The week I pledged to see Juanes live

This week, in short, I discovered the superiority of Spanish language music compared to songs in English. Besides that, my week went pretty normally. I have no idea why they choose to listen to lady gaga and beyonce when for the most part, they can't understand the words.

Our new (new) Conversation teacher is the most intimidating woman ever. Shes about 6 feet tall and speaks way too quickly and basically gets in your face when she asks a question. So annoying. We don't even know why we had to get a new teacher in the first place! Tuesday we had our first exam, which wasn't too hard but not an easy A either.

On the brighter side, everyone in my class is coming together in hatred for the new teacher, so at least we are not alone. I still love all of my other teachers because their teaching style includes asking you about your life and making us feel awkward while telling stories in Spanish. It makes for funny conversation.

The UMD group is also trying to make it so the program lets us take some classes pass-fail if we wish. Its becoming a big issue because a lot of students think the grades here will transfer as C's and B's instead of the A's that are easy to get in a UMD Spanish class.

After a fairly long week, we went to a Romanticismo museum with Mercedes. Snoozefest. Except we decided to dare each other to touch the antiques while the security guards were not on their "guards". We were all super tired so it was just hysterical. After the pointless museum tour, we got some coffee, went back to Alcala, and ate dinner. Then the girls and I met at Cafe Continental, where we had the waitress Maria, who thought we were locas.

Saturday, three other girls and I hopped on the train and took a day trip to El Palacio Aranjuez, which is outside of Madrid. It was a seasonal residence for the royal family, and it is giant! They have the most beautiful gardens, and two couples were taking their wedding pictures there! It was actually sunny out that day too, so we lucked out! We went in, and all the rooms were so elaborate, similar to the Palacio Real in Madrid. They also had a cool display of clothing worn by the royal family, and the last 5 of so wedding dresses princesses wore. They were all so pretty, and I would love to go back there. We then went to a nearby cafeteria where we each got the special, half a chicken, some sides and dessert. We were all so stuffed and tired on the train ride home!

We tried to go to La Garena, a town nearby Alcala to check out the nightlife, but the bus never came so we gave up and went out in Alcala. We'll try again another weekend.

Just talked to Kath on Skype and saw Harley! So presh. It's been raining here a lot, including today. So after mass, I got some lunch and stayed in and studied and read a bit for our exam tomorrow in grammar class. I'm not too worried about it, pero vamos a ver! I'm happy we have dance class again this week, and just want my test tomorrow to be over with.

Hopefully next weekend we are going to check out Toledo, and who knows what else!
Hasta Luego!

Carnaval in Cadiz

Ok...So it has been awhile! But, I just had a very fun and full weekend in Cadiz, a city in the Southernmost part of Span (Andalucía) where I celebrated Carnaval! The city was beautiful and the people there were very fun-loving but hard to understand! We left from Madrid, and took an eight hour bus ride to Puerta de Santa Maria, where our hotel was located. Carnaval didn't actually start until Saturday, so on Friday the program we went with rented a bar for us, where we had some drinks and danced until the bus took us home at 4:30. The city was totally dead on Friday, because everyone was preparing themselves for the whole WEEK of fiestas in Cadiz.

The trip was through an organized program, and there were students from a bunch of different countries who went with us. A group of Puerto Ricans were sitting with us on the bus and taught us this really funny dance/song they sing to get people around them to dance called the Pelua(SP?) where they basically call people out and tell them to get up and dance. Everyone was so excited for the big weekend fiesta.

On Saturday, we at breakfast at the hotel, took a little nap and then decided to see Cadiz during the day. Thankfully it wasn't raining like weather.com predicted, and the city was totally beautiful. There are a lot of beautiful plazas and buildings in Cadiz, and each plaza had a church and cathedral. Most people were already dressed up in their disguises, and we searched the city for some costumes and then returned to the hotel for some dinner.

After dinner, we got all dressed up in wigs and masks for the big party in the streets. We made it to the bus and everyone was partying and getting all excited for the night. The bus dropped us off and we were greeted by a massive group of people dressed up in groups of various different things. I was impressed by how creative everyone was, and most people carried large bottles (botalones) of alcohol around with them in the streets. Each plaza had a stage where performers were dressed up and played music, usually their songs had satirical and political themes.

Everyone was dressed up in the streets, and many of the bars sold drinks right on the streets. We ventured around to find a place to sit and ended up at a restaurant where it was mostly locals. From there we walked around, stopped in a few bars, got lost, found funny people to talk to, and saw a bunch of performers in the plazas. Although everyone was basically wasted and there were about 5 people per square inch in the plazas, everyone was really nice and no one was out of hand. I don't think the same could be said if Carnaval took place in the US the way it does here.

We ended up at a bar for a while where we talked to this Spanish guy dressed up like a Shepherd for a while about the differences between the US and Spain. All the people at the bar were super friendly, and it was apparent everyone was there just to have a good time.

From there, we left for the bus around 4 am and headed back to the hotel. We woke up by 10:30 the next day for the free hotel breakfast, smuggled a bunch of food for the ride, and even made it to the beach near the hotel for a few photos. We left the hotel around one and made the 8 hour trip back to Madrid. If you know me at all you can guess what I did the whole way back (slept).

I ended up back at my casa around 11:30, watched project runway online, and went to bed. Now it is Monday and pouring rain and I have an examen tomorrow! No es justo. I need to charge my camera but when I do, photos of Cadiz will be up promptly!

El Prado

Above are some photos from our class tour of the University of Alcala- it was really interesting and they even had their own school jail! If you spoke Castellana- A CÁRCEL!

Not too much has happened since my last post, so I will keep it short. On Thursday I got my haircut right after class, and it is so short (for me)! I probably got about 6 inches off in total. I wanted it to be significantly shorter, but I think the language barrier had something to do with HOW short it is. But now, a few days later I decided I really like it, and it cuts my shower time in half.

On Saturday we had a group trip to El Prado, a giant art museum in Madrid. They have some of the most famous works of El Greco, Velasquez, Ribero, and basically any Spanish painter you can imagine. It was really cool to see all of the paintings in their original form, but the place was so big I doubt we saw one tenth of the museum! Its definitely a place I would like to go back to. We then walked to the same restaurant we went to the first day in Madrid and got a great lunch. After that, Krissie Shannon and I walked around Madrid and window shopped until we were too tired to keep walking. After the train ride home, I took a nap, ate dinner and called it a night.

On Sunday I was glad to hear UMD beat UNC in basketball! It sounded like a fun game to go to, and I'm glad our team isn't sucking for once. Apparently the Superbowl happened on Sunday as well, but that's only a rumor that's going around Spain I think. They are getting ready for los carnavales here, and all the little peques (Kids) are going to dress up on Wednesday! Que Guay. Anyways, I have to go because I am headed to my flamenco class!
Hasta pronto!

One month!

It has already been a whole month since we landed in Spain. In some ways it feels like a year ago, and in most ways it feels like I just got here. It is nice to have gotten into a routine and to know my way around Alcala and more generally in Madrid. The weather here is cold but still sunny and beautiful, which is all I really care about. My hermanito is getting better because he is more used to me and doesn't try as hard to get my attention by doing bad stuff. However, he did come into my room today while I was asleep and started turning the lights on and off. Me telling him to dejame (leave me alone) did nothing, so I had to physically usher him out of my room. God bless his grandmother for watching him every night so I don't have to see (or hear) him.

Besides being woken up by a 4 year old, I have a lot to look forward to. Some planned trips I am really looking forward to include a trip to Cadiz for Carneval in 2 weeks and a trip to Sevilla the weekend of March 6. And of course I can't wait for my parents and sis to come over spring break! (Dad- Kath told me you like to read my blog out loud.) This weekend, we are going to El Prado in Madrid and hopefully (fingers crossed) staying in Madrid for a night game of Real Madrid versus Espanyol. We are hoping to buy tickets early that day to avoid online charges and get the best price. But can you really but a price on seeing Ronaldo and Kaka in real life? Probably not.

In terms of school, Alcalingua classes are going really well, though at times they can be really long. Today was our last day of history class with Rafa, one of my favorite teachers I've ever had. He has the voice of a voice-over actor for movie trailers or maybe a sports announcer and at least tried to make learning hundreds of years of Spanish history fun. We have a test tomorrow, which I should probably study for. I think our group will move onto literature for the next two weeks, but we will see on Friday.

So there you have a small life update while I procrastinate reading La moza de cantaro for class tomorrow. Hasta luego! (will update over the weekend) :-)

El Escorial

This weekend was really fun, it was Theresa's bday on Saturday, so Friday we naturally went out and had everyone near us sing to happy birthday to her in Spanish. We tried out our dance moves and found some really good Spanish guy dancers we assumed were gay to dance with. And one had a peg leg?...But I digress. On Saturday, all of the girls on the trip went to a Mexican restaurant on Saturday to celebrate. Delicioso. Chupitos gratis.
Friday after class we went into Madrid with Mercedes to the National Spanish Archeology Museum, where one of the guides chastised us for not partying in Madrid enough. I hate to sound like the stereotypical study abroad American, but the museum was super boring. But after, we walked to a churreria where we got the best chocolate con churros EVER.
Every person I have met here thoroughly encourages young people to party hard on the weekends; and generally giving us the opposite advice an adult would give to a college student in America. Tour guides, teachers, my madre. Going out both nights of the weekend and coming home at wee hours of the morning is not only expected but encouraged.
Sunday, a few of us went to El Escorial, a GIANT palace/monastery/ biblioteca/cathedral outside of Madrid. It was beautiful and interesting, but also huge and freezing. There were a lot of great works of art there, and every king of Spain is buried in the tombs. Its cool because we learned about a lot of the architecture and paintings we found there in our art class, so we knew what to look for. It was a cool thing to do for a day, and the town it is in is so quaint. It really felt like we were on the set of a movie or something with the crazy scenery.
I'm not really in the mood to write a lot right now so I am going to post some photos from Sunday. Hasta Luego.