Update on life

Helloooo everyone, so it's finally the weekend again!  Julie and I were wanting to go to Barcelona, but the plane tickets were just too much!  Instead, we're going to go to Madrid.  Should be fun, though I would be more excited about Barcelona... such is life.  This week went by pretty fast for me!  I have an eye infection... not fun!  Get to wear my glasses for the next 7 days.  I went to the doctor today and got some eye drops, hopefully I don't spread it to my other eye.  Also had my first test this week.  I think it went well, but I never know until I get tests back, so we shall see.  My program took us to the Arab Tea House this week.  For whatever reason I thought we were supposed to meet at 6:30, but turns out it was 6.  Thankfully Kelsey kind of knew where it was so we were able to find our group and join only slightly late.  The atmosphere inside was really cool, but I'm not one for tea so I (tried) to enjoy a small little cup.  It was still a good experience and I'm glad I went.  You can find Arab influences all over the place in south Spain, it's insane!  But, at the same time really neat.  My friends and I also had our second dance lesson this week!  I can't remember if I mentioned this before, but we've signed up for a months worth of Sevillana dance lessons.  This week we finished the steps to the entire dance, now just for combining the arms with the feet...  Sevillana is what the Sevillans dance during Feria de Abril, so hopefully I'll be able to join in during those festivals!  The weather this week has been horrible, cold and rainy.  It's supposed to be really nice this weekend (getting up to the 70s), but of course I'm headed north so I won't get to enjoy it.  Hopefully the nice weather continues on into next week though!  Well, I need to get packing and such.  I'll post about Madrid as soon as I can!

Arcos & Jerez- home of Sherry wine

Hola todos!  This Saturday Julie and I went out on a little adventure; just Julie, myself and good ole Rick Steve's.  For those of you unfamiliar to Rick, he is a well known, professional traveler who helps novice travelers, like myself and Julie, get the best out of their adventures.... aka the author of the Spain travel book Julie and I both bought for our trip here.  We put all of our trust in Rick this Saturday.  He only let us down when it came to his map making skills.  Fortunately for us, this allowed us to see more of Jerez then planned.  While we were trying to head north on the map we kind of somehow ended up southwest.... but it was well worth it!  We saw the Cathedral and Tio Pepe!  We eventually made it up to Bodega Sandeman for a tour and wine tasting.  Lesson learned, sherry is absolutely disgusting!  We both had to force it down.  We started with an extremely dry wine.  After the first glass my only thoughts were that it could only get better...boy was I wrong!  We humored ourselves and ended up taking pictures of us forcing the stuff down (pictured below).

Though we both hated the tasting, we both agreed we were happy we went.  Leaving Sandeman we ended up back over by the Cathedral (again, not having a clue how we got there), but eventually found our way back to the train/bus station.  We went into the bus station to catch a bus to Arcos to find the building more or less completely deserted.  We blamed it on siesta and decided to go eat and come back.  Well, upon our return there may have been one or two more people in the building... but that's it, no exaggeration.  Somehow we figured out you went straight to the bus to pay and hitch a ride.  After this trip I definitely felt I have officially dominated public transportation.  We had to take the metro to the train station and the bus to and from Arcos, but I digress. Arcos was a quick 30min bus ride from Jerez.  Rick offered a self-guided tour of Arcos, but after the fiasco with his map of Jerez we decided to explore ourselves.  Arcos is a really small town with one way in and one way out so it was pretty easy finding our way around.  After seeing Arcos I'm not really sure why any of the other cities are defined as white hill towns.  Arcos literally is a white hill town with all white buildings built on the side of a cliff, the other towns? not so much.  The city had amazing views!  When we got to the top where the Santa Maria church was we had an amazing view of the rolling hills below.  Being in Arcos made me realize just how big Sevilla is.  It definitely made me slightly homesick for the small city I know at home! 

Cordoba!

We had our first excursion today to Cordoba!  The first thing I learned getting off of the bus today was that Cordoba means city by the hill and it is one of Andalucia's five White Hill Towns.  It was a cute little town, but definitely one of those single-day trips.  We got a tour of the Cathedral which used to be a Mosque until the Christians took over and converted it into a Cathedral.  Inside was insane!  Below is a picture of Julie, Kelsey G. and myself posing in the arches found throughout the entire Cathedral (left over from the Mosque). 

In the middle of the building you can find the alter.  Like any other Catholic church, it was required to be in the shape of a Christian symbol.  When you're in the middle you can see the shape of a cross made by the pews, alter and choir area.  While we were there, a group of young men were having choir practice (or something of the sort).  They had amazing voices!  I felt like such a tourist taking a picture of them, but I couldn't resist.  (at the same time I am a tourist...so it's expected right?)  Below is a picture depicting the two contradicting Religions found within this building with the Arabic arches and the Crucifix. 

 

After the Cathedral we walked over to the Jewish Quarters which was a cute little area, but I didn't catch much of what the tour guide was saying if I'm being quite honest.  It was a small little garden area with a cute fountain... wish I had paid attention a little more!  After that we walked along/inside the walls of the city.  Inside the walls was (what you could tell would normally be) beautiful gardens.  Unfortunately, we came at a bad time and a lot of construction and upkeep going on.  When we climbed up the tower of the walls we saw an amazing view of the city!  Here's one of me with Cordoba in the background!

As always, you can find lots more pictures on Facebook.  (I'll have these posted in the next day or two at least), but I can only add so many pictures on my blog! =)  The day was really fun, but tiring, especially since I've been sick lately.  But, I'm not letting this interfere with my travels!  Julie and I are headed to Jerez and Arcos tomorrow; two more of Andalucia's White Hill Towns!

Heat, Light or a Cell Phone....

The other night Lauren and I were getting ready to go out when we found ourselves in a dilemma, or more so Lauren found herself in a dilemma.  The room we're sharing has two outlets, thus we can only have two things going at once.  (I should point out that our ceiling light blew earlier that day for the second time since we've been living here).  Naturally, we have our nightstand lamp on in one outlet and the miniature, 1940s, heater going in the second one when Lauren's cell phone started dying.  She looked at me lost as to what she should do...when she asked me if I had to choose between having light, heat or a cell phone we both more or less answered simultaneously answered, "cell phone."  I love this because only our generation would answer this way.  

Saturday Julie, Kelsey G., Ale and I went to Plaza de Espana to layout in the sun.  It was so nice!  It's the perfect place to just chill.  I wrote in my journal which was long over due (worse than my blog if you can believe that!).  Being in the sun was amazing... it was the first time I (slightly) broke a sweat which was actually exciting given the fact that I thought the weather was going to be nicer then it has been.  It definitely has warmed up a bit though and we're told that by the end of February/beginning of March it should be really nice weather, definitely looking forward to that!

I just recently got sick, but I think I've passed the peak.  Last night was the worst.  I got a fever on top of my runny nose and cough.  This is probably due to the fact that I walked about 30min to go to a dance lesson, but I must say it was worth it =).  Some of my friends and I have signed up for dance lessons to learn Sevillana Dance which what everyone dances at Feria de Abril.  We just had our first one yesterday, hopefully I'll be a pro by the end of my lessons!  Haha, at least well enough to join in on during the festivals.  had to skip classes today due to my illness, but I think it definitely paid off.  My fever broke and I got a lot of sleep in.  Going to the pharmacy here was also an experience ha!  It wasn't too bad, I was able to communicate with the pharmacist =).  He was really nice!  Towards to end he told me he spoke English, I told him that was good and all, but I wasn't to learn Spanish!  He said (more or less) fair enough, that's good!   Speaking of talking in Spanish, I have started having quite a few conversations in Spanish, which is really exciting!  I've had a couple with the son and a couple with my house mom.  It is the best feeling ever at the end of these conversations thinking I just communicated in another language!  It is also getting easier to tell my house mom things when I need to ask her something or tell her something.  When I first arrived I wasn't confident enough with my Spanish to say anything at all really.  I have definitely already come really far with this.  Also, on a side note, below are two pictures of my room.  Something I should have done at the beginning.

This is my half of the room at least.  Bed on the left with my beautiful peace sign collage of pictures =) and then my closet and desk... and yes, Lucy came along with me!  Couldn't leave the cutest little penguin at home all alone.

Tomorrow my program has a trip to Cordoba planned.  Don't really know much about the city at all, but I guess I'll learn all about it tomorrow!  I'll have to let you all know how it goes and show you some pictures!

Vino de Naranja

Hola todos!  Sorry again for taking 5 years to update... I will get used to this at some point!  It's hard to know what I want to say in my posts.  And it's hard to remember everything at the same time. (yes, I know that's why I should update more... I'm working on it!)  Anyway, second week of classes now.  Not enjoying International Management.  I don't really like how my professor teaches, not sure what it is about it.  He has some interesting things to say, but something about the way he teaches bothers me, haven't quite put my finger on exactly what it is.  International Business is more or less a repeat of what I learn in International Management (give or take some)  The other day we learned how the economy in Spain crashed.  Basically, over here when the money currency changed over to the euro a lot of people had money the government didn't know about and they couldn't trade in these massive amounts of money without raising a red flag to the government.  These people ended up putting all of their money into real estate and when the currency changed over they tried to sell back all of the property which wasn't possible.  Apparently if you drive along the coast there are multiple developments that have been abandoned because they didn't have the money to finish them.  (I'm missing some, but that's more or less the gist of what went down.)  Moving on, photography has been amazing so far!  I've learned how to use my camera without using my flash.  When used correctly you can get a picture that looks basically identical to what you're seeing with your eye.  (you know how sometimes the flash washes out the picture so then you try without a flash but there's not enough light?  yes, well that will never happen to me again!)  This picture is one I took one night of the river that runs through the city.  I'm really proud of it! ;)

On a more social note, I've met some really nice people over here!  Roxy and Alex (the two that have been living with me) are leaving this weekend, which I'm really sad about.  I've loved having them around, it's going to be so different without them!  But, Julie got here yesterday, which is really exciting.  Both of my roommates for the semester are great!  One of my friends Kelsey G. and I have planned a trip to Greece for the end of Febuary.  We are both ridiculously excited for it!  I've always wanted to go to Greece, I feel like a dream is coming true!  We'll see Athens and one of the Islands (we haven't picked which one yet).  Speaking of Kelsey, last night we went to go get a drink together and got lost in El Centro looking for a cute little restaurant to go into.  We finally picked one and they had a sign outside saying "Vine de naranja.)  Being in the city of Orange Trees my automatic reaction is to try it... bad idea!! I took 2 sips and couldn't drink anymore.  It was one of the worst drinks I have ever had.  Wine's should stick to grapes!  Speaking of all of the orange trees here (sorry to reiterate) Kelsey C. and I were walking to get tapas the other day and along the street workers were picking all of the oranges from a line of trees making the air smell full of oranges.  It was great!

I have met a lot of really nice girls so far!  Below is a picture of almost everyone in my group of friends over here. 

L to R: Molly, (random girl we don't know), Kelsey C., Megan, Jessi, Karla and Kelsey C. (the only girl missing is Maura!)

At first I was really worried about making a group of friends because a lot of the people clicked the first day.  Because a lot of them are from the northeast they have mutual friends, which makes an automatic connection. (this was not the case for me!  I think I've only met one other person from Tennessee so far).  Luckily though, I've found a great group of girls to hang out with!  We met up the other day to discuss travel plans and from the looks of it we won't be able to do much traveling together because everyone has various destination plans and different times they plan on doing their traveling, but it's fine.  Like I said before Kelsey G. is going with me to Greece and I believe Maura, Jessi and I are going to plan something for the week of Feria De Abril.  It will all work out in its' own way!  

I'm not sure if I have mentioned this before or not because as a lot of you know I have a horrible memory, but my absolute favorite place in Sevilla (thus far) is Plaza de España.  It's one of those jaw dropping places.  The first two times I went there I had no idea what the history was behind it.  Unfortunately, when I read up on it I was disappointed to find out what it's purpose had been.  It simply was built for a big International festival held in 1929 for all of the Spanish speaking countries.  This is neat and all, but it doesn't have the history I was hoping it had.  Needless to say, I still love the place and have started going there to just hangout and enjoy the sun after classes.  Here's a picture I took the other day!