Córdoba y Sevilla

This past weekend was spent traveling to southern Spain to the wonderful cities of Córdoba and Sevilla with my program CIEE.  Of course, the rain followed me to southern Spain so all of my pictures include the yellow rain jacket (one of the best investments of my life).

We had to catch the bus at about 8:15 A.M. on Friday morning, a little early for my liking.  But once on the bus, I fell asleep for practically the entire 4/5 hour ride to Córdoba.  I will include a picture of the food that my host mom sent with me because I had so much food for the weekend.  We were giving $40 Euro for food, but I don't think I spent much of that money on actual food (I don't consider helado food).

We arrived in Córdoba and it was rainy off and on, but at least it was a little bit warmer than in Alcalá.  We had to cross a bridge to get into the city, and the river was so flooded and brown.  Not a pretty river.  We walked around some of the different neighborhoods and I got some pictures of the cool little courtyards that Córdoba is known for.  The main attraction in Sevilla the mosque/La Mezquita.  To be honest, I don't remember much of what Fausto (the tour guide for our trips) said about the mosque because I was too busy taking pictures.  I brought my nice camera, and I am so glad that I did!  My pictures turned out sooo much better and it made time pass faster because I was busy playing with it the whole time.  In Córdoba, we mainly visited the Mezquita and I treated myself to some Carmel helado afterwards, and then we headed off to Sevilla later in the afternoon.

Arrived in Sevilla when it was dark and it was surprise surprise, rainy.  Like really rainy.  But our hotel was super nice and warm, so I was glad for that.  For nighttime festivities, my friends and I went to a Flamenco bar.  It was interesting and I'm glad to say that I've seen a Flamenco show but I don't think I would have to go again?  I also got a helado for a night time snack because it was Philadelphia Cream Cheese cheesecake with strawberries and graham crackers aka the closest to getting something like Coldstone.  Gotta take these opportunities when they arise!

When we woke up the following morning, it was still rainy, but I had my trusty umbrella and raincoat, so I guess I don't mind too much.  We walked around the Jewish neighborhood a bit and learned about some of the history.  Then we went to the Alcazar Real, where the royal family stays when they come to visit Sevilla.  The actual castle was not that cool, not going to lie, but the gardens outside were stunning.  Sooo many orange trees!  I asked my professor if we could eat the oranges and she just kind of looked at me like I was crazy.  What a waste of fruit.  She said that animals don't even eat them.  Regardless, they give off that wonderful orange aroma and they are so tempting to eat (but I must remind myself that not even animals want to eat them.  Darn).  After the cathedral, we had a little bit of free time in between, and my friends and I explored a bit and went to get something to eat.  I also found a little market and bought a few rings and scarfs because the scarfs were beautiful and the rings were a good deal too.

Ok I will admit I finally broke down.  I went to Starbucks for the first time since I've been in Spain.  My amazing friend, Sarah Lokers/Wixson, informed me that when visiting Sevilla, I should go to the Starbucks near the Cathedral because it is a good place to people watch.  Of course, I couldn't resist this temptation!  Sooo worth it!  Thanks for the good advice Sarah!

After our free time, we went to the Cathedral, which is the third largest in the world (#1 in Rome and #2 in England).  It was impressive!  I can't believe that these places are churches!  They are enormous, huge, gargantuam, monstrous, any other adjectives that describe the simple word "big."  I took so many pictures but a lot of them turned out blurry because we can't take pictures with flash.  Highlights of the visit:  1.  Maybe seeing where Christopher Columbus is buried (I say maybe because they're not sure if part of him is in there or not.  They think there is 100 grams worth of him here.  Or maybe I got lost in translation on this one because that's just weird if that's true)  2.  Climbing up the tower to see the city of Sevilla  3.  All of the cool architecture  4.  The shiny things  5.  The bathroom because I drank my grande Starbucks in about a 5 minute time period.  Never a good idea.

So after the Cathedral, we walked around a bit more with the group and then we had the rest of the time for free time.  Wonderful.  I went shoe shopping, thanks again Sarah, with friends and sadly did not find any good shoes.  That's probably a good thing.  After that I went back to the hotel and took a short little nap before going out to tapas.  A weird thing happened at tapas though.  The waitress asked for our ids!  What is this?! None of us had our ids on us, but I planned on ordering a coke anyway but still, it was a little weird.  Guess we know for next time?  The night was pretty relaxing because we were all super tired, and we went to bed a little early which I was fine with.

The next morning we had yet another walking tour, in the rain, around Sevilla.  We visited some fancy building, I don't remember the name, but Stars War 2 or something was filmed there?  Or something?  Since I don't follow Star Wars, I wouldn't know.  I forgot to mention that my friends and I are obsessed with jumping pictures.  I included only one of many taken this weekend, mainly because I look ridiculous in this one because I'm the only one still on the ground.  Props to Nina for getting the highest.  After our walking tour, we headed back to the hotel to get on the bus.  It was a looong ride home and it's funny how I can refer to my Spanish house as my "home."  Guess I kind of view it that way since it's the place to return to after a long weekend of travels.  Well that's all for now!  Sorry for the super long blog!  Hasta luego!

"W" Curve and Midterms

This week officially marked the half way point of my time abroad.  I have to say, when people told me that the time would go by fast, I didn't realize just exactly what that meant.  Looking back on the past two months, I have no idea where the time went!  Probably in all those class trips that I went on!

I have to say, studying abroad has had it's ups and downs.  We were told before leaving that we would experience the "W" curve.  The curve starts with you being super excited to start and super ready to jump right into the newness of everything.  Then once the newness wears off, you start to feel a little homesick.  But the homesickness fades with time, at least for most, and life is good once again.

Sometimes I feel like my life is lived by this "W" curve, or at least in waves.  Everyday has it's ups and downs, and I'll be the first to admit that I do tend to get homesick from time to time.  But when I'm feeling down sometimes, there's nothing better than a great group of friends to let you know that everything that you are feeling is normal.  Honestly, I love my friends here and they are like family because we do everything together.  Sometimes the best times are just chatting with my friends, sharing everything that is going on in life.  It's refreshing to know that I'm not the only one that struggles with simple everyday things like getting hot water for the shower, not understanding most of my families conversations, and just small things that I would never think about at home.

But I think I'm out of the bottom and back on top because Spain is proving to be beyond anything I could have imagined once again.  Maybe it's all this constant rain that's affecting my mood, but now it's sunny skies once again, at least I hope.  I am so fascinated by the culture, the people, the history, the sights, everything here stimulates me and makes me want to learn more and more (a definite sign that I am doing just fine here in the land of Spain).

Now a note on my midterms week.  I have to say that this week was particularly stressful due to them.  They are so much worse when in Spanish.  My Civilization exam went decent, not great, not terrible.  My Geography exam went splendidly if I do say so myself.  Best midterm grade ever possibly?  I am waiting for the results for my grammar class.  Let's just say I think that that class is necessary, yet not at the same time.  My professor/director made a list of "Typical American Errors" that we are supposed to know.  Things like the difference between por que, porque, por qué, and porqué.  Sure they might all look the same, but trust me they are not.  I had to write a composition describing a photo, and if she found one "American error" in my composition, I would receive 0/40 points on this section of the test.  Not cool.  I'm just praying that I didn't make a mistake on this part because at best I would get a D.  Ridiculous.  And it doesn't help that my host sister disagrees with the Professor half the time, which sometimes leads to confusion.  But I'm hoping for the best with this class since it might be my worse subject (which is surprising seeing as I always did well in Spanish classes at Hope, hmmm maybe it's the professor?  Just a thought haha).  For my Comparing Spain and the US class, I had a composition and I wrote about Spain's empire and how after the Spanish-American War, specifically with the event of the USS Maine, the empire collapsed.  It was a decisive moment on history because this was when America became a major player on the international level, and Spain began to decline as a world superpower.  I liked the topic.  We also had a test today, and I am waiting for the results of that as well.  Hoping for the best here too.

But after a weekend of crazy stressfulness, it's off to more adventures in the cities of Córdoba and Sevilla.  I haven't really looked at the itinerary for the trip, all I know is that I need to be at the University's dorm like place at 8:15 tomorrow.  Or they leave without me.  So I best be getting to bed soon.  I won't have internet access this weekend, but I'll try to post a short blurp about my trip on Sunday.  Until Sunday!

¡Gracias!/Shout Outs

Yes if you send me a letter or something in the mail, I will personally give you a shout out on my blog.  Feel honored.

Listed in order of said item being received:

1.  Mary Cantor - Thank you for the wonderful little note.  You always find the best quotes, I'm still jealous of your Frederick Buechner quote on your blog.  But your note made my day, so muchas gracias!  Also travel buddies soon?  K great, can't wait to see you and Kelsey Freya Hawkins!

2.  Mrs. Bult - Thank you for the Valentine's day card.  I knew it was from you, 1. Because you had a return sticker on it but 2. Because your handwriting is so distinct (a different distinct than Nate's though).  I laughed when I saw that it was a penguin, you know me too well.

3.  Norm - Thanks for the letter.  And now you have e-mail and even g-chat!  Look at you go!  Communicating machine you are!  Hope to talk to you again soon, maybe when mid-terms are done?

4.  Nate Bult - Thank you for the letter and also for the box of chocolates.  They came at the perfect time (before midterms).  I am trying my hardest to only eat one a day, but this is proving to be a more difficult task than I had anticipated.  The shiny little gold box is just so tempting.  Thanks love!

5.  Grandma Phyliss - Thank you for the cute little card!  I will have so many stories/pictures to show you when I get home.  Also, thanks for the picture of me and Nate.  The funny thing I don't remember even doing that, but it's a cute picture because it pretty much sums up our relationship well haha.  Thanks again!

I think that's it for now, but please keep it coming because it always makes my day when I see "Laura Grimm" sitting in the bin of mail/I check everyday at 2:00 in hopes of finding something for me.  I feel so blessed to have such a great family and also such great friends.  Love you all!

Castillos = Castles

Last post that needs to be caught up on.  Thank goodness.  I forgot to mention that it is mid-terms week, which means any form of procrastination is welcome.  Like blogging.  You know that it's bad when you'd rather blog about your past two weeks, than study for tests.

But this past weekend, instead of studying on Friday, I had a class trip for my Civilization class to Segovia (been there before but oh well), and also to another castle.  We took the bus to Segovia and I got to see the wonderful castle once again.
Only this time, I had a tour guide and some of the stuff actually made sense.  Also, I found out that I had missed a couple of rooms with all the weapons in them, you know boy stuff.  However, I was informed that the castle burned in the 1800s, and this is just a replica of what the castle was like.  Shoot.  They sure got me.  It's fun to dream though.  I would say this visit to Segovia was still a worthwhile venture because I found a sweet little café and got a pastry and hot chocolate.  Wonders.  Also, it wasn't rainy that day so I actually got some good pictures of the aqueduct with blue skies!

But the next castle that we went too was awesome, much better than the Segovia castle (once I found out that that one was kind of like a knock-off).  It is called the Castillo de Manzanares El Real or something like that.  The difference between a Castillo (Segovia) and an Alcazar is that a Castillo is more for royalty, like Felipe the third or fourth or people important like that.  This part of the tour got a little sketchy with my Spanish.  An Alcazar is a residence for nobles and people not as important as kings pretty much.  Who knows.  Still cool though. The views of the mountains were awesome as well.

Other activities this weekend included going to Burrito's, one of my favorite restaurants in Alcalá.  It is a Mexican restaurant, surprising yes I know, but I go there mainly for the fantastic guacamole and chips.  The sangria there is also good.  Every so often, if you're lucky, a mariachi band will appear and play typical mariachi music.  I just so happened to be lucky and they did come last Friday.

I also let myself out of the house to go to the mall with friends, and it is sad that the rebajas are ending.  But it is also good at the same time because now I don't feel the need to go wander around the mall.  On Sunday I had a family dinner on my mom's side because it was her birthday and also because her sisters like to get together every so often with their families.  My friend Claire was also at the dinner, so it was nice to have someone familiar there.  Well I think I'm caught up for the most part, minus a few things but I will slowly make my way into getting those in here as well.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I ventured into my culinary skills, well baking skills I guess.  I made chocolate chip cookies on a Sunday morning because I was really craving them.  I can't say that it was a complete fail, however there are some things worth mentioning:

1.  Brown sugar here is more like cane sugar, or in a more natural form, which equals not as good cookies (darn).
2.  Cream of tartar is not a common ingredient here for baking, it's used with meats?
3.  Not all stores sell chocolate chips (what?!?!?!)  We had to go to a special grocery store, and the chocolate chips were subpar compared to Nestle Toll House/Hershey's Milk Chocolate/Ghirardelli/any kind of chocolate chips that we have in the U.S.
4.  Conversions from cups to grams is a pain.
5.  Using Google Translate to change the ingredients from English to Spanish saved my life.
6.  My host fam. enjoyed them and my host mom brought some over to her sister (I only know this because my friend Claire lives at this house and told me that my host mom had visited and had brought some over).  So I would say that it was a semi-successful venture.  One of the first things I will do when I get home is to make chocolate chip cookies, and eat the batter, and probably eat the whole batch for that matter.  Can't wait.

Cuenca

Next item on the list: Cuenca.  I went to Cuenca with the University, mainly because it was free and I had nothing better to do with my Friday.  Plus I probably wouldn't have gone on my own since it's 2 and a half hours away from where I live.  So off I went with the classes that were going.

Cuenca is a unique city because it has "Casas Colgadas," which pretty much means that the town has houses that are built into the cliffs.  I would like to tell you that I know more about them, but this wasn't a field trip for my class, so I mainly focused on taking pictures.

When we got there, it was rainy (of course the rain follows me everywhere).  We walked across a bridge to get to a casa colgada, which just so happened to be a modern art museum?  We had a tour guide, and man did she love art!  She spoke very fast, but the weird thing was, I actually could understand her!  Yay Spanish skills!  But I was surprised at how interested I was in the art because I normally don't like modern art.  My favorite piece was of a model, but at first I couldn't tell it was supposed to be a high fashion super model.  It was only when I was sitting, looking from an angle.  Can you see her?  Guess I just need a little more exposure to this type of art.

After the art museum, we were given some free time.  My friend Nicole and I decided to walk around the city and opted not to go for lunch since we had both brought a lunch.  We roamed and found some pretty scenic overlooks (by accident), and it's always fun to see what you can find.  I think my quote for my time in Spain is the North Face logo: "Never Stop Exploring."  You may find it cheesy, I'll admit it is, but it's so true.  I want to explore every city I go to, and I'm trying to see as much as I can in the limited amount of time that I have!  The town of Cuenca is kind of what I expected Alcalá to be like, small little streets, brightly painted houses, big cathedrals, etc.  Don't get me wrong, Alcalá is wonderful, but sometimes it feels a little more modern than some of the other cities that I have visited.

After our free time, we went into the Cathedral.  It was pretty impressive.  We were told that we couldn't take pictures, which just made me want to take some just to do it.  But I refrained (ok I lie, I took some but they turned out blurry).  So no pics to post of inside of the cathedral.  But Cuenca was a unique place, definitely different than other cities mainly because of the casas colgadas...sick of hearing words that begin with "C" yet?

Carnaval in Cadiz, Cuenca, Cookies, y Castillos...but first Carnaval...

So as you may know the blog died for awhile.  But due to a large amount of complaints *cough Norm cough*, the blog is back up and running.  As you can see from the title, I have been rather busy participating in many activities that begin with the letter C?  So to begin, Carnaval in Cadiz.

A couple weekends ago, I went to Carnaval in the southern part of Spain.  It was an 8 hour bus ride, and let's just say it was a rather long bus ride.  We got to Jerez de la Frontera (the town we stayed in because all the hotels in Cadiz were completely booked) at 5:30 in the morning and nothing was open.  Nina and I hadn't exactly looked up where our hotel was because we knew generally where it was, so we began walking around trying to find it.  We failed and ended up getting a taxi.  It was raining and cold.

So, we get to our hotel at around 7:00 and the guy at the front desk gives us a funny look.  He looks at his registration papers, and says that we're not supposed to be arriving until 7:00 P.M.  P.M., not A.M.  When I filled out the info. online, I put 7:00 because I just figured that would be fine.  Haha no.  So after talking with the man in very broken Spanish, he finally understood that there had been a miscommunication.  He said that we couldn't get our room until 11:00, so we would have to wait.  My friend Nina looked at me and said, "¿Qué hacemos?" (What are we going to do).  I just responded with "Andar" (To walk).  Give me a break, it was early.  The guy started to seriously feel bad for us because he said that he would let us into another room, and not charge us the fee but if his boss asked, we got in at 10:00, so not to come downstairs.  How nice of him, it probably helped that Nina has blonde hair.  Just sayin'.  So we slept for a few hours before meeting up with our friends from Albion to head downtown to Cadiz.

The first day, Friday, was not a successful day for Carnaval.  The weather was terrible and there were no signs of a Carnaval anywhere.  We walked around in the rain trying to find people dressed up but there was no one.  After talking to some locals, we came to discover that the Carnaval officially begins on Saturday.  Shoot a day early.  So we walked around for awhile, exploring beaches, sitting in Ben and Jerry's, and trying to stay out of the rain.  It was a fun day regardless, but I was glad to get home and take a really long hot shower.

The next day was like the exact opposite.  Nina and I got up early to explore Jerez and it is a beautiful southern town of Spain.  It had orange trees lining the streets and cute little plazas with quaint cafes on the outskirts.  We stumbled upon old churches and even a castle.  Quite the adventurers.

Saturday in Cadiz was very different than the previous day.  Let's just say Carnaval is like Halloween only on steroids.  There were so many people dressed up in ridiculous costumes!  I would put some of my favorites on here, but they might not be suitable for children and I'm not exactly sure who even reads this blog.  But the weather held up and it was a pretty nice day.  We walked around pretty much all of Cadiz multiple times, which I guess is one of the oldest towns in all of Spain.  For awhile, we just sat on the sea wall, looking out at the ocean.  Yes, I sat by the ocean in February and it was warm out.  Life is good.  It was also warm enough to eat ice cream/gelato.  Oh wait, it's always a good time to eat gelato!  It's amazing how things look so much nicer when it's sunny.  But all in all, it was a successful day of people watching and I'm glad we went.  Definitely haven't seen some of those costumes in the U.S., but then again maybe they will appear next year.  Let's hope not.  I would label this as a very successful first trip. ¡Yay Cadiz!