Tira más madera para hacer la hoguera

Wednesday was class per usual. Started watching Los girasoles ciegos in Cinema class, which is another depressing movie about a Republican family living in post-civil war Spain. After the movie me and Samantha went shopping for some souvenirs for a bit. I headed home, did some homework, and then Mery and I had an early supper. Wednesday was the beginning of the Festival of San Juan (technically the festival started at midnight so it was really June 24th) to honor St. John the Baptist. Since the saint in question was indeed a baptist, the festival is celebrated on the beach near the water. Everyone gets together on the beach (and I mean EVERYONE), builds little bonfires, and sits around them drinking, talking, dancing, and waiting for midnight. When I got there, our friends had surprisingly already had a fire going. Turns out they met these guys from Madrid who were in town, befriended them, and got them to build a fire for us. They were cool guys, friends from college, and we sat around and joked with them for a while. They got up to go watch the concert at the big stage down by the beach after a while though, leaving us with a nice little fire. Still, we were running out of wood fast and midnight was a while off so me and Lauren got up to try and find some wood for sale. Walking down the boardwalk we found absolutely no wood, but plenty of vendors selling char-grilled ears of corn covered in butter and salt for 2euro. We bought 2 obviously. On our way back, we snagged a big cardboard box from the trash along with some old book and some loose bark from the palm trees. This sustained the fire for a little while until we sent some other people out to go beg other people for wood.

At midnight, the tradition is that everyone rushes into the water and jumps over 7 waves. Literally everyone does this, and it is really something to see. I didn't go too far in since I wasn't wearing a bathing suit, but some people went all out. I did my seven little waves, made my wish (should be obvious what I wished for), and then walked around the shoreline for a bit... the moon was almost full so the water and beach looked incredible. We headed back to our fire, which soon turned into a giant pit of billowing smoke and embers. Me, Chris, Josh, and Samantha went to walk around the beach to find some people to chat with. We ended up talking with this group of guys from Spain for a while. The one guy's name was Bambino (a nickname from the time he had studied in Italy), and they were talking to us for a while about random stuff. I got the name of Bambino's favorite Spanish musician: El Barrio, a flamenco singer. I've checked out some of his music and it is actually pretty legit. We hung out with them for a while, and then headed back to our people. We left around 2 in a cab. Honestly, this was one of the coolest experiences of the entire trip... it's a shame American Festivals are nothing like this one.

Thursday: everyone was super tired from the night before and still smelled like bonfire smoke, despite showering in the morning. Watching a movie in art class (about prostitutes and a nun, of course), and finished watching Los girasoles ciegos in Cinema... very good movie, ultra sad, and unfortunately accurately depicted the post-war reality. After the movie, my group gave our final presentation about the Republican Party during the Spanish Civil War. This is not Republican in the American sense: during this time, the Republic in Spain were the leftests: intellectuals who wanted freedom, equality of women, and progressive thinking in the government. Unfortunately, they lost the war due to the aid Franco and the nacionalistas received from Hitler and Mussolini, and were forced to leave Spain or were hunted down and murdered if they chose to stay. Absolutely horrific. My part of the presentation talked about some famous intellectuals from the time period like Luis Bunuel, Antionio Machado, and Pablo Picasso. Nailed the presentation, too. After class we all pretty much went home to study for exams. I honestly didn't feel like I had a lot of studying to do, so I packed my suitcase and whatnot. I forgot to mention that Mery made me a bocadillo Thursday: my favorite with the tuna salad. And because she is the most amazing person ever, she also made my favorite dish (the chicken with celery cream sauce) for dinner that night. I asked her for the recipe and she wrote it down, explaining every detail. I miss that lady so much.

Thursday night= finish packing, look over notes, sleep. Pictures are from San Juan, although they don't do justice to how many people were there and how much fun everyone was having.

Hasta.

Tae Kwon Do on the Beach

Well since I have a 6 hour layover in the Dulles airport this afternoon, I figured I’d at least write another blog entry. Of course, I actually am writing it in a Word Document and copying it and pasting it later since the Dulles airport doesn’t have free WiFi… yeah, stay tuned for the final blog entry about leaving Spain and how much Dulles airport sucks.

Anyway, Monday was a weird day because we were all coming off the super-busy Barcelona weekend and the realization that we had finally reached our last week in Spain was setting in. Classes were pretty simple. Talked about Dali and Surrealism in art class, and then my group had to give an oral presentation over Camino, which we nailed. After the presentation, we started watching La Lengua de las Mariposas, a film about the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. After class I met with my group for Cinema to write an essay, and then headed over with a group of people from the program around 5:30PM to go to our Spanish cooking class. This was literally one of the coolest things I did the entire time in Spain. The 18 person class split up into groups and each group made one of four dishes: Paella Valenciana, Arroz Negro, Paella de Calabaza y Chorizo, and Flan. My group made a huge dish of Arroz Negro, which is a rice dish with chiporrones (little squids) and a squid-ink sauce (hence the Negro part). It was pretty tedious at first because you had to remove the fins and mouths from the little squid by hand. The chef that helped us out was really nice, and the whole room smelled amazing. When it was all done, we all grabbed plates and were served huge portions of all the dishes. Oh and I forgot to mention the gigantic vat of Sangria we all made as well. So we proceeded to dine; the food was all really good, and I definitely plan on trying to recreate some of the dishes.
After the class, me and a couple friends stopped in a bar on our way home to watch the rest of the Spain world cup game. Afterwards we made our way home, I finished up the essay, and headed to bed.

Tuesday’s classes were ordinary. We finished La Lengua de las Mariposas in Cinema class… I really like this class a lot, not only because the professora is amazing, but also because by watching the movies I actually remember the history and events; all the movies we watch really help to visualize the political or social situation in Spain at various times in its history. Unfortunately, I never realized how brutally awful the Spanish Civil War was, and how much Franco’s dictatorship set Spain back as a country on the whole. The movie was really good, and I would recommend it. It’s another downer kind of movie, but then again Spain doesn’t have the most happy-go-lucky history either. I went home after class and ate with Mery. I wish I got to eat lunch at home more often because it is always so good. Because it was a really nice day, I rallied and went to meet some people at the beach. After all, this would be the last time I could sit under the Valenican sun. No Don Simon at the beach this time; actually, me and Samantha went over flash cards for our Cinema final haha. And on top of it all, there was a crazy Spanish man practicing some kind of karate on the beach. He kept shouting at people and just being a mangui in general. Oh Valencia. I’m not too sure what I did after dinner on Tuesday, if I did anything at all. I want to say I just stayed in and studied and chilled. It’s kind of hard to remember since this whole last week was a blur.

Pictures are from the cooking class, as I’m sure you can tell. I’m really gonna miss eating food like that!

Hasta.

The Good Morning Collective Moan

Sunday morning: the breakfast room was literally one giant hangover. I managed to get down in good time, and ate some fruit with some of my friends... some of whom were much worse off than I. I got to hear all the stories from the people that we got separated from the previous night... definitely made a good decision staying with the group. Anyway, I had packed my bag before coming to breakfast, and afterward we had to checkout and store our luggage in a locked room to pick up later in the afternoon. We all sat around for about an hour, slowly and painfully recovering until the bus came to pick us up and take us to the Barrio Gotico of Barcelona: the old city. We were all on the bus, everyone was ready to doze off for the 10 minute ride there, and then our tour guide started talking: "Hola, chicos. ¿Teneís energía para caminar en el barrio gótico esta mañana?" After she said this, the entire bus literally gave a collective moan, and off we went.

We got dropped off and then had to exit the bus. The tour was grueling, not only because everyone was absolutely exhausted, but because it was more or less pointless. We literally would walk around different streets in the old city, and then we would stop in front of a church or a museum. She would explain (her accent was MUCH worse that day) what was inside and talk about a bunch of random tangents, and then we would move on. So thus, theme of Sunday was: Drag our feet around the old city of Barcelona listening to our tour guide talk about all the cool things inside of the buildings that we weren't going to enter. Still, we went in a couple cathedrals, all of which were stunning. After at least 4 hours of the tour, we were finally done, and allowed to go explore the old city by ourselves. It was only around 2, but everyone was starving because breakfast had been... a struggle. Luckily, Lauren, who had been to the city once before, remembered a pizza place that was close by, and a group of us went there for lunch. The pizza was phenominal: 2 slices and a drink for 4 euro. I got 4 slices: goat cheese and tomatoes, mexican style, mozzarella and veggie, and spinach and cheese.

After lunch we got some gelato and then opted for touring the Picasso Museum. Although it was crowded and we were a little rushed, the museum was very interesting. Picasso was literally painting neoclassical masterpieces by the age of 14. The museum was organized chronologically, so it was fascinating to see the progression of his art and the changing style throughout the years. Very cultural, no doubt. We took the metro back to the hotel afterwards, gathered our stuff, and boarded the bus to head for home. Sleep ensued quickly, and we finished watching Avatar once we exited Cataluña. Arriving in Valencia literally felt like coming home: Barcelona was great, but Valencia is such a comfortable, friendly city. A group of us went to McDonald's after to grab a quick bit before heading back to our houses. I got a Cuarto de libra con queso and patatas fritas. Now, I don't know if I was famished or if I actually did eat the best McDonald's burger of my life that night, but either way it was just what I needed. Went back to casa, snuck in so as not to wake Mery, finished up my presentation for my Cinema class, and went to bed. So that was Barcelona in a nutshell. Way too big of a city to do in a weekend, but I got a good feel for everything. Still have to say I prefer Valencia by far. This city is special. I don't know what it is exactly, but it's undeniable.

Pictures are odds and ends in Barcelona.

Hasta

Day Two: Including Barcelona Underground

Breakfast at the hotel on Saturday was a little rough for everyone. They had delicious fresh fruit and juices and eggs, which made everything better. Best of all, we had a five hour bus tour planned for the afternoon. We got on the bus around 10:30, and we had a tour guide who was going to be spending the next two days with us. She was a really sweet woman from Barcelona. The only problem was that she decided to give all the tour to us in English. She had a really good vocabulary, it's just her accent was very thick (it was grueling to here all about the "Seeee-ty of Barce-LOH-na" all the time). Since we were indeed on a Spanish study abroad trip, I don't see why she couldn't have just given the tour in Spanish. It would have been honestly easier to listen to. Anyway, the bus tour was perfect because we got to see a lot of Barcelona (it's a huge city) as well as some of the areas on the outskirts of the city. Our first stop was a place called Mont Juic, which is a large hill near the coast. There was a nice park we stopped in to sight see for a little bit. It was funny to see how much La Sagrada Familia stood out in the skyline. We got back on the bus, and our next stop was the Olympic Stadium. This was really neat to see; Barcelona was surely an amazing host city, and the city benefited greatly in terms of the economy, so they were able to make tons of improvements with all the revenue. We drove down by the coast afterwards and saw the beaches and the famous "W" hotel.

Our last stop was in Gaudi's Park. As you may have guessed, Gaudi is Barcelona's favorite architect, and this park leaves no doubt as to why. All the walk ways and plazas are build right into the surrounding nature, and everything is super-modern. Most of the mosaics, which are absolutely stunning, are actually made from old tea cups and ceramic dishes. It was a beautiful day for the park, and I wish I would have had the opportunity to go back there and just relax. After the park, we were dropped off in La Plaza de Cataluña, which is the center of Barcelona... this was slowly becoming a common theme of the trip: Let's drop off all these students in a random square in Barcelona and have them find their way back to the hotel. Either way, we roamed around and found a nice restaurant to eat at: we were all starving (and exhausted). The food was really good, and the waiter was actually very friendly at this place. Afterwards we tried to make our way home by walking since we didn't want to pay for a taxi. Then, however, it started raining, so we hailed a taxi and headed for the hotel. Good thing too, because we were no where close. Once back in the hotel we literally slept... not napped, but slept. Until around 8.

Afterwards we pregamed up in Lauren and Sam's room (Vodka azul = Crunch berries in alcoholic liquid form), and then took our bus to Las Ramblas again. We found a great little restaurant, and a big group of us of 20 or so sat and a big long table upstairs. It was tons of fun, and the food was delicious. I got pork sausages and white beans... and a beer of course. After dinner, we blindly navigated the streets looking for a certain bar. Thanks to an iPhone, we found it. The bar was called "Dow Jones" and the gimmick went like this: they had a TV monitor that displayed all the prices of the drinks. However, according to supply and demand, the prices or "stocks" of each drink fluctuated. Turns out it was actually just really annoying to pay attention to the prices and you really only saved money if you drank stuff that no one else wanted... which surprisingly... no one wanted to drink. But the market "crashed" every hour or so. We pretty much stayed there all night since we didn't want to go all the way back to the port to a discoteca.

Me, Chris, Kara, and Andrea opted to take the metro home instead of paying for a taxi. Turns out the Barcelona metro at 4AM is only slightly sketchy. We made it home with only one minor delay involving some stairs (no one fell this time, quite different, actually) and since I had the key card that night, I went to my room and passed out.

Pictures of Day 2 are from the places mentioned above.

Hasta.

Barcelona: ¿Adónde empezar?

Apologies first of all on my part: turns out you need free time to write a blog, and I've been at a lack of that this past week trying to study/cram everything I hadn't done in Valencia in one week. So here I am sitting in my room with my suitcase packed about to tell you about LAST weekend, which was the Barcelona trip.

After class we got on our tour bus at one and headed for Cataluña. Slept most of the way there because we were all exhausted from whatever we did the night before... don't remember, maybe we went back to L'umbracle. Actually, that is what we did last Thursday night. We had befriended the public relations guy named Ahmad at this one bar, and he is a big shot at the discoteca, so he gave us all free entry passes and bought us a bunch of drinks when we got there. Crazy night; someone fell down some stairs (not hurt, but it was funny since it was this person's third time falling on stairs in Spain). Anyway, back to the bus trip. Everyone was exhausted from the night before. To pass the time, they put in Avatar with Spanish subtitles... gotta love it. Funny thing is that even on a 4 hour bus trip we weren't able to finish the movie because the region of Cataluña has a law that makes it illegal for buses to show movies while driving within the borders of the region. Yeah...

When we got to Barcelona, we went immediate to La Sagrada Familia, which is the GIANT church designed by Antoni Gaudi. The corner stone was laid in 1882 and the church will not be finished until 2030. As you can surmise, it is absolutely incredible. The entire exterior is full of sculpture of everything imaginable, but it all forms a unified theme. Interesting fact: the two main columns on the facade of the church are supported by two turtles: one a land tortoise and one a sea turtle. La Sagrada Familia is located equidistant from the coast and the mountains, thus each turtle represents the two natural land forms that the church is centered between. It really is remarkable: personally I have been waiting to see this church for years, so you can imagine how pumped I was. We took a lift up to the top of one of the central towers: it is the highest point in the Barcelona skyline and it isn't even finished yet. Some of the spiral staircases were a little terrifying on the way down though. I definitely made a new life goal to return to see it when it is completed.

After the temple, we took the bus to the hotel to unload our stuff. The hotel was really nice: black marble bathrooms, big beds (two people to a room and the beds were pushed together... Europe for ya), and modern decor. Clearly the reason why the trip was so expensive. We had to shower and get ready pretty much immediately because we needed to grab some dinner. The concierge recommended a place to us, so we all went there since it was just around the corner. We sat outside, and were soon waited on by a... how shall I put this: flamboyant, bitter, impatient Indian guy. We tried ordering our drinks in Spanish, but he refused to respond to us (since they use the vernacular Catalan language in Barcelona), so instead of communicating with our decent Spanish, he insisted on talking to us in some of the worst broken English I've ever heard. He was really arrogant about it too. I was getting a really bad vibe from Barcelona at this point. We were super American and decided to get hamburguesas. However, the ones in Spain are SO much better. They make them with lamb and herbs, and top them with lettuce, tomato, mayo, and a fried egg. That put me in a little better mood, but then we had to fight the guy to get our check.

We finally made our way back to the hotel to catch the tour bus that was dropping us all of on Las Ramblas for the night. Las Ramblas is the main road of Barcelona; it's kind of equivalent to New Orleans' Bourbon Street: drinking, prostitutes, fireworks, street vendors, and pick-pockets. Barcelona has expert pick-pockets, so we all guarded our belongings like crazy. We pretty much went bar hopping from there: drank goblets (yes, goblets) of beer at one place, went to the basement of another club for free shots, and then made our way to the port in a taxi to go to a discoteca that we had gotten free passes to. There was a much larger young-person population at the place we went to, but other than that everything was pretty much the same, just more expensive. We hung out there for a while, and then grabbed some cabs home around... 5? haha

Now here is where things got interesting. Tid-bit of information: we all had roommates (I was rooming with this guy Albert from our program), but the hotel only gave us one room key, which of course, my roommate had. We had been in the same group the whole night, but got separated at the discoteca. No big deal... he could just call me when he got in to let me in the room. Wrong: his phone ran out of money so he couldn't make calls. Anyway, I ended up staying in Sam and Lauren's room. Basically I slept in the crack of the two beds in jeans and a button down. Classy I know. I was freezing though, so around 7AM I got up and found this HUGE wool blanket in the closet. Best find of the day. I didn't mind not sleeping in my own bed since we all had to be up and moving by around 8AM so... more of a nap. Funny story though.

Since this is already a long entry, and I have a lot of pictures from the trip, I'll stop this one here. Pictures are from La Sagrada Familia mostly.

Destination: Barcelona

Hey everyone, I am heading to Barcelona this weekend with the UVa program, and thus will not have internet aside from my Blackberry. I'm running off a solid 2.5 hours of sleep right now... can you say: "sleep on the bus."

Big update when I get back.

Hasta.

Baby Beluga

Got my art exam back Tuesday in class. Solid A, so now I'm just riding that class out until the end. Cinema we started watching my groups movie in class... kind of boring since I had just watched it the day before, but I still enjoyed it enough to watch it again. Kara and I went shopping in some of the plazas to buy stuff for our families back home. So I got some of the soveneir shopping over with. I also bought myself a cheap button down to wear in Barcelona, since I didn't bring quite enough going out clothes, and the bars and clubs are strict on what you wear there. Came home, ate dinner (Mery made Paella... couldn't have been better), did some homework, and then went to meet some people at Casablanca for some drinks. Fun night.

Wednesday's classes were ordinary, nothing new and exciting. However, after class I went with Sam and Lauren to eat at this bar called Portland (it's a very American bar, clearly). Got the Stormin' Norman sandwich, which was really good, and a ton of food for 5 euro. We watched the kick off to the World Cup match between Spain and Switzerland. We had to leave soon after though to walk to the oceaografico to pick up our tickets. Once we got the tickets, we went to a nearby bar and finished watching the game. It was a let down to say the least. However, afterwards we walked to the oceanografico (Valencia's aquarium in the City of Arts and Sciences). The place was amazing. First of all, the architecture is unbelievable all throughout that area. Secondly, they have some really cool animals, and we got to watch a dolphin show, which is bound to put anyone in a good mood.

Came home afterwards, had dinner, and then did homework the rest of the night. Basically we are all realizing how much we have left to do for our Cinema class, and how there is no way we can possibly get it all done AND study for our final... especially because we are all going to Barcelona this weekend. Oh well. Poor entry cuz I'm writing in a hurry.

Pictures are of the aquarium.

Hasta.

Verso, perla, pluma, y flor... sorta

While I'm sitting here at my desk waiting for the rain to stop so I can go out... here is an update of Sunday and Monday.

Woke up at 1 on Sunday... had kind of a rough morning/week, so I needed to sleep. Mery made fish and mashed potatoes for la comida. Delicious. After lunch, I met up with Sam to go do something "cultural" in Valencia. Only problem is that the entire city shuts down on Sundays (and pretty much after 2 o'clock every other day, which makes it hard to do anything of interest during the week). So we opted to check out the botanical gardens. They are close to where I live, the weather was nice, and it is free admission for students. Perfect. It was pretty interesting, although a lot of the flora wasn't in bloom. Still, nice and relaxing. Lots of stray cats, too. We walked and saw one of the city gates, and eventually made our way back to our casas. Ate dinner with Mery. She made me arroz a la cubana, which is rice (a LOT of rice), a couple fried eggs, and a fried banana that you mix all together. It was pretty good... it was just a lot of food, and I was still kind of full from lunch. We hung out and talked for a bit, and I pretty much just went to bed afterwards.

Monday I had class again. Nothing difficult. Finished watching El Lobo in Cinema class. I liked it. It's about ETA terrorism in Spain during the last years of Franco's dictatorship. After class, me and my group had to watch another video so we could prepare our presentation for it. Our movie was Camino (2008) by Javier Fresser. It was a relatively bizarre movie, also very sad, but definitely extremely well written and directed. I would definitely recommend it to anyone, as long as you wouldn't mind reading subtitles. It's about a young girl (11) who has terminal cancer and has to deal with her family's religion (Opus Dei) and falling in love during her struggle with cancer. Yeah... not exactly light hearted, but worth it. Did homework in the evening. Mery made pasta for dinner. EXACTLY what I was craving. After dinner she asked if I'd gained weight. I had no idea, so she took me in her bathroom and showed me her scale. She weighed me in both pounds and kilos. Turns out I actually gained some weight, which is surprising since I walk everywhere. Either way, it was fun. She is the best haha.

Pictures are from the botanical garden.

Hasta.

La muerte de la manta

On Saturday we somehow all managed to wake up and get ourselves to the train station by 10:15. Since most of my group of friends here opted out of the Grenada trip, we thought we would do a little day trip of our own. Our destinations was Cullera, which is a touristy-historical town that is a 30 minute train ride South of Valencia. The big selling point is that it is one of the nicest beaches on the east coast of Spain. The train station is pretty cool looking in Valencia; it's located right next to the bull fighting arena. Anyway, we got our tickets, got on our train, and headed out. Once we arrived in Cullera, we took a bus to the beach. We stopped at one of the boardwalk restaurants for lunch; very good decision. Pretty much everyone on the trip was extremely sleep deprived, so it was a task just to get our order put in correctly. We got the special, which was a large salad, bread, a drink, and a main course for 7 euro. For my main course I got the paella de mariscos (seafood paella), and it was absolutely delicious. I cannot wait to learn how to make paella because it is slowly becoming one of my favorite foods, along with the bread they serve with every meal.

After we completely stuffed ourselves, the next task was a nap on the beach. We found a spot and set up camp. I pulled out my iPod, put on the new Jack Johnson album, and dozed off for a while. Afterwards, we got out the snacks we had packed and opened up some wine. Our original plan was to beach it in the afternoon and then head up to the castle at the top of the town to do some sightseeing. However, not long after our snack, the sky turned black and it started pouring. We took refuge in a Burger King, changed, and when the rain let up a bit we headed for a bus stop to take us back to the station. I was kinda ticked because I heard the views from the castle were amazing. Oh well, unseasonable amounts of rain in Spain WOULD happen when I'm over here. It took us a while to get back to Valencia since the bus in Cullera took forever to get us.

When we got home, Mery and Elmira were visiting in the kitchen. I went in and said hello: I looked like walking death thanks to the combination of sleep deprivation, sand, sun, and rain. Accordingly, I took a shower and tried to nap for a bit. Didn't work, never does. Went back out around 9 to meet up with people to get tapas for dinner again. We caught the end of the England vs. USA game in a bar (which was ironically an English/American pub, so it was packed) and then headed over to get some food. There were about 10 of us at a big table in this restaurant; we got pitchers of Sangria for the table and then everyone ordered one or two tapas for themselves. I got the bravas (the fried potatoes with garlic) and albondigas (meatballs). The meatballs were Spanish style and VERY good. We all kinda shared our food, so I got to try some roasted peppers, muscles, and calamari. After dinner we headed back over to the pub for some drinks... everyone was kind of dragging at this point, so we were trying to rally before we went out to the discotecas.

We took a cab to the port, heading back to High Cube. I had told my intercambio that I was gonna be out last night and she told me I should stop at High Cube. Once we got in, I looked around and found her. Her name is Tamara and she is a student here in Valencia who is trying to learn English. The school set me up with her so we could meet up and talk half in English, half in Spanish. Last night was the first time I met her, and it was a little difficult to have a conversation with the music. She introduced me to her friends, we danced a little bit and then we kinda got separated. We are gonna do coffee or lunch a day this week, so I'm excited to get to know her better and to practice Spanish.

Headed home around 4. I literally dozed off in the passenger seat of the cab we were in while my friends were chatting in the back. Once I made it home, I took out my contacts, got in bed, and was asleep before my head hit the pillow. Kinda depressing that this was my last weekend in Valencia. Next weekend I'm going to Barcelona (which is going to be awesome nevertheless) and then the following weekend I fly home... not cool. But I certainly can't complain about all that Valencia had to offer. We are all going to make an effort to see as much of it as we can next week, going places after class and whatnot. The only thing that is kind of dissappointing about having class here is that usually by the time we get out (3PM) most of the points of interests are closed. We are gonna try to find some stuff to do though, plus I have some intersting stuff coming up with the program like cooking classes and the trip to the aquarium.

Pictures are of Cullera, the train station, train ride, and Cullera beach.

Hasta.

¿Y… es tu madre?

Thursday night we all went back to our favorite bar La Casablanca. Just hung out there for a while, glad that midterms were over. We even got a free round of these really good shots (picture above), thanks to Javier the bartender. Some of the group dissolved after, and the rest of us went to walk around the Barrio del Carmen. Found a little club and went in there for a while, dancing and whatnot. We got a lot of stares as usual, and didn't stay too long.

Friday I only had my art class since the third-block classes were cancelled because of the Grenada trip. Went through the rest of the Bellas Artes museum. We saw the rest of the Baroque pieces, walked through a really nice Impressionism exhibit they had, and even got to see some pieces by Goya and Velazquez. Our professor had some cool info on a lot of the paintings; although his class is boring, he explains art in a pretty interesting way. Plus he likes talking about all the mythology and backstory behind a lot of the pieces, so I like that.

Our original intent was to hit up the beach after class since we all got out early. But, once we got back to the University it was raining, so we opted out. Instead, Lauren, Sam, and I went back to la Cerezeria de 100 monteditos. We sat down, got some drinks and ordered a bunch of little "monteditos"-- little sandwiches on really good Spanish bread. I had 1 with tuna, anchovy, olives, and oil, another with pollo asado, Caesar dressing, lettuce, Parmesan cheese and crispy friend onions, and then 2 of the best sandwich I've eaten there, which consisted of pulled, roasted beef in a tomato paste, Spanish bacon, roasted poblano peppers, and Brie cheese. So good. When we were done eating, we realized that it was sunny and warm and the rain had passed, so we rallied and decided to go to the beach. We met Chris and Josh there, expecting to nap the rest of the afternoon by the water since no one had slept much because of midterms. Unfortunately, the beach was completely unaccommodating to napping that day: it was extremely windy so sand was flying everywhere, there were loud little children posted up right next to us, and to top it all off, there was a jet flying over the water doing air stunts for a good hour we were there... jet engines do not work well with napping.

Left the beach earlier than usual, for obvious reasons. I came home, showered, and then dined with Mery and her friend Elmira. I really enjoyed the conversation; it was a little more dynamic than how it usually is when it is just me and my host mom. We talked for a good two hours, and then Elmira said goodbye and I got ready to go out. Me and some friends went over to Sam and Lauren's apartment to hang out for a little bit, and then we headed over to the Festival of Nations one last time, since this is the last weekend it's in town. We hung out there for a little while and then all walked over to the city of Arts and Sciences to find this club that we had free entrance passes to called L'Umbracle. The city of Arts and Sciences is cool enough as is. This discoteca was located on the terrace of one of the buildings on the river. There were palm trees everywhere, everything was glowing purple, and they played an interesting, but good mix of music. It was honestly one of the coolest places I've seen here. We all went down to the "bathroom" once we got there. The bathroom area has it's own bar and DJ complete with a dance floor. We basically just stayed there the rest of the night, and eventually took taxis home. Very fun night. I wish I would have taken pictures of the inside; I'll try and find some on Google or what not.

The pictures that are up, however, include the monteditos we ordered, the free drinks at Casablanca, and one of the buildings on the river in the City of Arts and Sciences called the Hemisphere.

Hasta.

¡Lo flipo!

Sorry it's been a while since my last update, even though not too much has happened. I had two midterms today, so I've been spending the week studying. Lies, I crammed all day yesterday. But seeing as thought I don't really have anything too exciting to say, here is some random things of note from this week.

Monday night I stayed up late working on my art project so I wouldn't have to worry about it for the rest of the week. I went to bed around 2 in the morning. I was laying on my stomach trying to fall asleep, and I heard a noise in the hallway. I figured it was Mery getting up going to the kitchen or something. However, a little while later I heard the noise close to my door; again I figured Mery was making sure I had locked the door when I came in. So there I am trying to fall asleep, when all of the sudden I feel these pulsating motions running up and down both sides of my spine... not too hard but I could definitely feel them. I kinda freaked out, then I told myself I was dreaming. But then, the pulsing continued and I convinced myself that I was awake and was not dreaming. I couldn't see anything since I was laying on my stomach, but I got really freaked out because I definitely felt something touching my back still. I quickly turned around and threw off the covers to see what it was and there was absolutely nothing there. So yeah, needless to say I was pretty creeped out. So I don't know, maybe I was dreaming and just didn't realize it, but it was honestly one of the weirdest things ever.

Tuesday was classes and beach day. Told everyone about my experience with the fantasma from the night before. Then I went on to work on evening out my tan. I was pretty successful since I look a lot less like a leper now. Came home, had dinner with Mery, and did some studying. I met up with some people at a little bar called La Casablanca later on. Kristy's roommate Dana from Miami their first year was in Valencia visiting for her study abroad trip, and I had promised to meet up with her. She and her friends met us at Casablanca; it's pretty crazy how people manage to find each other even when they are thousands of miles from home. But it was definitely a fun night. No ghost encounters during my sleep either.

Wednesday was literally study central. The only bad thing about studying abroad is that midterms still exist. And when both of my classes consist of looking at pictures or watching movies, it's definitely a wake up call when you all of the sudden have a lot to study for. I wasn't too worried about art class since, well... he has repeated the same 3 topics to us non-stop since the first day of school. Conversation however... definitely stressed about that one. We had about 200 vocabulary words that we had to be able to define in Spanish. At least 50-60 were idiomatic expressions aka they don't translate literally at all. In addition to that we had to know details from the two movies we watched along with some funky grammar we had reviewed. Clearly I spent the majority of my time studying for the latter.

And today. Art exam was just plain stupid. It was an essay/short answer test. For two of the questions we were given a picture and had to describe what style it was painted in and why. The professor decided to pick two paintings that were both Impressionistic/Post-Impressionistic, both of which depicted a mother and a child. However, it wasn't to show that there was a difference in the two. No. It was literally the exact same essay twice. But it was easy, just a lot of writing. The Cinema test wasn't as bad as I expected. Unfortunately the section for identifying the idiomatic expressions was hard because... well you kind of had to pull them out of your memory from scratch. There were 5 bonus points, so that should help. Anyway, exams are done with for now. We went out and drank after to celebrate; found a sweet bar that has this deal every day where you get a small sandwich and a large beer for 2euro. By the way: beer + lemon fanta = delicious. We basically spent the afternoon there, stopped in some shops at the center, and headed home. Walking back I got stopped by a woman who was selling subscriptions to this homeless children foundation. I stopped and let her talk to me about it, and then she asked if I would be willing to donate 20euro a month. I told her I really liked the program, but I wouldn't be able to because I was from the States. She looked surprised. Definitely passing as a Spaniard more and more. Yes.

I just got done eating with Mery. She made seafood, which was good, just wasn't feeling seafood too much tonight. Watched the news for a while, talked about this big problem that some of the European countries are facing. Apparently, the Turkish mint recently issued a coin that is IDENTICAL to the 2 euro coin over here (except it only has a value of 1 for whatever currency is used in Turkey). So basically, Mery warned me to check every time I get change, because you could accidentally receive one of the Turkish coins instead of the 2 euro coin, in which case you would be out of luck. Oh well, nice to know Europe deals with dumb stuff just like the States.

I'm exhausted, so I'm gonna nap a little bit and then head out a bit for the night. I only have my art class tomorrow since afternoon classes are cancelled for the Grenada trip. Plus tomorrow for art class we are just going back to finish walking through the museum we visited last week. I'm gonna go ahead and call it a three day weekend.

I'm still trying to upload the flamenco video. Not sure why it won't work. I don't have any other pictures to post, sorry. And the title of the entry (which was also one of the phrases on our test) is a way to say "I don't believe it." It's really popular because everyone remembers it.

Hasta.

Como se identifica a una prostituta

Not much to say in this entry. Sunday is LITERALLY the day of rest here. Most people (especially the young ones) sleep super late to make up for all the sleep lost going out on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. My host mother was telling me that when her son was my age, he would often sleep until 6PM on Sunday. I wasn't so bad; I managed to get up around 1PM. I had arroz con polla for lunch; it was nice to get to eat la comida with Mery since I usually am not home for it during the week. Afterwards I just kind of chilled, started studying for my midterms that are coming up on Thursday. I'm not too worried about them since we haven't covered hardly any material in any of my classes.

For dinner, a little group of us decided to meet up at a Tapas Restaurant in La Plaza de la Reina instead of dining in. Tapas are basically just family style dishes that you order--hot or cold-- and you mix and match them, sharing them with your friends. Our dinner that night consisted of Bravas (fried, seasoned potatoes with garlic-mayonnaise sauce... typical of the region and very good), Deep fried calamari, Paella Valenciana, and a pitcher of Sangria. We went and got helado afterwards and then walked home. It was really a lot of fun; it was my first time actually dining out with people, because I usually eat with my host mother. It's pretty inexpensive if you choose the right places, so I hope to do it a couple more times before I leave.

Today I had classes in the morning. I got a good 8 hours of sleep, but surprisingly I felt tired all day long. I think my body has adjusted to 5 hours max a night, and sleeping too much just messes with my internal clock. Art was okay... we finished up Post-Impressionism and moved on to las vanguardias. Everything we talk about in that class relates to sex in some way; lately the professor has been on a prostitute kick. Interesting fact about modern Spanish art here: whenever a woman is the subject of a painting, a cat painted in the picture signals that said woman is a prostitute. Cinema was fun... we just chatted in a large group, and went over some colloquialism. We are watching another movie tomorrow... score.

After class I came home and did some homework. Went out around 5 back to the Plaza de la Reina to meet up with some poeple and do some souvenir shopping. So we walked along the streets around the area. I got some stuff to bring back home, and picked up a button down shirt for myself for 10 euro (clothes are so cheap here if you go to the right places). I also bought some sun glasses since it turns out the pair that I bought have been turning the bridge of my nose blue because the metal oxidizes on my skin when I wear them. That's been a running joke for the past 4 days, so I finally had to buy a new pair.

Dined with Mery... she made Pollo con salsa de apio again, which is easily my favorite dish she makes. We chatted about natural disasters and a news story she had heard earlier where a family's dog ate their newborn child... I love our dinner conversations, clearly. I asked Mery if we could take a photo together so I could show ya'll who has been taking care of me for the past week and a half, and she agreed but wants to wait until she's a little more done up. Haha. So maybe tomorrow I'll manage to get one.

I'm attempting to do all my homework tonight for the week so I can take it easy. We'll see how that goes. Pic is random.

Hasta.

El ser comprendido

What a Saturday. I woke up reasonable early to catch the bus from the soccer stadium since yesterday was our program's free day trip to Peñíscola, which is another coastal city about 2 hours north of Valencia. Everyone was clearly exhausted from the night before, so everyone slept on the bus. Upon arrival at Peñíscola, we all headed for the beach for a couple hours (others were delayed getting there for reasons that do not need to be repeated haha). It was pretty hot yesterday, but perfect beach weather. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, although I did get burnt again, this time on the back of my knees. I fail.

After getting cleaned up and changed from the beach, our group headed up to the castle of Peñíscola. The castle was built by the Knight's Templar in the early fourteenth centruy, and is literally located atop a seaside cliff. It was pretty cool to walk around and see all of the spectacular views from the top of the castle. After an hour or so of perusing, we were free to walk around the town and look at the shops and what not. Lots of interesting stuff, nothing practical of course (giant swords, assorted trinkets, and vulgar Spanish tshirts). Stopped at a little cafe for some refreshments before heading back to the bus for another 2 hour nap on the way home. Successful day, but definitely pretty draining.

I got home around 8:30, showered (I had sand everywhere), and ate dinner with Mery. Pasta with homemade meat sauce; I was starving so it didn't take me long to finish. Afterward we talked for a little while about random stuff. She often talks to me about this book called El Club Bilderberg that she read once. Apparently there is this group of some of the most powerful and wealthy individuals in the world that get together to decide the fate of certain countries with the ultimate goal of reducing the human population by more than half to maintain our sustainability as a species. Interesting stuff, although I don't know how much to believe. She really likes talking about conspiracies thought, it's kind of funny. After dinner I skyped with my parents for a while. I really enjoyed that since all this text communication gets really impersonal after a while. Plus I got to see Bean haha.



And now ladies and gentleman, the nightlife. We decided to go back to the All Nation's Festival since it is a good meeting spot. It was packed when we arrived. Me and Kara split a bottle of this weird Apple Cider drink from a country that I had never heard of. You had to put the bottle inside this machine, press a pump, and let a shot of the drink fall 2 feet into your class, and then you take it immediately. Pretty interesting to say the least. After finishing our bottle, I couldn't resist the smell of all the food around so I went and bought some tacos (I know, not very original) from the Mexico tent. Clearly a good decision. From the festival we took a taxi to the Port to meet some friends at this discoteca called High Cube that was having a big party for some anniversary. The place was literally I giant, glowing green covered deck built out onto the water. There was a DJ and live saxophonist; there is this one song they play here all the time the people go nuts for, but I haven't figured out what it is yet. Aside from that it was mostly Lady Gaga, Blackeyed Peas, and Pitbull haha. The girls were getting hit on by these two guys from Valencia, but they kept buying people drinks so benefits all around. Toward the end of the night we had all found a spot to sit down on the side of this club. I was sitting next to this cute girl in a red dress, so after like 15 minutes I figured "what the hell" and started chatting (it's a lot more difficult striking up a conversation here with a strange girl, let alone in a second language). Turns out she was not Spanish, but rather she was from Paris and is studying here. Her Spanish was practically perfect though, so we chatted about all kinds of stuff until the place closed. Definitely one of the coolest experiences this trip: having a really good conversation with someone in a language that neither of us spoke as a first language. It was, and for that matter most of the interactions I've had here, kind of surreal, and the whole time I kept thinking to myself "This is so cool." And I think that's why this trip has been so amazing for me-- both in terms of learning academically and socially-- because it has been the best way to experience the fundamental aspects of life itself: understanding others and being understood.

So that is the philosophy that resulted from last night. The pictures are Sam, me, and Josh on the castle, the cathedral tower, and a shot of the beach from above. The other picture is the view from High Cube toward the beach.

P.S. New Jack Johnson album came out today. Thank god for iTunes and music on the internet, 'cause I don't think I could find the album over here.

Hasta.

Drinking out of straws

Post about the weekend: it's gonna be a double installment. Class was kind of hard to wake up for on Friday after our sporadic bar night the night before. Still, I am convinced that I managed to take the ideal schedule in Spain. For my art class, we went to visit El Museo de las Bellas Artes, which is 10 minutes from our school. The museum contains all baroque, romantic, and Renaissance art, so it really wasn't entirely applicable to our modern art course (aka not on the final), but it was still really interesting to see a lot of the works. We saw tons of great pieces as our professor walked us around explaining some of the more notable ones. We talked a lot about symbolism, and the thing I found most interesting was the fact that on many Spanish altar pieces it was typical to paint a pelican above the crucifixion panel, since the pelican was considered to be a bird put on earth by God to remind people of Christ's sacrifice. Now granted I don't have a lot of religious knowledge, but this was definitely something I had never heard of before.

I returned to the university for my cinema class. We were just doing some practice oral exercises. The first thing we did was doing consecutive translation: she read a passage in English, we took notes, and then had to translate it to Spanish aloud. Definitely a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. It made being a translator seem extremely daunting. Afterwards, we read a parable about a boiled frog and just discussed the moral. The entire time we passed around these cinnamon cookies and strawberry gummies... I love this class.

After class we FINALLY made it to the beach. But it was worth the wait since the weather was perfect. We went to our usual spot and set up camp (Don Simon tagged along, of course). Chris and I played "ping-pong," which is basically the Spanish equivalent of frisbee in terms of popular things to do on a beach. It's basically two big wooden paddles used to hit a hollow rubber ball back and forth in the air. It doesn't sound too exciting, but its actually quite fun and challenging. Plus, everyone does it here; they are fascinated by it. Still working on evening out the tan; it definitely looks like I have a skin disease, but I'm gonna get it fixed by the time I leave here. The highlight of my afternoon was clearly my bocadillo: Mery made me one with olive oil, tuna, tomatoes, corn, and green olives. One of the most delicious sandwiches I have ever had in my life.

Got home a little later than I expectee:the buses from the beach take forever to get home, plus we got held up talking to this crazy old widower from Toledo who is staying in Valencia. He hangs around the beach all the time, and this is the second time I've chatted with him. He sang for all of us, made some jokes, and then we said adios. My house mom was a little upset I got home late, but we still had a nice dinner: she made some kind of steak with peppers and onions and french fries, preceded by a bowl of lentil soup. Yum.

And thus begins the description of one of the more-excellent nights in Spain. We all met up at the fair of nations on the river. Had a few drinks (one from Mexico and one from Spain) and around 1AM we all headed out; by "all" I am referring to the fact that we were rolling at least 12 people deep. Anyway, the whole group was following me to an area called Canovás, which was close to where we were. There were a good number of places to go, but one of the girls picked out this place called St. Patricks... it wasn't too Spanish, and the majority of the employees were from Britain. We all sat around and chatted before we headed out in search of a discoteca. We found one just down the street, and once again Chris and I got the group in free of charge. The place was called Las Animas: there is a much larger Las Animas on the beach, but this was the smaller version located in the center. Maggie and I went to the bar to get some drinks, and while waiting in line we realized that the major demographic inside the club was male, 30+ years of age. At the time we just thought this was sort of weird, but the next day we all came to the conclusion that we may have been in a gay bar. Whoops. Although there also could have just been a shortage of females. Either way we all had fun.

After we left we all found a park in the middle of La Gran Via and sat around and just chilled for a while. Appropriate end to a great night to say the least. Taxi, home, bed, best 4 hours of sleep I've had in a while.

Pictures are of us on the beach talking to our friend from Toledo, group shot at the Festival of Nations, and the infamous bench in the park.

Hasta.

No comes la fruta

Yesterday wasn't too terribly exciting. In fact, it was a little grueling. I didn't get to sleep too much since we got back from flamenco fairly late, and I got up early and the morning and left for the University about 30 minutes earlier than usual because I had to print out my art project and get money out at one of the banks by the school. Art class was the usual monotony, although we talked about Post-impressionism in a way that I've never really learned before. Still, didn't really talk about any SPANISH artists, so I'm not exactly sure where this class is going. During the break between classes I found out that everyone in my Cinema class had an extra class that we needed to go to at 4:45PM in the afternoon in addition to the one we had at 1:00PM. The extra class is to make up for the class that we are going to miss for people going to Grenada next weekend since the bus leaves Friday afternoon. This was bad news since 1) we all were planning on going to the beach after our class at 3, and 2) I was already exhausted and really was counting on taking a siesta. Oh well, went to my cinema class where we wrapped up our unit on Volver, and then me and some friends headed to the park to eat our bocadillos and chill before our class later in the afternoon.

This would be an adequate time to note that people in Spain do odd things in the park. First of all, there are always couples performing large amounts of PDA. Also, people "walk" their dogs (all of which are gigantic compared to American breeds) and they don't do anything when their dog walks up to people sitting in the grass and goes crazy. However, the hallmark of yesterday was definitely they guy we were near in the park who literally stood and juggled bowling pins for an hour and a half.

Anyway, while we were at the park it started to rain, so we had to pack up our stuff and head back to the university. For the extra class of cinema, all we did was watch another movie. However, the movie was Mujeres al borde de un ataco de nervios, which if you have ever seen it is completely chaotic. In summery, after 4 hours of class already along with little sleep and a pretty complicated plot line, everyone in our class was completely lost/falling asleep. Still, we made it through, talked through the basic plot afterwards, and then headed back to the house (finally).

When I got home, my madre had a visitor. Turns out that one of the students who had stayed with her for an entire school year through the UVa program 5 years ago had returned to Spain to teach for the summer and had come to visit. He was a really nice guy; my house mom had definitely mentioned him to me before. So we chatted for about an hour about school and Spanish and whatnot, and then Mery made us dinner and we all ate together. It was kind of nice having another person around my age to join in on the conversation. The food was delicious as usual, even though she literally cooked it on the spot since she hadn't anticipated the other guest. After dinner we watched the Spanish version of Survivor for a while, and then our guest left and I got ready to head out.

Me and Kara met up some of our friends at a bar called La Casablanca by la plaza de toros and we chatted there for a bit. Some of the group left around 1 since they had class early, but the rest of us headed to a club to hang out for a bit. Turns out there was a giant Italian bachelor party being held at the club, so we met a bunch of Italians. Also, the coolest thing about being at clubs in Spain is listening to the Spaniards sing along to the American lyrics; they honestly knew most of the songs better than we did. Didn't stay out too much later, took a cab home, and went straight to bed. Definitely a fun night, although it is almost impossible to believe that an entire week has passed!

Pictures are just random shots I stole from some of my friends' facebook albums. Enjoy.

Hasta.

¡Olé!

The days are starting to run together now, so I have to think a bit before a write this to make sure I am writing about the correct day. Wednesday morning I got up and went to class. Art was boring: I don't understand how it is a class on Modern Spanish Art and the only artists we talk about are all French or German... but whatever. Conversation was fun as usual. Not much to say about the classes.

We had planned on going to the beach, but it was cloudy so we opted for walking around the centro looking in shops and whatnot. Our group got severed somewhere along the way, but we met up about 2 hours later. In between, I had my first horchata, which was pretty good, but definitely not as amazing as I thought it would be. Afterwards a couple of us went to the park and did some homework and ate some snacks we had gotten at the supermercado. We headed home around 7, and I arrived to see my madre had prepared me dinner even thought I told her I was eating out. I didn't complain because she is an amazing cook and she had made pike with peppers and onions. I ate early (8PM) and then headed off with some friends a to la avenida Blasco de Ibanez to find a little restaurant to dine at before flamenco night. We ate at this little bar; some of the people I was with got hamburgers and I got los calamares; they were quite good. Our waiter was from Malaga and had learned English at one of his jobs so he was excited to talk to us. He gave us a free round of limonello shots after dinner, along with some olives and peanuts to snack on. Great guy. When we were paying, we were chatting with him and the chef, whose names were Zeus and German. After we payed the bill they did another round of free shots with us. Awesome place, I intend to go back there with some more people sometime.

After dinner we headed out to El toro y la luna, which was another bar a couple blocks down that was hosting a flamenco dance night for our program. It was absolutely an awesome time; the dancers and singers were all in the same family. It was unbelievable to see some of the dancing and to hear some of the music, especially because this is such an iconic Spanish tradition. After a while and a couple of drinks, the entire bar was up on the stage dancing along to the music. Definitely one of the more memorable nights so far.

We took a cab home, and I finished up my art homework for Friday and went to bed. I'm about to head out tonight; had a great day today, but you can hear all about it tomorrow. The pictures are from flamenco, and the video is worth watching!

Hay tiburones en el mar?

Quick entry before I have to go to class this morning, but that's actually quite appropriate since Monday was actually a normal day of classes. Turns out my art class is kind of disappointing. The first unit is on Goya, and he talked about the difference between Neoclassicism and Romanticism to give us some background. I feel like I've had this lecture at least 5 times in the past year, so that was pretty boring (especially because I didn't think he gave that thorough of an explanation, but whatever). The worst part was is that everything was redundant, and we hardly talked about actual art. Kind of a let down.

Cinema class was better, of course since all we really do is watch movies it would be kind of difficult to have a bad class day. We started watching Pedro Almodovar's Volver, starring Penelope Cruz. The movie is pretty strange: ghosts, abusive fathers, murders, illegal hairdressers. Good film nonetheless. Plus, the professor actually makes it even more interesting by discussing a lot of the colloquialisms that show up in the movie (there are a ton).

After class a big group of us went to the beach for the afternoon. It was scorching, which is just what I needed seeing as though I already was burned in some random parts of my body. But I lathered on the sunscreen and sat and chatted. Pretty chill. Among other things, we talked about sharks in the Mediterranean and met a couple from Holland who had rented bicycles. There was also an incident in one of the beach bars that resulted in me and a friend getting free drinks. Good day for sure.

Came home and met one of my house mother's good friends. We talked for a quite a while; she was really nice, also from Peru. Showered real quick and then had dinner: lentil soup and chicken with a salsa bechamel. I am so lucky because my host mother cooks like none other.

Don't think I did anything too exciting after dinner. Went to bed around midnight, so I actually got some sleep for once. The picture for today is kind of random. It is the view from the back of my house's balcony where I hang my towels and swim wear to dry. Pretty old fashion, but it works great. I'm always afraid I'm gonna drop stuff while I am hanging it though... don't know that I'd get it back if I did.

Hasta.