I weep for my generation. The only plus side was Usher. I kind of love Usher, but as a joke (but not really), so seeing him do the splits kind of made up for that whole thing where the Black Eyed Peas were there and performed and wore strange light-up suits and had aliens as their backup dancers. At one point I pointed to the dancers on the field and proudly proclaimed, "My people!" Alien robot.

Overall, the European Super Bowl Experience was very fun, but I did miss eating spinach dip with my parents or chips, salsa, and sour cream with my roommates in Ann Arbor. And it made today a bit difficult. I got up at about 8:30 to get ready for class, which was at 9:30 but we had to leave at 9 because it takes almost a half hour to walk to the program center. (Usually I can go faster if it's just me because my normal walking speed is at least a power walk for most people, and when I'm walking with others I get yelled at to slow down a lot.) The class I had first was creative writing, and I'm quite excited about it. Since I love creative writing in English, doing it in Spanish will be both challenging and really fun, I think/hope. Later I had my first class at the Universidad de Sevilla: Spanish theater from the Golden Age, specifically by the author Lope de Vega. I really enjoyed this one, too. The professor is really nice and seems to want to help out students. She isn't the original professor of the class, because apparently the other professor is sick and not going to teach this semester, so she's filling in. She told us she took this class and when she did there were too many readings, so she cut down on some of them from the original syllabus. A professor who wants us to do less reading? Sign me up. A lot of the people in the class are with Erasmus, the main Europe study abroad program. Three other girls from my program went to this class too, and there were two other Americans as well. My guess is there were fewer Spaniards because it's an optional class for their degree, so not as many people take it. The way picking classes works for us is we go to more than we'll need to check them out and see if we like them, then give a list of our preferences to the program director and hope there's space for us to take all of the ones we want. I have 3 backups at the university, none of which I actually want to take, so hopefully some combination of my primary 7 will work (we take 5 total). This Lope class seems good, though; I took a class last year on Golden Age literature in which we read a Lope work, so I have a little bit of background in the course material. And I'm choosing between this class and History of the US, which I think would be really interesting to take in a foreign country, but apparently the professor is boring, so I might just opt for this one. I'll have a lot of literature, but hey, I'm used to it.

Tomorrow I have six classes I want to visit, so it'll be a really full day. Here's hoping they all go as well as the first one! (They won't, but I've accepted that.)

Never Buy Rings in Foreign Countries

First of all, happy World Nutella Day. I am eating some Nutella as I write this, so I thought it was only appropriate to mention it. Go have some, it's delicious. End of PSA. Secondly, I'm aware that it's taken me a week to update, but bear with me, I had to write a paper this week so I'm still recovering from the realization that I have to do actual work while I'm here too.

I'm also trying to open a package of glue that I bought earlier today. Why do I need glue, you ask? Because I'm an idiot and forgot that I have the worst luck ever when it comes to buying rings, especially in places that are not Michigan. In Córdoba yesterday, I bought a ring, which was luckily fairly cheap but looks nice. As I went to remove my cardigan on the bus on the way home--yeah, the ring didn't even make it a full day--the sleeve caught on one of the pearl-like objects (because they are very obviously not real pearls) and it popped right off. Now I have to glue it back on. The saga of my unfortunate ring-buying experiences begins in North Carolina, where I bought a really pretty ring for myself with my Christmas money. As time went on, the stones started falling out of their settings so that now about half of them are gone. Disappointing. Then I bought a ring at a now-unknown location (read: I can't remember where) and the band broke and pinched my finger. Then I went to Toronto and saw one ring I really liked, but chose not to get, which I still regret, later buying a different one that turns my finger green. So I really can't explain why I thought it would be a good idea to buy a ring in Córdoba, since clearly it never works out for me. I guess I just haven't learned my lesson. Hopefully the glue will render it wearable once again and all will be well, more or less.

Besides the ring mishap, Córdoba was lovely. We went to the Mezquita, which was originally constructed as a mosque, but a cathedral was added to it later. It was very cool to see the different time periods and religions. We also got a tour of some of the city, the Jewish quarter specifically, as well as the synagogue. There are a lot of very narrow streets and alleys, even more so than in Sevilla. Our guide explained that they set them up that way to block the heat of the sun so that in the summer you can retreat to the cool shade. The city overall was far more touristy than I though it would be. I guess I didn't really think about it too much, but there were a LOT of tourists. And many of the shops around the judería (Jewish quarter) were souvenir shops. I've noticed also that Spaniards tend to joke about all the Japanese tourists around. My grammar professor cracked a joke about looking at the Prado's paintings online so that you don't have "cien japoneses" (100 Japanese people) standing in front of you while you're trying to see Las Meninas. Our guide in Córdoba also mentioned the numerous Japanese tourists in and around the Mezquita multiple times. I don't really have much to say about that other than it's comical and interesting. Tourism aside, I liked Córdoba. I do think I prefer Cádiz to Córdoba, but they're both nice cities. Although I'm pretty sure as long as you're in Spain, you can't go wrong.

As I said before, the past week entailed writing an essay for the culmination of our cultural orientation as well as taking an exam. We're done!...sort of. We still have a second essay to write. Essays here are even more annoying because the paper size is longer and they only use 1.5 spacing instead of double spacing, and that makes a big difference, to be sure. I decided to write the longer of the two essays first, since real classes are about to start and I knew I wouldn't want to have to try to do it amidst figuring those out. Monday is the day of truth, when Universidad de Sevilla courses begin. I have a pretty good idea of what I want to take, so hopefully all of my classes will work out. We choose classes by picking 10 or so that interest us, then visit them next week and decide which 5 we want to take. We take 1 or 2 at the program center, which are more like classes at Michigan and only include program participants, and we take 3 or 4 at the University, so that we have 5 total. I'm most likely taking 4 at the University and 1 at the center, and I'm going to take a lot of literature. I'm really excited, the classes look pretty awesome. I'm just hoping they won't be too hard and that I'll make Spanish companions. We met a few students last night who will hopefully be able to show us the ropes a bit. Check back here for a full report about classes! I'm sure it will be...interesting.

Photos (from top): Mezquita: mosque, Mezquita: cathedral, Mezquita: outside, flowers in the Jewish quarter, a pretty picture of some orange trees.

Alien Robot

The busy schedule of our cultural orientation continued through this week, with us seeing the Catedral and Giralda (the view from the top is to the left, as promised), a historically relevant hospital/church, the Reales Alcázares (a royal palace that was originally a Moorish fort), yet another museum, a classical music concert, and Cádiz. The hospital was pretty interesting, though I didn't take any photos so there's not much to report there. I don't have any photos of the Reales Alcázares either because, while beautiful, the weather wasn't the greatest, and we can get in to see them with our student ID cards for free, so I plan to return in the spring and take pictures then. Apparently that's when the orange blossoms on the trees bloom, and I'm sure it will provide some quality photo ops. But it was still very cool to see the architecture and the gardens. It was originally built by the Moors, and later Christians built on top of it, so there's a blending of two different architectural styles that's pretty interesting. The museum we went to was the Museo de Bellas Artes (fine arts), which mostly exhibited baroque art from Sevilla. It was cool and all, but honestly I think it was a little foolish for them to show us the bigger, grander museums of Madrid before taking us to the smaller-but-still-very-important-and-respectable Bellas Artes here. Few museums in the world could stand up to the Prado, so seeing this one after made it a little less appealing. Plus I'm feeling museum overload. Today some of the girls from the program went to another museum in Sevilla, but I clearly did not accompany them, because the only way you could get me to go to another museum right now would be through some form of bribery.

One of my favorite excursions we've had so far was the classical music concert. The symphony orchestra played three pieces, one by each Beethoven, Saint-Saëns, and Tchaikovsky. The Saint-Saëns was a very cool cello concerto, and the other two were symphonies. As a lover of classical music, it was a real treat to get to go to this concert. I love going to classical concerts back home, and honestly for a while I forgot I was in Spain because it reminded me so much of the concerts I go to back in the States. It reminded me of home. This is where a cliché about music being the universal language belongs, but I don't really want to write one, so fill in your own. I was really, really happy at the concert, so it's great that they include this in our program, and I'm definitely going to go back there for another concert someday.

The day following the concert (Friday), we went to Cádiz, a coastal town surrounded by ocean. You may be wondering why we went to a beach city in January, in which case I would be wondering the same thing. Or maybe you just assume that no matter what, we must be having wonderful weather, because it's 30 degrees and snowing in Michigan, which wouldn't be completely unreasonable. Anyway, at first I was justified in my skepticism when we arrived in Cádiz, because it was chilly, windy, and rainy, and nobody understood why we were there. There was a chorus of "is this a joke?" floating around our bus as we pulled across the bridge into town. Naturally we started things off with a walking tour, so we had to huddle under umbrellas and avoid puddles while we were lectured about Cádiz's history. Then came another cathedral, where we at least were able to sit down inside. Afterward, we went to look at the "cámara oscura"--literally translated as "dark camera" but I think referred to as "camera obscura" in English--which involves a large white plate-like object and some fancy mirror reflection to provide a live view of what's going on outside. It works kind of like a real camera, and the light reflects off the mirror onto the plate, I think. It's hard to explain, and we weren't allowed to take pictures, but I promise it's really awesome. And apparently there's one in San Francisco.

Luckily, after the cámara oscura, the day improved greatly. We went to lunch and had seafood paella (if you don't know, it's a traditional Spanish dish of rice and either vegetables, meat, and/or seafood and it's delicious). Our meal also involved a bit of performance: my friend Leann and I both love to sing, and several of my friends have discovered my memory bank full of songs, therefore referring to me as the "human jukebox" since they can pretty much tell me any song and I'll sing it for them. So Leann and I ended up singing in the restaurant, which was fine because we had a whole room to ourselves except for an old Spanish couple eating a few tables behind us. They didn't seem too enthused by our performance, but I can't possibly understand why. So I was demonstrating my human jukebox properties as well as consuming a lot of food considering I had already eaten a sandwich and an apple before lunch, leading to a discussion of my properties as a human garbage disposal, which brought to attention the fact that I am actually a robot. And not only that, but I've also been called an alien for reasons such as not having pierced ears and not owning a single pair of leggings. If I ever write a memoir, I'm calling it Alien Robot.

The rest of our day in Cádiz turned out really well. Once the weather improved it was so beautiful, we just walked along the seaside and took pictures. I definitely want to go back when it's warmer. Since I forgot to bring my camera with me (but thankfully remembered my umbrella), the pictures of Cádiz are my friend Natalie's that I "borrowed" from Facebook. The first one is of five of the six of us who traveled together from Michigan, and the second is the view of the city from the tower of the cámara oscura. Bonito, no?

Is This Real Life?

This past weekend, we took a trip to Madrid, and the best word I can come up with to describe it would be unbelievable. Honestly, I kept having to figuratively pinch myself to figure out if it was really happening. The city itself is very cool, much like a Spanish New York City. There's so much to do, and we did so much. I have never been on my feet for so long in my life, but it was worth it. On Friday I didn't do much of cultural importance and instead went shopping with some of my friends, which was of course a lot of fun, but involved plenty of walking. After shopping we went for some delicious tapas, most of which contained seafood. I ate octopus for the first time! It was actually quite good. They make pulpo a la gallega (Galician-style octopus) which has olive oil and paprika on it, and it's rather tasty. The octopus itself doesn't have a terribly distinct flavor, but I liked it! We also ate calamari, mussels, and my new favorite thing in the world: jamón ibérico (Iberian ham) with manchego cheese. Jamón ibérico is very thinly sliced ham indicative of Spain, particularly the south, and it is delicioso. And manchego cheese is, of course, Spanish, so naturally here it's sublime. The dish tends to be a bit pricier (our plate on Friday was 15 euros), but that makes sense considering it's one of the most delicious things ever to grace my mouth. Later that night we went out to check out the Madrid night life, and of course had a ton of fun. I got to talk to some Madrileños (people from Madrid) in Spanish! At one point, I would say something to someone in Spanish and he would respond in English. We both wanted to practice our language skills, so that was the perfect way to do it!

My friends and I were very tired the next day, but we had a full day of cultural enrichment that I loved. First, we went to the Museo del Prado, the really awesome art museum in Madrid, where we got to see some amazing paintings. I've studied Diego Velázquez and Francisco de Goya in a few of my Spanish classes, most recently in our culture class here at the center, so being able to see their works in real life was indescribable. The Prado definitely had me questioning if this is really my life right now. It's still hard for me to believe that I was actually standing in front of the original Las Meninas. While I don't know that much about art, I've always liked and appreciated it as an artist of another sort (although it feels like a bit of a stretch to call myself an "artist"). All types of art can have a profound emotional effect, and I've always felt strongly about Goya's Pinturas Negras (Black Paintings), which he painted toward the end of his life. Deaf, old, and widowed, he began to paint works much darker in nature--hence, the name of the group--reflecting various themes. I've always been both fascinated and a little afraid of the paintings, and seeing them in person impacted me pretty strongly. After the Prado, we went to another museum, the Reina Sofia, where there are a lot of Picasso, Miró, and Dalí pieces. Seeing Picasso's Guernica in living color (or lack thereof, rather) was another experience that left me speechless. Considering everything that went into the painting and seeing its size was for sure a singular experience. There was a really cool progression of photos showing all the changes that the piece underwent before it was finished. It changed almost completely from the original, and it was really interesting to see his thought process. And although my favorite Dalí wasn't there (Cisnes que se reflejan como elefantes, or Swans Reflecting Elephants), I could've stared at his works for hours if my feet didn't feel like they were going to rebel from my body and self-amputate out of pain. Despite this fact, I agreed to go to the Parque Retiro with some friends, a gargantuan park of which we saw a small part. It was lovely, but the consensus was that it would probably be even nicer during any season except winter. Still, I'm glad we went, even if I could barely get myself up the hill leading to the entrance.

That night, I was clearly too exhausted to go anywhere, so I watched Desperate Housewives in Spanish (Mujeres Desesperadas) and went to bed early. The next day, we went to the Palacio Real (Royal Palace), which was also breathtaking. It may sound like I'm using a lot of hyperbolic adjectives, but the things we saw on this trip were really wonderful and thus difficult to explain. The palace is where the king once lived, but now it's only used for public ceremonies. The rooms were so ornate, it was kind of hard to take it all in. It reminded me a bit of seeing the Crown Jewels at the Tower of London. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but my favorite room was probably the throne room. There were chandeliers in every room, and it seemed like each time we went into a new room, they got bigger. Even though the king doesn't live in the Palacio Real anymore, it was still one of those times I wish I could marry into the Spanish royal family. (Another time would be when we learned in my culture class that the king gets paid something like 8 million euros a year to pretty much travel around and own a bunch of beautiful houses and tell Hugo Chávez to shut up. Yeah.) Too bad Prince Felipe is 42 and married.

So obviously Madrid was wonderful, but funnily enough I actually found myself missing Sevilla at some points. It has more charm than Madrid, and I prefer its size and atmosphere to the huge city. We've been doing some really cool cultural sight-seeing right here, as well. Last week, we went to the Baños Árabes (Arab Baths, similar to Turkish Baths to my understanding), which was pretty neat. It was a little bit too relaxing for me at some points in the sense that I had kind of a hard time taking it all seriously so I just laughed. But there's a room where you go into hot water for a while and then get into really cold water afterward, which sounds awful and I almost didn't do it because I hate cold water, but it was actually incredibly refreshing and made my skin tingle. There was also an aromatherapy room, good for helping me get over the cold that refuses to leave me alone. Later that day, we saw a flamenco concert, and I loved it. Sevilla is pretty much the best city to be in for flamenco, so of course we had to go see some. The dancing was so cool to see. The foot movements are very intricate and staccato; it reminded me of Irish step dancing. But the upper body movement is so fluid that it's crazy that they do both at the same time. And although the dancing blew me away, the singing is really what to focus on (or so I was told by my professor). The intricacy of the music takes so much skill to perform, it's almost operatic in some ways. The whole concert was a great experience.

Today, we saw the Catedral (Cathedral) and Giralda (the tower of the cathedral), which was beautiful. We climbed up the Giralda--it took a LONG time and a lot of leg power that I do not have--and the view was breathtaking. I'll post photos of the view later; this post has gone on long enough. If you made it this far, congratulations. There's a lot here, but there was a lot to tell. As always, much more to come!

Pictures (from top): Front of the Prado, Guernica, Parque Retiro, front of the Palacio, me with the view from the Palacio overlooking Madrid, blurry flamenco dancers.