Día 10- Castillo!

Woke up early to go the Castillo Romano de Sagunto. It is a castle in a city called Sagunto. The people in the castle fought General Hannabil in 219 B.C. four months waiting for the Romans to come and help them. But, they got defeated after four months because the Romans never came. The caste itself was beautiful. The walk up was a little rough since we had to walk up a mountain to get there, but it was worth it. Mistake number one of my day? Do not wear sandals when you are going to visit a very old castle and that is on top of a mountain. I do not know what I was expecting to see and why I wore a dress and sandals, but it was definitely the wrong way to go. But, all that matters is that I made it without falling on my face or hurting myself. So that is a victory in itself. To get to the castle we took a train, which was the first time I had been on a train that was not considered a metro. Someone came around and checked for your tickets and everything, which is something I have personally never experienced. It was interesting.

Día 9- Vamos a la playa!

Today I woke up early to go to the Mercado Central because it is only open in the mornings. The Mercado Central is Europe biggest fruit market that just happens to be a ten-minute walk from the dorms. This place is incredible. They have so many different fresh fruit, freshly made marmalade and honey. There was one part of the market that I did not like as much the fresh meat and seafood section. This place makes you want to become a vegetarian from the fresh squid to seeing a skinned rabbit with its eyeballs still intact really makes you think twice about your dietary preferences. They even had fresh eels. So fresh in fact that they were still swimming around in a little bit of water waiting for their fate. I seriously considering becoming a vegetarian after this, but I am not sure if I could do it. Maybe the engraved picture in my head of a skinless duck with its beak still intact will soon erase itself from my memory. After the market five of us went to the beach. It was the first time I had ever seen the Mediterranean Sea! We took a bus that took about thirty minutes to a beach that was very busy that seemed to be like a little boardwalk. I had a tortilla bocadillo for lunch at the beach which was very good. A tortilla bocadillo is like an egg and potatoes sandwich which seems a bit weird, but it also very typical so I figured I would try it. The beach was wonderful. There was the perfect amount of heat and breeze. It was relaxing. Two things that I did not enjoy about the Mediterranean Sea. The first the water was freezing. The second, the sand here loves to stick to your body. It is much different than the sand in the U.S. I took a shower and I could not get all of the sand off my face. I feel very grainy, but I guess it could be another way of exfoliating! On the way home I noticed a culture difference that I did not care for. Young people over here do not respect their elders on the buses. There is a section on the bus that was reserved for the elderly and young guy sat there even though someone had told him that those seats were reserved. What nerve. Apparently this is something that is very common in Spain according to my culture professor. The bus was full and there were at least five old people with canes and all young Spaniards sitting in the seats. Only one young woman got up for one of the older women to sit down and the woman was so gracious and surprised that someone was so nice to give up their seat. To me this act should be considered common courtesy.

Día 7 and 8- Laundry day…

I went shopping around the city and was finally able to find some shoes! We will see how good they are. I also was able to find an over the shoulder bag for my books. We went for horchatas y fartons in the evening and they were just okay. Horchatas is a tiger nut drink that tastes vaguely like a hazel nut vanilla. And you use a farton which is like a breadstick pastry to dip it in the horchata. I was not a big fan of this drink, but over the weekend our homework is to go to an horchataria a town over that is supposed to have the world’s best horchata. I am willing to give it another chance. I had a fight with the washing machine over here. It figures washing machines hate me. I could not get the stupid thing to fill with water. It was just spinning for a while so I opened the door to start it over and of course it ate my money. So I gave it more money. It does not matter what country I am in the washing machines will always hate me. Nothing can ever be easy. I do not understand the machines. They eat my money. How do I start the dumb thing? I am so over it. But I guess next time I know. I am pretty sure that I am going to be single handedly responsible for a for the dryer blowing up because I put more money in it than was allowed. We will see what happens. We went out for tapas. They were really good. There was only one thing I could not bring myself to try, escargot. I just could not do it. It looked too weird and the idea freaked me out too much. After tapas we went for more churros con chocolate, which was perfect since it was raining outside. A group of us really wanted to go somewhere for our three-day weekend, but we could not find something cheap enough and within times we could go. But, around one o’clock in the morning one of us found a trip to Pisa, Italy. So we booked it. We definitely have nowhere to stay yet so we will see what happens. The picture shown is la plaza de la virgen at night. I pass by it everyday.

Pictures from the top of El Miguelete

Día 6- Churros con chocolate

Today was the first day where when I woke up and I felt absolutely terrible, so I did not do much. I went to class and then I went to a grocery store that was on the way back from school. I spent a ridiculous 21 Euros on shampoo, conditioner, lotion, and Chap Stick. Everything here appears to be at least twice as much as it would be in the U.S. We went back for lunch. Then I did nothing for a while since I was really tired. After a while, a few of the girls and I decided that we wanted to go shopping and try churros with chocolate (it was the best homework assignment I have ever gotten). I bought a really pretty dress from natura, but I was unable to find shoes. I really need a good pair of comfortable shoes that will be able to go with dresses. I walk around so much here that everything from about mid-thigh down hurts in some way. I know that I will get used to walking around soon, so it is not that big of a deal. The churros were amazing and a very loose comparison would be to chocolate covered funnel cake. A few people had not gone to get churros from ‘Valor’ (a chocolatería that has been there since 1881!) but they were closed so they got gelato instead. The city is beautiful at night. I love the atmosphere and the temperature is comfortable. You would only need a light jacket.

Día 5- Donde está la casa de los libros?

Today I woke up at 8:30am to go to class at 10:45 and to eat breakfast. I really enjoyed my classes to day. In my culture class we discussed the Euro and the reason why people here do not really say gracias or por favor. My professor explained to us that saying gracias and por favor for everything is a way of distancing yourself from people and that is why people do not say it too much. She said that Spaniards think that Americans are too ‘educados’ or proper since we say thank you for everything. In my Spanish business class we just introduced ourselves, which was good because I still have not met a lot of the people here. After class a small group of us had to make our way to the bank because it closed at 2:15pm and we get out of class at 1:30. When we got there they had to buzz us in which is something I had never experienced before. There was a surcharge of 9 Euros to exchange money but I just did it anyway because I was beginning to run out. After the bank I went with my friend Steven to ‘la casa de los libros’, which is huge bookstore because he needed a book. Needless to say, we could not find it and we had to ask around. Because we could not find it we ran into ‘la plaza de los toros’ (where the bullfighting takes place) and the train station which was huge. Those are the pictures that I have attached. Today I also walked up to the top of El Miguelete which is a part of a church. It was hard to climb the 200 extremely steep steps to the top, but it was worth it. After dinner we went to a bar where there was music and flamenco dancing. It was a lot of fun. I had agua fresca for the first time, which someone described to me as being the Valencian mimosa. It was really good. We definitely got weird stares from people and I even think that there were some people that were mimicking us. While watching the show someone stood in front of me so I tried to stand somewhere else so I could see and I got the deadliest stare that anyone has given me in my life. Some people can be rude. Coming back to the dorms was a very interesting experience. Let’s just say that I was very happy to be walking with a group. I was surprised to see how many people were out on a Tuesday night. It is definitely a different lifestyle over here.

Día 4- Discovering the City

I woke up early to go to classes. We had breakfast where I had the best orange juice I have ever tasted in my life. It was about a half hour walk to get to class and we waited for about a half an hour before the professors showed up because they did not think that we were going to have classes today. The professors at this school are fantastic and I am looking forward to going to class. You can really tell that they enjoy what they do for a living and genuinely care. I am taking a Spanish Culture class, which looks very interesting, and a Spanish Business class, which looks like it is going to be a little more work. At lunch while trying to put my tray back I dropped it on the floor and broke a plate. People stood up and clapped and all I could think about is that I would do something like that. After lunch at the dorms we were supposed to go to the bank, but me and Janda lost track of time and were unable to meet up with the group. So we wandered the streets. We walked all around the city only speaking Spanish. We found El Corto Inglés, which is a ridiculous version of Macy’s with a supermarket in the basement. Everything is really overpriced. The store is literally ten floors. I did not like the store at all and I do not really have the desire to go back. Today was exciting for the two of us because we managed to walk around without getting directions or even looking at a map. It was the first time we were not with the group and it was the first time where people talked to us in Spanish and smiled. It was nice. We had a scavenger hunt around the city where we had to take pictures with different landmarks and my group won! It was exhausting and my feet hurt really badly. We will get a free dinner at a restaurant near us! The pictures I have attached are the view from my balcony!

A couple of pictures from the drive.

Día 3- Que es tú nombre? Gloria. GLORIA ESTEFAN?!?!

Woke up early from not getting too much sleep because I am still having issues with jetlag. We went to el rastro which is a flea market in Madrid that only opens on Sundays. I bought a few things there for very cheap including jewelry. Then we came back to the hotel to pack our things and go on a bus to Valencia, a four and a half hour drive. The drive was really pretty and on the way we stopped at a Spanish version of a truck stop. It was very interesting to see how things were different. When we got to Valencia an hour late (because the driver was of course late in picking us up) we had an orientation and we had our first meal in the dorms. Our room by the way is huge. We definitely got the best one. It has two balconies of the street. I will take pictures. People here seem to be a nice. Some boys from the University gave us a tour, which seems confusing, but I am starting to get it. I was finally able to contact my family today even though we still not have Internet in our rooms. There is wifi but the Spaniards are hogging the passwords so that it will not slow down the internet for them. Selfish I know, but I cannot blame them. Since I could not sleep a few of us went to a small bar with some of the Spaniards in the University. We talked for a bit and then I came back to my room around one where I laid awake for hours. It is hard to adjust to the time difference because I am barely getting any sleep, but I am still not tired. Hopefully, this will change soon. I want to get a descent amount of sleep. The picture I added was from the flea market, el rastro.

Día 2- Somos de Canadá!

I did not sleep to well because I was woken up by people in the hallway. Today I was not jetlag at all and I am surprised about how fast it took me to get used to the six-hour time change. The group woke up early and met in the lobby after breakfast at 10am. We were then given the choice to do an optional group tour of el Palacio Real or to go to el Prado which is an art museum. I decided to go to the palace because I wanted to spend more time walking the streets and it was a beautiful day. The palace was huge and beautiful and it is hard to imagine Spain’s kings and queens living there. We were not allowed to take pictures inside and I got yelled at. Leaving the palace one of the guards very rudely asked if we were Americans, and one of my friend’s Janda responded very quickly with ‘No, somos de Canada.’ So now I am from Canada so I am not ‘un Americano estupido.’ After the palace we wandered the streets back to the hotel where a few of us got phones, I did not really see the use in it so I did not get one. After getting phones we found a cute little restaurant and ate delicious chicken bocadillos. Then, we went to a beautiful park, but we were rushed because we had to get back to dinner on time. I find it easy to speak Spanish here and I enjoy it, but many others in the group only speak English. We went to the stadium where the game was and there were so many people. It was a lot dirtier than expected. After going to the stadium a group of was went to a sports bar to drink sangria and watch the game. I was so tired from walking the city all day that we wanted to sit down at a table. Apparently, we were not allowed to sit at a table because we were not ordering something from the restaurant. It was so annoying because there was not a single person sitting at any of there tables. There must have been at least 12. Because of this a few of us left earlier because we were so tired that we could not be standing any longer. Over all I really enjoyed the experience. The pictures posted are from el palacio real and a picture of the stadium on game day.

Día 1 - Wake up call at 1:30am

Lufthansa airlines. What an experience. My flight left today from Atlanta to Frankfurt, Germany at 6:15. Thus leading into the longest traveling experience of my life at this point. On the flight I watched one movie before I attempted to sleep to avoid jetlag. Failure. And this began with one word ‘kids.’ I do not understand how parents cannot teach their children to be respectful of other people and their property. I know that they are just children, but having a child run around the plane and messing with the seats of the passengers around them was something very hard on my part to tolerate. By the time I was able to drift to a light snooze Lufthansa decided to give us a wake up call by turning on the lights at 1:30 in the morning even though we still had a good hour and half left of the trip. Why you may ask? To give us hot moist towels, which I could have willingly done without in exchange for some extra sleep. Surprisingly, they did give us dinner and breakfast. The flight from Germany to Madrid was better, but upsettingly I was unable to sleep. When we got to Madrid we came to the hotel Tryp Gran Via where a few of us decided to wander the streets. I used an ATM here for the first time, but I was not quite sure what I was doing. It ended up giving me money so I must have done something right. I love the architecture here. The buildings are beautiful. The city is a bit overwhelming this weekend because there is a fútbol game tomorrow. It is a game to decide who represents Europe in the World Cup. I am pretty sure it was Germany against Italy, but I am not positive. People are crazy here and I definitely have already seen prostitutes on the street already. Our hotel room is nice except for the fact that we do not have a view and it is right outside the elevators. I can everyone’s conversations clearly, which makes me believe that they can hear me. We had dinner at the hotel and the only food that I recognized were potatoes. After that a few of us walked around the city and got gelato. I do not know what I had, but it was delicious and there was chocolate drizzled on top! The image uploaded is the bus that we had to ride to get to our gate in Germany. The middle of the bus moved when the driver would turn.