Addicted...

So I've only been in Spain for 4 weeks and I am already addicted to coffee. I don't even think I've ever finished a whole cup of coffee in the states, and now...I have one every morning and every evening after dinner. I am officially declaring myself a coffee fiend, weird huh!?
So my friends and I like to do our homework at different cafes around town and we found a really good one this week...It has WiFi, good tapas, awesome coffee, a comfortable and cozy atmosphere, and...cute camareros (waiters)! ;) Once again, don't worry mom...I haven't fell in love with any Spaniards YET! Which brings me to my next topic, the manner of Spanish men. They are very aggressive and forward about things. For example, My friend Alison and I went to a club last Thursday with our neighbor Marcela, who is from Colombia and she introduced us to two of her Spanish friends. One of them, Jose started talking and taking interest in Alison and the other, Fernando started taking interest in me. I was actually really excited about it at the time because the more people I meet, the more I get to practice my Spanish! We ended up talking/dancing with these guys for the rest of the night and exchanged numbers...little did we know this might have been a mistake. The very next day I received a text from Fernando, I will translate for you..."Hi Lisa, how are you my queen? I hope that we stay in contact and see each other again very soon!" Naturally, I didn't think much of it because Alison received one as well from Jose, only she actually did meet up with him again for a coffee one night and to her surprise...Jose expressed his love to her (Yes, he used the "L" word, LOL, after only knowing her for a couple days). This made me NOT want to take Fernando up on his offer to see each other again. The moral of the story is...Spanish men get way serious, way fast! After talking with some of our Spanish girlfriends, we realized that this is extremely common among all men here, which I find interesting considering it is the exact opposite in the states. In the US, for the most part...men are not very serious and aren't ready to meet someone and "settle down" until they are older. I guess this little tid bit explains why there are so many young married couples in Spain.
My classes are continuing to go very well...I feel like I'm learning so much on paper, but my speaking skills are lacking, which is a little disappointing, but I guess I just need to be patient with myself. I have to admit, it gets a little frustrating not being able to have intelligent conversations with people. All I can do at this point is "small talk" which I guess is a step, but not satisfying enough for me :(. I wish I could just magically learn the language overnight! :) The good news is that I am learning a lot about other things besides language. I am learning first hand about an entirely different culture and I love it! I think it's so interesting to see how other people do things and it really makes me appreciate the little things in life! :)
Travel Update -- This past weekend my friends and I visited Vigo and Pontevedra, both are coastal cities in Spain and both are beautiful. We started out in Vigo, which is about a 2 hour train ride from Santiago. The city itself was great, the people we encountered...not so much! We ran into the most obnoxious Spaniards yet. For example, one boy (about 20 years old) asked me if I wanted a smoke. I simply said no thank you, I don't like smoke. He then lit his cigarette, took a puff, and turned to me and blew smoke right in my face! I was INFURIATED! If I would have been in the states and that would have happened, I would have given him a piece of my mind, but since I am in Spain and don't know how to express my anger in Spanish, I simply turned around and walked away! I was so disappointed and although this kind of thing could happen anywhere (considering there are jerks all over the world), it made me really sad that someone could be that rude! Apart from the group of jerks we encountered, Vigo was great. On Saturday we took a boat out to "Las Islas Cies," and I would describe, but words can't do the islands justice...they were beautiful! I don't have too many pics because I have come to realize that my camera battery doesn't last very long. It was charged completely before I left for the weekend and died halfway through Saturday. (No worries...I am going to start taking my charger with me on weekend trips!) On Saturday evening we took a train from Vigo to Pontevedra, where we walked through the "old town" enjoying the scenery. The churches and buildings in general were amazing! We had heard a lot about the night life in Pontevedra so we decided to go out and OMG...it was crazy! Within the old town there were probably 30 different bars and all of them were packed! The streets were packed as well, like nothing I've ever seen before! We decided to get a taste of as many places as we could so we ended up staying out till 6am bar hoping...it was so much fun. Each and every bar was different in its own cool way!
I posted pics of last weekend on my shutterfly site. Some are from a night out in Santiago and the others are from Vigo and Pontevedra: http://mexigurl14.shutterfly.com/
To wrap up...I have an update on my weekend excursions. This week, I booked a bus ticket to Bilbao for next weekend (Oct. 3-5). Val gets to Santiago on Tuesday of next week and then will go with me and my friend Alison to Bilbao...I can't wait! I also booked a flight to London for the following week (Oct. 10-13). My friends Alison and Betsy and I are leaving on Friday and coming back Monday morning...I am so excited because I have heard that London was the European New York, and I LOVE NY! :) I also booked my flight to Scotland to visit my friend Cassie for the 3rd weekend in November...to say the least, I'm Super Mega Excited!
I am leaving tomorrow for Oporto, Portugal and will be there until Sunday evening. Once again, estoy emocionada! I have heard a lot of people say that Oporto (Porto) is one of their favorite cities so I have pretty high expectations and will let you know how it goes when I return! :) Maybe I'll even pick up a little Portuguese while I'm there.

As always, love you and miss you all! XOXO

ONE, TWO, THREE

Hello again! I have a few thoughts/comments I thought I would share...ONE, PDA here is insane...people basically do what they want, when they want, and they don't care who is watching, which is way different than what I'm used to. In the states, people are a lot more conservative about what they do in public (most people anyway). TWO, "siesta" (nap) has its pros and cons. The good part about it is that it is acceptable, in fact, expected that everyone take a nap in the middle of the day...which is just fine by me because as you all know, I LOVE to nap! :) The bad part is that everything closes during siesta, so if you aren't tired and want to do something, you can't...the town is dead from 2-4:30. Today I needed to go to the supermarket and buy some groceries in between my morning classes and evening class, so I walked to the supermarket only to be reminded that it was closed! I was so frustrated, not so much that it was closed, but that I STILL have yet to drill it in my head that nothing is open during siesta! I have been here for almost 3 weeks and I still forget stuff like that...it just goes to show how terrible of a memory I have (I am sure you are all shaking your heads right now because you know it's true!) THREE, I am very excited about all the traveling I am going to be doing within the next couple of months. Here is what I have planned so far... This weekend my friends and I are taking a little trip south. We are leaving Friday morning for Pontevedra (2 hour train) and spending the day/night there, then on Saturday we are going to wake up and take a train to Vigo to spend the day/night there. Then Sunday morning we are going to take a train back to Santiago. I am way excited...both cities are coastal cities so I plan on doing a repeat of A Coruña as far as spending time on beautiful beaches! :) The weekend following Pontevedra and Vigo I am taking a trip to Oporto, Portugal. My friends and I will be there from Friday morning to Sunday evening...It should be interesting considering I don't speak a word of Portuguese! People say it is similar to Spanish so hopefully I'll make do! :) The Tuesday after I get back from Oporto my best friend Val is coming to visit me in Santiago...I CAN"T WAIT! It will be so nice to see a familiar face :) She arrives on Tuesday and will stay with me Tues, Wed, and Thurs...then Friday her and I are going to take a weekend trip somewhere. I am not sure where yet, it was supposed to be Barcelona but our flight that we booked through Ryanair got canceled because of the Boeing Strike. I'm sure we will figure something else out! The weekend after that (Oct. 10-12) I am not entirely sure if I am going anywhere because the following Monday is when the "groupo de kansas" takes a week long excursion to Madrid (and nearby cities). I am really excited about it. Our program director and teachers come with us, which is great because they are awesome...more like friends than teachers! :) I get back from Madrid on Saturday, and then leave the following Sunday to meet Kim and Michael in Lisbon, Portugal...I couldn't be more excited! One, I hear Lisbon is absolutely beautiful and two, seeing Kim and Michael will be fantastic! We will be in Lisbon for about 2 and a half days and then Kim and Michael are coming back with me to Santiago. I am happy they will get a little taste of my life here. I know this blog helps a little, but I can only explain/describe so much in words, which don't do any justice to all my experiences...it is one of those things that you don't get the full effect unless you're there (and Kim and Mike will be)! So that basically brings us to the last week in October...I can't believe I am seriously already booked up for the next 6 weeks! I love Santiago and being here Mon-Thurs is great, but it is going to be so nice to get away every weekend and explore other parts of Spain/Portugal! Also, some time in November I plan on visiting my friend Cassie who lives in the UK...I will give you more details when I know, but as of right now...I am pretty sure I will be visiting Scotland at one point or another! Can you believe it, Scotland...Que guay! (which in Spain Spanish means..."How cool"). People say that all the time here...you pronounce it like K-Y. It is rubbing off on me, lol...I say it pretty often! I also say "Vale" a lot, which is getting a little annoying, lol. It is a Spain thing as well...the equivalent in English is "OK". In Latin America they use "Bueno". Tengo que hacer mucha tarea...I have a lot of homework to do before I go out tonight so I must be going. Oh yeah...another random tidbit...People in Europe go out SO LATE. Tonight we are going to a Brazilian bar because there is a little concert going on, and it doesn't even start until Midnight. Crazy, huh? The normal "going out" time in Spain is from 1-5am...even on weekdays! Hopefully I won't get back too late tonight because I have class at 9:30 tomorrow morning, but no worries...that is my only class until 4:30pm so I can come home and sleep! :) Now that I am totally and completely settled in and have a routine, I will be able to update more often so stay tuned! :) As always, missing you all!

Going on 3 weeks

A lot has happened since the last time I updated my blog...sorry for not updating sooner, but as you can imagine, I have been super busy! The first piece of exciting news is...I moved out of the hostal and into my own place. It's great and is really starting to feel like home! I live in an apartment in the old zone with my friend Alison. We share a double room, which is great because it is a lot cheaper since we split the rent (which means more money for me to spend traveling within Europe!) The way apartments work here is a little different than in the U.S. Basically, we have our own room and share a living room, kitchen, and 3 bathrooms with the other tenants who live here (about 6 other people). So far classes have gone well. I am taking Spanish Composition and Cultural Analysis, Art History of Spain, Transatlantic Hispanic Cultures, and Spanish Language: Composition and Conversation. I have classes Mon-Thurs with Fridays off...which is fantastic! :) All of my classes are taught strictly in Spanish and for the most part, English isn’t allowed! I understand a lot, but have difficulties creating/forming sentences…hopefully I’ll turn out to be a quick learner! As far as what I mentioned before about people in Spain being kinda rude, but not really considered that way since it is a cultural norm to keep to yourself…well I have decided that is a load of crap. I flat out just think MOST of the people here are rude and Spaniards have continued to disappoint me. For example…Yesterday, some of my friends and I decided to take a day trip to A Coruña, Spain, which is a costal city about 45 minutes North of Santiago. We needed to catch a bus from our place to the train station, which sounds simple, but ended up being quite the ordeal. We told the bus driver right when we got on the bus that we needed to go to the train station and about 30 minutes later, after having gone to the outskirts of town the bus driver turns to my friends and me and asks us what we are still doing on the bus. We said…we are waiting to go to the train station. He then started to yell at us, calling us ignorant for missing our stop. We said we weren’t from here and didn’t know what stop it was (we assumed since he knew where we were going he would tell us where to get off) and he said (in Spanish of course) “You should have been paying attention and asked someone.” To make a long story short he made us pay another bus fair to stay on the bus as it headed back toward the train station. The man was a real jerk and it is really starting to frustrate me that a lot of the Spaniards I have encountered have been rude and impatient with people, especially foreigners. I do fully understand that I shouldn’t generalize because there are nice Spaniards out there, but at this point that is difficult to do because I haven’t met any yet…no worries though, I still have hope! On the up side, it ended up being worth all the fuss because we finally made it to the train station, took a 45 minute train to A Coruña and spent an entire day exploring the beautiful city! Every minute was FABULOUS. We went sight seeing, shopping, and of course hung out on the beach overlooking the ocean! I have found it difficult and time consuming to add pictures to my blog, so I decided to upload my pics to “Shutterfly” so you all can view them! I already told ya about my mini trip to downtown Madrid, and as promised, I uploaded pics so you can see. I also added pics of Santiago in general, my apartment, and Spanish foods. In my last entry, I told you about typical Spanish foods, such as Tortilla Espanola (an egg with potatoes in the middle), Pulpo (Octopus), and Pimientas (Peppers). Also, there are just a few pics of A Coruña because I forgot to charge my camera and it went dead about an hour after I got there. I plan on getting some pics my friends took and when/if I do, I will post them! Here is the site: http://mexigurl14.shutterfly.com/ I hope you enjoy viewing my pics and will make comments! :) Love you and miss you all!

Arrived safely!

Hola amigos y familia! I wanted to let everyone know that I have made it to Santiago safely. It was a LONG trip, and even though this is my third day in Spain, I am still experiencing some jetlag. Me and the other 6 members of my group are all still so mixed up as far as days and time. We are all still running on Kansas time (which is why it is 2:00 am here - 7:00 pm there - and I am still wide awake) We have all been staying up to the wee hours of the morning here because it just feels right, it's difficult to explain, but needless to say...we are trying hard to adjust. So we first arrived in Madrid and me and my new friend Alison had a 9 hour layover so we decided to jump on the Metro (subway) and check out "El centro," which is the heart of downtown Madrid. It was beautiful, especially if you like big cities (it reminded me of an older European New York)...I will post pics soon, I promise! We were starving so our first spanish meal was bocadillos...tortilla espanola to be specific (con Cerveca, of course!) It was different, but good. Bocadillos are basically sandwiches, but not the kind in the US. These are on delicious fresh bread and have interesting ingredients. For example, a tortilla espanola is an egg with potatoes in the middle (like an omlet sandwich). Tortilla espanola is very popular here, so if you don't like eggs...you are in trouble! The beer we drank in Madrid was quite a bit stronger than American beer, but it was really good. So far I have tried quite a few different spanish beers and they have all been great! Currently, I am living in a hostel (basically a hotel) and am rooming with another girl from KU, Alison...who is totally becoming my new best friend. She is awesome...very similar to me actually. We have a lot in common...other than the fact that she is already fluent in Spanish (she studied abroad in Mexico). I am grateful for her because I have already been in a lot of situations where I have needed help translating things. Especially at the Madrid-Barajas Airport...If you don't know Spanish, it is almost impossible to figure things out or get by (and unfortunately I'm not exaggerating...it is by far the most difficult airport I've ever been to!) It made it even more difficult because a lot of people aren't very helpful...The stereotype that Europeans are rude proved itself to be true at the airport. No worries though...People in Madrid are different than people in Santiago. People in Santiago are not the "big city" type. It is like comparing people from Boston or New York to people from Kansas. Today, we had our 2nd orientation session, which included looking for apartments to live in. So far, we have visited 2, but have 2 more to see before we all make a decision on where to live. I'll keep you posted on my living situation! Basically there is a New Zone and an Old Zone. The Old Zone is very pretty (where the cathedral is located). The buildings are older with beautiful architecture, but the apartments are VERY small...as in space for a bed and a night stand and that is it. This part of town is amazing, right in the heart of the city. The new zone is more modern and doesn't offer the old European architecture that you expect when you come to Santiago, but the apartments are more modern and offer more space. Choosing will be a matter of balancing pros and cons. All the people from the group are great...and all are already fluent in Spanish. I am the only one here taking the "intermediate spanish" classes, while they are all here taking the "advanced spanish" classes to finish their degrees in Spanish (I am the only non-Spanish major in the program) I am basically the cute young girl who is clueless...lol! It's cool though because all my group members have taken me under their wing and have helped me. Classes haven't even started and my Spanish has improved. I am lucky to have such a great group of people here with me...they are all determined to help me progress my language skills! To sum up, here is a list of simple first observations: 1. Men are much more comfortable with their masculinity here. It is typical for a man to wear capris, tighter clothes, and carry a "man bag". In fact, I like the way men carry themselves here, not like men at home who are always worried about looking too feminine or "gay" (Don't worry though mom, I haven't fell in love with any Spanish men.......yet! :) hehe) 2. Spanish people aren't as friendly as Americans. It isn't common for a taxi driver or waiter to make conversation with their "clients," which is unfortunate to me because talking to these type of people is what I need to improve my Spanish (after all, practice makes perfect!) At first, we all thought they were rude, but come to find out, (from Mar-our Spanish program coordinator) it isn't really considered rude here because it's the norm. It isn't as if people don't want to converstate with Americans or foreigners, small talk just isn't a part of their culture like it is ours. 3. The food is way different. I ordered a hamburger knowing it wouldn't taste the same as at home, but I wasn't prepared for what the waiter brought out to me...a PINK slab of meat. Apparently, America is one of the few places that thoroughly cook meat! On a good note as far as food goes...we went to a fancy spanish restaurant as a group with our program coordinator and professores and had delicious food. We had Spanish delicacies, such as Octopus and Pimientas. Sounds gross I know, pero me gusta mucho! (I am honestly already finding myself unconsciously translating things into Spanish!) I took pictures of the different dishes we ate at this 5 course meal and will post when I get a chance. You will be shocked at the sight of the food here, es muy diferente de los Ustados Unidos. Thanks to everyone for the emails/comments...it makes me feel as if I'm not thousands of miles and an ocean away from home! :) I will most likely have an official address and phone number by the end of the week so stay posted! Buenas Noches y te amo mucho!

Getting ready to leave

I leave for Spain on August 30, just 10 more days...I can't wait! At this point, I have already done most of the pre-departure stuff, but still have a few things left to do on my Spain Checklist...yes, I have a Spain checklist! I am just that organized! :) This past Saturday, August 16 I had my 21st Birthday/Going Away Party with family and friends and it went very well (see pic). Saying bye to people was easier than I thought, then again, I don't think it has REALLY hit me that I won't see these people again until Christmas! I think I will have a much more difficult time saying good-bye to my immediate family--parents, sisters & brother-in-laws, and definitely my nephew! The thought of not seeing my nephew Jaxson for 4 months is heartbreaking. He grows bigger and more intelligent every day so I can't even imagine how different he'll be when I return home. I plan on calling him every so often so I can hear his sweet voice...Hearing it is a guaranteed smile! :) I am very excited, and of course nervous. My family is very close and I haven't been away from them for more than 2 or 3 weeks at a time, so 4 months seems like an eternity. I am also nervous about the language barrier. One of the main reasons I am going to Spain is to learn Spanish, but I'm obviously not going to pick it up in an hour, so the initial weeks in Spain will be quite interesting! Pray that I learn Spanish, and quick! :) My excitement definitely overrides my nervousness...Spending time in a foreign county is SO worth all the emotions that go along with it! This is the opportunity of a lifetime and I have every intention of having a life-changing experience. I already feel like I have changed a little, LOL, just by stepping out of my box (comfort zone) and going through with this whole study abroad trip! When I first mentioned my interest in studying in a foreign country for a semester, I don't know that anyone really expected me to follow through. I'm going to try my best to keep you all updated, but forgive me if I don't blog as often as I should! Here is to the first of many entries!!!