Mi Vida en España

Hello, Hello,

so it's been awhile since I've written anything. I've been pretty busy. We've had 2 weeks of midterms and projects and such so I've been doing a lot of studying. It's finally over and I still have a lot of stuff to do. We have so many papers due in November and I am a little behind in my film class. I've been doing well though, got an A on my grammar class exam, and I did really well on my essay for Art History. Besides the normal, all I have to talk about is my trip to Salamanca and Madrid. I forget normal/day to day things, that could be interesting for everyone else haha but they just seem to kind of pass by. I've been falling asleep in grammar class the last couple of days...it's just sooo boring. haha.
So it's really cold here in Granada! It went from one day being 70 degrees during the day and literally the next day was down 20 degrees. We totally missed fall and just went straight to winter. And our apartment is sooo cold. Carrie and I are constantly freezing...I swear it's just our room too.
So last weekend Carrie and I took a really spontaneous trip to Salamanca and Madrid. We had been thinking about doing it for about a week but didn't plan anything till the night before. First of all, our host mom's mom died last week. We felt really bad, and didn't really know what to do, but she called us as we were walking back from cooking class (which is so delicious) saying that she had already left for Salamanca because her mom died. So we were alone for awhile in the house and Wednesday night around 9:30 we made plans to go to Salamanca the next day! We left Thursday after class around 3 and got to Salamanca at 11:30 (by bus) that night to our hotel. It was a great hotel and only 23 euros a night!!! We were so wonderfully located too, right next to Plaza Mayor!!Carrie has a friend in Salamanca so we met up with her at a bar and hung out for a little bit but went home kinda early (1:30) so we could get up the next morning and do alllll the touristy things because that night we were taking another bus to Madrid. Oh and it was FREEZING in Salamanca...like 35 night, 45 during the day. We did all the touristy stuff the next day...the catedrals, the university (oldest in all of Spain), ate at a cute Italian restuarant, got ice cream, saw a roman bridge etc. It was a really pretty city. All the buildings are built out of sandstone and its small and cute. It gave me a similar feeling as Granada but just a bit smaller. We met these Belgium men who we kept running into all day. They each spoke like 5 languages!! crazy. That evening around 6 we headed to Madrid to meet up with Anna and Claire from our program. We had another nice hostel that ended up being 15 euros a night! But we made up for that cheap price with FOOD. We ate at 2 really nice restaurants and ate delicious food! That night we went out and did a bar for awhile and then just headed back. The next day we slept till noon (haha) and then took a 3.5 hour walking tour around Madrid...we saw the Royal Palace, some sweet plazas, statutes and buildings. I didn't mind doing less touristy things because I've been there before. We then went to the Prado for about 1.5 hours and saw a few paintings before they kicked us out cause they were closing. That night we really went out!! Claire has friends studying in Madrid so we met up with them and went to dinner (we didn't get there till 10:40!). It was another Italian place but whatever, I love Italian food! After that we went to 2 bars and then a discoteca! We met these Spanish guys at the second bar and spoke a lot of Spanish with them! They brought us to the discoteca and we finally went in. It was only 5 euros which is amazing because in Granada its usually 10! It looked just like you would picture a disco. We walked in and it was dark, with strobe lights and crazy green ray lights flashing everywhere, with a stage in the back and we went right to the stage and danced right in front!!! A fight broke out on the stage and we got kinda scared because the body guards were like alll over it and almost worse than the guys themselves...we got pushed around a little bit, but all was well and it made for quite the evening. We didn't get home that night till 7 in the morning!!! My first 7 am-er! haha. The next day we had to wake up and then we just take a bus back to Granada. And then we had lots of work to do..boo
Well then the week went by! habha yesterday was a busy day. We had a special visit for our art history class to the Alhambra! FINALLY. We did mainly the outside (the towers, the gardens, and the courtyard). It was beautiful of course, but really cold. Finally when we were done it was dark but a bunch of us still had to go to this ISlamic Civ. class conference thing. There was this conference taking place at the Law School about Morocco and the Western Sahara. We had to go and try and listen...it was hard considering it was in Spanish and I really didn't understand much! Too bad I still have to write a reflexion about it! haha
Tonight we are going to karaoke , so that should be fun. I am sure we will do something fun for Halloween tomorrow, i'm just not sure what!
Oh and in cooking class the other day we made this delicious stuffed eggplant. It was amazing. we told our senora, and she made it for us today for lunch!!! soo good.
Ok everyone, more seriously, my dad is getting hip surgery today, so think of him, pray for him or whatever it is you do. Keep him in your thoughts! I feel bad because I haven't called home in awhile and I didn't get to say good luck to my pops, so GOOD LUCK daddy, love you!!!
Until Later
love always
Kate

Hola,

so life's been pretty good. I've been getting lots of work done for the most part, at least more than lots of people. It is so hard to do work here. You just don't wanna do it!! There are some people in my group that are taking these classes as only PASS/FAIL...I am so jealous. My grades are actually counting towards my GPA, so I have to do at least ok!! Anyway, I am not too worried, the teachers here also realize that we are taking classes in a different language and are also here to have fun, so they understand a little. Anyway, here's how the weekends gone.
Thursday most people just kinda hung out at home and did lots of work because Friday we had to get up early to go on our day trip to Cordoba. That's pretty much what I did, but Carrie's dad was here so I went to meet them for dinner and then we walked around a little bit to show him a bit more of Granada. Friday we got up at 6:30 am to meet our group at 7:30. Cordoba was a good trip but not as fun as some of the other trips IES has taken us on. We first went to the city of Madinat al-Zahra. They are ruins from the Califa Abd al-Raham III city built around 930 and destroyed around 1100. It took only 40 years to build, but then it was destroyed in about 2. It's about 10 miles outside of Cordoba. It was tradition that when you were a Califa, you built your own city to show power and strength, so when Adb al- Rahman III declared himself Califa, he needed to do the same. Abd al-Rahman I came to Cordoba to get away from the Califa family in Baghdad because they had killed his entire family and he didn't want to follow people who assassinated his family. But he was just an Emir (governor kind of) so from Abd al-Rahman I until Abd al-Rahman III they were just Emirs, but independent of the Califa in Baghdad, when finally the III decided he had enough money to declare himself Califa. Ok anyway just a little history for ya. So this was his city. It was only rediscovered in 1911 so until then this city, after it's destruction, was only a myth to many people. And only about 1/10th has been excavated so far. It is a really important archaeological find because since this city was unknown for such a long time, it has no other influences from other cultures disturbing it. It is truly a city from 929! Most of it is in Ruins and being reconstructed but there is plenty of cool things to see. Hopefully that facebook link worked and you can check out the pictures. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2670403&l=42b65&id=9380060
Then we went to see some of the Jewish section of Cordoba. We saw the last Jewish courters left before the Jews were expelled out of Spain. We were suppose to go see the oldest Synagogue, but it was closed. This trip wasn't planned as well as some of the other ones...so we just went to the sephardic/andalusian jewish museum. It was cool we saw this guy perform traditional Andalusian Sephardic Jewish music! I bought some.
After the museum we went to the Great Mosque. It was pretty incredible. All of the classic red and white arches were there and standing strong! haha. It's funny to see how a Cathedral is built RIGHT in the middle of the Mosque. You can totally tell when you go from one area to the next. I took a ton of pictures so I hope that link works.
That was it, that was our day in Cordoba. Oh I forgot to mention that I had a headache the entire time, so the trip for me could have been better. Then we traveled home because we had a Flamenco Show to go see for our Flamenco Class....well we all rushed and ate dinner faster than ever so we could make it to the show. Well turns out it was CANCELED! which i was bummed about because I wanted to see it, but I was also relieved cause I felt like shit to be honest. My head was killing me. so luckily I got to go home and go to bed. Carrie on the other hand went out till 5:30 the next morning!!! They went to the club that I have been dying to go to!!!! I am bummed by head hurt
Anyway, Saturday was a good day, we did lots of homework during the day, but at night IES was having an Open Mic Night as this club/bar called Entresuelo. It was so neat. I loved seeing IES students get up there and do stuff..some people sang, played guitar, read poetry etc. It was cool to see some peoples talents that I hadn't know about before.
After that Carrie and I and some other people went to this club called 380. It's our favorite Tapas bar because the Tapas are sooo good. We hung out there till they closed, like 1ish i think, then went to Hannigans. It's an Irish pub and we met this guys from Malaga and sat with them until 3. It was really fun, we spoke with them mainly in Spanish so that was great. Carrie was really tired so we decided to leave.
Today I have lots of work I still need to get done, but tonight I am meeting my Spanish Intercambio!!! Her name is Ana and she is also 21, but I think she's graduated and doing graduate school. I'll let you all know how it goes later! Wish me luck, I am kinda nervous!
Love Always
Kate

Hola,

so I will finally write a bit about my trip to France. It was pretty nice. We did a lot of touristy things and didn't do any night life. Which is fine because by the end of the day, we both had stomach aches...it could have been the weekend of stomach aches haha but it's probably because we ate so much food. Pasta, fish, pastries, crepes, chocolate...so much. First we ended up taking a 1:30 am bus thursday night so we would get to Madrid with plenty of time for our 1:55pm plane...but the only other bus we could have taken would have only gotten us to Madrid by 12:30 and that was just cutting it a bit tooooo close. Anyway, it was fun...kinda haha. We flew to Marseille and everything worked out fine. When we got to Marseille we wondered around and found a map so we could find our hotel. Our hotel was great because it was so close to the old port, but our room smelled really bad and it was 4 flights of stairs haha, but other than that it was fine. Friday we really just walked around and saw the city at night. One of the nights, I don't remember which one, we met these Californian students who are studying in Bordeaux. We hung out with them for a little and got a drink at a bar near our hotel. Saturday Sally and I went to Arles, where Van Gogh did a lot of his paintings, lived and died. It also is known for having a lot of Roman Ruins! We saw an Amphitheater, Roman Baths, an old Roman Theater, and Crypts. It was pretty sweet. The town was sooo cute and picturesque. Throughout the day we kept running into these older couples who were traveling together. Its a small town so we saw them at all the monuments. We even saw them at the train station on our way back to Marseille...they were going to opposite way and sat across the tracks but we yelled back and forth to each other. I loved it! They were so nice. While in Arle we also had a wonderful lunch at a little cafe. Sunday we did the walk up to the Notre Dame of the Guard. It's a beautiful church and its huge. It has a 360 view of the entire city so that was really pretty. Apparently the statue on the top of the church has a baby jesus whose wrist is 3 meters thick! After that we went to the Cathedral and then we went to lunch. The best part of the day though was taking a boat to the islands. We went to If Island and Frioule Island. If Island is where the Count of Monte Cristo was supposed to take place. Both the islands were cool, but I wish I had brought my bathing suite cause the Frioule Island was beautiful and you could just jump into the sea! That was pretty much my time in France. Then we traveled back and had a few hours in Madrid so we went to Plaza Mayor and had lunch and walked around. We got good at the Metro in Madrid...I was quite proud of us! It's soooo easy actually and they are so fast and clean and reliable. We went into a Corte Ingles while in madrid, i think I've mentioned those...they are HUGE ASS department store type things that is also like a walmart superstore but so much nicer...they have anything you would ever want ever. The one we went to in madrid though was specialized and had 5 floors of like eveyrthing to do with electronics/music...first floor cds, second movies, 3rd computers, 4 music instruments/sound systems, 5th Vinyl records!!! Then across the street was a bookstore Corte Ingles...So I bought a book in English (The Firm by John Grishem). Corte Inges's are alllll over Spain and everyone loves them haha. Anyway, so finally we got home around 11:30 at night, and I realized that I have SCHOOOOOOL still. What a thought right? So I was up until 2, which is crazy for me because I never stay up late doing work. Next week I have 2 midterms and then the next week I have another 2, and we have major projects due eventually and I kinda feel like need to start working on them. Well anyway
This Friday we are taking a group trip to Cordoba to see the Great Mosque and I am really looking forward to it. Its just a day trip, so when we get back to Granada (around 9:30) we are going to see a Flamenco show for our Flamenco class...its gonna be a Crazy day, and I am gonna be exhausted. But it's gonna be great too. I am staying in Granada this weekend, which is necessary for all the work I have to do.
Ok thats all for now I guess...below is a link that I THINK will work for everyone to my facebook album about France. Please paste the link in your browser and let me know if you can see the album..this way, if you can, I don't have to upload pictures to this blog as well!!!
Ok love you all
Kate

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2669041&l=31add&id=9380060

Hi ya'll,

just wanted to say that I am back from France and had a nice time. Went to Marseille and Arles. I liked Arles more. Saw some cool things and ate lots of good food. Now I have lots of work to do and I don't wanna do it!

GO PSU football! woot woot
Love Always
Kate

Just an interesting fact for ya'll

Granada is an Arabic name from a LONG time ago, and when the French came to Granada they called the fruit Apple of Granada ...pomme de grenade ( i think that is how they say Granada)= pomegranate! They grow everywhere around Granada. So there ya go...the fruit was named after the city!

COOL