Paris/Ljubljana

Hello everyone!
Second semester has officially begun along with all the organizational problems they seem to attract here...welcome back to Spain.

Last week, before classes started, I took advantage of the time and went to Paris and Slovenia with Riitta.  We had a great time, although it was much colder than we expected.  The first day we arrived in Paris, we made our way to the hotel, which was conveniently located in the red light district about 5 min. walk from the Moulin Rough...excellent start to the trip.  We got checked in, and decided to explore a bit.  We made our way to the Sacré Coeur, and stopped in all the little shops along the way.  It turned out to be a really cool neighborhood, with lots of boutiques, and artsy little cafes.  That night we went to see the Eiffel Tower, and attempted to go up to the top.  It was very cool to see the Tower lit up at night, and the light show was great!  Unfortunately the top was closed, so we decided to try back another day. 
The next morning we went to the Louvre and other touristy things to be done in Paris.  Going to most museums in Europe is great (free!) if you have an official student ID and/or are an EU citizen under 25.  Many times only one of those would be valid, and of course it would be the one I don't have.  Usually I would say that I was from Spain, and whip out my official resident card, to get in.  Most of the time that would work - so we got into almost everything for free.  Which was good because we were paying an arm and a leg for everything, Paris is so expensive!
After the first two days in Pairs, both of us were a little unimpressed....all we saw was a dirty city, with unfriendly people, and overpriced everything.  That is until we went up the Eiffel Tower.  Unfortunately we were not able to go to the top, (because of course its closed in January!) but the view from the second floor is still pretty amazing.  It was there we realized why people love Paris. 
(Now I have something to go back for, the top of the Eiffel Tower.)

Sacré Coeur

Christmas tree?  Guess those crazy Frenchies don't realize that Christmas is over...

Do I look cold?  Because I was FREEZING!!!

 The next morning we flew to Ljubljana, Slovenia.  Many of you are probably asking, "why Slovenia?"  And that is a very valid question...we really had no idea what we were getting into, only that it was a cheap flight from Paris with a rumored 'Best Hostel in the World'.  The drive from the airport to the hostel was a little frightening.  There was absolutely nothing, it was like driving in Northern WI in the dead of winter...nothing.  Once we got into the city it was still scary....very post soviet union ugly buildings, gray, not inviting...What were we thinking!?!
Then we got to our hostel.  It was an old military prison, in the artist district, with really bright colors, and graffiti all over...sweet.  Once we walked in I knew we would like it.  There was great music, friendly people, and lots of community involvement activities going on.  As I mentioned earlier, the hostel was an old prison, and was converted by the local university art program into a hostel.  Each "cell" is now a room, that was individually designed by a local artist, and had a really funky vibe.  We went to the restaurant in the hostel to get some food, and were surprised at how cheap, delicious, and how much food you got for only 4 euros!  (great change from Paris and Madrid)
The city turned out to be great.  The downtown is located on a river, with a cute little downtown and a castle overlooking the whole city.  We had a great time walking around, shopping in the small boutiques, and visiting all the surprisingly modern/artsy/posh coffee shops that had amazing coffee for less than 2 euros!  I think we drank enough coffee in those 2 days to last about 2 weeks! 

View of Ljubljana from the Castle

Best meal ever, Goulash and home brewed beer yumm!

Hostel Celica

After saying goodbye to our new friends at the hostel we made our way back to the airport, after waiting about 45 minutes in the cold after the shuttle forgot to pick us up...and headed back to Paris.  We spent a few more days in Paris visiting all the things we had missed, and then made our way back to Madrid to prepare for classes to begin...

This is the first week of classes, and they are going surprisingly well.  I showed up on the first day with no idea what classes I was going to take or what I was even going to do for the day.  I found Susan and somehow we came up for a list of classes for me.  I went to the International Office to register, only to find a line of about 500 other students waiting to register...ok so the 500 may be a bit of an exaggeration but it was a lot!  I noticed that the woman who usually helps us was not there, so I asked someone and they said she would not be in until Wednesday.  I am not sure how one of the 3 people who works in the International Office can be gone the first two days of a semester when all the international students are arriving...but I guess that is just how the Spanish do it.  So I signed up for an appointment to register, and decided to just go to the classes anyways. 

Classes so much better this semester than last, I actually understand what is going on!  Still tweaking the schedule a bit, but a lot less than last semester!  I have met the other American students in the program and they are very nice.  I have also found that making friends this semester is a lot easier!  Probably because my Spanish is a lot better, but also because I just start talking to everyone.  I think its because I no longer have a security blanket of having a friend from the states, so I have to make new friends....probably should have just done that from the start...oh well - better late than never! 

This weekend its off to Córdoba - and weather.com is telling me that is should be a high of 59 and sunny. :)  woohooo!

French Family Vadeboncoeur

Hello all!
I know - Its been a while...  I have been in France for the past month with my family for the Christmas holiday.  It was really great to see them and we had a blast.  We spent the month in Châtel (portes du soleil region) skiing, visiting other cities, and bumming around.  Most of our time was spent with the crazy locals, and lots of visitors. 

Lukas was the first German to visit - and spent New Years with us.  We spent a lot of time skiing and goofing around.  It was great to see him - even though Hanna and I lost him on New Year's eve for a bit...not our fault though.  See you in Berlin Lukas!

Châtel

After Lukas came the rest of the Germans, Lisa's family.  They stayed for a week and it was crazy.  Not all of them speak English, and none of us speak German - so there was a lot of translating going on through Lisa.  It was quite funny - seeing what gets lost in translation, even though Lisa is a great translator!

hiking in Châtel

Montreux Switzerland

When Lisa's family left - we didn't know any more Germans to invite - so Meagan came!  Meagan currently lives in Luxembourg and spend a couple days with us.  We visited a lot of local towns with Meagan - and killed the car.  Good times!   She may look innocent - but don't let that fool you.  Meagan + Mom + Louise = Big trouble/Big laughs!  Had such a great time with her and hoping to visit her in Luxembourg sometime this year! 

meditation anyone?

what a view - good thing the pirate ship doesn't block it all

Giant fork!  Vevey Switzerland

Château de Chillon, Montreux Switzerland

After Meagan came Chris.  Chris lives in London and spends a lot of time with our family....mostly squatting at our house.  But we love having her anyways!  It was great fun - now I am looking forward to reciprocating the squatting at her house! 

the barf producing drive to Aosta Italy

Aosta Italy, great Pizza - views don't suck either.

That a girl Chris!

 And then there are the Grace's - those are the crazy locals I mentioned earlier.  A great family that we got to spend quite a bit of time with - and I wish we lived closer... We had such an amazing time - and a lot of it had to do with the Grace's.  I am looking forward to visiting them this summer to do some riding. :)

Christmas dinner

Dad's birthday - post chocolat mousse incident

that picture pretty much sums up our time in bars...

Chris, Ben, Hanna

Last day skiing in Verbier Switzerland with Lloyd

If I had to sum up my time in France in one sentence (maybe a bit of a run-on) it would be:
We skied, spent a lot of time in Switzerland, had pizza in Italy, got car-sick, went to the spa, broke the car, went to bars, ate at le Fiacre, finally got into the castle, went hiking, danced on tables, had chocolat mousse, watched a mountain bike race in the snow, sang the sound of music and had a kick-ass time doing it all!

As you can see from that sentence - It was a great vacation.  It was hard to come back to Madrid knowing that I was leaving my family and friends in France - to come back to Spain where most of my friends are leaving or are already gone... But it will be ok, I am much more proficient at Spanish now, so making friends will be a breeze! (fingers-crossed!)

End of the semester/Rome!

Hello everyone!

I am finally done with my first semester in Spain!  I can't believe how fast it went, and am very glad to have a second semester here. It was a crazy last week of classes, with a short trip to Rome with some friends.

We had found cheap tickets to Rome, Italy for Tuesday-Wednesday of this week.  We left on Tuesday after classes, and then came back late Wednesday night.  It was a very short trip, but we had just enough time to see all that we needed/wanted to see, and eat some GREAT food! :)  Of course you could spend a week in Rome and not see it all, but for having just one day of sightseeing - we saw a lot.

Tuesday evening we arrived in Rome and made our way to our hostel.  It was close to the main train station, so was very easy to find.  Once we checked in, got a recommendation for a restaurant, and a map of the city, we were off!  We first went to eat - pizza of course - which was amazing!  (after 4 months of Spanish food, Italian food was a very welcome change)  We decided to go to the Trevi fountain that night, and after getting a little lost - we finally found the fountain.  It was great to go at night because there was no one else there!  We spent a while there, taking pictures, throwing money into the fountain, and relishing in the fact that we were in Italy.  After we were frozen all the way through, we made our way back to the hostel, and went to bed excited for our busy next day.

Isabelle, Riitta, Marzia and I at the Trevi Fountain :)

The next morning we got up early, had a quick breakfast at the hostel, and headed toward the Vatican city.  Since we were close to the metro station, we decided that it would be easiest to take the metro to the Vatican.  Now before I came to Spain I was a public transportation virgin, I had no idea how to use it and got lost almost everywhere I went.  Now, I am quite good at it.  The Madrid public transportation is one of the best in the world,  or so I had heard, but had nothing to compare it to.  Now I do.  The Rome metro is really dirty, it is slow, the stations are ridiculous (it takes longer to find the exit, and get to it, than the amount of time one spends on the actual train) there are only 2 lines, and you cannot get anywhere in the city using it.  But we still managed to get to the Vatican and all around the city, although we walked most of it. 

Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel

Once we got to the Vatican, we went into the museum, which houses the Sistine Chapel.  After the museum we went to St. Peters Square, where they were setting up for Christmas.  We walked all over the city, and found some lunch - amazing pasta and coffee!  After lunch we went to the Colosseum and spent some time there.  This was a great time to visit because there were not a lot of tourists.  It was however freezing, so we took a lot of coffee breaks. :)

Inside the Vatican

St. Peter's Square

Colosseum

Yummm!

After more walking we made our way back to the train station and back to the airport for the flight home.  We flew Ryan Air which if you didn't know, they don't provide seat assignments...So people think they have to be the first on the plane so they can get the best seat.  This is ridiculous because 1. all the seats are exactly the same, and 2. everyone is going to get on, they have their tickets!  But regardless we got in-line right when we got there and waited for over 1 hour.  (the combination of running on Italian time and Spanish time means that everything runs at least 45 mins. late)  We didn't end up getting back to Madrid until 12:30pm and had to wait until 2pm for the night bus.  It was a great trip, and I hope to visit Rome again sometime.

The semester ended on Friday for me, and it feels great to be done!  I can't believe how fast the time went, but I wish it wasn't over.  I am looking forward to second semester, which is weird because back home no one ever looks forward to the next semester starting....I guess that is a good thing!

This weekend was crazy!  There were so many parties, celebrating everyone and their brother, and my friends guilt tripped me into going to most of them.  ("Ali, its our last weekend together, pleaseee!?!") What was I supposed to do...?  Anyways, it was really fun, and I will have relaxing time in Chatel, France with the family!!!  My flight leaves tomorrow morning to Geneva, Switzerland and I will spend the rest of December and most of January there with my family.  I am really excited to see everyone, and look forward to all the shenanigans starting tomorrow.

Keep watching for photos and stories of the "French Family Vadeboncoeur" Christmas in France.  :)
 

Happy December! :)

Wow!  Its already December (I know, its the 9th of December...so I am a little slow that is all)
Its hard to believe that I have been here for over 3 months!  Its gone by so fast, and as all the other students prepare to go home, I am very glad that I am staying another semester.  Maybe its because from the beginning I was mentally prepared (or at least was pretending) to be here for a year, but I feel that I have so much left to see and learn that I am not be ready to go home just yet.  I am defiantly ready for the semester to end, to see my family (15 days!!!) and to have snow.  Some of you may think that its great to not have snow, but I don't feel like its Christmas time without it....hopefully there will be plenty of it in Chatel, France!

I don't have much to tell about what I have been doing the last week...homework and such.  University has gotten a lot harder, with the end of my semester approaching.  Its just like back at Carroll, too many exams/presentations/projects due, and not enough time.  Here they are big on end of the semester group projects.  I hate them, because there is NEVER time for everyone to get together.  And of course because Spanish people are always late, and like to put things off until the end of the semester (including the professors) everything is piled on to these last weeks.  Planning ahead or providing semester plans is so overrated.  *said with large dose of sarcasm*


I have learned a lot about myself, and noticed how I have changed since arriving in Madrid.  The biggest thing that I have learned is independence.  When you go off to college there is a sense of independence and doing everything on your own, but for me that was nothing like the independence I have experienced since I arrived here.  I am also a lot more self-confident in my abilities of going somewhere foreign, and figuring it out, on my own.  Its a pretty cool feeling, when I look back at the first couple weeks here, and realize how much I have learned, and how much I was missing out on before this experience.  I am grateful that I have another semester to study here, and a summer to work here. :)

Now I am off to the office to meet with my future boss and discuss the details of my internship!  (a little nervous...my first "real job" interview, yikes!)  until next time...

love

Spanish/American Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.  We always go to my grandmas house in Arkansas for the week with the entire family.  Its is a lot of fun, and this was the fist year, in my memory, that I was not in Arkansas.  I had to do something to celebrate so I decided that I would make a Thanksgiving meal for my host family.  Quickly after making that decision I realized that I had no idea how to make any of the food...let alone in a kitchen where I don't know where anything is, or the name of it in Spanish.  I also knew that I could not make a Turkey, the whole idea of touching it is enough to make me gag...gross.

So I talked with my host mom about it and she thought it was a great idea and said that she would make a chicken, because apparently they don't eat turkey here...  So I began looking for the food that I wanted to cook, and started at an American grocery store in Madrid.  I went to the "store" with Marzia, but I don't think you can call that a store.  It was more a pantry, with American food brands.  (Soooooo tiny!)  I did get some pumpkin for the pumpkin pie, but they were out of pie crusts, and stuffing mix.  (But I got oatmeal and some crunchy peanut butter!!!)  Normally, making stuffing or pie crust from scratch is not a big deal, but when the ingredients are all different, and you have class all day on Thanksgiving, it makes it a little harder.  In the end, I decided that chicken, vegetables, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie would be the Thanksgiving menu for this year.  5 grocery stores later, I finally had all the stuff I needed to make dinner! :)

I had to go to classes all morning, which was very strange to be in class on Thanksgiving and in a country where they don't celebrate it.  (no one was in a particularly good mood, which was weird because I kept forgetting they don't celebrate, therefore it is just a normal Thursday for them...lame)

Anyways, when I got home from classes, my host mom and I began cooking and had a great time together in the kitchen watching TV and translating recipes and converting units.  All the food turned out great, and I was excited for everyone to have their first Thanksgiving meal! 
They were all quite skeptical about the pumpkin pie, because pumpkin here is only used as a vegetable.  (It would be like making a broccoli pie, I see where the skepticism comes from)

But they all tried everything, and liked it all, (even Raúl who apparently has the taste buds of a 4 year old, because he doesn't like anything)

Yumm! 

After dinner I skyped with everyone in Arkansas and my host family which was really fun.  It was difficult to translate everything quickly, because there is always at least 7 people talking at once but it was fun.  Overall it was a good Thanksgiving, nothing like being in Arkansas, which I look forward to next year, but a it was fun to bring some American culture to Spain. :)

Last night I went to Madrid with some friends to look at Christmas lights around the city, they finally turned them on!  The city was so festive and beautiful, but freezing.  I am sure it is still warmer here than at home, but damn!  I am not used to cold anymore!

Some of the Christmas lights near Sol - hopefully more picture to come!

Tonight we have tickets to the theater in Madrid, not sure what show, something in Spanish I assume. :)  And tomorrow consists of homework, 2 presentations on Monday, yikes!  (Its like I am a real college student again...)

love xoxo

A free leg of ham!!!

Hi all!
These past two weekends have been awesome.  I traveled with friends to different parts of Spain by train, which is great because its very cheap and I get to see many different parts of the Country.

Two weekends ago Marzia and I went to Ávila, a small city about 2 hours away by train.  Its famous for its walls, and they very nice walls.  We didn't really have a plan about what we were going to do, we didn't even know where to go when we left the train station!  But we figured out how to get to the old part of the city and walked around all day.  It was a beautiful fall day, and we had a great time.  We had lunch at a little restaurant right outside the walls, and finished the day with more walking around and a little shopping.  Ávila is very touristy, but because it is not tourist season, there were not any crowds which was good, but a lot of stores closed early.  We decided to go back to the train station early to see if we could change our tickets to an earlier train and luckily there was a train leaving in 20 minutes that we were able to change out tickets to - for free!

That was on Saturday, on Sunday Marzia and I had made plans to meet up with a friend, Isabelle, in Madrid for lunch.  After lunch we decided to go to the FREE Katy Perry concert.  The MTV European awards were here so Linkin Park and Katy Perry both held free concerts in the city.  The concert was great fun but I was really missing my American sized personal space bubble.  I also figured out that I am claustrophobic.  Not fun to figure out when you are in the middle of thousands of people all pushing you to get closer to the stage.  But once I got over that, it was great.  After Katy Perry we left the concert to go to a bar to watch Real Madrid play.  The game was against Athlético Madrid which is great because both teams are from Madrid!

The rest of this week was not very eventful.  Classes are getting a lot harder, and I now actually have homework and exams to study for...but I am also getting a lot better at Spanish.  I have even made some more friends, now I just don't even know how to balance my time! :)  I have also been trying to get my iphone to work since I got here.  I kept going into the local cell phone store trying to figure out how to get it to work here, but because they don't speak any English, and I didn't know how to ask all the questions I needed to know about the prices it was very difficult.  I finally had the genius idea to take the SIM card from the cell phone I have and put it into my iphone.  (I know, it took me 2 months to even come up with that idea...but that is not the point)  The next task was the take the SIM card out of my iphone - not as easy as it sounds.  After bending a bobby pin, breaking my tweezers, and watching every video on youtube about "how easy it is to remove the SIM card from the iphone" I finally got it out.  Then, after about 45 minutes of trying to get the SIM card unlocked in my iphone, I figured out that it just won't work here.  (I bet if I had an iphone 4 it would work...)  The next best thing that happened to me during the week, happened while I was eating breakfast and watching TV.  Spanish TV is...strange, they watch a lot of trashy talk shows and reality TV.  The commercials are just as bad.  However, one did catch my eye.  As I was eating my corn flakes, as I do EVERY morning, I saw an infomercial for an HP computer.  They always have free gifts and Spain is no exception.  In fact here it comes with 2 free gifts!  The first is a stylish laptop carrying case.  The second is a leg of ham.  Yes, an entire freaking LEG of ham!!!  I will order one just so I get the ham.

On Saturday, Marzia, Isabelle and I went to Cuenca.  It is another small city about 3 hours from Madrid.  Cuenca is famous for its hanging houses, which are very old houses, literally built into the side of a cliff...  It was a beautiful small city and we had a great time walking around and soaking up some sun.

It was a really fun day, and I know that it was because I came out of it with a poop story.  Some of you may think that is really gross, and yes it was disgusting, but think about it -  whenever you have a poop story, its always funny!  If you do not like laughing, then just skip to the next paragraph.  On our way home we all had to pee, but we were very close to the train station in Madrid so decided to wait and go in the station.  When we asked where the bathrooms were they said that there were none, but that all the trains have them.  We had to wait about 10 minutes for the next train to arrive and when it did we got on by the bathrooms.  Our nostrils were immediately filled with the most horrible stench ever.  I decided that I didn't have to pee bad enough to go into the bathroom but Marzia did.  She went in and as I am standing there holding her bag, gagging, I look around and everyone on the train has their scarves pulled up around their noses in disgust.  I go and sit down with Isabelle and we are laughing at everyone and gagging at the same time.  Marzia can't figure out how to close the bathroom door, and normally I would help her but I couldn't get any closer to the source of the smell.  Eventually she gave up and came out of the bathroom to sit with us.  We decided that we had to move to another part of the train to get away from the smell, but had to walk by the bathroom to get there.  We all prepared to make the journey past the stench and made our way to the front of the train.  At this point I am hysterical from the whole situation, with everyone on the train gagging, and Marzia not being able to shut the door, that I am almost peeing my pants (not good for someone who has had to pee for the past 45 minutes).  So we find three seat together towards the front of the train and as we are about to sit a man yells and tells us not to sit there.  We look around and there is a pile of puke on the floor.  So we move to another set of seats only to discover there is what appears to be a huge pile of poop on the floor.  At this point I can hardly contain my laughter, just trying not to die from disgust, and laughing at everyone else who is freaking out.  It was a once in a lifetime experience, and I am glad that it was only a 10 minute train ride.

That is all I have for now, hopefully I will have some other good stories for you all from this week! :)
xoxo

Guadalajara/2 month mark!

Hi all!
Tomorrow marks two months in Spain for me!  yay!  I am still having a great time and learning new things all the time.  Everything is still quite challenging, the language, missing things from home; family, friends, food that doesn't come with eyes... but it gets better everyday.  I finally feel like my Spanish has taken a big jump forward.  I can watch TV and understand a lot, have conversations with people around me, and survive a weekend trip to visit the grandparents. ;)

The grandparents live in a small town near Guadalajara.  Its about a 2 hour drive from Villa.  My host mom told me that we were going to visit them for the weekend and I was under the impression that everyone was going...this is where the whole language barrier things still exists.  Anyways, turns out that it was just me and my host parents going.  That was ok because its easier for me to talk when there are less people around, the whole confidence thing, so I just figured that I would get a lot of Spanish practice in.  We arrived at the grandparents house and my host mom's 2 brothers and wives were also there.  They are all very nice, but don't speak any English, good for practice but very frustrating at times.  None of the other grandchildren came so I was there bringing down the average age a bit. :)  It was actually really fun, and eating dinner with everyone was a blast!  It reminded me a lot of Thanksgiving with my family, everyone talking at once, very loud, just like David. 

Now Spanish people are very concerned with how much you eat.  Apparently they think that I don't know how to put food on my plate, or know how to tell when I am full, because they are constantly making me eat more.  And its even worse when they are old!  And they are quite old.  My host grandpa was absolutely hilarious.  He is probably at most 4' 10" and is very round, with high pants, held up even higher with suspenders.  He can't hear and doesn't like to wear his hearing aid, or admit that he can't hear you.  Watching the interaction between everyone was very entertaining because they would all be talking and then he would jut in to say something completely off topic and then everyone would yell at him, and then talk in normal voices about him.  This continued for the entire weekend and was very amusing. 
Here are a few pictures from my weekend. :)

This is where my host parents got married, such a beautiful church in a very small town.

Not sure what that is, but I found it in my room...

A beautiful look-out over a lake in the mountains near Guadalajara

The calendar for this week is pretty empty still, but hopefully that will change!  Tuesday is a holiday in Madrid (imagine that...another holiday!) so I don't have any classes.  I am trying to plan a weekend trip or a day trip somewhere but am having difficulties with the internet.  (This is one of those moments that I wish I could speak Spanish fluently because I want to call and complain and order the tickets online but that conversation is a little above my abilities still...grrrr)  Anyways, miss you all and would love to hear updates of your lives!
xoxo