Case of the Mondays

Last night we went to an irish pub named paddys to watch the vikings game! We showed up and im pretty sure every single american in granada was at that pub! i didn´t see one spaniard! So anyway, the game didn´t start until midnight here, but we were all in for a long haul because i reeeeally wanted the vikes to make it to the super bowl. So we all squeeze in and about ten minutes later someone goes, Maggie! I look and it is Alise Carlson! (a girl I played volleyball with in highschool). but how random! in the same town and same pub in spain!!! So everyone was super into it, then 3 am rolls around and the owner has to kick everyone out because of some rule or something? so anyway it got right up to the end and i didn´t even get to see the end! but its okay cause it probably would have ruined my night. I was so pumped during it though to tell everyone i was from minnesota cause was a true minnesotan cheering for the vikes there! (keep in mind this was like the second game ive watched all year-but it was still cool). So then this morning we had to get up at like 9 and had a class at 10- then i had the afternoon to myself to go get much needed school clothes- i really didn´t realize how much of the bare minimum i had brought for clothing until i found myself rotating between like 3 shirts everyday. I got lost and found some really cool parks, one i had seen before but didnt get time to walk through it, it has leafless trees all over growing in the cement, its really cool. When i got back to the school for evening class students kept asking me if i saw the accident? i was like, what accident? i guess a woman, (still not sure of age or any other info) got hit by a bus and was lying inthe street and was guessed to be dead- we are not 100% sure of anything but pray anyway! alot of my friends saw the woman laying there with blood everywhere so they are having a hard time with everything. - and then we walked extra careful back from school. you should see how fast these buses go though, i get scared just standing on the street when they go by! noone would stand a chance against one of those things. So......for a little comic relief after that depressing story- tonight i sat down to eat supper and it was a plate full of like this potatoe thing, i lifted it up to tear it, and a hair of my host mom was creased into the bottom of it. i just pulled it out, threw some ketchup on it and thought to myself over and over again about how there were starving children in africa.

La Ahlambra

Friday night was our last night with our host brother :(. He brought a girl from school to eat supper with us. I thought she was from spain because she looked like it, so I was like Hola! She’s from New Mexico. Anyway she was really sweet and she lives here on her own in an apartment so she was really excited to get a home cooked meal. When she finished eating my host mom asked her, fruta o flan? (fruit or this pudding type dish). The girl was like oh, no gracias, I am full. My host mom looked at her and said with a strong voice, Futa o flan. It was so funny, she didn’t realize that it wasn’t optional. Also that night, mama carmen’s friend Conche made us the flan for dinner. It was the only thing I haven’t liked since I’ve been here, awful. I love the flan in the carton, but this stuff was weird! My host brother asked how it was, and we can talk in English and they have no idea what we are saying so I told him he would have to see for himself. He took a bite and responded; well it’s just not really a consistent texture. After dinner he asked us to help him pack because he was short on time, we had no idea what we had gotten ourselves into. We walked into his room and it was like a tornado had gone through it! (think of my messy-times like 10). We rolled and folded everything and surprised ourselves how much we could fit into his one suitcase! He couldn’t fit it all coming here and then he also bought a ton of stuff! He peaced out while we packed his stuff by the way. After we were so pumped about our accomplishment, I opened up one of his drawers and realized there were still clothes in all of them. We repacked and then Caitlin and I both sat on the suitcase and we zipped it up! The next day Caitlin and I got to experience the food we had been worried about since our arrival. The shrimp for lunch still had the heads and legs on it. Keep in mind black eyeballs staring at you while you rip its head off and then head juice squirting out. I took off an eye ball and through it at Caitlin and mama Carmen and Conche laughed really hard. For supper we had a different treat. They looked like skinned minnows sitting in oil. Caitlin mouthed to me that she refused to eat it. Mama Carmen wasn’t taking no for an answer from either of us. It wasn’t too bad actually, just very fishy tasting. Yesterday we also got to go to the Alhambra!! It was soooooo pretty!!! There is one room that you whisper in one corner and someone else can hear it in another (the room of secrets). I knew this ahead of time because I had been there before when I was in high school so I was really excited. I walked over to one of the corners and told Caitlin to go to the other- our guide guy came in and started talking super loud into the corner- I turned to Caitlin and she goes… I can hear him from hear without the corner… I think that defeats the purpose. After that we went back to our houses and took a 3 hour much needed nap. Last night Carmen went out for a night on the town haha so we got the house to ourselves! We played music and took hot showers!!!! My first one since I’ve been here. The showers are only warm at night and we always take them in the morning. Then we got ready and went out for tapas again and then to the disco!! Granada diez- if you put your name on the list on facebook you get in for free!!! We got to sleep in and it was wonderful!!! A lot of families make the kids wake up for breakfast and then they can go back to bed, not Carmen she shut the shades so that we could sleep longer! I started to tear up last night because they day before Carmen saw Caitlin and I looking at these picture/paintings around her house, there were 3 really cool ones that we took pictures of- anyway last night while we were getting ready we noticed that Carmen had put all the pictures on the walls of our room. Tonight we booked our flight to Italy, and then we are taking a train to Switzerland and just staying there an extra day and doing London a different weekend. And then at Midnight tonight we are going to a sports bar and watching the VIKINGS GAME!!!!

Chocolate y Churro

Today Caitlin and I went on a hunt for towels. We walked into a travel agency to ask them and they all tried to tell us where we could get them. So much, that they were all fighting so A. we couldn´t hear or understand them, and B. they were yelling at eachother at the same time. So ni the end, a customer took us out of the store and showed us how to get there. On the way we found a shoe store that was 5 euros for every pair! We also got to have chocolate and churros today, its basiclly sugared bread dipped in chocolate-very famous here. Chris, brett, caitlin, stephanie and I (all kids from central), sat down, ate them and discussed our trips we will be going on. So far we go to Morocco next weekend until Monday, then we leave that night to catch the morning flight to switzerland, then that friday we leave from switzerland to go to london, and then back to spain that monday. My host mom made me toast again for breakfast, this is different than the toast in america though. its thick bread in a weird toaster thing, and then she puts butter and this marmolade stuff that is amazing on top. its kind of like honey but different. And as always we drink colacoa, pronounced cola-cow and its just hot chocolate but everyone drinks it here for breakfast. For lunch mama carmen made us soup with spinach, potatoes and some other stuff- then we had crocates, which are breaded cream things that are actually meat- i still actually haven´t figured out exactly what they are. We always have soup or a salad before our meals. The salad always has vinegar, oil and salt i think? they don´t have salad dressings here. but the salad is soo good!

Settled in

Now that we have been here for a couple of days things are getting much easier. I learned how to get to the school and back all by myself the first day- this was huge for me because i still dont know my way around pella all that well. Carmen my host mom still makes great meals, but tonight her friend conchi made pizza for us, and it was amazing!!! Two nights ago like 15 girls in our program, caitlin and I all went out to get to know eachother. The other girls didn´t know their way around the city yet and i´ve been here since thursday so i got to lead the pack around. The girls were all very nice and it was just fun to get to know some of them before we started classes with them. Yesterday morning caitlin asked me if her blowdryer and straightener would work with the converter in the outlet and i said... hmmm i don´t know- my straightener broke when i tried to in highschool but you can try it! she held up the plug in and said ¨well! momment of truth!¨and then plugged it in. As she plugged it in, the lights went out hahahaha. she had to go tell mama carmen that she blew a fuse! last night we all went out again with some different friends than before. our host mom asked if they were the same kids as before and i said no, different ones, we are just so popular! she thought this was pretttty funny. we didn´t get back until 5 o clock in the morning!!!! we didnt have class today until one though so i was going to sleep in. at 8 am i hear, buenos dias chicas!!! chicas, a que hora tienes las clases. I was so out of it i couldnt respond, and caitlin mummbled one! she laughed came and gave me a hug and kiss on the cheek and said ¨dios mio¨which is like o my gosh!!! then she pulled the blinds and we went back to bed! when we got up we showered and ate breakfast that she made for us. this all sounds great except for the fact that caitlin didn´t bring a towel and i only brought one, so we have been sharing the same towel since friday... we need to either wash it or buy some tom. haha just kidding, we want to buy some but we can´t find any! we are going to search again tomorrow. Another really funny story, today in class we got these sheets in spanish that had different things on them like ´has animals, or has only sisters´and then we make our own question and have to go find people in our class that match that discription. My friend chris was like´why did the teacher give me a weird look after she read mine? I read his question and it was ¨who lives in a pinaple under the sea¨´ looked at him and said... spunge bob square pants_???? and laughed and laughed. he misunderstood the assignment and thought it was just who questions and other people had to answer them. If you are a follower of the cartoon and the song, you will appreciate this story. Tonight we are staying in and going to bed!!! we need to catch up on our sleep. Oh and next weekend we go to Moroco!!!!! i dont know who to spell it, but we go next weekend!!! I am so excited!!!!

Host Family!

Heyyyyy.... so yesterday we got our host families.... i wish we wouldn´t have. JUST KIDDING!!!! If life couldn´t get any better... it did! Caitlin and I are in the same host family. Veronica (lady in charge of our program) brought caitlin and i to the ramp to meet them. This is where my story gets good. I started to go down the ramp with my suitcase behind me to greet my host mom. i got to the bottom of the ramp to kiss both of her cheeks but didn´t realize that i had built up momentum from the ramp and my suitcases so i went in for a cheek and just about knocked her over! my cheek pressed into her cheek and i grabbed her and let go of my suitcase so that we could maintain our balance! hahahah then i went to another old man thinking it was my ladies husband and gave him kisses! he looked very suprised when i went in for the kill and learned quickly after that carmen (my host mother) is divorced and that man was waiting for thier host girl with his wife hahaha. I couldn´t stop laughing the whole way back to Carmen´s house. On the walk back to her house I asked her if her house was close to where she picked us up at and she said Si! fifteen minutes later, walking on the cobble streets with luggage still in hand, i turned to caitlin and said in english...¨there´s nothing close about this.¨ When we got to carmen´s house we found out that there was an american boy from miami living with us as well. Joseph is this cute little black boy who is super eager to learn spanish. well actually there is nothing little about him haha, he looks like the football player that mom thought greg was going to look like hahahahaa. anyway, he and carmen are so funny together! she hits him on the arm and he taps her on the head with his water bottle, he speaks very little spanish but he´s always in the kitchen trying to talk to her. he´s only here until saturday which i am very sad about because he is so much fun to have around. Soon after we got there, we ate a huge lunch! and she threw away all of the extra food. Joseph told us that she throws away all of the extra food because its not fresh later. She demanded to know what he was saying to us and we said, that she doesn´t save food. - she got the most disgusted look on her face and said, no it is not fresh! joseph gets really mad because he wants to eat it later when he gets back from the disco. after lunch caitlin and i took like 3 hour naps and then ate supper at about 9. She made a very big meal again! she always has either soup or salad as the first course and then a meat or other stuff for the main meal and then a piece of fruit after the meal. (hear that mom?) I am eating very healthy! After dinner joseph took caitlin and i to walk around that side of the town so that we could get a good idea of where different things were at. On our way back we came across karaoke at one bar and salsa dancing at another. Naturally, we had to go check them both out. The karaoke was hiliarious! these two girls were belting it out and dancing like all of the cameras were on them. Then we went to see the salsa dancing across the street. This was something else! The fast dancing was crazy- everyone knew what they were doing and it looked so cool. The slow dancing... isn´t quite like it is in the u.s. and it is definately not rated G. That was a bit of culture shock but everyone around us kept saying, es parte of ze cultura. We went back and went to bed after this, and this morning had an amazing breakfast. Then, joseph walked us to the school to show us how to get there. so we are here now using the computers because i don´t have wireless in my house and then later our group is meeting here to do different stuff around the city and then we have class tonight. veronica told us to bring sandwiches because we wouldnt have time to go home for lunch, carmen was not happy! she lets us do whatever we want but we have to be there to eat!!!! P.s dont be shy on leaving comments! It´s nice to hear back from people!

Spain- First nights there

FINALLY!!!! I am in Granada and ready to start my program :) The flight was quite an adventure in itself after our 3 hour flight. We got on our 8 hour flight ready for take off when they announced that we would all have to get off on account that there was a leak in the engine and it would take a while to repair so we were to get off the plane and report back in 4 hours. The only plus to this whole situation was that we got the seats right behind the second part of the bus near the bathrooms so we had triple the leg space of everyone else.- and i said to my friend steph, "all we need now is a couple of cute spaniards and we will be set". low and behold- two REALLY cute boys from spain came and sat next to us. - steph and I both slept alot of the plane ride once we finally got to take off. Once in Madrid we just got a taxi to the bus station because we wanted to get there the most simple way possible. Little did we know it was going to cost us an arm and a leg!!! haha also, the taxi guy asked if we had tickets to granada yet, i said no (in spanish) which is "no" haha. jk but anyway, he told us that we would probably have to spend the night in the bus station!!!!! if we had bought tickets ahead of time we couldn't have used them anyway because of the 4 hour extra layover- but this put a little bit of panic in both of our eyes. We decided that we would trade off sleeping while the other watches the luggage haha. - we wouldn't really do that, but it was the plan. When we got there at 4:30- there was a bus open at 5:00- so we scrambled to find the bus! We found it and we were off for 6 hours!!!! The bus was really nice and everything went smooth after that. (besides the escalator that moves up but doesn't have steps, jus slanted movement- we almost fell off it until a guy ran down it and grabbed my bags haha). Last night we slept for 13 hours and were fully rested to go out and get tapas and wine tonight! we went by a disco and asked them how much to get in and one guy said 11 euro- and the other said it was free for us! let us cut in, in front of like 50 people! We went in for a little bit and then came back. Now we will all rest because tomorrow we get our host families!!!!
Adios!!!