Coming home pictures

Mother's Day lunch with Grandma, Bucky, and Downtown Sue

Putting on Abbie's shoes :-)

Nina!

My parents had a cold diet coke and Kirschbaums smiley face cookies waiting for me... I think I cried a little bit with my first sip of Diet Coke

Reuniting with my dad at the airport

And with my mom!

I figured I would post some "coming home" pictures for anyone who hasn't seen them yet :-)

i'm HOOOOOME!!!!!

Just a quick post to let everyone know that I got home safe and sound :-) I'm LOOOOOVING being home already... getting to see my parents at the airport was totally surreal and so awesome! I'll post more later-- going on 1 hour of sleep in the past 36 hours so I need a nap! CANNOT wait to see everyone!

hasta luego, grana

Surreal. So so so so so surreal. In two hours, I start my journey home. Oh. My. Gosh.

I'm trying to put how I'm feeling into words but I'm having trouble, which, I'm pretty sure, is because I really don't believe that I'm leaving. I really feel like it was yesterday that I was sitting in my piso looking at my iCal and just wishing it was February. And now it's May and the next dinner I eat will be my mom's pizza and the next time I change clothes will be in my room. So unbelievably crazy.

I used to really not get why people were so "you NEED to study abroad... it's the BEST thing ever". It's TOUGH! It's hard and you have to be away from your family and your friends and everyone and you're in a completely new place where they don't speak English and it's hard! But when you're sitting and waiting for your cab to come pick you up on the last day, you kind of get it. You get that you just did something REALLY cool. You realize that you lived in a foreign country for four months. You realize that you lived in a small city in a non-English-speaking country with a family that knows almost no English. You realize that in four months, you have been on three continents, in seven countries, and in fifteen cities. You realize that you did something you never thought you could do. This feeling is worth every skype session that I sobbed through, every time I turned bright red stumbling my way through a conversation, every time I would see my friends' away messages and get homesick... It's worth it. And the absolute BEST thing is that in a few hours I get to come home and see everyone that I've missed the crap out of for the past four months.

Tonight was our farewell dinner, which was a great time, along with our CEGRI rage at Granero. Highlights included eating a great meal, getting to eat at the same table as Miguel Angel and Nerea, watching my teachers dance on a bar, taking a shot of tequila with Yanira, my lit and conversation teacher, and watching the entire CEGRI staff chase out a guy who was creeping on all of the girls. It was the perfect end to the CEGRI experience. I'm really going to miss the CEGRI teachers! I also just said goodbye to Alli and Breezy, which was SOOOO tough! Thank goodness I get to see them in a few weeks though!

I also just wanted to thank everyone so much for being so so so so supportive of me during this whole experience. I am so lucky to have such a solid support system back home and such great people to go home to. Thank you so much to everyone for reading my blog and keeping up with me... It really means more than I can say. I love you all and can't wait to see you!!

WE GOT TO SEE ALI!!

OH. MY. GOSH.

That was the best goodbye to BADos I could ever imagine! 

So a few weeks ago, we found out that our favorite bartender, Ali (the bartender previously known as Alé.... I was spelling his name wrong this whole time) had left BADos. We were SO upset that we didn't know it was his last night and that we weren't able to say goodbye to him. Legitimately, I got a little bit choked up over it. He was just one of the best people we met here and we were so bummed we had no way to say goodbye. 

Cut to today... We're walking to BADos and pass an outdoor café. All of a sudden we hear a man yell, "¡Chicas!" (Girls!) we look over and see Ali jumping out of his seat and running over to say hi to us!! WE FOUND HIM! We were in such shock and were just so excited that we got to see him one more time. We told him that we were going to the bar for a drink and that we missed him and that we were so worried we were going to have to leave without saying goodbye. He gave us his e-mail and phone number and facebook name so we can keep in touch when we're back in the US. He also ended up coming to the bar later to say hello again and so that we could take a picture with him. It was just so great to have that closure with our Spanish friend!

It's weird to think that I went to BADos our first night here. Out of all the tapas bars in the city, we randomly chose that one and it became a place that we were known. It became a place where we were always welcomed with hugs, kisses, and as many rounds of "las tapas primeras" (the first kind of tapas) that we wanted. Ali and Moha were so welcoming to our visitors and made all of them fall in love with BADos as much as we did. As excited as I am to get back to Kam's, I have to say that BADos will always hold a very special place in my heart. 

A tribute... because I love BADos and this is more appealing than studying for my grammar final..

día de la cruz

It was so sweet I had to take a picture

día de la cruz

Storefronts closed for siesta

Part of my walk to school... note the Sierra Nevada mountains

Shawarma

The rest of this weekend has been great. Yesterday we did our shawarma lunch (and I finally learned out to spell shawarma), then walked around the city all afternoon. We were so stuffed from our shawarma that we decided to push BADos back to tomorrow, so I'll make sure to blog about our goodbye to our favorite place tomorrow.

Today, we went to mass at the cathedral and then checked out a few of the plazas decorated for el día de la cruz, or the day of the cross. There are huge crosses made out of flowers in a ton of plazas and everyone is dressed in traditional Spanish clothes. Flamenco dresses are everywhere--- so, so cool!

The rest of today is just going to be a day of studying... two finals, one interview, three actual classes, and three class fiestas left!

Final Weekend!

Well, we're into the final weekend in Granada... this is so exciting!

 

Thursday was a very important day for a few reasons. My life was changed completely by my purchase of gypsy pants. Yup, gypsy pants. Granada is filled with gypsies, and they all wear these pants that look kind of ridiculous but are very intriguing. They're kind of I Dream of Jeannie-esque, but not necessarily to that extreme. I like to describe them as kind of like gaucho pants with a weirder waistband and that are cinched at the bottom... very strange. Howeeeever, we've been so intrigued by these pants that we needed to buy some. And they are AMAZING! So comfy, so euro... I've been living in them this weekend. 

I also got a TON of souvenir shopping done on Thursday, which was really exciting. We're gonna do a little bit more today but I think I'm almost done! 

Yesterday we spent the day in Nerja, a beach town about two hours away from Granada. It was absolutely gorgeous and it was a great way to kick off our last weekend. Today, we're going to kind of do some of our "one lasts". We're going to get one last schwarma for lunch, go to the mirador one last time, and get one last round of tapas at BADos. I spent the morning packing, and I think I'm pretty much set to go aside from the clothes I'm going to wear this week... that's just so crazy to think of! Tomorrow is going to be mass and then lottttts of studying during the day.

Getting closer and closer and getting more and more excited by the second to see everyone!

Starting to Wind Down

Well, we're officially reaching the end of the study abroad road. This is SO exciting!

I started cleaning out my room last night and was getting kind of nostalgic! I ran across my orientation packet, my receipt for WiFi at the hostel we stayed at the first few nights, the cards I read on the plane ride over here... it's so weird that I got all those things FOUR MONTHS ago!

I'm getting more and more excited about the thought of having completed this. My sense of accomplishment grows every day and I know that getting on that plane is going to be the best feeling in the world. I will get on that plane knowing that I did something that I really didn't think I could do, and that's pretty exciting.

The girls and I have started planning out our last weekend here, and it should be pretty fun. We're considering maybe going to the beach on Friday and then spending Saturday walking around the city, shopping, having one last botellón, and hitting up all of our favorite spots one last time. We just can't believe it's our last weekend in Granada! Kristin will have two more weekends in Europe after that, and Alli and Breezy will have three (they're staying to travel), but they said it's still so bizarre that none of them are in Granada. 

I am one edited essay, one final interview, and two final exams away from being done! Just gotta keep trucking through this last chunk of classes :-)

Hanging out with 1,700 of my closest Spanish friends...

So yesterday was the big party for Granada students that Vega invited us to. Oh. My. Gosh.

Let me start by saying that it was definitely one of the best cultural experiences I've had so far. It was a really cool insight into the lives of 18-23 year olds in Spain. 

So, Breezy, Vega and I met up at 11:30am to go to this party. We had to wait at a gas station for a guy to come and sell us our tickets for the party, and once we got our tickets we went to the Hipercor (a big store) to wait for the bus to come pick us up. I expected there to be maybe 200 people there. Nope. 1700. One thousand, seven hundred people all waiting to get on busses to travel 20 minutes to a discoteca for this party. It was a madhouse! 

People were literally elbowing each other in the face to get on the busses. It was like sorority/fraternity barndances on steroids. Vega, Breezy, and I all locked hands in an attempt to stay together, but we were bombarded so fast that we lost each other for a few minutes... very intense! We ended up realizing that we were either going to get trampled trying to get on a bus or were going to have to wait three hours to get on one, so one of Vega's friends told us to follow him. He said he was going to call a taxi for us. After about five minutes on the phone, he told us he couldn't get a taxi but his grandpa would drive us. We got a ride to a discoteca in the middle of an olive field from this guy's grandpa. I love Spanish people.

So, we got to this discoteca (in the shape of a castle) and it was HUUUGE! It turns out it is the biggest disco in Andalucía (the region we're in). And the place was absolutely mobbed. It was wall-to-wall people, all dancing and singing and drinking and talking. 

We hung out with Vega, her brother Ezekiel (pronounced: eh-thee-KEEL), his girlfriend Laura (pronounced like Lawry's Steakhouse with an -uh at the end instead of the -ees), and all of their friends. Everyone was so nice and welcoming and we got to do a LOT of Spanish practicing! 

All in all, it was a really fun day and a really good experience. I'm so glad I got to see a party from the perspective of a Spanish person... Breezy and I were probably the only two Americans in the whole place and we felt like we were fitting in well. Usually, we all get targeted as Americans and are subject to people coming up to us and going "oh my GAWD" (seriously, happens all the time. Very clever.), but this time we were totally blending in. It was such a cool perspective to have for a day. Check out this video of the madness: 

A mí me gusta mucho ir al cine

Today was a really fun day because Breezy, Vega (the Spanish girl who is Breezy's intercambio), and I went to the movies! Breezy and I have been talking about wanting to see a movie for awhile now, and it was a perfect day to do it. 

Walking into the movie theatre was one of the biggest reminders of home I've had so far. Seriously, aside from everything being in Spanish, it easily could have been an American movie theatre. It's fun that the schema is just so similar. The smell of popcorn, the obscenely large boxes of candy, the overpriced soft drinks... all of it!

We saw a Spanish movie called Al Final del Camino, which was about two journalists (who hate each other) who have to go undercover to do a story about a retreat for couples with marital problems. It was really cute, and, of course, the journalists fall in love at the end. Very textbook romantic comedy :-)

Vega invited us to go to a big party tomorrow. It apparently starts at noon and goes the whole day and a TON of Spanish students will be there. I heard "room full of Spanish people to talk to" and I was THERE! I will make sure to take lots of pictures and blog about it tomorrow!

Things I Will and Won't Miss

So, my friend Gina did this on her blog and I thought it was a great idea so I'm going to copy :-)

THINGS I WILL MISS ABOUT SPAIN:

-My host family. I was really, really, really blessed being placed in this homestay. God was looking out for me.

-The walking! I loooove that it takes me a half hour to walk to school and a half hour to walk home. The exercise is great and it's really fun to people watch

-Tapas bars. Seriously, where else in the world can you go and get free dinner with your drinks?

-Alé from BADos. Alé was just one of the best Spaniards we met here. Such a great guy, always looked out for us, so welcoming to our visitors, knew our orders, always handing out the free chupitos.

-Tortilla Española, or Spanish potato omelette. SO tasty!

-Being able to people watch at any time of the day. People are always in the streets and it's so fun to watch how they live

-Fountains everywhere! There's just something really cool about all of them

-Sra. Pan, the lady who sells tortas de chocolate

-Botellón

-Listening to Spanish people try to sing American songs (i.e. Carlos' version of "Stayin' Alive" or Rosario's (male) friend's version of Beyoncé's "If I were a Boy")

-Siesta! How it's perfectly acceptable to take a nap in the middle of the day

-The weather!! It's soooo nice

-Being able to see the Sierra Nevada on my walk to school

-My CEGRI friends, but I'll still get to see them all the time back home <3

THINGS I WON'T MISS:

-Being woken up every morning by Carlos crying. I still can't figure out what he's screaming about, but it's a daily occurrence

-Not having control over when or what I eat! It's really nice to have someone cook for you, and Rosario cooks very well, but it's frustrating having no control

-Julia, the grammar teacher

-Having to download TV shows off of iTunes

-How sloooooooowly people walk. Seriously, molasses in January. These people just stroll everywhere. I get that they're just laid back and are enjoying their walk, but I walk with a purpose! The worst? Older couples who hold hands and walk like that. You can't get around them!

-The fact that cars honk CONSTANTLY here. If there is a traffic jam, you can bet that 85% of the cars will be laying on their horn. 

-And, of course, being this far away from the people I love. I've always been a pretty ooey-gooey-I-love-my-family-and-friends-and-boyfriend-la-la-la kind of girl, but being separated for this long has really made me realize that it doesn't matter where you are, it just matters who you're with. I'm SO lucky to have made such great friends here and I'm not trying to minimize that at all, but being away from everyone back home has just been tough! Thinking about all of the reunions I get to have (SO SOON!) is so exciting.

THINGS I AM LOOKING FORWARD TO:

-Seeing everyone!! This is the longest I've gone without seeing my mom in my whole life! It's just going to be so great to see all the people I've missed so much.

-American food!

-Baking

-DRIVING! I haven't driven in 4 months!!

-Kam's (both going there for fun and working!)

-Meeting Nina! I have a whole new family member.... crazy!

-My week at school after I get back

-Being able to spend Mother's Day with my fam

-Hot, good showers for as loooong as I want

-My own bed

-Being able to lay on the couch and watch TV!

This is a great city and it has been one of the best study abroad experiences I could have asked for, but I'm definitely counting down the days until all of those things! Can't wait to see everyone :-) It's getting closer and closer

Good News :-)

Oh my goodness, Tuesday is almost over. I swear, the school weeks here absolutely fly by. This week's been pretty good so far! I had my big literature paper due on Monday and was having a lot of trouble thinking about what to write about on Sunday night, but I ended up having one of those lightbulb moments early Monday morning (the paper wasn't due until the afternoon), so I think I did okay on it!

It's just been a pretty normal week! I've been watching a lot of my Office DVDs... that's fun! We have a lot of stuff to do in all of our classes these next two and a half weeks of school, so it's just a lot of homework and a lot of studying. My favorite teacher is Yanira (I have her for both literature and conversation) and she has been so understanding about us having so much to do. We were supposed to have conversation presentations next week, but she came into class today and said that they weren't important and she wanted to take away some of our stress so we don't have to do them. I love her!

We all had a ton of fun for Laura's birthday on Saturday. We botellóned a little bit by our favorite "juice bar" (it's actually a café with slot machines called a salón de juego (game room) but someone thought it said salón de jugo (juice bar) the first week and the name stuck). After that, we went to a bar near our pisos, then to both of our favorite chupiterias, and then a discoteca that's built into a cave. It was the coolest disco ever-- literally the walls are just cave. It was a ton of fun and a great way to celebrate Laura's birthday.

I'm just kind of working on homework and putting some stuff together these next few weeks... it's so weird that my time here is winding down! I remember in January when I literally thought April would never come, and now it's almost May!

Oh... and did I mention... 

... Remember that little plan I had cooking up circa two posts ago? It just came to fruition. See everyone in time for Mother's Day :-) 

Weekend!

It's been a pretty decent weekend so far! I realized yesterday when I was talking to Matt that this is my first full down weekend since right after my dad left... how weird is that? I've been feeling a little antsy and jittery and I think the uncharacteristic amount of downtime is a good explanation. 

Tapas on Thursday were good-- Vega told me that I speak Spanish very well, so my confidence came back up a little bit for that test. Yesterday I slept in reaaaaally late for the first time in a loooooong time, so that was awesome! After I got up and took a walk, then just came back and relaxed all day. It was great to re-charge after so much crazy traveling last week. Rosario came home for lunch and was really excited because she passed statistics (she's going back to school to become a nurse) and so we had a huge lunch with wine to celebrate. The kids and I hung out for a little bit after lunch. My friend Caitlin sent me the song "Hoedown Throwdown" from the Hannah Montana movie and I played it for Maria. She was completely beside herself because she said that nobody here has been able to hear it yet because the CD isn't out (things take much longer here... for a reference point, we just started to see advertisements for Marley and Me). Apparently Maria's going to be very cool at school on Monday :-). Thanks, Cait!

I spent the afternoon just chatting with people, relaxing, and watching the new episode of The Office. I was going to meet up with Gina for churros con chocolate after dinner but had to reschedule because Rosario was M.I.A. She ended up getting home at 10:45 and served dinner at 11:00... she's a busy lady! I was bummed I didn't get to see Gina, but we're gonna go one day this week! I met up with Breezy, Alli, and Kristin around midnight and we just got a few drinks and had a very chill night.

It's my friend Laura's birthday today, so I think we're going to all go out to celebrate tonight. It should be fun!!

Hope everyone in Champaign is having a great moms' weekend!

Three Weeks Left of School?!

It's so hard to believe that it's the weekend and I only have THREE WEEKS left of school. WOW. The school weeks here go by so fast. I'll get the "oh my gosh it's only Monday?" feeling on Monday and then it feels like I blink and it's Thursday already.

It's been a pretty good week at school. We had a short little paper to do for Literature and watched a movie in Law that I have to write a paper on this weekend. The movie was called Mar Adentro and was about this guy Ramón Sampedro who was a quadriplegic and wanted an assisted suicide in the '80s. We have to write a paper with our reactions to the movie, so I have to think of something more than that I cried through the entire second half :-). The movie is really good (very sad), and I recommend it. It stars Javier Bardem as Ramón and won the 2004 Oscar for Best Foreign Film. Check it out! I also have a big Literature paper due on Monday, so that will be taking up a lot of the weekend. 

Tonight, Breezy, Alli, Kristin and I are going to meet up with some Spanish girls for tapas. We have this program called intercambio where our school can set you up with a student from the University of Granada who is studying English and you can get together and practice your languages with native speakers. Breezy's intercambio is a girl named Vega so we're meeting up with Vega and her friends to practice. I'm still a little under the weather from traveling but am so excited about this possibility to practice Spanish so I'm going to go for sure. My proficiency test is in four weeks!! Yiiiiikes.

Rosario had a few friends over at lunch today and I was trying to practice with them, but it was pretty difficult. Between ten days of speaking English last week and the fact that they were speaking a mile a minute and eating at the same time, I was having a lot of trouble understanding and getting a little discouraged. I think (and hope!) that tonight will help bring my confidence up a little more. That test is looming!

Other than that, I'm just kind of relaxing back into life in the piso and getting so excited about my return home. I've got a little something up my sleeve that I don't want to spill too much of yet in case it doesn't come to fruition, but it would be really exciting. I should find out in the next few days if it's going to happen... cross your fingers!!

Eurotrip 2009

Guinness Factory!

Buckingham Palace

WOW it's been a long time since my last post! I apologize!! I promise promise promise that's the longest I'll go for the rest of my stay here. 

Lauren and I had a great time this past week on our little Eurotrip. We started out on Friday night and caught a night plane from Granada to London. It was Lauren's first experience with Ryanair, which is the shantiest of all shanty airlines but will get you from Granada to London for DIRT cheap. Highly recommend it to anybody traveling in Europe... it's worth the lack of complimentary drink and the strict baggage requirements. We made it into London around 1am and caught a train into the city center. We were completely exhausted and got to our hostel and just crashed. 

The next morning, we got up and started out to sightsee. We saw Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, the Thames River, and the London Eye. I found myself quoting European Vacation that entire day... "Hey look, kids! There's Big Ben and there's Parliament!"... "Kids, Big Ben. Parliament." If you don't know what I'm talking about, you have to watch this clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFsDjmceuDo. After conquering that area of town, we decided to venture over to Buckingham Palace. We took a veeeeery long route to get there which ended up being great because we were able to see some of the really cute residential areas. I, of course, decided that they all looked like they were out of The Parent Trap.

At Buckingham Palace, we saw the guards and the palace from in front and then took a walk through the gardens and through St. James' Park. After that we took the tube to Harrods, the ENORMOUS department store in London. We looked around Harrods for awhile, bought some mini-cupcakes (I had missed cupcakes!) and then wandered that area for awhile. We ended up getting lunch at a pub and then heading back to the hostel to nap and get ready for our evening. 

We had gotten tickets for Spring Awakening, which is one of my top three favorite musicals of all time. I'd seen it twice in New York and was really excited to see the West End's new version. It did not disappoint-- such a phenomenal show! And the box office even bumped our seats up because the theatre wasn't full-- so we had an amazing view! As a side note, Spring Awakening is coming to Chicago this summer and if anyone is looking for a good musical to see, go see it. I will put out the warning that it's very edgy and artsy and isn't your typical "family musical", but it's very thought-provoking and deep and has incredible music. Go to www.broadwayinchicago.com for more info :-)

After the show, we went to dinner in the Covent Garden area, which was so cute and I fell in love with. It was like if New York's theatre district was in the Village... so great! We then made our way to Piccadilly Circus to try to meet up with Lauren's friends from school but ended up needing to catch the tube back to the hostel before we could meet them. 

The next day, we checked out of the hostel and explored more. We tried to make it to Westminster Abbey for Palm Sunday mass but narrowly missed it because of a tube snafu. Bummer! We ended up walking around a lot and meeting Lauren's friends for lunch, which was really fun. Then we headed back to the hostel, got our stuff, and got on a train to the airport for our flight to Dublin.

We got to Dublin around 10pm and were able to find our hostel pretty easily. We checked in, got settled, used the internet there to send emails home, and crashed for the night. The next day, we slept in and then made our way over to the Guinness Storehouse for a tour and a free pint, which was a lot of fun. We discovered that Irish people are SO nice! Everyone was so great the whole time we were there. That night, we went on a little pub crawl to experience Temple Bar. My friends Meg and Caitlin studied in Dublin last summer and had a lot of great places for us to go. It was a very fun night. We spent most of Tuesday walking around and doing some shopping. We saw a lot of Dublin and then turned in early so we could get up for our flight the next morning. 

On Wednesday morning, we were up dark and early (think 2:45am) to catch our plane to Tenerife. It was a veeeery early flight but so worth it to get to the Canaries! The island was absolutely gorgeous and we had a great time hanging out with my friends and just relaxing on the beach. We both managed to get a little tan and it was definitely rejuvenating. 

One of my favorite moments in the Canaries was when we went into this little sandwich shop to get sandwiches to go one night. There were two older men behind the bar and they made our sandwiches and asked if they were to go or to eat there. When we said to go, they kept asking why and said we should stay there and talk to them. With my proficiency test in four weeks and one day, I'm in no position to turn down a conversation with a native speaker, and these men looked very un-creepy, so we stayed. They ended up giving us each a few free beers and shots of Ron Miel (honey rum... SO. GOOD.) and I got to practice my Spanish for over an hour, which was definitely needed after a five days of non-stop English. They told me I speak very well and when they asked if my parents were Spanish, I just about leaned over the bar to hug them. It was definitely a needed ego-boost. I know my Spanish has gotten better since being here, but just to hear people that I don't know and that don't deal with American students on a regular basis give me good feedback makes me feel a lot better about this test. 

We got back to Granada yesterday morning after a looooong trip home (7 hours in the Tenerife airport, 2 hours on a plane, a hostel stay, and a 2 hour bus ride). It was a great trip, but it's so great to be back in my routine and back to what I know. I'm someone who loves the familiar :-)

A big milestone happened while I was gone. Saturday was my one more month mark. I'm now officially into my last month. It's such a weird feeling and such a great feeling. I keep kind of going back and forth between "that's still kind of a long time" and "that's NOTHING!" I just am so happy that I've gotten this far and am looking SO forward to the rest of my time here and especially to my return home!! I CANNOT wait to see everyone!

cheers. lift. spit spot. supercalifragilsticexpialidocious.

Just a SUPER quick update to let everyone know that Lauren and I had a great time in London. We're at an internet cafe in the Gatwick airport grabbing a little bit of internet really fast before we check in for our flight to Dublin tonight. Having so much fun and promise to update more later!

Lauren's Here!!

YAY!! Lauren made it!! I went to the airport at around 4:40 yesterday and was able to meet her as soon as she got through baggage claim. It was so great to see her and we had SUCH a great time yesterday.

We got her settled into her hostel, then just took a little walking tour of my favorite parts of Granada (Cathedral, a few plazas, the ice cream shop that Matt and I were obsessed with, school, etc.). When it was about 8:00 we headed over to the Mercadona to pick up some sangria and botellón by the river at sunset. It was so relaxing and so great to catch up. After that, we went over to BADos (obviously!) for a tapas dinner and some more drinks. Lauren got to meet Alé and Moha (our two favorites), as well as bartender #3, whose name I don't know but gave me the two-kiss Spanish thing and asked where Matt was and then said that I have a lot of visitors and that I'm very lucky because my dad, boyfriend, and cousin all came. I told him I know-- I'm a VERY lucky girl to be able to have all three of them come.

Lauren loved the dinner (as I knew she would) and we started getting pretty tired right after. I took her to Dolce Vita for one shot and then back to her hostel to crash. I hopped in a cab (figured I'd throw that detail in for you, Mom-- I don't walk alone at night! ) and got back to my piso, chatted with my mom and dad and Matt and Sarah, and then turned in for the night. 

Now I'm just going to finish packing, head over to Lauren's hostel, spend the day sightseeing, and then we're off to London tonight!! :-) 

Happy April :-)

WOOHOOO! We made it to April!! So exciting! I love the first day of the month here. It just makes me feel like I'm making progress and that I've accomplished something, like "I successfully lived in Spain for the ENTIRE month of March." Might sound crazy, but it's the little things haha. 

April should fly by pretty fast, too! I've got Lauren coming TOMORROW (!!!!!!) and we've got our 10-day vacation, and then we'll come back to Granada for two days and when Lauren leaves it's the 14th already! SO nuts! Then I'll have one free weekend, one weekend in London again, another free weekend, then the weekend with the farewell dinner/packing/saying goodbye. Absolutely nuts.

Yesterday was pretty good! Highlights included taking a four-hour nap, getting served an entire frozen pizza for lunch (when I ate a third of it, Rosario came into my room and said she thought I liked pizza and asked if I wanted something else. I explained to her that, yes, I loooove pizza, but there was no way I could eat an entire frozen one), and mysterious hypnotist baby-daddy coming over for dinner. He's actually very nice and we had a long, very interesting discussion about religion. I like having in-depth talks like that because it helps me hone my Spanish. If I have something to contribute, I will want to contribute it, and It's kind of that being thrown into the fire of an intense conversation thing. 

I've got a law test tonight and then it should be smooth sailing for the rest of the week! 

It's Almost April?!

I cannot BELIEVE it's almost April... I love it! I seriously feel like it was two weeks ago that I was sitting in my piso looking at my iCal and just wanting it to be February SO bad. Time's starting to fly, and I'm really loving it. 

As weird as it sounds, I feel like I enjoy Spain more and more when the end is closer and closer. It's sort of that "okay, I'm going home in six weeks, I know I can make it, and I know that I want to see this and this and this before I leave, so I have to get on it". Maybe that's strange? Not sure! In any event, I'm enjoying the rest of my time here but will be absolutely ecstatic to come home in 41 days!

It seems like almost everyone at CEGRI is hitting their MAJOR homesick wall right now. I thought it happened a few weeks ago (which I blogged about), but this week has been even worse. I'm really glad I hit mine early (ummm... like the first two weeks...) because I feel like I can get a lot out of the last chunk and I know the gist what to say to the people who are really down right now. 

My cousin Lauren gets here on Thursday and I'm so excited to see her! We're doing a mini eurotrip VonderHeide style :-). On Friday, we're going from Granada to London, then going from London to Dublin on Sunday, and then Dublin to the Canary Islands (Tenerife, specifically) on Wednesday, then flying back into Malaga on Sunday and getting a bus back to Granada Sunday night or Monday morning. It should be awesome! I'm hoping that I'll have internet access to put up some blog posts!!

Pictures! :-)

The presentation of Matt's sea bass... so impressive!

Props to Breezy for this paparazzi picture :-) 

Throwing up the "dos" at BADos

We loved the fountains!! This is in Plaza Nueva

Halftime at the game!

The Real Madrid crowd

Pregaming at a pub by the stadium

Ambushing Matt at baggage claim

I apologize for the delay on these! The internet at our hotel in Madrid was REALLY slow last night! Back in Granada now :-) 

Best Week Ever

Okay, get comfortable... this is going to be a loooong post!

So, this week was the best week ever. Hands down. Matt and I had SUCH an awesome time together and it was so great to get to show him Spain and let him see where I live and what my life is like over here. 

I sometimes have attention issues, so I'll divide this up by day

SATURDAY: Alli and I took the bus up to Madrid to go to the airport and meet our guys. Our friend Kaitlin was also on our bus, and it turns out her dad was on Matt's flight. So, the three of us took the metro from the bus station to the airport. I managed to put on eyeliner and mascara on a moving metro (subway) with only the mirror in my bronzer case. I was very impressed with myself. We got to the airport and managed to find where we could wait for them. I kept saying I was either going to throw up because I was so excited. I was literally bouncing up and down and shaking while we were waiting for them. They were laughing because I was staring at the baggage claim doors way too early. Matt's flight had just landed and I was sitting there staring at groups of people who were CLEARLY not from Chicago coming through the doors. Finally, we started hearing our midwestern accents and Kaitlin's dad came through! At this point, I was starting to freak out. I kept staring and staring and saw Matt come through a few minutes later. SO exciting. I (of course), did the whole crying and making a scene thing, but it was just so good to get to see him. We went and sat in an airport cafe and had some water/diet coke (guess who had which), and I got a tortilla (egg and potato omelette) bocadillo because I hadn't eaten since dinner the night before. So Matt got his first few bites of boc in and we hopped in a taxi and got to our hotel. 

We checked in and then both crashed for about four hours... we were tired! After our long siesta, we decided to venture out. We went across the street to the Parque de Retiro, where we saw more people making out than we ever had in our lives. Seriously, everywhere you looked there was really intense Spanish PDA going on. Ew. So we took some good pictures, saw some good stuff, and headed back. We then got ready for dinner and walked up to Chic Atocha (the wine bar I went to with my friends in January/February) for a few glasses of wine while we waited for 8:30 to roll around so we could go to La Sanabresa, which I truly believe is one of the best-kept secrets in Madrid (even though I originally heard about it through a guide book... okay, maybe not so secret). In any event, we had our first glasses of wine of the trip and headed up the hill to get to the restaurant.

La Sanabresa was even better than I had remembered it. It has incredible, incredible food and is extremely reasonably priced. That night, I had chicken croquettes and RABBIT (I know! It was so good!) and Matt had mushrooms and swordfish, which he dubbed some of the best fish he's ever eaten. And Matt really likes fish, so that's saying something. We split a bottle of Marques de Cacéres, which was absolutely phenomenal red wine and is available in the US (we clearly checked the second we had internet) and split a piece of cheesecake for dessert. Amazing meal.

After dinner, we stopped by an alimentación to pick up a bottle of wine to have in our room. Breezy had called earlier that day and asked if we would be up for going out with her and her boyfriend, Chris, that night. Matt's jetlag wasn't too bad, so we said we were definitely up for it. We went back to Kapital, the seven-floor disco that I described in my Madrid post from January/February. I have to say that going with Matt was SO much different than going in a group of American girls. We had a blast and totally threw Matt and Chris into the world of Euro clubs.  We got back to the hotel (which was RIGHT around the corner) at 3:30ish and then just crashed for the night.

SUNDAY: I woke up around 9:30 and headed down to the McDonalds (AMERICA!!!!!) that was on the ground floor of our hotel building to get a diet coke and some free WiFi while Matt slept off some jetlag. He came down to meet me and we got in a solid 30 minutes of internet time. Then we dropped my laptop off in our room and ventured out to explore a little bit. On our way downstairs, we were in the elevator with a soccer player from Recretivo, who are a Primera Liga team and were playing in Madrid that day. The team was staying in our hotel! We walked down the street and saw some sights, bought some more wine (notice a theme developing) at an alimentación for that night, and enjoyed the 73 degree and sunny weather. We then dropped out stuff off in the room, got changed, and headed over to Gran Via for lunch at TGIFridays (I know, I know... I just really miss American food!). When lunch was over, we hopped on the metro and got to the Bernabeau stadium for the Real Madrid game!! 

Oh. My. Gosh. I am SO SO SO glad we were able to go to that game. It was an atmosphere like nothing I've ever experienced. We got off the metro and were immediately inundated with Real Madrid mania. There were vendors completely lining the streets selling shirts, jerseys, scarves, pictures, and soccer balls, people screaming Real Madrid chants, people from all over Europe wearing the logos of a million different football clubs, and a British man dressed as a chicken (including a yellow mini tutu). Absolutely nuts and absolutely awesome. We met up with Breezy and Chris in a pub across from the stadium and had a few Amstels (not Amstel light... "Amstel heavy" as Matt calls it) and had a good time getting ready for the game. We took a lap around the stadium at about 4:15 and got up to our seats at 4:40, perfect timing for the 5:00 kick off. 

The game was so cool. Soccer in Europe is seriously a way of life. The Bernabeau stadium, home of Real Madrid, is an 80,000 person stadium and was completely sold out. There were people everywhere waving scarves and flags, screaming, and chanting. I had a lot of the cheers stuck in my head for the rest of the day... very reminiscent of sorority recruitment ("come on in join the fun..."). Real Madrid beat Almeria 3-0, which was very exciting. The stadium went crazy every time a goal was scored and they really do scream "GOL!!!!!!" at the top of their lungs. It was so great and the best part for me (sorry, cheesy) was getting to watch Matt's reaction to it.

After the game, we went out to dinner with Breezy and Chris and Alli and her boyfriend Matt. We just got some quick bocadillos and sat outside at this little cafe. It was great to get to talk with everyone and hear how everyone else's weeks were going so far. After dinner, we went back to the hotel and crashed for the night. 

MONDAY: Monday was one of our travel days. We got up pretty early and checked out our free hotel breakfast, which was fantastic, and then headed out to the bus station to catch our bus to Granada. The difference in the bus rides alone and with Matt were insane. The five hours flew by and I was able to introduce him to the world of the Spanish bus system. We got back to Granada, checked into the hotel, and then relaxed a little bit before heading out. We went to an internet café for a little bit and then got some ice cream at my favorite ice cream place and walked around the city. I took him to SuperSol, the grocery store by school, and we got some tinto de verano to botellón with that night at the mirador de san nicolas, the best view in the world. We got ready and met up with Breezy and Chris to hike up there. We were hoping to make it by sunset, but by the time we got there, it was dark. It ended up being even better, though, because the Alhambra was lit up and it was a perfect temperature. After walking down, we decided to all head over to BADos for some drinks and tapas before dinner. 

Matt LOVED BADos (as I knew he would.... there really isn't a way to not like it). We first ordered drinks and the first round of tapas (hot turkey and cheese sandwiches with olive oil and french fries with garlic aioli and some sort of spicy ketchup-y thing. After that round, Matt was hooked and we decided to stay there for more tapas and make a dinner out of it, which I am always up for. We got another round of drinks (tinto de verano for me and Alhambra beer for Matt) and the second round of tapas, which are Spain's version of hamburgers with pasta salad and fried shrimp, and then a third round with the tortilla española sandwiches and more fries. Our favorite bartender, Alé, was working and was very excited to meet our novios. It was a fabulous introduction to BADos for Matt.

I then took Matt to Dolce Vita, which is one of Granada's chupiterias. A chupiteria is a shot bar, basically with a huge list of shots that you can order. Some are tasty (i.e. #43-- "Shamrock." Mint, chocolate liqueor, and Bailey's). Some are awful (i.e. #83-- "Five Star General." Jagermeister, mint, rum, tequila, and Goldschlagger). We had three pretty solid shots and then headed back to the hotel to relax for the night. 

TUESDAY: Beach day!! We got up pretty early and caught our 10:00am bus to Motril, which is the closest beach to Granada. We had a great bus ride there and the weather was fantastic. We did have a slight hiccup when we got to the bus station and couldn't decide how to get to the beach. After the group decision had been made to try to walk, we started wandering Motril trying to find the beach instead of waiting 20 minutes for the bus. As you can probably imagine, the walk to the beach ended up being us wandering Motril for two hours, asking three different people how to get there, before asking a policeman where the beach was and having him tell us that it wasn't in walking distance. So we hopped in a cab and got there within ten minutes.

The beach was absolutely gorgeous. The sand was perfect, there were really cool rocks everywhere, the waves of the Mediterranean were incredible, the Sierra Nevada was behind us.... just absolutely stunning. We waded a little bit into the sea and spent most of the day just laying around and relaxing. We took the bus home around 5:00pm and got back to Granada around 6:15. We relaxed and got ready and then went out for a fantastic dinner in Plaza Bibrambla. 

We went to Centro, the restaurant my dad and I discovered during his visit last month. We got a great table outside and just had one of the best dinners I've ever had in my life. It was so incredible to get to sit in such a beautiful place, with Matt, eat great food, drink great wine, and just sit there with all the time in the world to talk about whatever we wanted to. It's definitely an experience I'll never forget. Matt had the sea bass and it was the most impressive presentation of fish I've ever seen. It was an entire fish (scales, fins, eyeballs, and all), cooked in a mound of coarse salt. They brought it over to the table and set it up on a tray and then filleted it right at the table for him. SO cool, and he said it was really good.

After dinner, we went back to the hotel and just relaxed. We're big on watching old episodes of The Office at home, and getting to watch them with him on my computer here felt so awesome! It's one of the things I miss most about home :-)

WEDNESDAY: Wednesday was one of our only non-travel days. We slept in a little bit and then ventured out a little bit. We got some tortas de chocolate for breakfast (YUM!) and then walked around by my school a little bit. I had to go and take a literature test, so I did that really fast while Matt tried to find some internet. Our internet café's internet was down (weird) so we went to CEGRI to use their computers super fast. It was fun to get to show him where I go to school! After our internet adventure, we went to get some schwarma for lunch and then walked back up to the Mirador de San Nicolas to see the view in the daytime. That's a view I will never get sick of... it's so gorgeous.

We hiked back down to the city center and got some more ice cream and walked around and shopped for souvenirs and then went back to the hotel to get ready for dinner with my host family! We got over there at around 8:30 and I showed him around and we chatted with the kids before dinner. Carlos was absolutely in AWE of Matt and didn't leave his side the entire night. They bonded over Super Mario, which was adorable. Rosario loved Matt and kept telling me that I was a very lucky girl and that he was very handsome (both of which I already knew). She served us crema de espinaca (cream of spinach) soup, cured ham (Matt loved it), and tortilla española (my favorite), plus flan for dessert. Carlos was asking Matt if he liked chocolate milk, and Matt happens to love chocolate milk, so Carlos sprinted into the kitchen to make them each a glass. So cute!

After dinner, we went to Chupiteria 69, another chupiteria, for a few shots before heading to BADos to meet up with everyone one last time and say goodbye. We each had a glass of wine and then bought a bottle at an alimentación to enjoy back at the hotel while we watched more of The Office and relaxed.

THURSDAY:  We got up early, had some breakfast at the hotel, and then hopped in a cab to get to the bus station for our bus to Madrid. It was a great ride (watched a lot of Office on the laptop) and we made good time. We took the metro to our hotel, checked in, relaxed a little, and then headed back into the city center to have dinner at La Sanabresa again. It was a great last dinner. We headed back to the hotel and had one more night of relaxing and watching The Office and CNN International.

Friday we got up and had breakfast and then went to the airport. It was so hard to say goodbye, but it was just such an amazing week. I am glad beyond words that he was able to come and visit and that we were able to spend such a great week together. It really could not have been better :-)

Back!!

Ahhhh I apologize apologize apologize for the lack of blogging this week. Matt and I had an AMAZING week and there will definitely be a loooooong entry about it in the near future. I dropped Matt off at the airport this morning and then Breezy and I spent the morning reminiscing about the awesome week, watching Jon and Kate Plus 8 on my computer, eating lunch at TGIFridays (a cheeseburger not made of pork!!!!!!!!!) and buying snacks/dinner food/pop/wine at the alimentacion to prepare for our night of watching The Office and more Jon and Kate in our Madrid hotel. Not the most Euro way to do Madrid, but definitely what we need after our tough morning :-)

More details to come, I promise!

Fiesta de Primavera

So today has basically consisted of me trying to distract myself from freaking out all day about the fact that Matt's getting on a plane in, oh, an hour!! I just seriously can't even begin to explain how excited I am! :-)

I spent the day walking around the city and window shopping. One of the things I love about Granada is that there are so many tiny side streets that you can walk for hours and still have so much to see. I got a manicure and pedicure, too! I am always the girl who messes up a manicure the second its done, and today was no exception haha. I went to dig through my purse to pay as soon as it was done and, of course, ruined the nail polish on one hand. The lady was so nice and literally pushed me back into the room to re-do what I had just messed up. After she was nice enough to re-do my entire left hand, I tipped her and then left, only to drop my phone as soon as I got out of the salon and wreck the same hand picking it up haha... no pasa nada!

After my appointment, I came back to the piso for lunch and to say goodbye to Rosario and the kids for the week. They're at the beach with their dad and are so excited. Carlos came in to say goodbye and was showered and wearing a brand new outfit because "vamos a quedarnos en un hotel de cinco estrellas" ("we're going to stay in a five-star hotel"). That kid is too funny!

Alli and I met up to go to the fiesta de primavera this afternoon. Fiesta de primavera is the celebration of the first weekend of spring and basically consists of EVERYBODY in Granada under the age of thirty gathering in one part of town (which happens to be right by us) to drink and relax and enjoy the nice weather. It was a really cool cultural thing to see. I took some good pictures that I'll post later. We then just walked around and got schwarma for dinner. The best analogy I have is schwarma : Granada :: cheap pizza places : Champaign. There are schwarma places EVERYWHERE, especially in our part of town, which is right by the University. I had never tried it, but it was good! It was basically a chicken wrap put on the grill and served hot... delicious!

Now I'm just doing some last-minute stuff and getting ready to meet Alli to get on the bus to Madrid! I can't believe it's today!!

Why I Love Conversation Class

So, today, only half of my conversation class was present. Half of the class is five people. (Classes at CEGRI are teeny).

So we get into class and Yanira, our teacher, looks at us and said that we should do something fun. So she took us to the bar next door for a glass of wine. I got credit today for sitting outside in 75 degree weather with a glass of red wine talking about my boyfriend coming to visit me.

I can handle this :-)

Matt gets here on SATURDAY MORNING!! I am so incredibly excited! I met up with Gina for ice cream today to talk about how excited we are for Matt and Tom (her boyfriend) to get here, and Breezy, Alli, Kristin and I have been freaking out all week. It's going to be so so so great!

On a more serious note, today marks the two year anniversary of when we lost my uncle Tom. Tommy was one of the greatest people I have ever known and we miss him so much every day. If anyone's looking for a good cause to support, check out www.abta.org. We love you, Tom.

Adventures at La Caixa

So, the big event of the day yesterday was getting Real Madrid soccer tickets for Sunday's game!! Aaaand it was an event.

So, background. Breezy, Alli, and I have been talking about getting tickets to this game since the very beginning of study abroad. All of our boyfriends will be in that weekend, and we figured it would be so fun to take them to. Plus, Matt is really into European soccer, so I was taking him regardless. So Matt and I have been researching this for two months, and we figured out that the most secure way to get tickets is to wait until they go on sale (a few days before the match) and then buy them at La Caixa, a bank that has automated ticket selling machines (kind of like ATMs).

So yesterday was the day the tickets went on sale. They went on sale at 10, and Breezy and Alli had class until 10:45, so the plan was that I was going to stalk the La Caixa machines and call them if it looked like we were going to have a problem getting them. So, I check at 10... 10:05... 10:15... 10:30... 10:40... and I'm thinking that we're not going to have any problem at all. It was telling me that there were TONSSS of seats left. So, we all meet at school, walk the two blocks to the machine, and try to buy our tickets. Every time we would find sections with available tickets, they would be sold out. We would try to get one ticket in a section that said it had 51 tickets, and we'd get the little red exclamation point in a triangle that haunted my dreams last night and it would say "entradas agotadas" (tickets sold out). 

At this point, we're all on the verge of tears, just trying so hard to get these tickets and getting so frustrated. I ran back to school and used the internet to try to see if I would have better luck trying online, and Breezy and Alli kept trying at the machine. After an hour of me freaking out in the computer lab and Breezy and Alli yelling at the machine, crying to three different Spaniards, and running across town to use another machine, we GOT them!!! Tickets magically opened up in one section, and all six of us (Breezy, her boyfriend Chris, Alli, her boyfriend Matt, Matt, and I) are going to the game! We are SOOOOO excited!! The hour and a half of stress was totally 110% worth it... it's gonna be awesome! 

Happy Birthday, Mar Mar!!! I love you!

Córdoba

The intricacies of the ceiling of the mesquita catedral

You know you're a study abroad student when you have 35,395,295 pictures of ceilings and continue to take more because they're all really cool

Interior of the mesquita catedral.... the red is brick and the white is stone

Yup, more pictures of ceilings!

Columbus getting permission to discover us

Gorgeous. In the gardens of the Alcazar

I love this one

Orange and lemon trees

Gardens of the Alcazar

Alcazar from the garden

So yesterday we had our school sponsored day trip to Córdoba. It was a really cool excursion but very exhausting!

I met Breezy at the juice bar (our normal meeting place) at 7:15am to get to the Palacio de Congresos on time to catch the bus. The ride was about two and a half hours long and the craziest bus ride EVER. We were going through curves in the road so fast and I think I legitimately felt the bus go on two wheels at some points. We were all bracing ourselves and trying not to freak out! The twisty ride also led to the most intense game of "luggage" the world has ever seen. (For those who have never played, luggage is when everyone in a car-- best if it's the backseat of a station wagon on the way home from some sort of extracurricular activity-- leans to one side when making a turn and screams "LUGGAGE!!" at the top of their lungs). At one point, I was trying to sleep and had my iPod on my lap and it went flying across the bus so far that I had to stand up and take a few steps to get it. We made it there and back safely though, thank God!

When we got to Córdoba, we started out by touring the Alcazar de los reyes católicas, or the Castle of the Catholic Kings. It was pretty intense and had the most beautiful gardens I've ever seen. It was such a gorgeous day and it felt great just to walk around and enjoy it. This castle is also where Christopher Columbus met with the Spanish king and queen to get permission for the voyage that would lead to the discover of America (fun fact!). 

After touring the Alcazar, we walked around the Jewish quarter of Córdoba. It was really interesting to see because the city has been either EXTREMELY Muslim or EXTREMELY Catholic for its entire history, so this little section is completely different than the rest of the city. We visited an old synagogue and walked around some of the patios of the homes.

Then, it was everyone's favorite time... boc time. Boc is our abbrev for bocadillo, which means sandwich. (I abbrev(iate) all the time in English, so it just makes sense to do it here, too. But instead of obvi meaning obviously or def meaning definitely, bocadillo becomes boc and bufanda (scarf) becomes buf). So we ate our bocs on the patio of the mesquita catedral (mosque cathedral) and then had two hours to walk around and explore. Breezy and I did some good exploration and saw a lot of the city in that time. We also got what was, no joke, the best ice cream of our lives. It was phenomenal and exactly what we needed on that 80 degree and sunny day (I know, it's tough! :-) )

After our break, we took a tour of the mesquita catedral. It was absolutely ENORMOUS. The architecture was incredible and the intricacies of everything were amazing. It was really cool, too, because it started out as a mosque years and years ago and then was converted into a cathedral when the Catholic reconquista began. 

After that tour, we just got on the bus and headed back to Granada. Everyone was exhausted by the time we got back! It was a nice little excursion but it was definitely nice to crash when I got back!

OHHHHHHHH We're Halfway There

Number of times I have played "Livin' on a Prayer" today: four.

Today marks my halfway point of study abroad. Holy. Moly.

It's really weird, because in some ways I feel like this just snuck up on me and I can't possibly be halfway done already, and in some ways I feel like I've been here foreeeeeever and can't possibly be only halfway done. I've learned so much about the language and the culture of this gorgeous, peculiar, completely foreign, fun, sometimes silly city since getting here, and I know I still have a lot more to learn.

I was trying to explain to people today that I'm so glad that the end is starting to be in sight, and it's not because I'm miserable here by any stretch of the imagination. It still absolutely sucks being away from everyone I love and being away from familiarity and the luxuries of America, but I have adjusted pretty well and am doing okay living here. The reason that I'm so glad that the end is in sight is because I feel like I can start to focus more on the great things about Europe than on the things I miss back home because those things will be in sight. It won't be like the first week when I had to wait four months to see my mom and to go to a restaurant with free refills of Diet Coke and take a hot shower for as long as I wanted. I will be so excited that my home is in sight that everything will just be that much better and that much more enjoyable. This might sound depressing, but I really don't mean it to!

For a "deep thought with Sally" moment, I just have to comment on the feelings of study abroad students. Study abroad is a lot harder than people think it is. The vast majority of the kids on my program came in the program SO excited about study abroad, having to have wanted to do it forever, so excited to travel and to live in a foreign country and all of that good stuff. That was one of the hardest things for me at the beginning. I did NOT want to be in Granada at the beginning and was so homesick and just was having a really tough time. I've gone steadily up since then. There are good days and bad days, but on the whole I've been doing better and better as time has gone on. The vast majority of the kids, though, are starting to get out of the honeymoon phase and are missing home like crazy. What interests me, though, is that most people don't really talk about it. People feel like they have to be like "oh my gosh this is GREAT! This is the best thing EVER, I never want to LEAVE!" It's almost like there's a stigma attached to admitting homesickness. My advice to future study abroad students is to allow yourself to feel how you feel. There will be days when you can't get the key to your apartment to work and you had trouble communicating something to the store clerk at Blanco and you look at pictures of your friends at school on facebook and they're all having a great time and all you want to do is go home. And there will be days when you have an amazing conversation with your host family and you get asked for directions by someone on the street who thinks you're a native and you walk around the rest of the day feeling so Euro and you walk up to the Mirador de San Nicolas and look over the city and realize how incredible it is that you have the opportunity to do this. My advice is to just feel whatever you are feeling. Don't let your feelings of homesickness get you completely down, but it is important to feel it and not to feel like you have to constantly be ecstatic. Don't let anybody make you feel dumb for being homesick. It happens to everyoneeeee and the absolute best thing you can do is acknowledge your feelings, feel them, and then try to pick yourself up. (I do realize that 90% of the people who read this will not study abroad, but I want to write all this down before I forget!).

Today was our day trip to Cordoba, which I'll blog about tomorrow. It was good but exhauuuusting! It's my bedtime!! Hope everyone's doing well!

Busy Week

I apologize for the lack of bloggage this week! I had a test yesterday and one today, plus a paper due today, so it's been a big study week.

Ummmm.... let's see! Here are some random highlights:

-The weather in INSANELY gorgeous. Low 70s and sunny every day. I've been spending a lot of time outside trying to get some color on me. Rosario told me that I looked tan and that she was shocked because I'm "very, very white". It was pretty funny. I'm not burning, though! Those OBBT summers have done me well. 

-Yesterday we had pizza for dinner. I tried to explain the concept of deep dish to the kids and they were amazed (of course, I then pulled up Giordanos' website and showed them). They asked how big the cheeseburgers were, so I showed them Chilis' website. Carlos gasped, turned to me and said "I am coming to visit the United States!" Then he told me that he was going to eat 90 pizzas and 80 cheeseburgers when he came to visit

-Carlos spent all of last night singing, "We Wish you a Merry Christmas" (in English). It was one of the cutest things I've ever heard, especially because he didn't know the "and a happy new year" part. He just kept repeating, "We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas" over and over again.

Today's our last day of class for the week, and then we have our day trip to Córdoba tomorrow. Tomorrow also marks the HALFWAY point of study abroad. WOW. In some ways it feels like it flew by and in some ways it feels like I've been here for ages. I've got a ton to look forward to in the second half of the experience, though!

T-minus 9 days till Matt gets here!

Paris!

Notre Dame... Look closely and you can see the gargoyles!

Eiffel Tower light show from the top of the Arc de Triomphe

Champs Elyssee

View from the top of the Eiffel Tower

SO GLAD I got to see Meghan! She's blogging too-- check it out! meghantravelstheworld.blogspot.com. I literally laugh out loud every time I read it!

Arc de Triomphe

SO cool.

Kicking off Unofficial with a Nutella crepe and a beer. I should remind everyone that I'm legal in Europe :-) (and less than three months to go until I am in the US, too!)

Chateau of Versailles

Carolyn and I in the architecture studio... we're 3 for 3 on celebrating at least part of Unofficial together!

This weekend in Paris was SO much fun! I expected to like the city, but I didn't expect to LOVE it as much as I did. It was such a beautiful city with a really cool energy. I had heard all of the ¨Parisians are rude; they'll be mean to you because you don't speak French¨rumors, but we were very pleasantly surprised by how great everyone that we met was. It was awesome!

We got to Paris on Thursday night after a loooong day of traveling (five hours on a bus, two hours on a plane, one more hour on a bus). We were so excited to get to our hostel! We got there and there was a line out the door to check in, so we decided to grab dinner in the hostel's bar/restaurant while we waited for it to die down. During dinner, Carolyn called and we made plans to meet in Versailles the next day... I was so excited! After dinner, we all jumped on the internet for a little bit and then crashed for the night.

The next day, we woke up, had our hostel breakfast, and then got ready for the day. Jenny, Betsy, and I took the metro down near the Lourve and walked around that area for awhile. It was Unofficial and we were all a little homesick and upset that we were missing it, so we decided that celebrating it in France was definitely necessary. We got some lunch and some drinks (I had a Nutella crepe for lunch. No big deal.) and then got in contact with Carolyn and started to make our way to Versailles. We got on the RER train and made it out there! Carolyn met us at the train station and after about five minutes of crying and screeching and hugging and jumping up and down and making a scene, we all headed out to her school to meet up with her friends and to celebrate Unofficial with them. Carolyn's friends were a blast and we spent a long time hanging out in their architecture studio before heading over to the Chateau of Versailles to continue the celebrations. We hung out in the gardens and then took out boats in the Chateau's pond. It was SO much fun despite the intense Oak Brook Bath and Tennis flashbacks of people not knowing how to paddle the canoe that they took out. But we managed to get back in successfully and had an awesome time. After that, we went back to the studio and Carolyn and I went and got some dinner to catch up. I can't even say how great it was to get to see her and catch up. We all ended up staying in Versailles that night and had such a good day catching up with U of I kids.

The next morning, Carolyn came with us back into the city. We got off at the Eiffel Tower and decided to go to the top. We had gotten the tip that morning to climb the stairs to the second level and then take the elevator to the top from there. VERY good advice! The stairs are tough (670 of them!) but it's definitely worth not waiting in the loooooong line and saving 10 euro! Getting to the top was SO cool. You could see the whole city and it was incredible. And there are a lot of safety measures for anyone scared of heights! After the Eiffel Tower, we walked down by the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysses (I might be totally butchering the spelling of that). We grabbed some lunch and did a little shopping before parting ways. Carolyn headed back to Versailles and Jenny, Betsy, and I went back to the hostel for a much needed nap.

After my nap, I got a hold of Meghan!! She said that she was going out to dinner with her parents and her Italian and invited me to come with! I met her on the metro and we walked to her foyer to meet up with her parents. It was SO SO SO great to get to see the Hartsells!! We went out for dinner on Champs Elysses before going to the top of the Arc de Triomphe to watch the Eiffel Tower light up. It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen! After the light show, we went out for a drink and then they were nice enough to take me all the way back to my hostel. It was SUCH a fun night and I can't thank the Hartsells enough!

The next morning, we woke up and were really unsure about the whole Daylight Savings issue. We had gotten an e-mail from our program director, but (of course) just kind of skimmed it and assumed it was telling us to change our clocks ahead. Turns out we don't actually spring forward until the 29th! Weird! In any event, we played it safe and pretended like it was an hour ahead. Better to wait an hour for a flight than to miss it by an hour! We walked around a little bit, saw the Notre Dame, which was extremely impressive, had some lunch and some crepes, and then headed back to the hostel to grab our luggage. We had checked out that morning and had left our bags in the luggage closet there. Now, when we left, the closet was essentially empty. Buuuut when we got back, this long, narrow room was FILLED to the brim with backpacks and suitcases. So we ended up literally hiking through suitcases to get to ours from the back... it was pretty funny! 

After a metro ride, a bus ride, waiting at Beauvais airport for a few hours, a plane ride, another bus ride, and a cab ride, I made it home! It was a long trip but SO awesome! I can't wait to go back to Paris one day... although I think I might try to learn a little more French first. Repeating "bonjour" "oui" and "merci" can only get you so far!