Feliz Cumpleaños Aunnie!

Happy Birthday to my mom!  I cannot believe that 51 years ago today she was...................celebrating her 10th birthday! 

View from my bedroom window

A day in Cadiz and a funny pic of Rafa

Taking one for the team and enjoying a delicious croissant for you!

Okay, I have to be self-deprecating here: I am lame…my 50+ year-old host mother is staying out later than me!  So, in an effort to go against my very being and NOT be lame (aka, stay up past the early hour of 3 AM on the weekends) I have adopted the siesta.  In America this word never work—unless you are Anne B***nahan (will not reveal full identity), my mom’s friend who is INFAMOUS for her ability to nap, few people possess the time to lie down and pass out in the afternoon.  In Spain, everything is shut down during these hours.  It is almost as if your only choice is to siesta.  Tough, I know.

Another thing that would never work in America (my family at least) is the desserts.  We only have fruit for dessert.  Knowing Fa-tass*, he would be incapable of sobering up from his daily refined sugar high.  Also, we always have a knife in our hand during dessert.  For whatever reason, no one eats the skin on fruit here, so dessert is a bit of process…skinning and cutting the fruit, then eating it.  Anyone who has ever had dinner in my family knows that having knives in our hands would be a miserable idea.  “Mary, I really think the ERA proposed in the ‘70s was unnecessary.”  Mary lunges across table, knife in hand.

Another difference: the perception of food.  Today for dinner my sister made me—what she called**—“vegetable stew.”  In reality, the vegetable stew was actually about equal parts olive oil and salt (probably close to a half-gallon of each), with an occasional vegetable; I kid you not.  It was delicious, but seriously fattening.  EVERYTHING my family cooks here is doused in olive oil.  Or fried in it.  In our kitchen we have a 5 liter (roughly 1.3 gallon) container of olive oil; we constantly are buying more as 5 liters go verrrry quickly.  (I had seconds of the olive oil soup.)

Anyways, this past week was fun, but a bit intense.  My class is now in its final week and on Friday we had our first exam.  It was funny getting my grade back today—again reminding me that this is not just a vacation with occasional classroom learning.  My grades actually transfer back to EEUU—must study accordingly.

Friday night I went out for ice cream with Denise, from Carnegie Mellon (originally from LA).  Delicious.  I was riding a Sevici home when I passed a bar and ran into a group of other kids from my program.  Hung out with them for a while and we then headed to Calle Betis.  This is a street, close to the river, composed of discotecas and bars.  One professor told us it is where Spaniards go “ir de pescas,” or go fishing…basically, looking for American girls.  My group ended up in a bar with many rainbow flags adorning the ceiling.  The cross-dressers also enlivened the atmosphere.  Brad, from Villanova, is a muscular African-American who was out with us.  He was approached by a group of Spaniards who were hoping he was a rapper, when he said no, they asked if he at least sings hip-hop.  Again, no, but they still went on the buy him lots of drinks.  I left pretty early and walked home with a group of kids.

On Saturday my program went to Cadiz, a beach town on the coast.  20 euros and an hour-ish later, we were at the ocean.  We jumped off the bus and headed toward the ocean.  The water was gorgeous, very very warm.  Based on maps, Cadiz appears on the Atlantic, but my host family said** that Cadiz has beaches on the both the Atlantic (cold water) and Mediterranean (warm water), so I assume we were on the Mediterranean.  I was a big spender and spent 5 euros to rent a chair for the day.  Money well spent!  I mainly read some magazines and swam.  Ahhhhh relaxation!

Cadiz

Apparently, my parents desperately needed some beauty in their lives, because they went to a gas station (yes, we are very classy) to pick up wi-fi (they were at our internet-less lake house), to Skype me.  Despite my mother getting ridiculously close to the screen and reminding me of orthodontist appointments where you awkwardly are staring up a person’s nostrils, it was lovely to talk with them.  Like always, Matthew is the voice of reason in their house. 

Countdowns: 4 days until end of first session, 18 days until my family visits me.  Looking forward to some more exploring of the streets of Sevilla this week!

Love to all!  And sorry, if I had more time, I would have written less...

*Fa-tass is a term of (semi) endearment that we call my father.  My siblings and I cleverly came up with this apodo in order to call my dad “fat ass,” without ever actually calling him one.

**Actually, this is my interpretation of what she called it, so who knows what she REALLY called it.  (Basically, my life is like the game telephone, by the time the Spanish enters my ears, is processed by my semi-functioning brain, and is then “comprehended,” the message has changed from “that man is well-dress” to “there’s a woman wearing a toupee!”…or something else absurdly different.)

Check out this ad with Rafa.  I think he looks so funny in it!

       

I swear, I'm smarter in English...and my jokes are actually funny!

My intensive Spanish for Business class is going well.  Antonio, mi professor, is quite a character.  We only are allowed to speak in English if we speak with a British accent.  Apparently, we all "speak English perfectly, with perfect American accents."  I was not about to "refudiate" his point!  Also, when we make mistakes he loves to declare (in English, with his very own British accent): "I want an anthrax sandwich."  Driving people to eat anthrax might be a new low in my life.  At the same time, holding enough grip over someone to make them eat an anthrax sandwich is powerful stuff...Leader of the free world in my future?  Probably only if it speaks English...

Reason #261 (and counting) why I fail at Spanish: Apparently, on the first day when I met my host family, I told them that my mother has a rare disease--I was trying to say that she used to be a nurse. I figured this out tonight at dinner when my senora asked me how much time my mother has left to live. oooops!!!!

ENFERMERA vs. ENFERMADAD...I could have sworn I used the right one.  (Regardless, both hold some validity: "My mother is a nurse" vs. "My mother is a disease.")... 

Hopefully, Senora y Marga will still be nice to me even though my mother is not currently in the process of dying from a rare condition.

Un beso!

Hace Calor

104 degree out today!  I had no idea I could heat up a city THAT much!  Seriously, killer heat, but it should get better.

I have started in classes now.  For 3 hours everyday I am in a Spanish for Business Students class.  And deberes now...blah.  It was a harsh reality waking up to my alarm Monday morning and remembering that I am not just on a 4 month school-less vacation.

Anyways,  I ate more delicious food and loved jamon serrano!  I am now at my home working on some homework.  Actually, writing this to avoid doing homework. jeje.  (I actually really enjoy the class.)

I went to la catedral today and climbed 32 stories to the top of La Giralda.  It is the tallest building in the city and provided some gorgeous views (like me passed out on the top floor).  It used to be a mezquita (mosque) when the Muslims ruled in Sevilla.  I need to pick up a book on the history here; it is so interesting!  Check this out if you'd like:  http://www.aboutsevilla.com/sevilla/history.asp  

I was wearing a Wisconsin t-shirt today and my guide at the cathedral asked me if I "knew Bucky the Badger."  His parents have friends who studied at Madison and gave him a Bucky Badger toy when he was little.  Apparently, he still has it and it is 20 years old.  Some of the other kids were laughing, saying that before meeting me they had only said "Wisconsin," at most, three times in their lives!  Also, Jaime, the director of my program, spent time in Madison, so CIEE has some  Badgers decorating their office.

Moving away from the novel, hope it is more manageable reading.

Ciao!

Fotos

http://picasaweb.google.com/111161978190687820435/Sevilla02?feat=directlink

Hope this works!  If not, I'll try again.

Aventuras en Sevila

Hola.  I last wrote before I had my interview.  It was fun and I ended up being interviewed by the professor, Antonio, who I am going to have for the first two weeks of classes (for the intensive two week language program).  Before my interview I was talking with mi guia Antonio (same name as professor) and Jaime, the Director of the program.  Jaime was explaining to me that Antonio is a “satiro” and during my interview I should ask professor Antonio what that means.  They were laughing and really enjoying talking about “satiros.”  I got a definition and basically think it means a “peeping tom.”  My entire interview basically consisted about talking about satiros.  Muy interesante…now my professor thinks I am a bit crazy.

For most of the activities we are in our group of 10 people with our guia Antonio.  He is so funny and we all really enjoy him.  He is going to be in the US from October through March(ish) for work with CIEE.  He told us that he needed to practice two words with us: “bitch” and “beach.”  He can never quite say them correctly; he kept saying “okay, how is this?  I will need my swim suit for the bitch.”  He also considers himself to be a “macho iberico.”  I think this is Spain’s equivalent of “pimp.”  He also was going on about something and I thought he said that he was a tiger, but apparently he said nothing of the sort…needless to say, I get made fun of a lot here! Jeje, all in good fun.

Anyways, after the entrevista, our groups walked the city a bit and went out for tapas.  Soooo delicious!  We were in the centro and the streets are beautiful.  At times you forget you are outdoors because the streets are very narrow (I think everyone has almost been hit by a car) and you almost can’t even tell that you are outdoors, but then you come across a gorgeous plaza with lots of bars and outdoor eating space.  For dinner we had sangria, tortilla Espanola (eggs, potatoes, cebollas, it was SO good), pork in a whiskey sauce, croquetas (reminded me of mozzarella sticks, Matthew will love them), and a few other things.

Despues de comer, the three groups met up for a flamenco show.  It was great—there was a guitar player, singer, and two dancers, it also was about 100 degrees inside, so in spite of the great dancing and guitar playing, each minute seemed to drag on FOREVER! 

After the flamenco, we went back to the hotel.  I went out to a bar to have a drink with three other kids.  I tried tinto de verano for the first time.  It is vino rojo with Fanta limon.  It is pretty good and I am pretty sure it has close to zero alcohol content, so it is a good drink for me!  I was with three other kids, Makaela from Oregon, Jake from Davidson, and Luis from Pace.  They are really good at Spanish and were really helpful.  We try to speak Spanish most all of the time, por supuesto, even if we are only with Americans.  The four of us went back to the hotel around 2 AM, muy temprano for here.

The next morning consisted of breakfast in the hotel, check out, and then sesiones informativas obligatorias at FCEYE. (Side note, FCEYE, the business school, was built a long time ago as a jail, it never was used as a jail, just a school, but you can definitely tell it was designed as a jail.)  We learned about intercambios (where we are partnered with a Spaniard and get help with our Spanish in exchange for helping them with their English), security, and other school stuff.  One of the speakers mentioned how the “typical girl from Wisconsin, with blonde hair and blue eyes, is so easy to pick out of a crowd here.”  Jeje.  She then knowingly smiled at me and I mentioned that she even got the state right.  We then walked back to the hotel to meet our host families.

Anyways, we got to the hotel and my family had left to move their car.  I guess they were parked in 30 min parking, and we were running late, so they went around the block and came back.  I was greeted by Marga. She is 21 years old and lives with her mom.  She just finished her studies and is a physiotherapist; she has a small room in the apartment for her work.  I have a room on the second floor of the apartment with two beds in it.  It is possible that I might have a Spanish roommate, but probably not.  The apartment has fuunctioning, fast internet. Yay!

I unpacked and then met my senora.  She came home from work and we talked and ate a DELICOUSSSSS lunch of soup followed by a bunch of meats that had been used to flavor the soup.  And watermelon for dessert.  I then had to meet up with my group for more activities.

I walked to the designated meeting point.  I was a bit nervous to venture into the streets of Sevilla for the first time by myself, but it was super easy to find.  Antonio arrived by bici and our group headed off.  We walked to the metro and took it to the CIEE center en el centro.  The metro is two years old (brand new!!) and incredibly nice.

We walked around the streets (alone the way I got a cell phone for calling within Spain), just exploring for a while, and then got some tapas and tinto de verano.  We had a leisurely dinner and then headed to the Plaza San Salvador.  Everyone just stands around drinking beer or tinto de verano and talks.  Ben, a kid from Indiana U, and I found in ice cream shop in the plaza, so naturally, I got a cone.  Pretty good…it was a flavor with cheese (cream cheese like) and nuts.  At midnight you can’t drink in the plaza anymore, so everyone heads out.  Our guides then took us to a different calle with a bunch of bars.  The inside of the bars were packed, to the max!  You basically order a drink and then go outside to drink and talk.  We found some good mojitos here.  I talked to a lot of the students in my program…one from WI, a few from the east coast, and also talked a lot with the guides.  I decided Antonio possibly had a few too many cervezas when he asked (in English) if he could be a cheetah instead of a tiger, and then started saying “rawr rawr” a lot.   He then thought he had confused his words, and starting asking for bananas because he thought cheetah meant “monkey.” Jeje, it was quite hilarious.  

I left around 1:45 (again, sooo early!) with Kirsti, from Indiana.  We split a taxi; it dropped her off first and we had a bit of trouble finding her building.  The taxi driver had no clue either.  Then I got dropped off…this is when the comedy of errors occurred…

My complex contains one building and to get from the outside to the inside it requires two, possibly three (if a certain gate is locked), keys.  This was the second time I’d been there and the first time I was going in alone.  I tried getting into the building and NONE of my keys worked.  Two service workers came to help me and they couldn’t get any of my keys to work, so they used one of theirs.  I got in and went to the seventh floor.  I couldn’t find my apartment.  I am in apartment C and there was literally every letter of the alphabet BUT C.  So I went back downstairs, but needed a functioning key to leave the building too!  (I later found out that there is a button on the wall you can push to get out too, but at the time I had no idea.)  I stood inside trying to use my non-working keys, but of course, they failed again.  The two service men returned and let me out.

Next, the three of us walked to a different entrance.  Although it is one building, there are parts that you can only access from certain entrances.  However, my keys didn’t work at this entrance either.  I decided to call Marga, but could barely understand a word that she said.  The service men talked with her, and it turns out, the lock is just very hard to work.  After about 10 minutes, we were able to open the door.  I thanked them for their help and went into the building.  Once I got to my floor EVERYTHING was pitch black.  I used my 10 euro phone to try and find my way to my apartment.  Finally found it.  Struggled for 5 minutes with the next lock (again a difficult one), when my senora heard me and opened it.  She had been up watching Nadal. 

I talked with her for a while and got a glass of water.  Somehow I accidentally dropped my phone (still in my hand from when I was using it as a flashlight), and spilled water all over myself (I was wearing a white dress) and the kitchen.  At this point, I was laughing at myself…I made it home after 45 minutes of trying to open doors only to find myself standing in a white dress, now pretty soaked, in a puddle in the kitchen.  It was quite the adventure.  I then went to bed.

I slept until noon, had breakfast, showered, organized stuff, had lunch (amazing soup followed by steak smothered in garlic—amazzzzing!).  I have just spent a half hour writing this, and after am meeting up with Denise, from Carnegie Mellon, to walk around/explore.  Later we will go to “Sevilla por bici,” and explore the street by bicycle.

Everything here is great!  The family is so nice, and all the people are too, that it just doesn’t seem like reality, I expected a few problems at least.  I guess I am just going to end up on “Captured Abroad” and that will even it all out!

XOXO, Jane

Bienvenidos a Sevilla

First, a disclaimer: My mother likes details, and since my only mission in life is to make my mother happy (obviously!), I may sometimes end up rambling on, and on and on and on.  And on.  Also, since I currently do not have an abundance of time, you may find my writing to be rambling, incoherent (especially if traveling to Amsterdam), and not always flawless (I know, the very opposite of me!).  I believe the quote is, “if I had more time, I would’ve written less.”  Anyways, please bear with me and abstain from judgment.  You can still judge me for others things of course *high five* but basically, this isn’t looking too competitive in the race for Pulitzer Prizes… 

Right now it is 14:30 en Sevilla.  I arrived yesterday around 14:00.  I flew Milwaukee to Chicago to Madrid to Sevilla.  On the flight from Chicago to Madrid I was seated next to Inez, an 82 year old woman from Chicago.  She spends half of the year in Chi and half in FL.  While in FL she became friends with a French couple and was on her way to visit them.  I got to see LOTS of pictures of her grandchildren and learn all about her political leanings (she doesn’t love Obama, but was far from conservative, referring to republicans as “ridiculous people who have no idea about anything and don’t care about the common good…etc. etc. etc.;” seven hours later we parted ways in Madrid.  On that flight I met a kid from Madison seated across the aisle from me.  There were also about five other people in my program on that flight.  We missed our connection and bummed around the airport for a while.  I stayed with the boy from Madison, and a boy from Indiana.  Madrid to Sevilla was an hour flight.  I was seated next to a boy from Hawaii studying abroad through a different program.  I asked him some questions about Hawaii and then, thinking of Inez (who is hoping we can meet in Chicago for oysters—her favorite!), decided to spare him, and silenced myself.

We were greeted in Sevilla and put into cabs that went to our hotel.  Had a nice conversation in Spanish with my driver.  Well, he spoke Spanish and I spoke my own version of it.  Once at the hotel I got a package with orientation info, dropped my bags in my room and went downstairs for lunch.  We were served scrambled eggs with bacon, mushrooms, and onions, then steak, then a mousse like dessert.  After, I walked around with some kids.  Finally showered after that and headed down to some more orientation jazz.

We had a meeting with staff from CIEE (that is the program I am studying with).  We went over general info and then got our housing assignments.  I am living with Margarita and her 21 year old daughter who is also Margarita.  I was happy to see I’d be with someone my own age…I mean, who doesn’t like a margarita?   

After the meeting we broke up into three groups, each with ten people.  Each group has their own guide.  All of the people who work for CIEE are gorgeous!  Our guide Antonio included…desafortunadamente, one of my two roommates called dibs.  Antonio helped show us where our homestays would be.  I will be living in Nervion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nervion,_Seville).  We had eggplant with brie, salmon, and tomato, followed by rice and chicken, and a dessert similar to that at lunch.  I was intending to go out at night but was way too tired, just went to bed instead.

My two roommates are great!  One is 26 and in college at Oregon.  The other (who ended up going out and rolling back in at 4 AM) is from Chicago and goes to Iowa.  We woke up around 7:30 (actually, roommate number II was still enjoying her third hour of sleep of the night) and went to a continental breakfast.  At 9:15 everyone met in the lobby, we split into our groups and the facilities.  The b-school has an awesome atrium.  The building is called FCEYE (everybody calls it “efe ce eh”—sorry I don’t know how to put it phonetically) and is pretty close to where I will be living.  We had more meetings with more gorgeous people.  Then, a buffet lunch (not too good) at a restaurant and a bit of walking through the city.  It is beautiful.  The sun is intense and very hot.  Orange trees are everywhere.  Sadly, the oranges aren’t orange until la primavera (spring), so we just see green spheres in the trees.  Also, these oranges aren’t edible…they apparently taste more like lemons.  The city has lots of Arab and Roman influences.  We walked past some Roman ruins and a grand park.  Both were located in (what soon will be) mi barrio, Nervion. 

I am now in my room for a short while.  We have one-on-one interviews tonight to determine our speaking abilities, then dinner, and then a flamenco show (I think).  Tomorrow we meet our familias and move in!  Exciting!

Sincere apologies if I haven’t gotten back to your email, the internet (here, “wee-fee”) has been pretty slow.  For this same reason, I will post pictures once I have a better connection.

The language has been okay so far.  The staff is so helpful and nice.  They said that they will soon go into their regular way of speech…cutting off whole syllables of words…so that should be fun!  The kids are all super nice as well.  Most of the country is represented, there are four kids from Madison (didn’t know them prior to this).  Great news: I am BY FAR the most blonde kid in the program.  I will only allow the Spanish men in bars look at my lovely golden locks in exchange for drinks. 

Sorry this just turned into an itinerary of my days.  I am still a bit delirious from the sleep deprivation…

Besos!