Sardines

I just ate sardines. And they were actually really good.

Let me start from the beginning. This weekend I went to Ireland on Thursday night and came back to Spain on Saturday night. That was the best decision ever. Don’t get me wrong, Dublin was amazing and I had a lot of fun there. One of my best friends from school even came for Friday night so that was great to see her. The city was cool and reminded me a lot of the U.S. – probably because it is way more Americanized than any city I’ve seen in Spain. But the shopping was great and I even started liking Guinness by the end of it.

That all being said, I am definitely a Spain girl. I will say Spain trumps Ireland any day. I like the people in Spain, even though they are sometimes rude to foreigners; it seems to me that they have much more soul here. This realization may be due to the fact that I came back to Carnaval, a huge celebration in preparation of Lent. As my host mom’s brother put it, “everyone needs to get their craziness out so they can focus in the coming weeks.” He is very religious and very smart. Anyway, Carnaval definitely lived up to the expectations I had, and Toledo doesn’t even celebrate it as much as other cities in Spain.

After a few traveling errors, I was back in time to see all the costumes and bands of Carnaval. My bus got back to Toledo at 10:45pm and I was up in Zocodover, dressed and ready to go by 11:30pm. I really don’t even know how to describe the city and the people. Everyone was wearing costumes, kind of like Halloween, but way more intense. There were a lot of group costumes and a lot of very elaborate and funny costumes. I have never seen anything like it. There was a band playing and people were so happy and were dancing around the whole plaza. The best part of all of it was the atmosphere and how happy everyone was. It was so much fun just to look around at everyone.

Anyway, that was last night and I woke up at 11:45am this morning, which was a miracle for me. I think that is the latest I have slept in since I have been here, but I really needed it to catch up from all the traveling. I met up with my friends for lunch and it was such a beautiful day today. I love Toledo so much, especially on days like today; it’s going to be hard to leave.

Anyway, after lunch we stopped for an ice cream cone in the Plaza and sat and enjoyed the sun. We realized that tonight was the “entierro” or funeral for the end of Carnaval. We decided we should go. So we met back up in Zocodover and some how managed to find it after following the noise of the fireworks. We missed the actual “entierro” which is the dumping of tons of sardines into the river, but we caught the end of the firework show, which was incredible and really fun to see. Afterwords, a band was playing and they were handing out free grilled sardines. I have never had sardines before, but figured, why not try them… We stood in line for a while and finally got our sardines. They were surprisingly better than I thought they would be. The only problem was that there were lots of tiny bones so it was hard to eat them. A great experience nonetheless.

As luck would have it, I got home and what was waiting for me, but a sardine sandwich! This one did not have bones and was even more delicious! It really just tastes like fish. It was yummy.

So, yet again another great weekend, sardines and all. I can’t believe I really only have three weeks left here and four until I am back home. I’m ready to come home and see everyone, but I definitely want to come back to Europe some day.

Homesick

These past couple of days I have been feeling extra homesick. I’m not exactly sure why - maybe it’s because it’s a little past the halfway point in the program – or it could be that I am starting to get annoyed with the small things that are different here. Either way, I miss home a lot.

But I am also very happy here. I continue to learn new things all the time and enjoy my time talking to Sayto and meeting new people. Sometimes Sayto can even be the cure to my homesickness. For example, last night I was walking back to my house from school and was thinking about home and all the people I miss and started getting really sad. But once I got back, I was instantly in a better mood. I walked in the door and Sayto and the neighbor were talking and greeted me so nicely and wanted to talk about our days. Sayto’s nephew was there and he was very nice too. The cat, chiquitita, was excited to see me. It was all good and I felt much better.

It still amazes me how much my emotions can change in such short amounts of time.

Valentines Weekend in Toledo!

As I wrote before, this past weekend, I had the option to either stay the weekend in Toledo or travel to Cordoba with some friends. I ended up deciding to stay the weekend in Toledo to save some money and fully experience the city. I could not have asked for a better weekend! The weather was the most beautiful I have seen Toledo and I got to relax and catch up on some things.

A friend that I met in Valencia while traveling came to visit this weekend so it was fun to be able to show her around. I got to experience Toledo as a tourist, which I hadn’t done. I saw all the important sites in the city, and even took a tacky tourist train to see views of the entire city. Check out the photos!

It was also Valentines Day this past weekend, which made the city much more crowded. I think Toledo is a fairly romantic city so there were a lot more tourists this particular weekend compared to others. This was great for people watching but not so great when the people you are watching start making out in the streets. PDA is very common here, but the PDA on Valentines Day was almost unbearable. This was especially bad for those of us who have boyfriends at home. It was very frustrating to watch the couples. But other than the obnoxious PDA, the weekend was perfect. I am glad I made the choice to stay.

PICTURES!!!

Sorry I haven't done this sooner, but here are some of my favorite pictures...

This one is the foot bridge in Toledo, it is beautiful!







These are my friends in Valencia next to a super cool fountain




Plaza Mayor in Salamanca!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Today is Aunt Betsy's Birthday...Hope you're having a great day!!!

OPCIONES

Sometimes I wonder if I make the right decisions. I have so many options here and so far I have no regrets on what I have chosen to do. For some reason, this week I feel like I have had so many options to choose from and each one has seemed to be very difficult. I don’t know if it’s because it is the halfway point in the program or what, but I am starting to feel I have so many things I want to do still and so little time.

Tonight, there is one thing I know for certain that I made the right decision for myself. Tonight, I could have gone with some friends to a local bar for some drinks and tapas after we had a tour and studied a bit. I wasn’t very hungry and it was getting late so I decided to just come home and be with Sayto. What a great choice I made!

I got home and Sayto’s neighbor’s daughter was over, whom I have met many times. She and Sayto both love Italy and love that I am going there after the program. Every day Sayto brings me a new book about Italy or Florence or Rome – she has so many, it is great to look at the photos and try to read the text! Anyway, her neighbors have an internet connection so we went over there to see pictures of Italy. When they first said they wanted to show me pictures, I thought they had a certain site in mind that we could go right to, but no, this was not the case. We spent about and hour and a half on google searching for different images. I finally taught them that you can click on the imágenes tab and see only pictures, and that helped a lot. Halfway through our time there, the husband/father brought out a plate of jamón (ham), a very typical Spanish thing to do with 3 glasses of vino for the three “mujeres guapas.” That wine was the best wine I think I have ever had. It was very strong, but very sweet and rich. And the ham was great too – I’m getting accustomed to eating ham and I am starting to like more and more.

The point of this little story was to show that if I would have gone to that comfortable little bar that I have been to many times, I would not have had this great authentic experience. There have been many choices I’ve had, but I think it is a matter of making the best of every situation and keeping an open mind about everything.

This weekend I have the opportunity to go to Cordoba with friends or stay in Toledo. I have decided to stay in Toledo and be a tourist here – I feel like I still haven’t seen all the sites here so I am going to spend the weekend here – and possibly make a day trip to Madrid to see a museum I have been wanting to see since I have been here. I’ll let you know on Sunday if I made the right decision!

Mi movi está en Barcelona!

It’s been a while since I have written, but here are some updates…

This past weekend I went to Barcelona – the second largest city in Spain. It took 8 hours to get there by bus from Madrid. The group that traveled decided that it would be best to take the overnight bus that left at 11pm and arrived at 7am. This was very difficult for me because as many of you may know I cannot sleep on buses. But, we got to Barcelona ok and found our hostel after about an hour and a half and took a four-hour nap. Woke up to a beautiful city and the weather stayed nice the entire weekend.

There were a lot of things to see and we had little time. Barcelona is a very touristy city so a lot of people spoke English, even though the language there is Catalan – a mixture of Spanish and French, which sounds nothing like Spanish. Luckily we could manage on the Spanish and English.

The first day was really just a day to adjust to the city – we had a great 10 euro 3-course meal by the beach close to our hostel and walked around the city for a little bit. We took a bike tour up to the Sagrada Familia – Gaudí’s life work, which is still under construction even after his death. It is supposed to be finished in 2020. It is an amazing work and I could see why it has taken so long to complete – the details are amazing!

The next day (Saturday), I wanted to try to see the Dalí museum that is a two-hour bus ride from Barcelona, but I could not figure out how to get on the train. My friend Kerry and I went to the station with every intention of getting there, but could not figure it out! So we decided to just spend the day touring Barcelona, which worked out just as well. We went to the Picasso museum, the Chocolate museum (our ticket was a chocolate bar!) and the Gaudí park – Parc Guell. Everything was beautiful but I especially loved the park. I wish there wouldn’t have been so many people there, but it was still great to see and experience. Kerry and I then proceeded to walk back to our hostel, which was great until it had been an hour and we were only half way there. We had been walking around all day and were getting tired. We were on a mission to get to the Christopher Columbus Monument but had to give up when it started getting darker and our legs started getting more and more tired.

Everything about Barcelona was great…except when I lost my phone! Saturday night we went to this famous discoteca that is 7 floors – called Razzmatazz. It was very cool but also very expensive. So Kerry and I decided to leave early and were on our way out to catch a cab. The entire weekend I had been extremely careful with all of my things because Barcelona is known for its pick-pocketing. A moment of weakness came upon me as we were searching for a cab and I put my phone in my pocket instead of in my purse. We got a cab and were trying to explain to the driver where we needed to go. I am not sure if my phone slipped out of my pocket in the cab or if I was actually pick-pocketed. Either way, as we were walking back to the hostel I noticed a man brush up against the side of me. Ten seconds later I realized I had not put my phone back in my purse. That’s when I reached for my phone and it was not there. Now whether it was actually stolen or if it fell out in the cab, I will never know.

It was a life lesson that is for sure. It could have been a lot worse. I guess if I could pick any valuable to loose, my phone would probably be it. Hopefully now I won’t loose anything else (knock on wood!). 26 euros later I have a new phone, got to keep my same number and saved the credit I had on it before. Whew! What an emotional experience. I loved Barcelona, but spent a lot of money there!

Luis

The day I met Luis definitely had its ups and downs, literally. I was very confused during fiction class and also very frustrated, but I have learned to try to work past the frustration and I think I actually understood the story we read…eventually. Luckily I only had that class to worry about. So I decided to use my extra time to finally start my online requirement called AVE. It is supposed to help us learn Spanish through situational exercises. Anyway, I am very behind on it since I have to do it while I am at school because you need the internet to complete it. This had its ups and downs and I eventually gave up for the day to let my brain relax. As I was walking home from school, I fell down the stairs (literally a down in the day). I was by myself, but two nice Spanish girls helped me up and made sure I was ok, which I was, minus the scratches on my arms and the impending bruise. Then I came home to Sayto, my new host mom (who I love!) and showed her my scratches. I think she used to work in the medical field or something to do with a hospital…but either way, she “fixed” me with some ointment and besos (kisses).

We ate lunch, we took a siesta (well, me not so much – I really just rested my eyes and body), and I was back off to the school. I decided that since I had experienced a few set backs in my day I deserved a little treat. I stopped in a store I have been in before that is on my way to school. They sell mostly food and little candies and drinks. I walked in and said hello to the man behind the counter, grabbed an agua grande with confidence and considered my options for treats. After choosing one, I placed my items on the counter to check out. At first the man did not tell me how much my total was but instead asked if I was a student, to which I replied sí, en la Universidad de Castilla La Mancha. Our conversation continued for about 10 or 15 minutes. I learned that he has been studying English for about 6 years, but claims he knows nothing. I told him about where I live and what I study. He seemed very upset that I am not going to be a sports journalism writer. Sorry. Finally, he asked me for my name and I asked for his, Luis, he responded, pero es Lewis en inglés. We said our good byes and I headed for school. I think I like that store. I want to become a regular. Hopefully when I go back Luis will remember my name. That was the ultimate “up” of the day. Thanks Luis for your 10 minutes of patience.