Monday, June 27, 2011

Fla-freaking-menco!

Last night was so awesome. We went to an underground little flamenco bar, and it was seriously one of my favorite cultural experiences thus far.

First, we met up with keely and Jessie. They brought with them a girl named kat. She was staying at their hostel. She was great tho! We all were hungry xo we decided to get a nice dinner. I'm trying to forget how much I paid. It was un poco expensive hehe. But it was so delicious. We went to an adorable Italian resturant. I was in the mood for veggies so I got a salad with strawberries, warm goat cheese, walnuts, and balsamic. It was unbelievably good. The cheese was amazing. Lakshmi and I de decided to go big and we split a chocolate souffle for dessert. OMG.

After dinner we wandered around the tiny streets looking for this flamenco bar Jessie had heard about. Map quest herself led us around. It was so hilarious when we found the place I have no idea how we got there! Anywho it was this kinda hole in the wall bar. I felt like I was in a cow barn almost. It was insanely hot, there where huge fans, and misters on the ceiling. We got there at about 1030 and the show was set to start at 11. Of course it didn't start till later but whatever hehe.

Ok they don't teach you in class how freaking intense flamenco is. We learned about how it isnt really a dance you can learn, and how you have to feel the pain of the gypsies in order to have the passion to dance like them. But wow.

So quick history lesson, flamenco started in Seville or somewhere near it. It originated with the gypsies, but what influenced by the arabs and the Jews. Gypsies are a group of people here that, similar to the jews, don't relly have a homeland. historians say they came from India. They were the lowest class in the caste system, so the fled. From then on they have been nomads. They are kinda natorious for sticking in a clan and stealing hehe.

So to make a long interesting story fit in my blog, I'll just sum it up as flamenco is a lot different than most people think. Its spontaneous and passionate. At the bar, there were two men one with the guitarra (he sang) and the other played a drumish thing (honestly to me he was sitting on a barrel and hitting it). There was one women dancing, but also she is part of the music because she pounds her heels and claps a lot. It was amazing I took a few videos. You'll see.

Today we haven't done much. Just explored. Broke down and got star bucks...oops. Now we are napping in the room. Well Lakshmi is napping, I am watching one tree hill. Tonight we are going to a different flamenco place I believe. Then, it's off to Barcelona at 7am tomorrow!

Sunday, June 26, 2011

Good morning (or afternoon depending how you look at it)

Hi everyone! It's a beautiful day in Seville. I spent the morning wandering around the most gorgeous neighborhood. I saw the largest gothic cathedral in the world (third largest cathedral minus gothicness). I met up with Jessie and keely, girls from Iowa who are traveling together. They just got here this morning though. They did the overnight bus too. Although it sounds like theirs was worse, they had a layover from 1130 pm to 3 am! Any who so I met them at the cathedral (it's lakshmis day to go to granada, she left at 6am I didn't even hear her go) and the three of us explored a little bit. I can't decide if Seville is the most pretty city we have been to or not. It's a lot different. Almost like the difference between Arizona and Chicago. How do you compare! After sitting at a cafe with Jessie and keely for lunch, they needed a nap. So they went to their hostel. I explored for a little while on my own, then it got to be 1:30 and I was sweating so I decided to go back to the hotel.

And here I am a wonderful nap later. I think im going to go wander around for awhile until lak gets back. Then we are meeting up with Jessie and keely to go to a flamenco bar tonight! I'm so excited for that.

It hasn't hit me that I am not going back to Valladolid. I loved it there. I wish I could transport the city to the US. I'm going to miss it so much. I have absolutely got to figure something out so I can keep taking Spanish classes (I finished my minor this spring). I really don't want to loose everything that I am learning here. Its been fun while I'm at the hotel alone the door man has been talking to me. He is this lil chubby old man that is constantly smiling. I told him about the predicament, his advice was "go to a bar, make a Spanish man fall in love with you, then make him chase you to the states. Personal tutor." hahahahaha he is so cute! He giggled and said "en serio, mal idea." (seriously though, that's a bad idea) what is funny tho is one of the professors from Pennsylvania (the Luis of their group) lives in phillidelphia now but he is from Valladolid. He met his wife when she was studying here 30yrs ago. She told him to come to the states for her and he did! After 5 months or something. Crazy cat.

Saturday, June 25, 2011

42 degrees celcius=107.6 farenheight. Yay!

Well we are alive and well after our first day in Sevilla, um but we are sweaty to say the very least. After napping this morning at the hotel, we decided to just walk around today. We asked the hotel people where shopping was and they pointed us in the right direction. We thought maybe we shouldnt go out until after siesta time, but we didn't listen to our instincts. Note to self: ALWAYS LISTEN TO YOUR INSTINCTS. At 2pm in Sevilla, not only is everything closed for lunch, but it's 110degrees and people are hiding in air conditioning! It didn't take us long to realize we needed to hide as well. We sat in a cafe for a long time, then stumbled around el corte ingles, the Spanish version of Macy's which stays open through siesta. By then it was five, a little cooler (aka 97), and stores were open. Lakshmi and I did what we do best, we shopped.

After shopping we started to go back to the bus stop but we stumbled upon gay pride parade! Wonderful little parade with party buses and scantily dressed men. The people all just buy alcohol and walk along with the parade. The bus Lakshmi and I wanted wasn't running due to the parade, so we stopped quick at a pizza place, then entertained ourselves by walking home with the parade. Lakshmi is headed to Granada tomorrow for a day trip. So we are back at the hotel kinda early. She has a long day tomorrow. As for me, idk what I am going to do. Possibly go on a tour of some palaces.

It's gorgeous here. It's a lot different than castilla Leon (the province that Valladolid and Madrid are in). It has a lot lot lot more Arab influence. It's really neat to see. We are thinking water park on Monday. It's ridiculously hot! Maybe flamenco bar Monday night?! Yay it will be fun!

Lets just take the bus all night...yeah thats a good idea

So. It's saturday morning for me here in Sevilla espana. Lakshmi and I just spent the last 12 hrs traveling, by bus! From 1130pm to 845 am we were on it. Shoot me. My neck is killing me. Thank goodnessn for Spanish drammamine, at least i slept.

So yes lets see where was I last. I believe I had just mentioned the farewell dinner/noche de San Juan festival but hadn't actually experienced either one. So I will begin there.

The farewell dinner was intense. We joined up with a group from Pennsylvania that we had our classes with, so there was about 50 students altogether. Um not many people have been to Spain but for those of you who have or have been to Europe in general, things are smaller here. Much smaller! There isn't a banquet hall we can just rent out, so needless to say things were cramped. And let's not leave out the detail that in Spain the alcohol is cheap. They make these giant juice boxes (like 1 liter) of wine for the fine price of 55 cents! I cant tell you how many people had poked straws in the top and were drinking them out of their purses before dinner (the four boys were less subtle, they had 2 liters bottles of "coke") but any who you get the picture. Combine the recipe of 50 twenty somethings (more than half from the east coast), free wine on the table with cheap wine in their bags in a tiny little room. It equals loud, very loud. But fun, and the food was great.

The noche de San Juan was literally the biggest beach party i have ever seen. There were like 2000 people on the beach that night. There was one huge main bonfire, but then other kids just sat down and made their own little ones. There was a whole lot of intoxication going on too. Drunk people surrouded by flames. Sounds like I recipe for disaster right? Kinda. It was good tho. I actually used my Spanish a lot cause we fused groups with some people that I knew from a pizza place in valladolid. They randomly saw us and remembered us. It's always good when you can break out of the American crowd.

The next morning was our graduation. Our group struggled hehe. But we all made it thro and it was really nice that they recognized us like that. They really seemed to appreciate us for coming here and attempting to experience their culture. I had never really realized that before. Like when I am struggling to think of a word or pronounce something horribly wrong I would get embarrassed. But in reality, i am the one speaking the other language. They only speak one and many of the people i meet haven't been to Portugal let alone the us. It's good to hear that people like it when we come here and learn and try to understand their culture.

After graduation we had lunch with our family. I couldn't nap for some reason so afterwards lakshmi and I wanted to get out of the house and just hang out in Valladolid until we had to leave our little home :(... We went to a plaza and people watched for a bit, then when 5pm hit and the stores reopened, we went to the shopping area to recharge our cell phones for the last week. My friend ally has been really down lately because she broke her foot (hopefully I mentioned that but if not here is the abridged version, ally was dancing on a marble floor and stomped to hard and broke a bone in her foot. Osteopenia anyone?) she can't do much walking and stuff with her Spanish style crutches, so i called her to hang out. Convenient for us, so lives across the street from the beach so we decided just to sit and people watch there. It was really nice, and some of our Spanish friends came and we said goodbye to them. At 9 we went home for dinner, and that's the last I saw of Valladolid.

I'm so sad I'm never going back there. I love the city. I want to live there! Minus the fact that i would need to bring a small population of iowans/Illinoians/coloradans with me hehe. (ok I'm lying only one coloradan)

P.s. I'm not sure why I was infatuated with recipes today...maybe I'm hungry.
Oh and is it Illinoians or illini? Estoy confundida.....

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Exams!

Yay I have one down and one to go. I guess that prolly means I should be taking advantage of the free time and studying haha but honestly I don't think it's really necessary at this point. It's sooooo crazy we are done with class.

So any who last night was cool. For some reason our good ole professor Luis decided to take us out for tapas the night before exams. It worked out well tho because lakshmi and I were lazy so we studying all afternoon and then met the group at the plaza mayor at 9. Oh goodness our afternoon tho. Apparently mari and vale thought it was extremely necessary that their already white ceilings got repainted white. So 8 am yesterday I wake up to mari knocking on my door (which when I went to bed the night before she was not there...) she told me I had to shower because I wouldn't be able to later. I informed her I showered before I went to bed and I would just go a day without it lol. Any who by the time we got home literally the apartment was a mess. Mattresses in the living room plastic everywhere. It was claustrophobic to say the least.

Um so yup we just locked ourselves in our room, then we realized we were like hot boxing it (minus the weed) it got intense in their cause we had the windows closed and door shut. We were sweating while we studied hehe a good workout.

Yup so then Luis decided to take us out. It was good cause the kitchen was a mess and we couldn't really eat dinner. We went to this sketch little bar, but it's a really famous place because it's where the bullfighters go after their fight. I thought it was interesting. There are a bunch of original pictures and two mounted bulls! They also serve bull tail!! I asked Luis why if the place was so famous why it wasn't nicer. But Luis explained how bullfighting is really kinda an old persons sport. He grew up here and lives here every summer, but has never gone to one! Crazy.

Well tonight is a legit holiday, like every week here I swear is something, but this one is a real one. Tomorrow is the day of saint John (San Juan). Tonight is the shortest night of the year, and everyone celebrates by partying on the beach (the gorgeous river beach of Valladolid hehe) San Juan was zachias's son and the story is that when he was young he would jump over fire. So tonight they have a big bonfire, burn old things from the past year, and then when they fire dies down they jump over it. Its to celebrate the coming of summer and beginning or a new year. I equate the whole thing to getting shit faced on new years, making a "resolution" and passing out outside in the snow!

Haha welp I will try and blog tomorrow but I won't be at school really, just for graduation whoop whoop!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Just saw ally's blog and it's way better than mine :(

I suck at blogging apparently. I just saw my friend ally's blog, and its phenomenal she has like pages and bible verses and she talks about her feelings. Man, I feel like a loser. Hehe just kidding I don't want to make a career outta this. I could make a career out of traveling tho. Who wants to sponsor me?

Any who. Mari and vale got home this morning. It was sad that someone in their family died but they were very chill about it. It was also nice to have the house to ourselves. We figured out how to turn the Spanish dubbing off. OMG we watched two movies, say yes to the dress, some terrible knock off of what not to wear, and friends. It was glourious.

So ally broke her foot dancing on a marble floor at school. Her bones must be weak (she's a vegan, I suggest supplements) but now her trip is basically ruined cause she is in a cast and Spanish crutches are like the wrist stick ones ya know.

It's been so great I am getting really excited and really sad. I love Valladolid!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

No tengo un titulo

Buenos dias!! Hopefully everyone still reads this and hasn't forgotten about me....

Today is Tuesday. Tomorrow is my last day of class, then thursday I have finals, then Friday we have graduation and Lakshmi and I are getting on a bus to Seville. It's all going by so fast! So weird I am totally excited to travel tho!

Yesterday we walked to the bus station with some other girls. Only took us 1hr but whatever. When we were walking home an old lady asked me for directions, and AFTER I spoke to her and told her where to go she said "de donde en espana eres tu?" aka where in spain are you from aka she thought I was from Spain! Hahahaha it was a proud moment in my life.

We had to go to the equivalent of radio shack after getting bus tickets because I am an idiot and I brought my old blackberry charger not my camera charger. The guy that worked there was really nice and he let me charge my battery at the store without buying the charger. El era un majo (its a word they only use in Spain for someone that is super nice.) I have been called that only once, when an old lady was standing and I gave her my seat. It was an honor hehe. The old people here are sooo active. They are always walking around or pushing each other in their wheel chairs.

So Lakshmi and I are alone again. Someone in mari family died. So they left in a rush last night to go to the wake and today the funeral. It's going to be weird eating lunch by ourselves. Haha oh well it's an adventure.

Monday, June 20, 2011

Its Monday!

Finally Monday of my last week of school it's so weird! I have been here for so long,but I feel like it was just yesterday I got here. I can't wait to be done with school, but I really will be sad to leave. I love Valladolid. It's such a great city.

Well today is Monday so we aren't really doing anything. Lakshmi and I need to go by a bus ticket today. So that will be a trip haha. Its a long walk. Last night after supper we walked it to make sure we know how to get there. So fri night begins Lakshmi and my big adventure! Thursday night should be fun too because theree is a festival on the beach and it is after our finals! Yay!

Oh my gosh i forgot to add in my post about the weekend that Saturday night we went out with our teacher! He is from the south of Spain so he dances much better than the men of the north, haha or so he says. But it was very fun, and odd haha.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Salamanca fue un exito!

Well it's Sunday afternoon here. Good morning all you Americans! we had such a great day yesterday. We went to Salamanca which is a beautiful city. It has a really cool history, I am feeling like I am learning a ton when we go to these cities for the day. The entire town is made out of the same brick, and it's so gorgeous. From far away the brick looks like it's dirty, but up close it is really just ribbons of colors in it. I really like it. We did our sightseeing and then during our free time I hung out with brooke ally and Lakshmi. They are good girls, buut I shop toooooo much with them. Oh the money you blow in Europe. I got jeans tho 10 euro! Originally 45 so m impressed. We didn't know whether or not we were going to stay in Salamanca a lot of the girls did, but when it came down to it we didn't want to. It's just q lot of extra money when I feel like we got a good hold of the city in a day.
So about 8 of the Iowa kids decided to return to Valladolid and the rest stayed which was nice. Cause then it forced us to split out of the big group of Americans.

When we got back it was dinner time aka 10 pm. Ally took us to a really yummy italian restaurant (just me lak and Brooke and ally) I got a calzone the size of my head! But the best part was our waitress. She spoke broken English but she was just so sweet. Typically Spanish women are kinda cold but she loved us! She told us all about how she likes the us more than British hahah.

After that we took naps and then decided to meet at 1230 to walk around downtown. There is a big festival kinda because people are getting done with school. Summer begins!!

This morning Luis took a few of us who were functioning to the sculpture museum here in Valladolid. It was sooo awesome its a lot of old wood carvings from the catholic church in hthe tenth eleventh twelfth thirteenth blah blah centuries! So old stuff hhehe but it helps to learn about the history it makes things interesting, aftr he took us to yummy ssnack pre lunch. A common tapa here is the croquet a it's a fried ball with a creamy filling. They are savory tho not sweet.

Anyways I gotta go I'm sweating cause I am stealing Internet and the only place it comes in is in the bright sun. So sorry there is tons of errors in this post but I can't see the screen haha

Friday, June 17, 2011

Mira mama una chica rubia natural!!!

Haha I was running yesterday and a little boy yelled "look mom s girl with natural blonde hair!" haha little does he know....

Well today is Friday thank goodness. I'm bored of school and I am ready to be done. Thank goodness only four days left!! Last night was pretty boring. After supper, Lakshmi and I didn't want to go out, but we took a long nap so we figured we wouldn't fall asleep. So we went for a walk at like 12 it was fun. Haha we figured out we are walking like 2 hrs a day. It's insane.

Yup so I'm boring now just hanging out.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Hello wednesday

Yay we are getting near the end of school! The Asians finish tomorrow and after that only four more days! The friday of our last week is a graduation ceremony haha. So I haven't really been up to anything in the last 24 hours. I had a normal day at school, oh then we had our final conversation partners. That is always a good experience. I had a different girl this time. She was really great. She gave us good tips about where we should go for our final week. Sounds like Valencia, Seville, and Barcelona are must sees, but I also want to stop in Granada to see the alahombra. Lakshmi and I plan on figuring all that out tonight, and getting tickets tomorrow. This weekend is Salamanca. We have heard that it is awesome so I am really excited.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Catch up post lisbon

Here is the low down on this week. I have nothing going on.

Sunday: we woke up at 2 pm. At the food our mommy left us for lunch, went to the beach, and came home to watch our annual Sunday evening movie with our host mom.

Monday: I went to class, Ate lunch, napped, went to the beach, ran (I found a wonderful new place to run by the rose gardens. I love it) and then there was talk of salsa dancing (haha salsa is Latino not Spanish but they don't really have like flamenco classes) but after supper we all met up and it was just a lot of not knowing where we were going and everywhere we went was closed. The girls maybe don't realize that people don't go out so much during the week. The weekends are so fun I don't really think it's worth it.

Alrighty now I'm all caught up! That is my life!

Last day in Lisbon

Alrighty, so it is now Saturday and everyone is exhausted and our train doesn't leave until 4 or something like that. We thought maybe we would go to the beach but when we woke up we realized it wasn't worth it. We had to quick shower and pack because check out was 11. After we checked out of he hotel, keely had this great idea to get American breakfast somewhere. So she asked the hotel lady. Fail. The lady told us a train to take and gave us jank directions once we got off the train so we were tired and crabby and in the middle of Lisbon starving. After attempting to find eggs and pancakes for an hr or so we gave up and went into a random restaurant. Everyone was slap happy but pissed at the same time it was hilarious.

Our breakfast was a fail so we decided to go to the one place in Lisbon that we really bonded. THE MALL. Haha it was right next to the train station and there was a grocery store so we figured we could sit there for the next 4 hrs. Which is exactly what we did. We set up camp los estados unidos right in the center of the food court and chilled. Haha we got food and stuff and some people would get up and walk around while we watched their bags. It was fun actually, miserable but fun.

So next we got on the train. This time I bought portugese Dramamine first (the first time was kinda bad so i figured on no sleep it would be terrible, forgive me for getting a little assistance with sleep) let's just say 10 hrs on a train is awful. But we got home eventually, like 2. Then Lakshmi and I had a nice 40 min walk home then finally finally finally we slept!

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

I believe it's now thursday and I'm going to sintra!

This catch up of journaling and blogging is seriously intense. Good think this week so far we have done absolutely nothing so i am not really getting further and further behind.

So it's Thursday now and we had mixed feelings about today. The girls that were hung over saw the sun when they woke up and decided they wanted to go to the beach. Lakshmi Brooke ally and I however werent so bad and we had heard sintra is a must see. Im so happy we went there is was awesome!!! When Luis told us to go there he said it was a fairytale. He wasn't lying!

So basically you have a 40 min train ride from lisboa to sintra for 4 bucks round trip. Everything is cheap it's awesome. Any who we are at the train station (there was a star bucks it was amazing) any who the people behind us realized we were American. So we talked to them for awhile. They were a family with a guy and girl in college. From San diego, they owned a shampoo company. The dad was super friendly haha I feel like he was more interested in talking to us than his kids. He even sat by us on the bus while his family sat somewhere else. Haha who knows.

So any who we get to sintra and we are starving. We ate at the cutest little cafe. I seriously can't even describe what this to town looks like. First of all it's coastal. It's on the side of Lisbon that is closer to the Atlantic, so amongst the mountains you can see the ocean. It's gorgeous with green plants and gardens everywhere. The city is very old and mainly just for tourists now. It's got like 5 palaces and 3 castles. We decided just to go inside one castle and we would walk by the others. Th castle we went into was a huge moorish castle at the top of this mountain, overlooking the entire town. We had to take a bus up, um it was terrifying. But well worth it. At one point we had to make a ten pt turn. The bus driver got up and asked some men to get out and help him, all in a days work apparently.

The actual castle itself was like a playground. You will just have to see pictures when I get them up. So after that, we decided to get some supper. We found a cute place outside that had something vegan and a hamburger for brooke haha. The guy that owned the place came up to us in the middle of our meal and took a picture of us and asked us where we were from cause apparently they have a facebook page for their restaurant. I'm famous!

Anyway, after a long day we got on the train and came back to Lisbon. We decided earlier as a group to see what barrio alto was all about at night. So after napping and stuff, we hopped on trains at 12 to go out there. Holy house party in the streets. It's a place with solid bars and the catch is people don't stay in them. You get a drink in a plastic cup then stand outside the bar/in the streets and drink it. It was a great place tho because it was a tourist attraction, but for young people. We met people from all over, London, Switzerland (haha my personal favorite because they thought for sure I was Swedish), brazil, and the US.

All in all we had a good time in Lisbon!

Monday, June 13, 2011

Fun Fun Thursday

Alrighty, lisbon post number two coming at ya. THURSDAY:

So after a night of relaxing in the hotel room, we decided to wait for kate and elise (the two girls who hadnt arrived from valladolid yet) to do anything. They didnt get there till 12 which was fine because it felt good to take long showers and eat normal american type breakfasts with huge amounts of tea at the hotel haha. We had looked up the tourist info for lisbon and decided that today would be the day we went to see barrio alto (which is the main shopping/partying center of lisboa) and maybe get some lunch there then head to the aquarium area and actually go into the aquarium and then be over there for dinner and possibly go out there that night.

So thats exactly what we did, train to barrio alto FAIL. we didnt get lost it was just once we got of the train we realized the hype about barrio alto is um that its all bars. LITERALLY ALL BARS. nothing was going on it was like a ghost town. so we were hungie americanas at like 1, and naturally we could see the river so we walked toward it in search of food. i would like to take credit for finding the cutest sushi place ever! i cant wait to upload pics for everyone. oh check my facebook ally masterson (my vegan friend) and keely kemp (my ginger friend) have uploaded some already! So anywho despues de lunch we did the aquarium. call me a nerd but i like to go thro the whole thing and read everything. so i felt a little rushed, but it was worth the money only like 11 euros.

after lunch we decided to get food. the mall we went to the night before was right next to the aquarium so the vegan ally and our picky group member brooke and i went there for supper. everyone else hit up a nice irish bar on the strip next to the water. it was so fun after we ate we just went and sat with them. its hilarious you walk into a place at 6 and they say are you here for drinks or a late lunch....but whatever.

alrighty now the fun begins. we realized we were losers for thinking that you go out after supper. so we went back to the hotel to nap and shower before we went out. at 12 we walked to kate and elise´s hotel (haha they were in the other holiday inn hehe) picked them up then subwayed to our little aquarium area. NO BUENO. there was no one there! and the only people that were there were 17 or so. so needless to say we stuck it out for like an hr (got a bar owner to give us free drinks for being the only people in his bar) then hopped in some cabs. You must remember beside me ally and lakshmi all the girls are soroity girls (minus keely but she partys purty hard) so this next part im ashamed of. They decided to jump in random cabs and say take us to the party. which the cabs willingly did. safely. haha

so now we are in some other area of town. no idea where but it was by the water and there was sail boats it was nice. the bars were packed and it was great everyone was dancing and you didnt even have to drink because it was like being at a middle school dance. so fun! we stayed out late lets just say that. its nice that the girls have experience getting crazy because we dont have to babysit. i appreciate it. haha anywho that was my thursday

And the marathon of blogging must begin...

Almighty so I'm behind I crammed a lot of living into the last few days so I may have to catch up in several posts.

I'll start with Wednesday. Holy early morning. 3am our train to lisboa left!!! It was intense. Train travel is slow and long, but I slept for a while and when I wasn't sleeping it was fun to see the countryside. We arrived in lisboa (in Spanish and portugese its lisboa and in English its Lisbon not sure why) at 10 am. There is a time change between the countries which seems silly. Any who it was so wonderful to get in a cab and say "english or espanol." and he replied "English, I have no idea how to speak spanish." haha I didn't realize no one speaks Spanish, literally no one. But anyway 6 euro cab ride later we got to our hotel, well a holiday inn, not our holiday inn. We attempted to check in but we were at the holiday inn a few miles from the one the cab took us to, so we walked. But oh well ya win some you loose some. It was an adventure.

We decided we needed food, and I had heard of a trolley that just kinda takes you through Lisbon to get a feel for the city. We asked our wonderful hotel staff of how to get there, and they told us that we could get daily metro passes for 4 euro a day. BEST DEAL OF OUR LIVES we lived on the metro in Lisbon I swear. So we found a cafe close to the metro, attempted portugese food which was the same as Spanish except even stricter regulations on free water! I don't know if I have said that glasses of water aren't really free here, some places yes, some places you ask for a glass you get a 2 euro bottle, and in Portugal YOU ALWAYS GET THE BOTTLE! Our last day we were begging the waiter for tap water. Sorry I got sidetracked there. So after lunch we found this trolley and it was so cute. Totally San fransico style. My first impression of portugal was that is is an ugly dirty version of Spain. but the more i looked at it the more I liked it. The city is situated on the tejo river but it's at the mouth to it's really wide and close to the Atlantic ocean. After the trolley we walked along the river cause it was gorgeous.

Lakshmi had heard of an aquarium in Lisbon that was "badass" so we hopped on a bus and went out there when we got bored. I am so glad we did. The area around the aquarium is like the science center in DES moines. A lot of education and kids mixed with a little bit of party. We decided not to go into the aquarium because two girls from our group weren't there yet, but there were these sweet cable cars that started at the aquarium and went along the water. So we rode those down and found ourselves at a strip of bars. Naturally we stopped. Haha then post one drink at 3 in the afternoon we went shopping. Oh h&m how we bonded. But oh well it was the first time any of us had really shopped so it was good. And we went cheap for dinner and ate at the food court of the mall.

We were so tired after this marathon day we just went back to the hotel (via our lovely metro) and chilled.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Portugal!

I love portugal! Everyone needs to book a trip to see sintra. It's a little town outside of lisboa. Ok that's all I have to say. Good night my dearest amigos.

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Test day yuck

Hey so I just had my first exam this morning. It was harder than I expected but not bad. Everyone was kinda freaking out it's a little annoying. I have one more test in like an hr. I'm a little sleepy I don't really want to take it but hopefully after we finish we can just leave. I think I'm kinda sick. I just saw Luis and he said I looked like crap. Haha he is a funny guy. I feel a little better today tho so hopefully it's just a cold. We leave in like 15 hours for portugal! A red eye train it should be fun. There was a mess up with the hotel rooms it's now 80 euro a piece because some ones host mom said if there are extra people in your room they call the police. So that is a no no apparently. It's a little annoying cause one girl booked it without asking but idk its a holiday inn so it will be a nice place. Note to self do everything on my own from now on tho. Ok well I hope everyone is having a good time in los estados unidos! Hasta luego!

Ps I will look and see why you guys can't comment.

Monday, June 6, 2011

Beach, two day week, raisin boobs and allergies. AWESOME

Well I am at school a little miserable. Last night we were watching a movie with our mom (a little Sunday night tradition we got going on) and I started getting really stuffed up. I have been getting a little bit of a sore throat but I'm pretty sure it just allergies. Miraculously the only medicine I brought to Spain was benadryl! Hopefully that helps I just took some. It would suck to be miserable in Portugal. Today in our culture class we learned all about the camino de Santiago. It sounds amazing if anyone wants to go with me it takes a month haha! Tomorrow I have two tests which sucks but I think they will be really easy, plus its the last day of school for the week so nothing can bring me down! Yesterday after I blogged we went to the beach. It's um kinda nasty water similar to the good ole raccoon haha, but the sand is good. Imported from the canary islands! Hahaha and there are people everywhere working out playing vball typical beach stuff. Maybe someday I will take pics of it...there just may or may not be boobies in the background (hence raisin boobs in the title, the old ladies have no shame) OMG there was a topless woman working out in thong bikini doing abs (knee huggers to be exact for those coach Roberts groupies reading this) it was r rated that is for sure. Which speaking of a little cultural tidbit about here is that nothing is sensored (a post Franco rebellion) on tv people are naked bleeding dying whatever! It's different but interesting for a culture who claims to be conservative.

Speaking of, Elaine unemployment is insane (40%)!! So in every city we go ( minus Segovia cause it's mainly older people and tourists) there are huge demonstration in one plaza. The ones in Madrid and barcelona are the biggest and have been getting a bunch of attention on the news. I saw madrids and I got pics! It's like a little tent ghetto in the center of the city. Well anyway ii learned today that the young people here are protesting against democracy. They don't believe it works in times of crisis. It's almost as tho Spain, a developed nation, has reverted to a third world country and needs socialism to get them out of it. I thought it was interesting and very different than our view in the united states.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

I feel a lil awkward

Haha I'm sitting in a bar currently at 1:00 pm on a Sunday wearing running shorts and a tshirt surrounded by a bunch of people who just got done with church ( it's a Spanish thing to go to bars after church) whatevs.
We ended up not staying in Madrid yesterday. The city is really fun and gorgeous but we didn't really know what to do. Its like not super touristy so we kinda saw it in a day, like the museum prado and the palaces and stuff. It was a really really good day tho i liked it a lot. When we got home last night we knew our parents weren't expecting us for supper plus it was like 10 so we figured they were in bed our already done with supper. We went out to a cute pizza place, supposedly the best in town ( there is only like two tho so its not saying much) the pizza was delicious but it was like 12 euro and there was 8 slices for 5 of us. Didn't quite cut it. So we got some tapas at a bar on our walk home. We went the cheap route, which is the first time since we got here because Luis has been paying for our tapas the two times we went out. Um they kinda sucked haha. Well it worked out cause when we got home our parents had went to cigales, their lil pueblo, for the night. And so we raided the fridge. They still aren't home so it's a lil awkward cause they weren't expecting us. Oh well we will see how it goes in an hour or so when they get back! I love you and miss you all. I only have a two day week of school cause i go to Portugal Wednesday yay!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Feliz Fin de Semana!

Hey everyone! TGIF! And I'm already done with class while you losers are just waking up hehe. I'm chilling at a bar stealing their wifi. They don't really understand iPads so I don't think the bar tender knows what I am doing. Using the schools computers gets old and today while I was at school the internet was down....any who um last night. Tapas tapas tapas! Luis treated our group to a tapas crawl it was really fun and the food was delicious. We stayed out pretty late tho so I thought i was going to have a hard time staying awake in class but I was chipper hehe! I'm so excited to go to Madrid tomorrow. There are a few of us planning on getting a hotel and staying the night. Well actually a hostel. Which are completely safe place it's just that damn movie makes them sound bad so I didn't wanna say it. But I did haha. Its seriously like 20 bucks a night in a hostel it's sweet. Yeah so tonight we are just going to kind of hang out. It's finally a little warmer today so that's good. Hopefully by next week we can go to the beach! I'm still rocking short lines and they need to go. Well I will prolly not blog until Sunday evening. Ten un buen fin de semana! I miss you all!

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Boring Day

Good morning everyone! I am really having quite a boring day. Just had class and a little nap now I came back to school to use the internet for awhile. It´s freezing here. Well not freezing but like 16 grados celcius whatever that means. It´s not normal apparently, and no one has proper clothes. Oh well it´s not too bad with a sweater on but I only brought one so it´s getting pretty tacky. I am going to go running after this because I couldn´t this morning. My host mom thinks I´m getting up too early (8 oclock) and she can´t sleep when she knows I´m gone. It really annoys me cause they dont care if we come home at 3 but waking up at 8 is waaaay too much. Whatever tho she was pretty nice about it so I am going to follow the rules. I´m getting excited for madrid this weekend! and a short week of school next because  IM GOING TO PORTUGAL!!! I hear its really really awesome there, and it will be nice to get away from Valladolid for a lil while. Well as far as last night goes I just met with my conversation partner. We went to the beach and had a coke at the bar there then walked home. It´s really good to do that every week it keeps you away from english all afternoon. I am also kind of getting to the point where my brain hurts. not because its hard just because im switching between english and spanish and its pretty difficult. I am also craving cereal and normal food. I love the food here I just want something normal!!!!

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Day I Finally Lost Count

Hey so I didnt blog yesterday we just didnt have computer access. but I bought a train ticket to lisbon portugal for a 4 day weekend!! i cant wait i hear its super pretty. we decided on that place because i dont think i will ever get the chance to go there again so im taking advantage of it now. itll be June 8 to the 11th!!

alrighty i gotta tell you about the bull fight. it was intense. first they stab the bulls with little swords with pretty stuff on them then the matador comes out and waves the flag around to tire out the bleeding bull then they hand him the sword and he stabs the bull (sometimes through and through like you could see the sword poking out the other side) then if he is good he pulls his sword out of the bull...and finally the humane part. he gets a special sword and kills the bull by stabbing it right in the brain stem to severe it so it cant feel and it dies. then the horses come out and they drag the bull off.

glad i went but holy shit. enough said. (when I get my pics up its gonna be awesome)

so yeah that was all i did sunday, then monday was a mess after school lunch siesta, we all met at an internet cafe to plan our trips. well its hard to do on the internet so we ended up walking all over town to get to the train station and talk to them. which im really glad we did they guy saved us 200 euros which is like 300 bucks. But yep we just ate dinner and watched tv with Mari after that.

Now yesterday we actually went to the train station and bought tickets then walked around the city. We got churros and chocolate at the place luis reccommended, but idk they arent super sweet just a lot of fried dough. Not worth the calories. This morning has been good so far I think after class we will just go to lunch then we have our life in spain class with luis on wednesdays at five. thats the one where we meet with our speaking partners. hopefully i get a good one!!