I don't know why, but ever since I've come here all of my things seem to keep breaking.
First it was my watch. The battery died within the first month I was here. Then the chain on my favorite necklace broke. The cell phone I was given here is several years old and barely holds a charge. Now the back is falling off to the point where I have to tape it together. It's a good thing the original owner of the phone doesn't want it back. My sneakers look fine, but I only used them to play tennis back in the States so the bottoms are so worn out now that I'm not sure they will make it until EuroTour. My boots are even worse off, falling apart at the seams. I'm pretty sure my purse is almost done for. Also, I might just ditch half of the clothes that I brought here because they are all starting to fall apart, too.
Not to mention the fact that people here keep giving me jewelry as gifts when what I really want is peanut butter and scholarship money. Not that I'm complaining about getting nice things as gifts. I just need the scholarship money more.
Luckily, my host mom is very willing to take me clothes shopping. In fact, we went to Huesca yesterday to buy me new boots. I like these ones a lot more than my old ones anyways. The thing is, this is the time of year that everything is on sale here in Spain. Though I would have paid for the boots myself, my host mom insisted they were a late Reyes Magos present. I'll find a way to pay them back later.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Sunday, January 12, 2014
Jaca, Tapas, and Expectations
Back to school, again. Ugh! Life was so much easier when I didn't have to wake up before sunrise.
Anyways, things have wound down after the holiday season, which means that everything is pretty much back to normal around here. I've also been a bit sick lately, so I'm sorry if I end up rambling. I still can't quite think straight.
School started back up on Tuesday, so I (unlike everyone in Wisconsin) had to wake up early and head over to school. Nothing much interesting happened this past week in terms of school, but I do have to present a Power Point some time either this week or next week about the geography of Wisconsin.
Friday night I just hung around the house and sketched. Saturday was a bit more interesting. I went to the first theater group meeting since before the holidays. We read aloud scripts this week. I was only given smaller parts, but I didn't mind because I tend to get caught up on strange words when I'm reading aloud in Spanish. Anyways, they were very fun to do. That afternoon Alex, Grace and I headed over to Jaca to hang out. Grace took the opportunity to talk about the fact that she was disappointed that she hadn't really made a close Spanish friend yet. It turns out Alex was disappointed about the same thing. I found that I wasn't quite sure what they were talking about. I guess that coming in to this experience I had never actually expected to make close friends, even though I would have liked to. I mean, of course I wanted to make friends, but I wasn't expecting to meet someone where four months later I could call up my host parents and say "Hey, I'm headed over to so-and-so's house after school. I'll be back by dinner". The kind of friend where I feel more comfortable at their house than at my own.
After all of that, the three of us went back to Sabi in time to catch the last half hour of a soccer game. Soccer is, as many of you know, a big sport in Spain, so that night we had Alex's host parents and some family friends over at our house to watch the game before dinner. We ate tapas, including some of the meat that my parents ordered from my relatives in Austria (they own a company).
Today I hung around the house again. I finished my project for Geography and watched Ender's Game in Spanish. The movie was very fascinating. I should really pick up the book (or, at least, I would if I wasn't trying to improve my Spanish).
See you all next week.
Anyways, things have wound down after the holiday season, which means that everything is pretty much back to normal around here. I've also been a bit sick lately, so I'm sorry if I end up rambling. I still can't quite think straight.
School started back up on Tuesday, so I (unlike everyone in Wisconsin) had to wake up early and head over to school. Nothing much interesting happened this past week in terms of school, but I do have to present a Power Point some time either this week or next week about the geography of Wisconsin.
Friday night I just hung around the house and sketched. Saturday was a bit more interesting. I went to the first theater group meeting since before the holidays. We read aloud scripts this week. I was only given smaller parts, but I didn't mind because I tend to get caught up on strange words when I'm reading aloud in Spanish. Anyways, they were very fun to do. That afternoon Alex, Grace and I headed over to Jaca to hang out. Grace took the opportunity to talk about the fact that she was disappointed that she hadn't really made a close Spanish friend yet. It turns out Alex was disappointed about the same thing. I found that I wasn't quite sure what they were talking about. I guess that coming in to this experience I had never actually expected to make close friends, even though I would have liked to. I mean, of course I wanted to make friends, but I wasn't expecting to meet someone where four months later I could call up my host parents and say "Hey, I'm headed over to so-and-so's house after school. I'll be back by dinner". The kind of friend where I feel more comfortable at their house than at my own.
After all of that, the three of us went back to Sabi in time to catch the last half hour of a soccer game. Soccer is, as many of you know, a big sport in Spain, so that night we had Alex's host parents and some family friends over at our house to watch the game before dinner. We ate tapas, including some of the meat that my parents ordered from my relatives in Austria (they own a company).
Today I hung around the house again. I finished my project for Geography and watched Ender's Game in Spanish. The movie was very fascinating. I should really pick up the book (or, at least, I would if I wasn't trying to improve my Spanish).
See you all next week.
Monday, January 6, 2014
Sunday, January 5, 2014
I Apologize For My Lateness
I wish I could have had the time to do this earlier, mainly because it's currently 1:30 a.m. Spain time, but I've been running around all day. Fortunately, tomorrow is "Los Reyes Magos" which is a fiesta all throughout Spain celebrating the day that the Magi came to give Jesus Christ gifts. This is normally the time that most children receive gifts in Spain instead of on Christmas Day. However, I'm not looking forward to going back to school on Tuesday, especially because, though my Spanish has improved exponentially since I first came here, I still don't understand Philosophy.
If I'm going to be entirely honest here, I didn't enjoy Christmas that much. I only spent it with my host parents, host brother, my host grandma, and great aunt and uncle here. Basically we just had dinner at our house on Christmas Eve and then went to my aunt and uncle's house for lunch Christmas Day. As good as the food was, no one really celebrates Christmas like they do other holidays here. Still, in true American fashion, I gave my host family their gifts on Christmas morning. My host brother seems to like the Milwaukee Brewers jersey I gave him (despite the fact that he plays Basketball) because he packed it with his other clothes for when he goes back to the University in Zaragoza. My host dad is really into the books about Wisconsin that I gave my host parents. Because the books are in English he works through them slowly, but he is now prone to speaking aloud random facts about my home state that I may or may not have known.
Though Christmas was fine I do have to say that I enjoyed New Years Eve/Day a lot more. We spent New Years Eve at my host mom's mothers house in Zaragoza. The entirety of my host mom's family showed up. After dinner we Skyped my host sister on exchange in Pennsylvania. Victoria got her entire host family together and we all did the countdown to midnight with twelve grapes, in true Spanish fashion. For those who have never heard of this tradition, in Spain on New Years, everyone is given twelve grapes, one for each time the clock chimes at midnight. The idea is to eat one grape every time the clock chimes, and if you finish your grapes by midnight it's considered good fortune for the year. I successfully ate my grapes. After that, my older host cousins went off to fiestas and the rest of the family stayed at my grandmother's house where we sang songs for the rest of the night. Some of them where more traditional Spanish songs, but others were American oldies (YMCA; New York, New York) and others were a little more modern (Macklemore). Because my whole family is aware of the fact that I have an audition in order to get into the music program at the college I'm attending back in the States, they had me sing one of my audition songs. Most of them had never heard me sing before and were apparently impressed (despite the fact that I was a bit off key on account of a head cold).
Of course, with the holidays comes homesickness because of missing my family and all of our traditions. Also, being from Wisconsin, missing the snow. However, I got my longing for snow satisfied because today my host dad drove all of us (Alex, Grace, Jen who was visiting from Zaragoza this weekend, and me) up to the mountains on the French border where the snow is several feet deep and perfect for making snowmen. Jen is from Florida and absolutely loves snow because she never gets to see it where she lives. Though she has been skiing in Colorado, she told me she never had time to make a snowman while she was there, so we made sure to make a massive one taller than any of us. Grace was impressed at how fast I can roll snowballs to snowman size. Hey, I'm from Wisconsin. I got this. I would post pictures, but they are on my phone which is currently dead (again). I'll be sure to do it tomorrow.
After that adventure we went back to Sabi for lunch and then my host family had to take Manuel and Jen back to Zaragoza. We stayed there for the "Reyes Magos" parade, mainly because we couldn't leave until the crowds had cleared out of the main street. It was a small parade but with the equivalent excitement of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. When the "Reyes" came past on their floats all the little kids sitting on their parents' shoulders went absolutely wild. Imagine hundreds of small children screaming "DIIIIIIIOOOOOOOOSSSSSS MMIIIIIIIIIIIIOOOOOOOOO!!!!" like a pack of animals. After the streets cleared out we drove home and ate dinner. Then I went out for tea with Grace and Alex where we discussed many things, but mostly interesting family stories. Now I'm making a blog post at two in the morning. I swear to God this is absolutely normal.
If I'm going to be entirely honest here, I didn't enjoy Christmas that much. I only spent it with my host parents, host brother, my host grandma, and great aunt and uncle here. Basically we just had dinner at our house on Christmas Eve and then went to my aunt and uncle's house for lunch Christmas Day. As good as the food was, no one really celebrates Christmas like they do other holidays here. Still, in true American fashion, I gave my host family their gifts on Christmas morning. My host brother seems to like the Milwaukee Brewers jersey I gave him (despite the fact that he plays Basketball) because he packed it with his other clothes for when he goes back to the University in Zaragoza. My host dad is really into the books about Wisconsin that I gave my host parents. Because the books are in English he works through them slowly, but he is now prone to speaking aloud random facts about my home state that I may or may not have known.
Though Christmas was fine I do have to say that I enjoyed New Years Eve/Day a lot more. We spent New Years Eve at my host mom's mothers house in Zaragoza. The entirety of my host mom's family showed up. After dinner we Skyped my host sister on exchange in Pennsylvania. Victoria got her entire host family together and we all did the countdown to midnight with twelve grapes, in true Spanish fashion. For those who have never heard of this tradition, in Spain on New Years, everyone is given twelve grapes, one for each time the clock chimes at midnight. The idea is to eat one grape every time the clock chimes, and if you finish your grapes by midnight it's considered good fortune for the year. I successfully ate my grapes. After that, my older host cousins went off to fiestas and the rest of the family stayed at my grandmother's house where we sang songs for the rest of the night. Some of them where more traditional Spanish songs, but others were American oldies (YMCA; New York, New York) and others were a little more modern (Macklemore). Because my whole family is aware of the fact that I have an audition in order to get into the music program at the college I'm attending back in the States, they had me sing one of my audition songs. Most of them had never heard me sing before and were apparently impressed (despite the fact that I was a bit off key on account of a head cold).
Of course, with the holidays comes homesickness because of missing my family and all of our traditions. Also, being from Wisconsin, missing the snow. However, I got my longing for snow satisfied because today my host dad drove all of us (Alex, Grace, Jen who was visiting from Zaragoza this weekend, and me) up to the mountains on the French border where the snow is several feet deep and perfect for making snowmen. Jen is from Florida and absolutely loves snow because she never gets to see it where she lives. Though she has been skiing in Colorado, she told me she never had time to make a snowman while she was there, so we made sure to make a massive one taller than any of us. Grace was impressed at how fast I can roll snowballs to snowman size. Hey, I'm from Wisconsin. I got this. I would post pictures, but they are on my phone which is currently dead (again). I'll be sure to do it tomorrow.
After that adventure we went back to Sabi for lunch and then my host family had to take Manuel and Jen back to Zaragoza. We stayed there for the "Reyes Magos" parade, mainly because we couldn't leave until the crowds had cleared out of the main street. It was a small parade but with the equivalent excitement of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. When the "Reyes" came past on their floats all the little kids sitting on their parents' shoulders went absolutely wild. Imagine hundreds of small children screaming "DIIIIIIIOOOOOOOOSSSSSS MMIIIIIIIIIIIIOOOOOOOOO!!!!" like a pack of animals. After the streets cleared out we drove home and ate dinner. Then I went out for tea with Grace and Alex where we discussed many things, but mostly interesting family stories. Now I'm making a blog post at two in the morning. I swear to God this is absolutely normal.
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Post Christmas
Happy Sunday, everyone!
I'm very tired today, but with good reason.
Not only is it Post Christmas, the aftermath of an exhausting few days, but I also had a bit of a cold yesterday. Fortunately, it's a lot better today. On top of that, yesterday we went to see El Hobbit: El Desolition de Smaug. I'm not quite sure if I spelled the name exactly right, but you all know what movie I'm talking about. We went to see that movie at 10:30...at night. The movie didn't end until 1:30 a.m. Then I had to get up early this morning because we went snow shoeing in the mountains where there is actually snow. The main reason we went to do that was because another exchange student, Kaylee, is staying at Grace's house. Kaylee is from Hawaii and is on exchange in the Canary Islands. I think my favorite comment by her about the climate here in the mountains was, "Wow! There's ice, and it's not in a freezer!" Even for Grace and me, who weren't as impressed by the snow, it was still a lot of fun, and undeniably beautiful.
Kaylee first came here yesterday. All of us exchange students went ice skating in Jaca and then we all went to see El Hobbit together. It was fun, but anyone familiar with the Lord of the Rings movies know that they are lengthy. Because Spanish is my second language, I don't feel qualified in giving a full review of the movie, but I will say I have one complaint. Benedict Cumberbatch (who voices the dragon, Smaug) wasn't in this version because it was translated into Spanish. Of course, I understood the movie. It just takes more effort than I usually have to make to understand it. Combine this with a three hour long movie and it gets tiring. Grace started to feel the movie's length about two hours in. She spent the rest of the movie resting her head on my shoulder while we went back and forth, commenting on the movie. Most of our comments were simply "I ship it." For those of you who aren't familiar with the term "ship" or "shipping" it's just a slang term for when you like the idea of two characters (in this case, in a movie) as a couple. Some of these pairings grew progressively more ridiculous as the movie lengthened. Surprisingly, our craziest "ship" wasn't Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) and Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch, but not in this version). It was Legolas (Olrando Bloom) and an ork.
However, I think the best part of this weekend is that we still have one more week off!
I'm very tired today, but with good reason.
Not only is it Post Christmas, the aftermath of an exhausting few days, but I also had a bit of a cold yesterday. Fortunately, it's a lot better today. On top of that, yesterday we went to see El Hobbit: El Desolition de Smaug. I'm not quite sure if I spelled the name exactly right, but you all know what movie I'm talking about. We went to see that movie at 10:30...at night. The movie didn't end until 1:30 a.m. Then I had to get up early this morning because we went snow shoeing in the mountains where there is actually snow. The main reason we went to do that was because another exchange student, Kaylee, is staying at Grace's house. Kaylee is from Hawaii and is on exchange in the Canary Islands. I think my favorite comment by her about the climate here in the mountains was, "Wow! There's ice, and it's not in a freezer!" Even for Grace and me, who weren't as impressed by the snow, it was still a lot of fun, and undeniably beautiful.
Kaylee first came here yesterday. All of us exchange students went ice skating in Jaca and then we all went to see El Hobbit together. It was fun, but anyone familiar with the Lord of the Rings movies know that they are lengthy. Because Spanish is my second language, I don't feel qualified in giving a full review of the movie, but I will say I have one complaint. Benedict Cumberbatch (who voices the dragon, Smaug) wasn't in this version because it was translated into Spanish. Of course, I understood the movie. It just takes more effort than I usually have to make to understand it. Combine this with a three hour long movie and it gets tiring. Grace started to feel the movie's length about two hours in. She spent the rest of the movie resting her head on my shoulder while we went back and forth, commenting on the movie. Most of our comments were simply "I ship it." For those of you who aren't familiar with the term "ship" or "shipping" it's just a slang term for when you like the idea of two characters (in this case, in a movie) as a couple. Some of these pairings grew progressively more ridiculous as the movie lengthened. Surprisingly, our craziest "ship" wasn't Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) and Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch, but not in this version). It was Legolas (Olrando Bloom) and an ork.
However, I think the best part of this weekend is that we still have one more week off!
Sunday, December 22, 2013
VACATION!!!
For all of you back home and across the globe who read my blog religiously, thank you so much for your devotion. Seriously, it's not like I'm posting chapters of a riveting mystery novel. I literally just log in to my account and ramble about my week in a condensed and organized manner. Thank you for reading!
Winter Vacation is upon us. I repeat, Winter Vacation is here! This is probably the best news I could ever post on this blog other than something along the lines of "Hey, everyone. I was abducted by aliens this week, but don't worry. They didn't scientifically experiment on me. They only wanted me to help them save their home planet. Needless to say, the mission was a success. My new intergalactic friends and I are going out for coffee next week."
There are two things we can deduct from that previous paragraph that has been spewed forth by the dark corners of my subconscious: 1. I am in an excellent mood 2. I read and watch way too much sci-fi.
Sorry if I'm confusing anyone. I'll just get on with my usual synopsis of my week before I start discussing my personal opinions on Transcendentalism and the methods used for dinosaur cloning in Jurassic Park.
Monday, as you know from my previous post, I spent the day in Madrid on a class trip. Tuesday and Wednesday were normal school days, but Thursday my class took a trip to another Instituto in Huesca were everyone attended presentations involving the job fields and areas of study they want to go into. Since I'm not actually attending a university here in Spain I only really went for the experience. The whole system, in truth, is the same sort of thing you could find at these events back home.
Friday was a half-day at school. I only had to come in for the first two hours to take a history exam. As usual, I finished before almost everyone else because I normally can't answer all of the questions and the ones I do answer tend to be mediocre answers at best. Well, except for Matematicas, I'm great at that class. I guess it also helps that I was taught to be a quick test-taker. That's sort of a thing set up by the educational system of the U.S., isn't it? Here, whenever there is a long exam, we normally do it after school and they last for about two hours. Normally there are anywhere from 2-5 questions on the entire exam. In the States, we learn how to quickly and accurately answer a lot of questions in a short amount of time, even if they are shot answer. Your answers have to do with your understanding of the material and the ability to thoroughly explain it instead of how much of the text book you can memorize word for word.
Don't take this the wrong way. I'm not trying to rant about educational systems. I'm simply making general, and what I think to be accurate, comparisons.
Yesterday Alex, Grace and I took a bus to Zaragoza where we met up with Jen (you might remember me mentioning her back around Thanksgiving). We spent the day Christmas shopping for our host families. Normally, gifts are given on "Reyes Magos" which celebrates when the Wise Men came to give baby Jesus gifts. This falls on January 6th. However, being Americans, we all decided to give our families their gifts on either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day in order to share a little tradition with our host families.
Today was the first day I haven't had to wake up early in two weeks. I spent the day wasting my time on social media, drawing fictional characters, and channel surfing until I settled on a Sherlock marathon on TNT. As it turns out, just like Doctor Who, Sherlock does exist in Spain, you just have to know where to look.
Safe travels to anyone traveling over the holidays. Happy Holidays to everyone currently abroad. Finally, Merry Christmas to everyone back home.
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Secretly...I'm Exhausted!
Well, this is the long-awaited late blog post about Madrid.
As the holiday season has settled upon us and Christmas Day draws closer, I finally feel myself getting into the holiday spirit, at last! It took several hours of baking sugar cookies, two Glee Christmas specials, one Doctor Who Christmas special in Spanish, and several hours of listening to Christmas music, but I'm finally starting to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It will be even better once we get the tree up.
Over the weekend, as I've been announcing for weeks, I went on a class trip to Madrid. On Saturday we woke up insanely early to get on a bus at 7 in the morning in order to spend 5 hours driving to Madrid. When we got there and got all our luggage up to our rooms, we split up into groups and wandered around trying to find a place to eat lunch. After that we joined up in a plaza and headed to an art museum called Prado. For dinner my friends in my class found a nice pizza place that I enjoyed a lot, and then we hung out at a bar until we had to meet up with the rest of our class again to head back to our rooms.
Sunday morning we woke up early again to eat breakfast. Then we had a few hours of down time before we split off into two groups. The group I was with went to La Reina Sophia which is a very large art museum that houses a lot of works by Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso among other things. I got to see the "Guernica" in real life, which I highly suggest doing because photographs don't give it justice. As much as I love art museums, there is a lot of walking and standing involved in going to visit one, so after two days of that on top of walking all over Madrid, I was thoroughly exhausted. Fortunately, the agenda for that evening was going to see a play titled "Montenegro" in a very nice theater. It was very interesting, but I can't exactly explain what it was all about because the plot was very complicated and the language was very complex. Imagine yourself watching a Shakespeare play you know nothing about in a foreign language and you can get the idea of what I felt like. However, I do have to say that the actors were spectacular! Absolutely stunning!
Monday morning we woke up early, of course, and we took a tour of the theater we had gone to the previous night. I was really excited about the tour because I absolutely love being back stage. I always feel really comfortable back stage, but it also gives me a bit of a rush at the same time, if that makes sense.
Finally, we piled back onto our bus, stopped at a bus stop for lunch, and finally headed home. I didn't get back until about 9:30 that night. It was a long weekend, but I absolutely loved it. It gave me some special time to bond with my classmates in an environment that wasn't a crazy fiesta with bad music.
I didn't actually take any pictures because all of the places we visited (art museums and theaters) were all no photography places.
That pretty much sums up my entire weekend. Now that I'm into the holiday spirit I can't wait to post more Christmas related materials.
Feliz Navidad!
As the holiday season has settled upon us and Christmas Day draws closer, I finally feel myself getting into the holiday spirit, at last! It took several hours of baking sugar cookies, two Glee Christmas specials, one Doctor Who Christmas special in Spanish, and several hours of listening to Christmas music, but I'm finally starting to feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It will be even better once we get the tree up.
Over the weekend, as I've been announcing for weeks, I went on a class trip to Madrid. On Saturday we woke up insanely early to get on a bus at 7 in the morning in order to spend 5 hours driving to Madrid. When we got there and got all our luggage up to our rooms, we split up into groups and wandered around trying to find a place to eat lunch. After that we joined up in a plaza and headed to an art museum called Prado. For dinner my friends in my class found a nice pizza place that I enjoyed a lot, and then we hung out at a bar until we had to meet up with the rest of our class again to head back to our rooms.
Sunday morning we woke up early again to eat breakfast. Then we had a few hours of down time before we split off into two groups. The group I was with went to La Reina Sophia which is a very large art museum that houses a lot of works by Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso among other things. I got to see the "Guernica" in real life, which I highly suggest doing because photographs don't give it justice. As much as I love art museums, there is a lot of walking and standing involved in going to visit one, so after two days of that on top of walking all over Madrid, I was thoroughly exhausted. Fortunately, the agenda for that evening was going to see a play titled "Montenegro" in a very nice theater. It was very interesting, but I can't exactly explain what it was all about because the plot was very complicated and the language was very complex. Imagine yourself watching a Shakespeare play you know nothing about in a foreign language and you can get the idea of what I felt like. However, I do have to say that the actors were spectacular! Absolutely stunning!
Monday morning we woke up early, of course, and we took a tour of the theater we had gone to the previous night. I was really excited about the tour because I absolutely love being back stage. I always feel really comfortable back stage, but it also gives me a bit of a rush at the same time, if that makes sense.
Finally, we piled back onto our bus, stopped at a bus stop for lunch, and finally headed home. I didn't get back until about 9:30 that night. It was a long weekend, but I absolutely loved it. It gave me some special time to bond with my classmates in an environment that wasn't a crazy fiesta with bad music.
I didn't actually take any pictures because all of the places we visited (art museums and theaters) were all no photography places.
That pretty much sums up my entire weekend. Now that I'm into the holiday spirit I can't wait to post more Christmas related materials.
Feliz Navidad!
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