This experience has been what I've made it to be

So.

This is awkward.

I came down with a terrible case of chicken pox?  My computer crashed?  I forgot how to speak English?

Alright so none of that is true.  I'm simply attempting to come up with excuses for why I haven't blogged for the past two months.  I don't have one... unless laziness counts.

I usually have a theme for each of my posts, but since it's been so long, I'm going to share with you whatever thoughts enter my mente.

• Tourists like Segovia.  I've been a tourist many times, but never have I been the resident witnessing tourists take photos and talk in excited voices about visiting my city.  #goodfeeling
• Spain is pretty great.  It's very diverse... meaning the northern part of the country (called "país Vasco") is much different than the south.  Customs are a bit different, typical foods vary, the accent differential is similar to that of Minnesota compared to Texas.
• Terraces are awesome.  It's now 73 degrees F in Segovia, and I'm sitting out on the Terrace with the sun roof up... all right outside my room.
• The Semana Santa in Segovia was impresionante. I was lucky enough to be here and witness it in person.  Photos to come.
• Going to a theater and watching a movie in Spanish is a ton of fun, and very educational.
• As a group we have traveled to maaaaany different cities within Spain (in order):  
• Salamanca
• Madrid
• Toledo
• Escorial/Valle de los caídos (site - not a city)
• Barcelona
• La granja (countryside outside of Segovia)
• Andalucía
• Córdoba, Granada, and Sevilla

Some of those cities we only stayed for a day, others we were there for at least three nights.  Andalucía is basically a large area within Spain.  We had our biggest excursion there where we stayed for one night in Córdoba, a couple in Granada, and a couple in Seville.  

• "[Spain] wasn't going to be like I thought it was."

     Even though at times life is hard, I've had a fantastic time here.  The most important thing for me to realize early on was that it wasn't going to be like I thought it was.  I studied abroad a second time because I wanted to perfect my Spanish.  I did not come because I wanted a semester off of "real" school, because I wanted to party in a new and exciting country, because living with a host family is the summit of happiness, because I wanted to meet Spanish girls.  No.  Those did not have any sway on my decision to study in Spain.
     What I had to realize was that if I wanted to strive for perfection with Spanish I would have to do it on my own.  Perfection is not going to walk up to your front door and ask if it came come in, sit down for a while, and chat.  It's not easy.  I realized early on that if I didn't put in major hours on my own time, in addition to studying abroad in a Spanish speaking country, it wasn't going to happen.  Excellence isn't achieved in a classroom; it's achieved at home, in the library, in a cafe, or wherever else you choose to work at it.
     I was upset that I wasn't learning Spanish at the pace I wanted to.  Once I came to grips with the fact that I wasn't merely going to absorb the language as I hoped a second abroad experience would do for me, my impression of Spain changed drastically.  I began hitting the books harder than I had before.  Doing the homework in a way that most students should - but also in that way that simply never happens because it takes "too much time".  In addition to a respectable dedication to school assignments I began to work on my individual areas of struggle within the language: grammar and vocabulary.  For the grammar I bought a book in Spanish - Los Juegos del Hambre (The Hunger Games) and started reading.  For vocabulary I went to the local "chinese store" (which is what the Segovians call it because it's proprietors are Chinese) and bought myself a shiny new orange notebook in which I would record seven new words a day, including three phrases a piece for retention.  Since that time, my Spanish has improved in leaps in bounds - something that hadn't happened since my abroad experience in Chile where my Spanish comprehension level soared.

• This experience has been what I've made it to be.  I went in expecting to learn Spanish from the Spaniards.  What I didn't expect was everything else I've learned.
• How to cook deliciously healthy meals.  
• It wasn't till last semester (fall of 2012) when I developed my interest in cooking.  Before that I was awful... my goodness I was bad (at the beginning of the semester I had to ask my roommates to help me fry an egg).  My first "big" attempt at cooking was to, of course, impress a girl with her favorite meal.  I asked my crush over to my apartment in an attempt to have one of those movie-perfect nights where the guy and girl cook something together.  You know, where there's fun music in the background, and inevitably a food fight breaks out at some point?  What ended up happening was she came over and worked on homework while I struggled to figure out how to brown some beef.  However, even without a food fight, I think it turned out alright... just ask my girlfriend :)
• ANYWAY.  The point is I developed an interest in cooking right before I left for Spain, and now that I'm here I have learned from my host mom how to make many healthy, delicious, and filling dishes.  I learned that it's very easy to have a fresh piece of fruit after every meal, and making home-squeezed orange juice for breakfast is an easy thing to do while waiting for your toast to pop up.  I learned that there are a thousand distinct ways to make a salad, all very easy.  
• I learned how to very quickly and effortlessly peel an orange... a pleasing fruit I had always avoided due to the hassle in peeling it.
• How to plan a vacation.  
• This has been something that all of us study-abroaders have done a lot of.  During our free weekends many of us have hauled ourselves off to another city for a couple of days.  This is a list of places I have traveled to outside of group guidance, or will travel to after the program:
• Madrid
• Mallorca, Spain - An island off of Spain
• Salamanca
• After program: 
• Rome, Italy
• Venice, Italy
• London, England

Another aqueduct shot

Freshly squeezed orange juice

Salad - noodles, lettuce, chicken, tomatoes, baby onions, olive oil, pinch of salt

Salad - lettuce, oranges, apples, carrots, baby onions, olive oil 

Semana Santa

Semana Santa

Semana Santa - One of the processions gathering

One of the processions making their way from the aqueduct to the main square 

Semana Santa

Carrying a particularly large cross that required two people at times, the main carrier asks for water from a friend behind him

Semana Santa - La catedral

Semana Santa - I asked a few people if they would mind taking a picture with me :)

Semana Santa - One of the final processions

Semana Santa - Up close

Semana Santa - Up close

New hair cut/style :P

Barcelona, and a bit more

The past three weekends have been filled up with (or were supposed to have been filled up with... I'll explain in a bit) three difference excursions: Valle de los caídos, Barcelona, and La granja.

Valle de los caídos 2/09/13: 
On this Saturday my group and I visited a place called "valle de los caídos", or in English "valley of the fallen".  It's located outside of the town San Lorenzo de Escorial where we first visited "El Escorial" which is a historical residence of the king of Spain.  But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The "valle de los caídos" is most notably known to be the place where Francisco Franco (not the actor, James Franco, who's name was automatically typed by my fingers before I realized what I was doing) is buried.

If you don't know, Franco was the dictator of Spain from May of 1939, when he and the nationalists won the Spanish civil war, to his death in 1975... just shy of 40 years - the longest dictatorship in all of European history.  He is buried on a mountain where some other 40,000 war soldiers are also buried.  His grave is inside a massive church built into the mountain with a massive cross on top which he had built while he was still alive so he could honor himself in death.

Franco's final resting place

The cross can be easily seen from far away

I don't want to get into opinions of Franco, as there are many, and they vary from love to hatred, although I'm going to go on a ledge and say most people didn't like him, as from I've heard the only people that liked him were the rich people.  But my point is, that even just visiting his grave upset a lot of our host parents, and also a few members of our group.  It's a very touchy subject.

I was going to talk about La Escorial, but then I realized that it was three weeks ago, and I hardly remember anything.  So, I apologize, and I'll try harder to remember next time!

Barcelona 2/15/13 - 2/19/13:

For me (and I believe many others in my group) this weekend holds the prize for best weekend yet in Spain.  Barcelona is an incredibly city, full of life, seemingly kind people (although my host mom says they are the New Yorkers of Spain) and great ways to spend free time.  The only problem with the city is that they don't speak Spanish, but Catalan.  It's a variation of Spanish, but still a different language.  Were it not for that, I would have loved to live there for a while someday in my never-ending attempt to improve my Spanish.  

I would love to sit here and spend my entire night writing about the weekend in Barcelona, but the problem is I could do just that... spend the entire night writing - and that's not something that appeals to me right now.  So I'm just going to highlight the basics via bullet points as they come to my mind, and let my photo's do the talking:

• Gondola.  We took a ride above the city in a box attached to a cable.  It was really cool, but also really short which made it very overpriced (15 Euro).
• Las ramblas:  The name of the most popular street in Barcelona, also the street we lived on.  It was almost always pumping with enough people to compare to New York city at closing time, touristy shops, and after 11 PM many, many prostitutes.  
•  Olympic stadium of 1992.  On our free day I visited the olympic stadium of 1992 with a few others.  It was thrilling seeing it all, and imagining what it must have been like 21 years ago when the world's best competed in front of everyone.
• Our hotel.  The rooms were completely pink, and it had a 24 hour long buffet, including drinks.  Even though a few of us got sick, I was a big fan of unlimited and free food whenever I wanted it.
• La Sagrada Familia.  An amazing church designed by Gaudi which has been in development for over 100 years due to a lack of funding.  I wondered how they could build something for so long, especially with the entrance fees being as high as they were (13.5 Euro with a seemingly never ending line of tourists) but when I got in I was able to tell how.  It was incredible.  I don't have any pictures from the inside, but it was incredibly, and very much had a sort of "new age" feel to it.  Also, the church itself is so tall that it could easily be seen from every high vantage we ended up being at anywhere in the city.  This site will bring to a lot of information if you speak Spanish.  If not... there are really good pictures on the homepage which I promise are worth looking at.  La Sagrada Familia

Fountains 

Pink hotel room

woo!  Reminded me of Disney World - the fountains were timed to music

Street performers and our director - Gladys

Entrance to the mall - beautiful

Just having some fun in the mall :)

Just outside the mall

La Sagrada Familia

Bridge leading to the mall

View from the park designed by Gaudi

Gondola

Gaudi's park

Gondola

Gondola

Olympic staduim

My Olympic sport: Basketball

Fútbol

The old bull fighting stadium now converted into a modern mall 

View over the industrial side of the port

La granja 2/23/13:

Just kidding.  We were supposed to go here, but it was canceled because of the snow.  Honestly, all I know about it is that it's outside, so I'll tell you more about it later when we actually visit it!  

That's all folks.

The first three excursions

Salamanca 1/19:
Very similar to Segovia in appearance and feel, but Salamanca is a bit more touristy.  When we were there it was raining so we only got to see the humongous cathedral.  We ate at McDonalds.  I pickpockeded Gabe because the guys and a few of the girls were playing this game where we tried to see if we could pick pocket each other.  I gave my wallet to Gabe to see if i could get it back.  And i did.  It was awesome.

Madrid 1/26:
Huge.  In fact, only two cities in the United States are larger:  New York, and Los Angeles.  The size is the first thing that hit me, and I loved it.  As I fell asleep on the drive over, I didn't get to see the entrance into the city, but when I opened my eyes for the first time it was evident that Madrid was a pumpin' city that never sleeps.  That phrase actually couldn't be more accurate because literally people party till past six in the morning on weekends.  Anyway, I'll start on my personal trip:

We arrived on Saturday morning, and dropped our luggage off at the hotel.  Upon arrival we were given a few hours of free time to do with what we wanted.  Myself and the three other guys who I was staying with decided to eat the lunch our host mom's packed (life is good :) and chill in the hotel room.  We could have explored, but we knew there was plenty of time for that.. and I think we all enjoyed the man time.

Our hotel - Mediodia

When 2:00 rolled around we gathered in the hotel lobby and were off to visit the Museo Reina Sofia... one Madrid is famous for.

The rules of the museum apparently prohibit groups from entering the front doors, which makes things difficult for a group of 29.  Our plan was to wait in line and pretend like we didn't know each other.  Let me just say that our group makes a lot of noise, and our plan was not a success. 

They let us enter the backdoors, as if we were an some sort of embarrassment, but hey.  We got in.  We were required to spend two hours in the building, exploring what we wanted.  I am a really big appreciator of pencil sketches, so I spent most of my time analyzing any canvass I could find scratched with a regular Number 2.  Sadly, I wasn't able to take any pictures - as was expected.  I wish I could have shared some with you, two hours is a long time, but I enjoyed it.

The backdoor - not too shabby.

After the museum we had the rest of the day to spend as we wished... which was a decent chunk of time considering it was only 4 PM.  I went out with a few others and explored a bit... American style (it involved McDonalds).  

That night we went to a very famous club... El Kapital.  It was pretty nice as far as clubs go, but still incredibly loud, dirty, and not really my cup of tea.  It was pretty sweet though because one of the people in our group had a friend who lives in Madrid, so he was able to get us VIP tickets which included drinks on the house a few tables reserved for us on the second floor overlooking the dance floor below, and probably most importantly we were able to skip ahead of the multi-hundered number of people waiting outside, shivering in the cold.  

The next morning we all woke early, most of us running on two hours of sleep, ate the continental breakfast which included bread, bread, cereal, orange juice, and more bread; and gathered for a very long day of museums, walking around the city, and the King and Queen's official house.  

I gotta say, the Spanish know how to make a mansion.  

The King/Queen's official "palace" was incredible.  We weren't allowed to take pictures in there either, and even though I took a few (my camera hanging from my chest, while coughing to muffle the sound) I wasn't able to get anything worth sharing.  Anyway, it was incredible.  The most luxurious, enormous, impressive, detailed, and expensive building I've ever seen.  Apparently it's only used a few days each year, as the royal family doesn't live there.

Royal house from outside

We also visited the Museo del Prado... which has over four thousand works of art including Botticelli, El Botticelli, El Bosco, Velazquiz and Goya according to this website of interesting facts about Madrid: http://madridinfo.net/madrid_facts.htm

By the time we went to the Prado I was bastante cansado and wanted nothing more than sleep.  Regardless, we had a good time.  

The following day we had entirely free.  To describe a long day in few words: we went to a few places to shop, took the metro which was really cool/useful, saw the bull fighting stadium, and explored some more.  

Metro station

Plaza de Torros

Oh and street performers are awesome.

Toledo 2/2:

One of my favorite places so far.  The city is plump full of swords, daggers, and weapons from Lord of The Rings, as it was literally the place where the weapons for the movie were created.  This is the dagger that I bought for 22 Euros.

I love it!  It's going to sit on my desk here in Spain until I go home where it will sit on my desk there, until I get an apartment where it will sit on my desk there :)

Toledo

The city was build without any mathematical sense in case of an attack on the city.  If there ever was an attack, it would be very difficult for the invaders to navigate the city.  That being said, it was also difficult for us to navigate the city.  

As with all of our excursions, we visited the local cathedral, but besides that we were free to explore the city.  I enjoyed exploring Toledo mucho, because all of the little shops were so interesting.  As a LOTR fan, it was really cool to see so many legitimate swords and LOTR trinkets.  I doubt I'll make it back before the semester is over, but I'm very glad we had the opportunity to explore Toledo.