So today was it-the first day of school-and I didn't even have a class! We met at the bus stop around 10am because Toni thought we should sleep in so that we weren't tired :) Then we eventually got around to actually getting on the bus and getting to the campus around 11am. The buildings on the campus look pretty modern, but it is not nearly as big as ISU. Maybe like a community college size in the US. We went to a classroom and listened to Toni tell us everything we needed to know about the school and our classes and life in Caceres and everything. She loves to talk! We were greeted by a Dean of the university. He said he wants to have lots of activities to interegrate their students and our students. We also took a picture with him. When Raquel was about to take the photo, Toni said, "Cheese and whiskey but not together!" That must be similar to what they say in Spanish when they take pictures! Then we took a 30 minute break and went to the cafeteria and talked to each other. We went back to the classroom for 2 more hours of listening to Toni talk and answer our questions and then she sent us home for the day. Toni is our program coordinator. So much for a first day of school...we never met a professor or other students! It just shows how relaxed the atmosphere is at the school!
I went home, had lunch and rested and then went shopping!!! I've been looking for boots ever since we got here and I finally found some cheap ones (20 euros=$30)-they are from a Chinese store called Mi Bo-ta but I don't care! Everyone wears boots all the time here! I also got a nice, new, shiny pink scarf for only 2 euros ($3!) When I got home, I FINALLY got to talk to my parents on Skype. It was good to see them and talk to them since they both were busy all weekend. I had dinner and I really liked it tonight! It was chicken and cheese soft shell tacos (they call them flutas-flutes) and a tomato, green pepper, onion salad. There was more to the salad but I'm not sure all of the ingredients, but it was delicious! As a note, Spaniards eat bread from baguettes at every meal. They also never have what we would consider dessert in America. They have a piece of fruit or yogurt instead. All of the food is very very healty, which is good!
Tomorrow I will have one of the four classes I am supposed to be taking. They are really starting us out slow, but that's fine with me!
Monday, January 31, 2011
Sunday, January 30, 2011
El Domingo (Sunday)
Last night, I talked to my host mom Espe about my family and friends. I brought lots of pictures and showed those to her. She told me that she is divorced and works in another city-1 hour away- as a social worker. She works with delinquent youth and helps them with their problems. Her ex-husband also lives near Caceres. He works with children who have to be taken from their parents and put into orphanages. He lives outside the city and has a farm for a hobby.
At 10:30pm last night, I met up with the other students and we went to a cafe for cafe con leche (coffe with milk) and el chocolate (hot chocolate). Next, we went to a concert at a bar that one of the students from Spain told us about. It was basically one guy playing guitar and singing. I could not understand any of the words because it was so loud. After the concert finished, we went to another bar down the street. When we walked in, the first floor seemed pretty crowded so we went up the stairs to the second floor, which was completely empty. Shortly, the bartender came upstairs and we started dancing. It didn't take long before the Spaniards started coming upstairs :) The party kinda came to us I suppose. We heard a couple of English songs which were really fun to dance to. Lady Gaga is really big here. After, we went to a third bar where a guy offered us some free alcohol if we would go there...probably because not much was going on and he wanted us to liven up the party. We left at about 3am and after walking everyone home, I finally got to bed around 4:30am! But in Spain, it's very common to stay out til 6am on the weekends!
Today is Sunday, so all of the stores are closed. Only restaurants and churches are open. This morning, I went to Mass with Lizzy and Courtney. We went to La Iglesia de San Juan. All of the churches here are cement buildings with no inner walls, just cement, which makes it really cold. It was very beautiful though! I could not really understand the readings, and unfortunately we didn't have a guide of the responses in Spanish, but I will look into getting one. After Mass, I came home and had lunch, then took a 3 hour siesta :) I LOVE siestas!
When I woke up, Maria and Clara (my host sisters) told me about their family and friends and the three of us went with Maria's friend Cristina to a cafe. The cafe had an art gallery upstairs which was pretty cool! Cristina speaks quite a bit of English and she wanted to practice a bit, so that was fun! We walked around the old part of the city and they told me all about the history of different places. Hopefully I will get some pictures up soon! There were lots of statues of important people too. I kissed the toes of the statue of San Pedro, which is believed to help you get a boyfriend. My sister Maria told me "I kiss the toes of San Pedro and now I have boyfriend." I love listening to their English too. Today, I taught them how to say sausage.
Tomorrow is my first day of school! I'm kinda nervous about understanding the professors, but I think it will be fine. We might only be at school for like 4.5 hours tomorrow. It rained both yesterday and today but my sisters said it doesn't usually rain this much. Tomorrow will be sunny and that will be nice!
At 10:30pm last night, I met up with the other students and we went to a cafe for cafe con leche (coffe with milk) and el chocolate (hot chocolate). Next, we went to a concert at a bar that one of the students from Spain told us about. It was basically one guy playing guitar and singing. I could not understand any of the words because it was so loud. After the concert finished, we went to another bar down the street. When we walked in, the first floor seemed pretty crowded so we went up the stairs to the second floor, which was completely empty. Shortly, the bartender came upstairs and we started dancing. It didn't take long before the Spaniards started coming upstairs :) The party kinda came to us I suppose. We heard a couple of English songs which were really fun to dance to. Lady Gaga is really big here. After, we went to a third bar where a guy offered us some free alcohol if we would go there...probably because not much was going on and he wanted us to liven up the party. We left at about 3am and after walking everyone home, I finally got to bed around 4:30am! But in Spain, it's very common to stay out til 6am on the weekends!
Today is Sunday, so all of the stores are closed. Only restaurants and churches are open. This morning, I went to Mass with Lizzy and Courtney. We went to La Iglesia de San Juan. All of the churches here are cement buildings with no inner walls, just cement, which makes it really cold. It was very beautiful though! I could not really understand the readings, and unfortunately we didn't have a guide of the responses in Spanish, but I will look into getting one. After Mass, I came home and had lunch, then took a 3 hour siesta :) I LOVE siestas!
When I woke up, Maria and Clara (my host sisters) told me about their family and friends and the three of us went with Maria's friend Cristina to a cafe. The cafe had an art gallery upstairs which was pretty cool! Cristina speaks quite a bit of English and she wanted to practice a bit, so that was fun! We walked around the old part of the city and they told me all about the history of different places. Hopefully I will get some pictures up soon! There were lots of statues of important people too. I kissed the toes of the statue of San Pedro, which is believed to help you get a boyfriend. My sister Maria told me "I kiss the toes of San Pedro and now I have boyfriend." I love listening to their English too. Today, I taught them how to say sausage.
Tomorrow is my first day of school! I'm kinda nervous about understanding the professors, but I think it will be fine. We might only be at school for like 4.5 hours tomorrow. It rained both yesterday and today but my sisters said it doesn't usually rain this much. Tomorrow will be sunny and that will be nice!
Saturday, January 29, 2011
First Day in Cáceres
Woke up this morning at 10:30am. I slept from the minute I got into bed until my host sister woke me up then! I took my first shower. Not much water pressure but at least it was hot. The shower is like a tub with a pull curtain around it to keep the water inside. For breakfast, I had Corn Flakes and milk. I think they bought the corn flakes just for me but they were good! I read on the carton that the milk was from a cow and I think it might have been whole milk because it was really sweet but I'm not sure. I even drank the cereal milk because I know they don't drink milk very often here so I'm not sure when I will have some next.
When my host sisters were ready, they took me our group's meeting point at the post office. We met up with the rest of the ISU group and Toñi, our program director. She took us to buy cell phones. They are similar to prepaid phones in the US. Text messages are about 10 cents in Euros so like 15 cents each and calling is 12 euro cents so like 18 cents per minute. Next, we walked buy the store where we will buy our books for our classes.
After that I went back home with my sisters for lunch. We had their version of spaghetti and meatballs. The spaghetti was like corkscrew noodles and the meatballs were like hamballs. It was pretty good. And, a LOT of food!! After lunch, I took my first siesta!!! It was great! Life here is so easygoing and it is nice to get a break from the fast life of the US. This evening I met up with other ISU students and went shopping. While we were walking to the shops, it started to hail and then that turned into rain. The stores have lots of rebajas (sales) here until the end of February. I didn't end up buying anything yet, but I think I'll be buying some more boots soon! They are definitely in fashion here! Tonight we are going with some other students from the university to a free concert in a club! Should be pretty fun! Tomorrow we'll be sleeping in and then off to Mass!
When my host sisters were ready, they took me our group's meeting point at the post office. We met up with the rest of the ISU group and Toñi, our program director. She took us to buy cell phones. They are similar to prepaid phones in the US. Text messages are about 10 cents in Euros so like 15 cents each and calling is 12 euro cents so like 18 cents per minute. Next, we walked buy the store where we will buy our books for our classes.
After that I went back home with my sisters for lunch. We had their version of spaghetti and meatballs. The spaghetti was like corkscrew noodles and the meatballs were like hamballs. It was pretty good. And, a LOT of food!! After lunch, I took my first siesta!!! It was great! Life here is so easygoing and it is nice to get a break from the fast life of the US. This evening I met up with other ISU students and went shopping. While we were walking to the shops, it started to hail and then that turned into rain. The stores have lots of rebajas (sales) here until the end of February. I didn't end up buying anything yet, but I think I'll be buying some more boots soon! They are definitely in fashion here! Tonight we are going with some other students from the university to a free concert in a club! Should be pretty fun! Tomorrow we'll be sleeping in and then off to Mass!
Friday, January 28, 2011
Made it to Spain...finally!
After spending 30 hours in the Newark Airport, we finally boarded a plane to Madrid. Here are some memories of our time in the airport:
Every 15 minutes we heard the “special message” read by a woman across the pa system reminding us to keep our luggage with us at all times.
That message was followed each time by a man with a British accent announcing to the “ladies and gentlemen” that we should know that 50,000 security personnel are working to keep us safe and we should read the information about security at the various “checkpoints” in the airport. We were really looking forward to the last time we would hear those messages…almost had them memorized!
Bev taught me to put baby powder in my hair to keep it from being greasy.
I read The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Max Lucado all in one day! I LOVED the book!!
Last night after we found out our flight was delayed by 4 hours, I went to buy a cell phone charger and met a lady named Elena at the kiosk. We got to know her and her daughter Jimena who were flying to Madrid as well. Elena is from Texas and Jimena is from Mexico. I told her about my spring break trip last year to Oaxaca and she knows where that is but has never visited. She and her mother are taking what they consider to be a “real vacation” and spending a couple weeks here in Spain. They were both super nice and we even took pictures together :)
The flight to Madrid finally left around 1am today and was 7 hours. It was a good chance to get some sleep. The plane was very nice…each one of us had our own tv screen and pretty big seats with pillows and blankets. I was too tired to even think about watching a movie, so I slept most of the way. When we arrived in Madrid, we were very happy to have all of our luggage show up at the baggage claim!! We took a bus to the train station and bought tickets for the 7pm train to Caceres. It was a 4 hour train ride and we stopped in lots of cities along the way. Everyone looked at us funny because of all the baggage we had but oh well. We saw some students on the train who we assume were returning home from school since they were dressed in uniforms. Can’t believe they don’t get home from school until 9pm at night!
Once arriving at the train station shortly after 11pm, we called Toni, our program director who lives here in Caceres, to let her know that we were here. She called our families to come pick us up at the train station. My family was the first to pick me up. I have a mom who goes by “Espe”, a sister named Clara, and another sister named Maria. Clara is 23 and is studying Civil Engineering at la Universidad de Extremadura here in Caceres (the same university I will be taking classes at). She says that my Spanish is very good so that’s a relief! Maria is 18 and is studying pharmacy in Salamanca, Spain. She will be here for the next 10 days because she just finished her final exams and has a break from school. I don’t know much about my host mom yet. She told me that she wants me to tell her if I have any problems because we are a family now and she wants to make sure I am feeling well and doing well. When I first got to the house, I had a tour and then had dinner (at 11:30pm nonetheless). We had tortilla de patata which is like an omelet with chunks of potato in it. It is served warm. We also had bread and small tomatoes. It is 12:30am right now, so I think I will get to bed. Sooo excited to shower and sleep in a real bed!!! I’ll write more soon!
Love,
Annette
Every 15 minutes we heard the “special message” read by a woman across the pa system reminding us to keep our luggage with us at all times.
That message was followed each time by a man with a British accent announcing to the “ladies and gentlemen” that we should know that 50,000 security personnel are working to keep us safe and we should read the information about security at the various “checkpoints” in the airport. We were really looking forward to the last time we would hear those messages…almost had them memorized!
Bev taught me to put baby powder in my hair to keep it from being greasy.
I read The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Max Lucado all in one day! I LOVED the book!!
Last night after we found out our flight was delayed by 4 hours, I went to buy a cell phone charger and met a lady named Elena at the kiosk. We got to know her and her daughter Jimena who were flying to Madrid as well. Elena is from Texas and Jimena is from Mexico. I told her about my spring break trip last year to Oaxaca and she knows where that is but has never visited. She and her mother are taking what they consider to be a “real vacation” and spending a couple weeks here in Spain. They were both super nice and we even took pictures together :)
The flight to Madrid finally left around 1am today and was 7 hours. It was a good chance to get some sleep. The plane was very nice…each one of us had our own tv screen and pretty big seats with pillows and blankets. I was too tired to even think about watching a movie, so I slept most of the way. When we arrived in Madrid, we were very happy to have all of our luggage show up at the baggage claim!! We took a bus to the train station and bought tickets for the 7pm train to Caceres. It was a 4 hour train ride and we stopped in lots of cities along the way. Everyone looked at us funny because of all the baggage we had but oh well. We saw some students on the train who we assume were returning home from school since they were dressed in uniforms. Can’t believe they don’t get home from school until 9pm at night!
Once arriving at the train station shortly after 11pm, we called Toni, our program director who lives here in Caceres, to let her know that we were here. She called our families to come pick us up at the train station. My family was the first to pick me up. I have a mom who goes by “Espe”, a sister named Clara, and another sister named Maria. Clara is 23 and is studying Civil Engineering at la Universidad de Extremadura here in Caceres (the same university I will be taking classes at). She says that my Spanish is very good so that’s a relief! Maria is 18 and is studying pharmacy in Salamanca, Spain. She will be here for the next 10 days because she just finished her final exams and has a break from school. I don’t know much about my host mom yet. She told me that she wants me to tell her if I have any problems because we are a family now and she wants to make sure I am feeling well and doing well. When I first got to the house, I had a tour and then had dinner (at 11:30pm nonetheless). We had tortilla de patata which is like an omelet with chunks of potato in it. It is served warm. We also had bread and small tomatoes. It is 12:30am right now, so I think I will get to bed. Sooo excited to shower and sleep in a real bed!!! I’ll write more soon!
Love,
Annette
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Snowed In!
Hello from Newark Airport (New Jersey)!! Due to a big snowstorm last night, our flight was delayed 24 hours and we will be leaving the US tonight. Last night after we got our new flight assignments, we decided it would just be easiest to stay in the airport since all the hotels were full. Slept on chairs in the terminal for maybe 4 hours. It was quite a night. There are quite a few birds-probably pigeons-in the airport and they were flying near where we were sleeping. But luckily they didn't land on us just scared us a bit! About half of the students in the program were stuck in the US because of this storm. I am with 4 other students from Iowa State and we are trying to make the most of it. Unfortunately on our previous flight they made us check our carry-on luggage due to no room in the overhead compartments so we won't get it back til we get to Madrid...which leaves us without a lot of things we would have liked to have had but we are making it through. I think we got around 15 inches of snow total. Can't wait to be in Caceres where there is no snow!! The weather looks like it will be fine for our flight tonight so hopefully next time I write I will be in Spain!!!
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Welcome to My Blog :)
Dear family and friends,
In just three days, I will be on a plane on my way to Spain to study at la Universidad de Extremadura in the city of Cáceres. Spain is 7 hours ahead of Iowa time, so when I arrive in Madrid on Thursday, it will be 10am there, but 3am Iowa time. I will be taking 12 credits of Spanish classes at the university and hope to quickly become a fluent Spanish-speaker! I am one of 19 students from Iowa State participating in this study abroad program. I will be living with a host family and my host mom is named Esperanza. On the weekends, I plan to travel all over Europe with my fellow Iowa State amigas (friends). I hope you enjoy my adventure! I promise to post pictures and stories often, so be sure to check for new posts! I will miss you all so much but I think I'll be having the time of my life at the same time!
Love you all!!!
Annette
In just three days, I will be on a plane on my way to Spain to study at la Universidad de Extremadura in the city of Cáceres. Spain is 7 hours ahead of Iowa time, so when I arrive in Madrid on Thursday, it will be 10am there, but 3am Iowa time. I will be taking 12 credits of Spanish classes at the university and hope to quickly become a fluent Spanish-speaker! I am one of 19 students from Iowa State participating in this study abroad program. I will be living with a host family and my host mom is named Esperanza. On the weekends, I plan to travel all over Europe with my fellow Iowa State amigas (friends). I hope you enjoy my adventure! I promise to post pictures and stories often, so be sure to check for new posts! I will miss you all so much but I think I'll be having the time of my life at the same time!
Love you all!!!
Annette
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