First Blog about Spain!

Monday January18, 2010 12:07 a.m.

Well, I made it to Spain! The flights here were soo long, but I had a lot of fun with Ben and Paige. The first airport I was at all of my bags were searched because I left my computer in one bag and some mouthwash in the other. Some lady told me to “get with the program” when she saw my stuff being searched in Omaha. Haha… We had a seven hour layover in New Jersey which actually went by pretty quickly. When we looked out our terminal we saw the empire state building which was pretty sweet. Then we headed to good ‘ol Spain on a huge plane for a good 6 hours. I was planning on sleeping, but never really did. I managed to dominate Paige in checkers a few thousand times on her ipod though! After the flight we were beginning to get very tired because we had been up since 4 am the day before and it was now about 2 am American time when we arrived in Barcelona and 7 am in Barcelona. Our flight in Barcelona was delayed for a couple hours because they had to fix it… KINDA sketchy but it was cool.. Finally we arrived in Granada after not sleeping for a good twenty-four hours, we were tired but had so much adrenaline that we didn’t sleep. The mountains here were amazing surrounding the town and the view from the plane looking down on the city nestled in the mountains was beautiful. We took a bus from the airport to the hotel (even though we had no idea what we were doing or where to go!) We ended up finding it just fine and actually walked around the city for a while. When we got back we kind of laid around but never slept. At this point I was dead tired but of course we had to go to the bars and get tapas (free food with a bought drink). So naturally at around 8 we went to the first bar. It was a nice bar, but I think that it was for older people because we were definitely the youngest by a good 10 or 20 years. We made our way to other bars also and even got to watch the Cardinals play the Saints at an “Irish Pub”. Well we went to about 4 bars and were ready to go back to the hotel because we hadn’t slept in two days. On the way back to the hotel, the girls decided they wanted to go into a discoteca. We got there at 1 and we were early! There was basically nobody there. (Most people in Spain go to the bars from 9-2 and then to the discotecas from 2-6 am) The next hour it filled up sooo quickly. It was probably the coolest place I have been to for a night!. It was so much fun! Well 3 or 4 o clock rolled around, and we were all pretty tired! We started walking back to the hotel but not before we got something to eat! Haha After that we headed back and went straight to bed. I was so tired. Eleven o clock rolled around way too quickly the next day, and it was hard to get up. We showered and all and went to go meet Veronica our program director. We found out where we lived and who we live with. I didn’t actually get paired with anyone, and I didn’t think it was a big deal though. An hour later our families picked us up. I was put into a home with a lady named Ana who lives alone, but hosts kids all the time from many different places. The meeting was kind of awkward because in Spain they kiss each other on each cheek haha kind of random! We got to our apartment where I found I was the only person living with her, so I was pretty nervous considering she doesn’t know any English at all. I tried speaking as much as I could and probably failed miserably, but it all worked out. I did run out of verbs to use though haha. I got a meal right away when I got to the apartment. She is a great cook! I think I had some sort of fish soup with pan and hamburgesas y ensalada. She cooked soo much food for me. After that I finally got more sleep! A good 4 hour nap haha. After I woke up today from the nap she brought me to show me where my classes would be tomorrow at noon. (I’m not really sure if I will find it or not tomorrow but oh well!) When we got back I went and found an internet bar and kind of did my own thing. I was feeling overwhelmed with being by myself and everything. I skyped the family and things like that. When I returned, my Senora introduced me to two guys that are also staying with her. (I had no idea they were going to be staying there also). We were speaking Spanish back and forth at first because I didn’t know they spoke English. Finally I asked where they were from, and they said Minnesota. Of course immediately I began speaking English with them and we were shushed by our Senora haha. It was great to find two guys (who are both pretty fluent at Spanish) living in the same apartment. We had dinner and it was much easier than lunch because I had so many questions for them. (In Spanish of course) We went to another internet café and then came back and now here I am ready to call it a night! The guys told me that our senora shuts the heat off at night and it gets super cold haha welp that’s all I have. Hasta luego!

P.S. the sunsets here are gorgeous over las montanas que se llaman las Sierra Nevadas!

Chris