Happy Thanksgiving!!

I'm sitting in my room this morning, missing my family, watching Mulan, and from the dorm rooms on either side of my, I can hear Christmas music!!! haha :) My dad posted a picture of my grandparents' house, all set up and ready for food!! I didn't think Thanksgiving was really important to me, until Tuesday, when I headed to the cafe kitchen to help out with making the food!!

We all had a ton of fun, listening to music, dancing around, making lots of food, and specifically for me, peeling and chopping 20 something pumpkins for pumpkin pie and pumkin soup (my hands are still bruised, and I had the easier job of cubing the pumpkin)...Mark is a beast when it comes to peeling those pumkins... I don't know how he did so many, so fast... But anyway, working together made me realize, to a greater extent, that all of us ESDES students need eachother, in a big way. In a weird way, we've all become a sort of family. We're all in the same boat, missing family and friends and home right now, but we have eachother to make this the most unique Thanksgiving ever :)

So these past two days, as I've been helping out in the kitchen, I've been getting more and more sick. I totally didn't think that I'd actually get sick from being AROUND gluten... but I definitely inhaled it. Soooo much dough was being made... I could see flour everywhere this one time, when 100 cups of flour got dumped into this giant bucket for all the pie crusts... we probably have around 50 pies of the punpkin and apple genres... no joke... it's awesome :)  I had to leave early last night, because I started feeling HORRIBLE. I went to bed early (which never happens) I slept in, and I'm still really sluggish, sick, and in pain. Stupid gluten. I want to be normal and do normal activities without horrible repercussions!! I at least want to make food and have fun with people and not get sick... how simple is that?? I don't care that I can't eat it, I just want to be normal! OK. Enough ranting... It can't be changed. I just need to be lame and stay out of all kitchens, away from most lotions (yes, I got sick from hand lotions here...), and stop doing "normal" things.

SO. last week, John and I took the bikes and headed to the town of Villa Real, a short train ride from school... We were trying to get to a lake, but didn't make it because we had slightly weird directions... Anyway, we had a good 20km bike ride, instead :) It was cool to see a new town, but it was rather industrial.. Next time, we're going to make it to the lake taking a more scenic route. We ran out of daylight to make it back and around the other way, so we just took the train back, and that was it :)

Saturday night and Sunday we had a Volleyball tournament :) It was super fun! Our mostly American team got 3rd place. We could have done better, and the team that won was rather dirty (didn't know it was possible during a Volleyball game, honestly... ), but more than anything else, it was just super fun to play!! I took tons of pictures, which will show up in my photo blog sometime soon... haha...

Sunday night I went out with Julianne, Ricci, and Borja. First, we went bowling, then to a movie, becuase movies don't start before 10:30... It was super fun, and I can honestly say I understood most of the movie, and laughed at a few of the same times as everyone else!! haha. So I guess I got the jokes?

Lack of Internet Leads to Several Entries in One Post

11/4/10
Converted my computer/all internet sites to Spanish, with John's help :) I've been talking MOSTLY in Spanish, and it definitely DOES get easier with practice. Yay :) Today at lunch, this guy (forget his name... but he's a theo student...) told me to stop talking so slowly and perfectly, and to just talk faster and make lots of mistakes. I know he's right, but I hate making mistakes! I feel so stupid!


Week in Review


Saturday night: MiniRally. Futbol tournament. Super fun! I played on a team with other American girls... We won 1, tied 1, and lost 2. Pretty good for only 1 girl that actually plays! Our game plan went like this: Get the ball to Cindy. This plan worked great, except that she got hurt during every game, and each time it was worse! By the last game Saturday night, she was done for :(


Sunday (Halloween): More futbol games! Cindy and Jillian couldn't play due to injuries, so the rest of us played different positions We ended up getting 4th place, out of 5 teams… yup. We’re awesome ☺
That evening, we all dressed up, watched a movie, and ate pizza in Julianne and Brianna’s room. It was super fun!


Monday: Holiday. Día de los Muertos. I went to Valencia with a group of people, had some lunch, and walked around. Holidays in Spain are the worst. But only because I’d like to go DO staff, and everything is closed/only open odd times when I can’t be there. Other than that, I love practicaly having no school ☺


11/17/10
BAHA!! So I was writing that nearly two weeks ago, and forgot to actually post it due to lack of internet. So THIS WEEK… haha


On Sunday, I went to Castellon with some friends, and we met up with our Grammar teacher, Alina. She’s known as the “hott teacher.” Seriously, she’s attractive. Haha. She is pretty much fluent in English and, obviously Spanish, so we always ask her for help when we (me and my Group C classmates) don’t understand something, we always ask her for help, because she’s always the most helpful, and she can translate phrases for us ☺ We walked around the city, did some fun stuff, and ate dinner at an Italian Buffet. Definitely some of the best food I’ve had. REAL, green and red lettuce, fresh mozzarella with tomatoes and balsamic, desserts up the wazoo….I was in heaven.


So, I don’t have school on Friday, (big surprise) so I’m going to get on a random train, make a random stop, and go see a sweet little town ☺ Who knows where I’ll end up! I’m stoked about this trip ☺


Two nights ago, I went with my friend, Richie, to his city league futbol game to take pictures. Now, I should be editing those, but I want to download a free trial of Adobe Lightroom first and see if I can make them look any better (stupid night time with weak lighting).


11/19/10
Here we are! Friday, and I STILL haven’t posted this stupid thing. I went shopping yesterday after classes, and bought tons of necessities at PRIMARK. Definitely my new favorite store ☺ Good prices, decent quality, what more could I ask for??? I walked out of the store with a bag FULL of stuff I needed, and I only spent 45.50 E! I was so proud of myself ☺


I don’t have school today, so I’m going to go explore a random town with my friend John. Should be fun!! If we don’t like it, we’ll hop back on the train and try the next one!


It's 2 AM. The internet is sucking, and I'm bummed because I'm calling my mom back on skype every 5 minutes :( I kinda wish I was tired, but I'm not, thanks to the awesome coffees (yes, plural) I had tonight.

Field Trip - Andalucia y Marruecos

Who gets to be in college and go on field trips? Me :)

Anyways, this past week, I went on a trip with the school to southern Spain and Morocco! It was absolutely amazing. Here's my journal from the week. It's lengthy, but quite detailed... probably too much so... Oh well. We'll see if pictures can be included this time...(trys picasa..no success) ok that's going to be a NO. I need to spend more time on Picasa first. It'll happen, some day!

Note: all my quotes were in Spanish, so I'm "translating" what was said...hehe…ALSO. No proofreading done.. It took long enough to simply type this. By the time I actually finish this, I’m not going to care…

October 18, 2010

Left the school around 9 AM. Rode in a bus for way too many hours (7?8?) We watched Gladiator in Spanish with English subtitles. I couldn't believe that was one of the movie options on a school-sponsored trip. haha

First stop: Hotel in Granada. It was very close to the central area of town, super close to a supermarket, the cathedral, the tourist market, restaurants, etc. Ana (our awesome professor and one of two sponsors on the trip with 56 college students...), took us on a small walking tour of the city and around the Cathedral and then into the Cathedral. It was probably the COOLEST cathedral I think I've ever seen. (I'm saying this on Monday, and we have several more to see.. this actually wasn't the coolest...). It was so fun to watch people's faces as they entered the heart of the Cathedral. 

She let us go for dinner, and said, "Be back at the hotel at 10pm. We have plans." Dinner was awesome. I went to a Chinese restaurant off one of the main streets with some friends. We had, well, some interesting food...not exactly sure what was swimming in Mark’s soup… BUT. We only spent 16 Euro for the four of us. Oh. Did I mention I was eating with 3 guys?? Ya, we did well that meal.

These plans Ana told us about involved a nighttime walking tour of the old part of the city, with spectacular views of the city as well as Al Hambra (the amazing palaces and gardens we were going to see the next day). At the end of the walking tour, the guide left us in front of a small bar. We all went inside and sat down for a Flamenco show. It was amazing how fast the dancers were moving their feet! I was so exhausted, I actually fell asleep, in my chair, with all the loud music, dancing, clapping, and "ole-ing". We got back to the hotel at 1 am. I was soooo ready for bed. 

October 19, 2010 - Granada

In the morning, we went to the Cartuja de la Asuncion de Nuestra Senora. It had cool architecture, but it was kind of a let down after yesterday's amazing Cathedral. 

Next, we went to Al Hambra. I could have spent the ENTIRE day there, walking around and looking at amazing, intricate designs in each room, as well as spending a lot of time in the gardens. We were told that Al Hambra was in the running a few years ago to be one of the 7 Wonders of the World. In the end, however, it was number 8. I loved to see the influences of the different people that lived in the area, which included the Jews, Arabs, and Christians. Different leaders that lived in the palaces included decorations and gifts from the other cultures in their designs of the different rooms to represent the peace and acceptance of different beliefs and cultures. Why can't we do that now?

The outsides of these palace buildings were rather plain and boring, especially in comparison to the inside! Upon entering the buildings, I found that the walls were all very intricately designed, with different moldings and carvings. It's incredible how much patience the people had in order to build something so magnificent, piece-by-piece. Everything in Spain is done more slowly, and with more care. But I think the finished product is definitely a better quality. Americans (especially me) need to take a look at the speed and patience of Spaniards. They understand the concept of taking your time, doing it right, and not rushing through life making yourself believe you enjoy running around like a chicken with your head cut off. A head-cut-off-chicken can’t build 8^th wonders of the world.

OK. The outsides of the buildings might have been slightly plain, but the gardens, fountains, and pools of water were amazing! Arabs didn’t have much water in their homeland, so they wanted water everywhere in their new home in Spain. They had pools of water EVERYWHERE. But these pools were only for reflection and some were for bathing purposes, but the were NEVER used for swimming. I don’t know how they managed to keep kids out of them, because Granada has a high-desert type of climate. That would probably kill me to look at water and not be able to get in it.

We had the afternoon free, so we hit up the Mercadona (favorite grocery store) and ate in a pretty park. Picnics with one knife and one fork for 5 people is the best. Haha! After lunch, we were tired and FULL. Money goes so much farther at the supermarket than at restaurants and street vendors. We went back to the hotel, napped for an hour, and then went and found the street markets designed to trap tourists in a labyrinth of small storefronts with no way out unless you buy everything you see. I am proud to say I only bought two items for myself (besides food), and one was at this market. Harem pants. I have a picture of them on Facebook. They’re the orange and green ones, if you really want to go look for them…

Got some gelato before heading back to the hotel, even though I was freezing. (Pretty sure I ate Gelato every day… yay for being allergic to everything else. haha)

October 20, 2010 – Marabella, Puerto Banus, Gibraltar

More bus time. My favorite. So we had three memorable stops on the way to Gibraltar …

1. Bus leakage. Gross. So, here’s the gist of what happened. All of a sudden, while almost everyone is sleeping, dirty, brown water/oil starts coming out of the ceiling on the left side of the bus, and gets everyone dirty/all the seats. We pulled of the road, and chilled in an empty field for a while…

2. Marabella. Lunch stop/beach time. 1 hour. Not enough time for me to actually want to go swimming, and the water wasn’t incredibly warm, either. It was pretty, but nothing too special.

3. Puerto Banus. I really wanted Gelato. So, I went in search of a little shop. Unfortunately, the only place cost 6 Euro for a SMALL. Ridiculous!! But, I did see some pretty amazing cars and yachts in the port. Everyone walking around us was in their 60s + and they only spoke English. It was super weird to be in Spain and have to talk in English. Ana told us this was where all the rich people vacationed. I could see why. It was beautiful, and the weather was amazing.

Finally, we ended up in Gibraltar. The Californians in the group likened the border control between Spain and Gibraltar to that of California and Mexico. Essentially non-existent, but still a pain to wait in lines… We only had 3 hours or so to spend in Gibraltar. I could have spent 10 minutes and been done. There was one main street through the city, and that’s it. It was just a huge tourist trap with pound signs on everything (since it’s an English colony), making it that much MORE expensive. I ate one stupid French fry from someone else’s plate, because I was hungry but couldn’t really buy any food at the 3 places available, and got sick from Gluten. Bleh. Becka, Chowder and I wandered around the city a little, looking for random other things to see, off the main road. We found a sweet old church up on the side of the mountain, but still surrounded by houses. It made my 3 hours spent there worth it. I didn’t go see the monkeys because I didn’t understand how it all worked, and heard it was going to be super expensive. Oh well. (Not even going to say maybe next time, because there won’t be a next time.)

October 21, 2010 – Morocco

Crazy day! Woke up early, because we had to make our Ferry. Hung out on a sweet ferry for 2 hours while it took us from Spain to Spain… yes, because there are two cities or colonies or something in Morrocco that are Spain’s… So, the Ferry landed in Spain, and there was a tour guide there to take us into Morocco. Then, they told us to split into two groups, since we couldn’t all fit on one of their busses. Spanish group, and English group. I went with the Spanish group. Border patrol here was much more strict. As soon as we crossed the border, I definitely noticed lots of differences. I found all the cars built in the 1990’s and before! They’re hidden in Morocco.

We took the road that followed the coastline into the city. The water, for the first 100 feet or so out into the ocean was brown, murky, and disgusting. There were tons of what must have been beautiful hotels along the shoreline, but all of them were run down and deserted. Clearly, this wasn’t a high-traffic tourist area, as it had once been. It was quite sad, really, because the area would have been beautiful with a little up-keep.

On our way to the city, we stopped at what appeared to be a rest stop. There were two younger gentlemen with two camels, ready to ride, and an older gentleman with two more camels to take pictures with. I was super excited to say I rode a camel in Morocco, until I hopped off the bus, and saw how horribly mistreated these camels were, and how long the rides were (10 steps) for 1 Euro. I was not going to give those guys any of my money. I felt super bad for the camels. Clearly, the camels were miserable. I was not going to support what those guys were doing to their animals so that they could make money of the Americans…

We get into the city, pass by lots of interesting things, and finally stop. We get out, and we’re told this is part of our walking tour. We walk into the food market area… Now, this would have been awesome and fine, except for the meat market and the fact that there are TONS of people, and I don’t want to get separated because I was slightly scared I was going to get pulled into an alley (there were lots of them…). Meat market. Fish smell HORRIBLE when they’re somewhat fresh, but dead on ice. The melted ice was making rivers down the street, and I was wearing sandals. GROSS!!! I wanted to throw up, but I was too scared I’d lose sight of the person in front of me, making it difficult to keep up with the group, and therefore getting pulled into an alley.   (OK. I thought about this a little too much. But I didn’t exactly feel safe in my surroundings…)

We walked through a maze of houses and shops and other buildings. I was completely disoriented. We went to a rug store, where everything was RIDICULOUSLY overpriced, but it was pretty cool to see all of the designs and the beautiful work done by hand.

Lunch was included in part of the tour. It was a traditional meal of couscous, veggies, and chicken. With a salad soaked in oily stuff… I got to eat the oily salad thing… Delicious. The only other people in the restaurant were Americans in another tour group thing. They were probably about our age, as well.

After lunch, we went to a farmacie. Yes, that is how they spell it! They, again, tried to sell us stuff. This time it worked. I bought Henna… because it was actually cheaper there than anywhere else I’ve seen…

After that, we were pretty much done with the tour, and just headed back out of the city, thru the border, and back to the ferry. Unfortunately, they never really checked our passports, so I don’t have a cool stamp in it from Morocco L

October 22, 2010 – Sevilla

Woke up, packed up, and headed to Sevilla. Saw the 3^rd largest Cathedral in the world. AMAZING!! It had an absolutely ginormous organ. Definitely a Gothic cathedral. I found a little piece of paper that says it’s the Guiness World Records certified largest area covered for one cathedral… or something like that.

Later in the afternoon, we went on a surprise horse-drawn carriage ride through a small section of the city, a sweet park, and the Plaza of Spain. I think we were all more excited about it because our teacher was excited more than the fact that we were all super excited about what we were actually doing…

When we got back to our starting point, next to the cathedral and in front of a fountain, a group of people decided it would be fun to take a jumping picture off the fountain. I was wearing a dress, but thought I was holding the right parts down enough to be OK. Haha. Oops. Ya, that was a fail. I don’t want to find out if people got pictures or not. I was thoroughly embarrassed.

We essentially had free time for the rest of the day. I walked around the city with Becka and Daniel. We went to the major shopping area, looked around, and when we went into H&M and split up, I got followed around by a creeper with a scar over his right eye. As we continued walking, we found a market. I found the same bed coverings we’d seen in Morocco for 16 Euro, while the ones in Morocco were around 120. Ya. Ripoff. Really, America? You have to buy it in Morocco? What if it just says Made in Morocco… Sounds good enough to me at that much of a price difference.

October 23, 2010 - Sevilla

I woke up sick, but actually rested for the first time the entire trip. Too much gelato. We had church in a park, which was absolutely beautiful!  The people leading out in church had an awesome plan to involve everyone. They split us up into groups, assigned us different portions of the service, gave us twenty minutes, and said, “How can we worship in a different way during this part of the service?” The theme was “Crossing Boarders”.  It was amazing to see how creative all the groups were.

The rest of the day we had free to do whatever we wanted. I spent a lot of time writing in my journal, drinking tea, and walking around. It was awesome.

In the evening, Becka, Chowder and I went to a supermarket, bought some stuff, and took it to the river front. We sat on a rock wall overlooking the river and bridge. It was sooo beautiful! We walked around the river for a little while, walked over a few bridges, then stopped in the middle of one because it had lights facing down toward the water. Becka threw in a piece of bread. It took the fish a few minutes to figure out what it was, but once they did, it was super fun to watch them take huge bites out of it and fight for it. People walking over the bridge gave us the funniest looks. Here are 3 college students, intensely watching fish eat bread, and laughing and exclaiming over the fish. Quite amusing.

We went and found another café for the evening, because we wanted to sit around, journal, and people watch. We went to “Café de Indias” which Chowder described as a “racist Starbucks.” It was essentially a mirror image of the Starbucks across the street. We could hear a concert going on from the café, so we went and checked it out, but it wasn’t that great. So we went to find the Roman Ruins. Turns out, it’s just two small columns… that’s it… So we called it a night and went back to the hotel.

October 24, 2010 – Sevilla, Cordoba

Went to another palace this morning. It was similar to Al Hambra, but I didn’t think the actual palace was as cool. However, the gardens were amazing!

Afternoon: Cordoba! Ana took us on a short walking tour of the town, and then we were free for the evening. I walked the Roman Bridge with a group of people, and then we headed back to the hotel. The town was pretty much dead. Of course, it was a Sunday night… probably part of the reason

October 25, 2010 – Return Trip

Went to a Mezquita in the morning, which was cool, and then headed back towards Sagunto (7.5 hour trip with stops).

By this point, I was SUPER sick. I was pretty much miserable the whole way back to school, but I would not have traded all that gelato and no sleep for anything! However, healthier food/food I could actually eat would have been nice…

When I got back to the school and they told us to run to dinner before it closed, I was ecstatic that they gave me a bowl of lentil soup. I never thought I would be so happy to see lentils in my life. I can honestly say I missed the cafeteria while we were travelling. How crazy is that?!

1 Month Down...7.5 to go :)

I can't believe I've already been here for one month!! :) Spain is amazing, and my Spanish is improving! SLOWLY, at times, but still improving.

Due to my lack of patience, there will be no pictures accompanying this post. Everyone and their dog is using the internet right now, making it SNaIL SPeeD. Bummer.

OBVIOUSLY I'm really good at posting on this blog frequently, but I've been writing stuff down, so I should be able to recall most of the "important" details of this last month...

The first full week of classes (Sept 20-24) was a little overwhelming. I didn't understand everything my teachers were saying, had to look up words (in my handy dandy Spanish English Dictionary) in order to understand the directions at the top of the page for my assignments and homework, and there was NO WAY I was going to talk in Spanish unless I had to. I was so embarrassed at how "American" I sounded, and didn't want anyone to know... (haha. Like it wasn't already obvious...) However, the first Wednesday I was there, we took a field trip to Sagunto (5 minute bus ride, max). The night before, my friend Mark challenged me to only speak in Spanish, and I did it! ...by pretty much not talking for the entire day. But oh well! It helped me learn new words and phrases, pushed me out of my comfort zone, as well as taught me a lesson in not needing to constantly be talking. Observing and listening are often better options. (You'd think I would have already learned that...) So. We went to Sagunto and explored the castle on top of hill overlooking the city of Sagunto. (And this would be the perfect place to insert pictures. Stupid internet.) And then went to the market. Pretty much anything you could possibly want, at a reasonable price, is in the market. It's every Wednesday, while I'm in class. :( Definitely going to need to skip class sometime soon and get over there again. It's amazing.

The following week, on September 29, I went to my first Futbol game! :) Truly amazing :) I can honestly say I enjoyed it more than a football game. Unfortunately, Valencia lost to Manchester United. Since the busses stop running at 10, we couldn't get back to the school that night, and the school was taking us to Valencia in the morning, some friends and I spent the night at a hostel and met up with the rest of the group the next morning. Instead of going back to the hostel and sleeping after the game, we decided to walk the streets of Valencia, which were surprisingly still quite busy at 12AM. The next day, however, we were informed that more places would have been open if not for the strike on the day of the game. The school tour of Valencia was not nearly as interesting as the walking tour I went on the day before... We got off at the wrong train stop, due to our "local" tour guide, and had to essentially walk through the ENTIRE city to get to the hostel (2 hour power walk), then another 20 minute walk to the game... By the time we got to the game, I was soooo ready to sit and relax. haha.

The next weekend, Oct 1-3, I went on a "camping" trip with the entire school/church. You really can't call it camping, since we were living in little "bungalos" with nice mattresses and showers and all. The beach was literally across the street from the camping area. We went tide-pooling in search of crabs (that's all there was to search for.. no sea anemone or anything to stick your fingers in like on the California coast.) Later Saturday afternoon, a large group of us got together, and we started a game of American football... I had many good laughs trying to explain the rules to hott, athletic Spanish dudes who don't understand why the ball isn't constantly moving in a forward direction. Saturday night, I talked witha  group of guys about the US president, economy, government, etc. I learned lots of new words (because they were so similar to English). They can't understand why I wouldn't want the US to become a socialistic society.... It's hard to explain why I wouldn't want something they already have that's working just fine for them... I got super frustrated with my lack of vocabulary, because I felt stupid using lots of small words in the process of trying to explain myself. Luckily, they were patient with me and helped me out. This was the first time I realized I could somewhat carry on a conversation in Spanish...
Sunday was more of the same awesomeness. Chilling on the beach and having a blast.

I went to school for three days, then headed off to LONDON early Thursday morning :) There was some holiday the following Monday and Tuesday, but the plane tickets didn't work out that way, so me and 22 other people missed classes to head off to England :) I wish I could have spent a month in England. It was so amazing, and so much to see!! The only thing that put a damper on the trip, for me, was spraining my ankle on the LAST stair, on my way out the door at 6:30 AM to get to our bus on time. It got pretty swollen, and is still quite painful if I have to turn, run, or do anything except walk in a straight line. I think walking tons of miles every day helped it heal faster.

Thursday was spent entirely on traveling. We arrived at our sketchy hostel, and wondered what we'd gotten ourselves into, being 20 minutes outside London, by train. We were in the middle of a miniature India, which was actually pretty sweet. Mark and I ate the BEST indian food ever for dinner that night, and it was reasonably priced! Everyone else at Pizza Hut. Lame.

Friday, we walked what I thought was all over the place, seeing lots of different touristy landmarks and buildings (Westminster Abbey, Westminster Cathedral, Trafalgar Square, The National Gallery, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace). My absolute favorite part of the day was listening to the Evensong concert in Westminster Abbey. AMAZING sound. I had never heard anything sound as good in person as their male choir. That night, when I looked at the map, I realized we'd only covered 25% of the city... somewhat depressing.

Saturday was John's birthday. We walked through Hyde Park and did some other random things... then that evening we all went out to Mexican food for his birthday. The food was amazing! None of us had had Mexican food since leaving the US, and we all thoroughly enjoyed it. Mark took about 200 pictures of pigeons in the park. He would chase them and snap pictures at the same time. It was quite hilarious to watch... I don't think I took pictures of him taking pictures, but I should have!

Sunday, I went with John and Mark to Box Hill, a small town about an hour outside London. We ended up hiking through a vineyard just opposite of Box Hill, but the view was amazing and didn't have all the tourists. I loved how green everything was. No need to enhance or edit the pictures! :)

We had to head back to Bournemouth by train on Sunday evening in order to make our flight early Monday morning. Since we had 6 hours to kill upon arriving in Bournemouth, the guys decided to make a video including shopping carts from the empty parking garage across the street from the train station. I can't wait to see their video. We also walked to the beach. The guys jumped in the Atlantic at 1AM. Props to them. I was super cold with all my layers on standing on shore. There was NO WAY I was going to get in that water. Around 2:30 AM we made it to the airport, half slept half talked half listened to music til 5:30, then went through security, got on our flight, and headed back to school. Chandler missed his bus back to Bournemouth, therefore missing the flight. We were all super worried about him, but he made it back to the school a few hours after us... with quite a story to tell :)

I slept all afternoon and evening, exhausted from the trip. Totally threw off my sleep schedule, as I didn't go to sleep til 3 AM. And this brings me to this past week... which I will talk about later, since it's 1:15AM, and I'm super tired. And nothing happened that I think I need to share right this instant.

This Past Weekend...

Friday was the first day of classes, and I only had two. Both teachers said, "Enjoy your first weekend!" So I had absolutely nothing I had to do :) I love the feeling!

I went to vespers, and after that, everyone kinda just went back to the dorms to bed... I, on the other had, wanted to SEE something, since all I had seen was the airport and the campus. I decided to explore the dorm. I found out we have better laundry rooms here than at Walla Walla, and ROOF ACCESS!!! From the roof, I can see all of Sagunto, the Mediterranean, and the ruins of a castle on top of the mountain overlooking Sagunto. It was beautiful! I took pictures, but the internet is too slow to load them right now...

Saturday was church... of course :) We (Me, Anleah, Emily, Liz, Heather, Julianne, and Becka) accidentally walked out in the middle of the church service, thinking it was over. We had already stood up and sat down for different prayers about 7 times, and we thought it was over, this one time, because everyone was talking, no one was up front, and a whole bunch of the local high school kids were getting up and leaving! oops. We were all too embarrassed, or at least I was, to go back in, so we stayed in the lobby til it was time for Sabbath School.

For Sabbath School, they set up white, plastic chairs outside in relatively small circles. Different people lead out each group. It reminded me of small groups at my own church, and I thought, "What a great idea?! What if my church did something like this during the summer? The congregation would get to know each other soooo much better, and everyone would make new friends and be more connected." Isn't that what church is supposed to be??

In the afternoon, everyone wanted to take naps who didn't go to the beach... how lame is that?! Who naps on Saturday afternoons?? That's the one thing that's always been hard for me. Taking naps during the day, and waiting around. (OK, two things...) I got to talk to my parents instead of nap :) It was awesome! So much more refreshing :)

At 6, some campus group had planned a get-together including ice-breaker games. They thought only 15 would even show up, but it was more like 50... which was cool! I got to meet more people, which is what I love to do. After vespers, everyone hung out and we played tons of games, like Mafia and Ninja. It was actually super fun to see tons of high school and college-aged people all hanging out and having fun together. It's not something I've seen happen successfully at home, which is sad. Think about what a great impact both groups could be on each other!

Sunday, Daniel and I rode bikes to the beach. We invited lots more people, but the girls wanted to go to Valencia, and the guys wanted to sleep... at noon... whatever. So, we hung out at the beach, enjoyed the refreshingly WARM water, and then headed back towards the school. However, we made a stop at the information station, which, of course, was closed, and ended up finding the historical part of Sagunto. It is soooo pretty!!! I finally felt like I was actually in Europe after we walked the old, narrow, cobblestone streets and took tons of pictures. Total mileage on a bike with a horrible seat: 11 miles... :(

Every evening, starting last night, we have open gym! I played indoor Soccer. Yes. It was actually super fun! I never thought I would actually enjoy it. I can honestly say I now want to put effort into understanding the game and improving my skills.

Mondays are my longest school days.. I start at 8:50, and finish at 5, with a few Spanish breaks... haha 30 minutes here, 25 minutes there... you know :) So actually, it isn't that bad.

The first morning I was here, Chandler said, "Every day you spend here you will like it more. It kinda grows on you." The first day, I never thought that was going to be possible, but he was right!

I love this place :) ...Even with the naps and waiting around :)

Day 1

Fun fact: Recaro makes airplane tray tables. How cool is that?

I literally RAN through the airport to make all of my connecting flights. Quite entertaining. I slept pretty well on my flight from San Francisco to London since I took benadryl. If not for that sleep, I would NOT be functioning right now...

I arrived at the Valencia airport a little before 9pm. Unfortunately, my luggage didn't arrive with me. There was definitely a sinking feeling as I saw the gates close at the baggage claim without my bags. I was tired, and very worried about actually having to SPEAK Spanish. I was so good at avoiding the speaking part of Spanish through all of my classes in the US, but now I had no choice. Too bad I didn't take more advantage of it when I had the chance. I pulled out my pocket dictionary (good thing it was in my carry-on! I almost packed it. haha), looked up the word for suitcases, which is "moleta," and proceded to inform the only official-looking person in baggage claim that I didn't have my suitcases. He told me to go to the Iberia baggage claim area, which was through the mysterious automatic sliding doors... "Dang It!" I thought, "Now I have to talk to more people in Spanish." I wanted to cry. I didn't want to talk to anyone, I wasn't going to have all my stuff for my first day of school, and the guy at the counter couldn't track down my bags. He specifically stated that he had no idea where my bags were, and that someone would have to find them tomorrow.(Well, maybe no specifically stated, since he was talking in Spanish and that was a rough translation...) I gave him the information he needed, sat down at the Cafe I was instructed to stay at if someone from the college wasn't there right then to pick me up, and waited. I couldn't figure out how to use the phone, and there was no wifi. After an hour and a half of waiting, hoping someone would be there before the rest of the airport shut down, Samuel and his wife, Katarina, showed up. My life got soooo much better from that point on. We waited for another two hours for some more people to get in, since they missed their flight from Madrid. Eventually, we decided they weren't coming, and left.

I got to the school at about 12:30am, today... I was exhuasted, but couldn't make myself go to sleep! I think I slept 4 hours?? I'm completely running on adrenaline right now, trying to keep myself awake!

We had to take a multiple-choice test this morning, and I actually surprised myself. I remembered more of it that I thought I would! We'll see if the test says the same thing. . . We took a tour of the campus, which was very helpful for me, since I had no idea where anything was. My roommate is very helpful. She's from Mexico and wants to teach Spanish, so she has come to Sagunto to perfect her Spanish. She speaks a little English, I speak a little Spanish, and we get by :) Or, you know, just smile and nod... haha.