Hola familia y amigos...
(Monday, October 3, 2011)
Today I just went to class and after my history class (which ends at 9:30pm) I went out for dinner with Jenny, Audra and Srvani (3 girls from the UC program). We went to this really good vegetarian place called El Piano and the guy who worked there was really nice and talked to us in spanish... the place was literally filled with english speaking people... a couple from England, another exchange student from England, and us. And unfortunately we were speaking in english the whole time...
the reason I don't like chillin' with americanos...
(Tuesday, October 4, 2011)
After German class María invited me to hang out with her and her friends. So I walked with her to her friend's house and we just sat and chatted for about 3 hours before walking back to my piso. She and her friend are really nice but are younger than me and sometimes they only talked about people... as Eleanor Roosevelt once said: "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, and small minds discuss people". In other words, I was a bit bored after about 2 hours, but it was fun to just be listening to Spanish, talking in spanish and learning new words and phrases in spanish from spaniards! :) I am in Spain, after all.
(Wednesday, October 5, 2011)
María came to my history class today and took notes for me! (Whooo!! They are so much more detailed than my notes and helped me understand things quite a bit better... however, she hasn't been back to take notes since. I knew it was too good to be true. haha) In class I met 2 other americanos, Sarah (from Kentucky) and Alex (from Colorado).... they were having just as much trouble as I, so after class we went to a photocopy shop near campus and made copies of the notes for them. Then we all went out for Kebab together. I LOVE Kebab!! Kebab is a turkish/iranian food that is absolutely incredible (if you go to the right place) in Europe!! And there are Kebab shops
everywhere. Its also the food of choice at around 4am or later after a long night of drinking. (No, I haven't done that yet... eaten Kebab after drinking, I mean. ;) haha)
(Thursday, October 6, 2011)
Thursday night we had a 'tutoría' with the history professor (Paco). I love this man- he is so sweet and really wants us to learn, not just for the sake of learning something only to forget it later, but to learn something new that means something to us and will hopefully stick with us. He also wants to help us as foreigners, and for this, I am thankful.
After the tutoría, Chris (my italian piso mate) made dinner for the four of us- spanish tortilla and mashed potatoes. (lots of potatoes, but soooo delicious). I love that my roommates love to cook!! I am always learning something new from them. (a.k.a. not only am I in heaven in Spain and in this piso because I get to speak
so many languages (Spanish, Italian, German, English...)
all the time, but also because I am learning to cook so much better and so many new foods!! :) (...Yes, we will have dinner when I get home so I can cook ya'll some good spanish food... or maybe a buffet style dinner with italian, spanish and german foods that I will have learned to cook. Sound like a plan?) That night I just stayed in and watched a movie (The Big Lebowski... in spanish, of course) with the boys... but I was really tired so I only watched part of it and then went to bed.
(Friday, October 7, 2011)
Friday night I made dinner for my piso mates: Turkey burgers with avocado, tomatoes, gouda cheese, and sautéed mushrooms. Messy, but delicious... as a burger should be. They enjoyed it, so I was happy. Then after dinner, I went to a bar with Oscar for a mojito, before going to La chupitería (chupitos= shots). This place has 104 different shots to choose from for only 1 euro each. We had 2 shots here and then met up with my piso mates at embotellón. Embotellón literally means 'large bottle' but in this contexts it signifies the large plaza at the edge of town where everyone goes to drink and be merry. (I personally think its quite gross... and reminds me a bit of 'merica, well, SB at least.) Embotellón is the cheapest way to get drunk... people buy their drink of choice at an 'alimentación' (like little A1 markets that litter the city) and walk to the parking lot that is 'embotellón' to drink with friends. There is always a 'montón' of people and there isn't any música. Also, the ground is nasty cuz there are spilled drinks and who knows what else... yea, ew. We didn't stay out too late that night...
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| Chupitos! I don't remember what they were because basically you go in, pick a random number between 1-104 and then be surprised by what you've got. |
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| Embotellón... Can you see all the people packed in this parking lot?! |
(Saturday, October 8, 2011)
Picnic day with los Italianos!! :) Today was soooooooooo much fun!! The italianos decided to have a picnic in Sacromonte (Sacred Mountain... which is in the hills (a.k.a. wilderness with fresh air) on the other side of the valley from La Alhambra.). Everyone prepared something, we met at the bus stop, took the bus up the mountain as far as it went and then walked the rest of the way to a little area on top of the mountain where we set out a blanket with all our food and drinks and enjoyed the day. We had
so much food! Emanuela (my italian piso mate) made a frittata, Chris made something similar to a small meatloaf, I made fruit salad... we also had rice, desserts, cerveza, sandwiches, and a really good 'tortilla' made from pasta. It was like spaghetti carbonara but in a 'tortilla' form... I don't know how to explain it, but yum! After eating we sat around and chatted. I hung out with the only two spanish girls who were there, and a nice boy, Mohamed, from Morocco who has studied in Spain for the past 4 years (and had school taught in spanish in Morocco, thus, he speaks spanish perfectly). After resting a bit, Emanuela and I hiked up part of the hill that went a little higher with two italian boys to see the view of ALL of Granada down below. It was beautiful. Then we joined the group again and played a little game kinda like a cross between red-rover and capture the flag... but different. One girl held a sweater (the 'flag') in the middle and then there were 4 people on each team, numbered 1-4. The girl in the middle would shout a number and what ever number was called had to run to capture the sweater before the other person got it, and run back to their team's side without being tagged by the other team. It was fun! After tiring out from this game, we all returned to chatting. Slowly everyone started leaving in small groups. I walked back down the hill with Emanuela, Teresa y María (the 2 spanish girls), Chiara (an italian girl who is like out fifth piso mate cuz she's always over. She is super sweet!), and Mohamed. We stopped on our way down the hill at Camborio for tea and to watch the sunset from the terrace. It was breathtaking to watch the sunset over La Alhambra and the city of Granada from this point. :) (Camborio is a night club in Sacromonte that is usually filled with a bunch of foreigners, so I haven't been. Plus it's also super far from my piso.) Then Emanuela and I played 'kick the ball (instead of can)' with a ball that Emanuela found... until we reached a family with two boys who we kicked the ball to and they played. :)
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| Sacromonte |
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| The Church at the top of the hill |
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| The church from the parking lot where we ate |
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| Comida y gente |
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| María, Teresa, Chiara |
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| Our cute little picnic |
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| The big group of picnic-ers. ;) (Chris is the guy sitting next to me) |
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| La Alhambra and Granada from Sacromonte |
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| Me at the top of the hill |
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| ...even higher up! |
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| Emanuela and I :) |
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| Gypsy houses look like this in Sacromonte. So pretty! |
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| Sun setting over La Alhambra from Camborio's terrace |
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| Again from Camborio |
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| The girls: Francesca, Emanuela, Chiara, María, me, Teresa |
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| Fra, Manu, Chiara, Teresa, Mohamed, me |
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| La Alhambra by night-ish |
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| El Camborio |
We ended the night by stopping in Plaza Nueva where we watched a street performer's comedy act. He was hilarious!! And really got the crowd to participate. I laughed until it hurt today, and it felt so good! :D
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| Two random guys on the street... they were with the bachelor. |
(Sunday, October 9, 2011)
I just did a TON of homework today... I had so much to read for clinical psychophysiology and also things to organize. It was kinda fun though because Emanuela, Chris and I were all studying together in the salón (living room) for a while.
That's it for week two! Week three coming up next! un beso
P.S. Happy 21st Birthday Jace!! (it's today- the 24th)
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