Life is a Game we Play.

The little things...

THE GOOD:

Strangers greet you every time you enter a room.

You get introduced with a kiss on each cheek.

There are borderline pornographic ice cream advertisements outside of every (usually Asian-run) convenient store.

Everyone has the cutest pet dogs...and they understand spanish (obviously, but the first time I heard someone yell at their dog to "sientate" (sit) i was impressed)

The streets get washed basically every night. And the streetcleaners have the sweetest neon jumpsuits I’ve ever seen.

Step aerobic and spin classes here still appreciate a good J-Timberlake remix.

There are heladerías (ice cream shops) and zapaterías (shoe stores) on every corner.

It’s socially acceptable and encouraged to take a siesta (nap) every single afternoon.

There are beautiful beaches only an hour away.

I only have class on Monday and Wednesday.

The workers in the University cafetería basically wear tuxedos.

BEBIDAS: Cruzcampo-the beer of Andalucía, Mojitos!!, Sangría with peaches and strawberries, Tinto de Verano (aka red wine and orange or lemon Fanta), café con leche, COLACAO!!

TAPAS: croquetas, eggplant, tortilla española with tomato, squid, churros con chocolate...

Discotecas...dancing until 6:30am...

Hookah bars with belly dancers, English bars with beer pong tourneys, and pirate bars with free sangría

THE NOT SO GOOD:

In Mexico, men whistle at women. In Spain, they hiss.

Nothing is free. They charge you for the bread on the table that you didn’t ask for and didn’t eat.

Milk is not refrigerated and has a shelf life of about a year?!

Ham is not refrigerated and has an indefinite shelf life. They don’t even bother taking the hair off of the pig’s leg before it’s displayed prominently in the restaurant’s front window ready to eat....

You have to duck into doorways to let cars pass because the streets are so narrow.

I get dripped on by air conditioners every 10 feet...but don’t have one in my own house.

You never know what color the traffic lights are because they are positioned before the crosswalks. I don’t know why this bothers me so much, but it does.

Everything is closed from 2:00-5:30 pm for lunch/siesta. Everything is closed all day on Sunday.

Sandwiches consist of bread and meat. That’s it. No mayo, mustard, lettuce, tomato, onion, etc...just Bread and Meat.

No one is allowed to have friends over to their house, so every social event happens on the streets...usually requiring some form of spending money.

It’s impossible to find a normal notebook...everything is graph paper.

I eat lunch at 3:15pm and dinner around 10pm. I will never get used to that. Snacking doesn’t exist.

Hot water and internet access are very scarce resources.

I went to the Sevilla Fútbol Club soccer game last night. I can’t even describe the atmosphere...they give the Badger Student Section a run for its money! It’s funny, though...the women get all dressed up with make-up and high heels...I guess it’s the equivalent of 2^nd floor Helen C. White?? Also, while the players on the field are probably in the best shape out of anyone I’ve ever seen, you’re surrounded by the unhealthiest audience...everyone chain smokes.

Everyday, my señora puts a bowl of fruit out on the table after lunch, and everyday I want to eat a peach...but I never do. I don’t know how I’m supposed to eat it...just like I had to be informed to eat my french fries with a fork and that the lettuce was to be eaten separately and not on my sandwich. I know they peel the peaches...but then what? So, I normally play it safe and stick to bananas...I know how to eat those.

But today...I stole a peach and ate it at school...it was as delicious as I imagined it would be..

posted by Erin @ 4:55 AM 2 Comments

When in Portugal...

My weekend in Lagos, Portugal is going to be a tough one to beat.
We arrived in paradise at approx. 6pm local time...and the debauchery began shortly thereafter.
Liz, Sarah, Kim and I signed up for a trip through a local travel agency for 2 nights in a 4* hotel, trips to the beaches in Lagos and Portimao, a trip to the "end of the world"...you know, back when the world was flat?... and a nice little booze cruise through the caves.

So it begins...Liz and I are making guns with our hands and shooting each other's heads off to put ourselves out of the misery of having to listen to the Bolivian princess in front of us. This girl did not shut up for 4 hours. She took an hour to tell this story about how she'd never been so scared in her life because she was lost. From the way she started the story, we were expecting it to be something like, It was 5am, I was drunk, I was 60 kilometers (happy, mix?) from home, and I wandered around for hours while being chased by a pack of rabid wolves. oh no, no, no... she was separated from her friends for about 20 minutes, 2 blocks from the hotel, at 8:15pm. That was hour one... Furthermore, I now know that she has 2 brothers, one of whom has been married 2x, 1400 guests at the 1st wedding, 600 at the second. She's been dating her boyfriend, who is the brother of a girl she used to cheerlead with (and she was good because she USED TO BE really skinny and easy to throw around) and she ran into him at a party where she broke up with her previous boyfriend, for 5 years...BLAH BLAH BLAH...brother started a newspaper company in Washington BLAH BLAH BLAH she gets security guards to take her everywhere in Bolivia BLAH BLAH BLAH...used to babysit a german kid who called her momma but her real mother mommy....you get the picture. she didn't even breathe. I asked for a few drops of poison in my coffee...but no one helped me out.

Anyways, on our way to Lagos, Tosh sent us a message asking where we were staying, and when we replied, he followed up with: Meet us in the lobby, we're here. We were still a couple hours away, but it was pretty sweet that Tosh, Eduardo, and Grant were staying in the hostel right across the street from us. We met up with them on Friday night and painted Lagos red...Sevilla Futbol Club red if you will. Went to this bar called Joe's Garage (very portuguese, I know) watched a little bit of the Milwaukee Brewer Game on tv...tried to take a picture, but as Liz said, unfortunately there is not a camera setting for "it's dark, i'm inside, and i want to take a picture of a TV." We proceeded to become hot messes from dancing the night away and then meandered home with a stolen Sevilla FC scarf.

Saturday, we ate the most amazing hotel breakfast I've ever had with our semi-famous actress roommate from Holland and then proceeded on to the beach, with left over goodies from breakfast wrapped up in napkins to save for later...
Took a trip to the "end of the world" Saturday night...It was so cold and windy/borderline miserable, but it was so beautiful it didn't matter. We got to watch the sunset at the end of the world...how many people can say that?

Sunday, we took the boat ride through the caves, where I have to think that our portuguese tour guide was high when he was telling us what the rock formations looked like..."this one is an elephant...shark's mouth...monkey...don't you see it?" uhhh, no?! Beach'd it up again and then journeyed back to Sevilla. I'd call it a SUCCESS.

posted by Erin @ 5:40 AM 0 Comments

¡¡¡EEN-KOO-BOOS!!!...¡¡¡EEN-KOO-BOOS!!!

posted by Erin @ 5:53 AM 2 Comments

dreamy

Picture 1: Alex and I showing some @ love in Madrid.
Picture 2: Rock climbing in Cádiz.

Last weekend, Liz and Michael (2 students in my program) and I went rock climbing with Michael´s spanish host brother and about 15 of his friends. It was probably the sweeeetest thing I have ever done. The view was breathtaking...if it hadn´t been quite so cloudy, we could have seen Africa from the top of the rocks. Doing it all in spanish made it that much better, too. We camped out Saturday night, and by camp out, I mean we slept in sleeping bags in a parking lot...covered in cow shit... Got up Sunday morning, had some café con leche y tostada and climbed all day.

Seeing JAVIER and INCUBUS in BARCELONA on FRIDAY!!!!!!!!!!

posted by Erin @ 8:48 AM 2 Comments

I´m almost done with orientation weekend here in Sevilla. I sign up for my classes in about an hour. We got tested on our speaking skills in an interview where some people got asked questions about their families or hometowns, and I had to discuss why the US economy isn´t doing as well as it used to. It went ok, I suppose, because I got invited to take classes at the actual spanish university. I really would like to, but classes wouldn´t end until late January-early February. As of right now, my flight home is on December 15th. They said that exams can sometimes be taken early, but I would probably have to stay until the last weekend before school back in Madison started.
I moved into my homestay yesterday. I have a mom and a dad, a 12 year old brother and 17 year old sister. I have only met the señora so far. For lunch we had some strange ham, gazpacho, and a salad that had sardines, oil soaked peppers, and sea salt in it. It was oook. We eat lunch at about 3pm and she doesn´t serve me breakfast. I accidentally rang the doorbell instead of turned the light on when I came home at 3am last night...oops.
All of the people in my program are great. Two nights ago, we went to this really sweet outdoor bar on the river (Guadalquivir) where we sipped on some mojitos, bobbed our heads to the techno music and got to know each other a bit. I finally found some shisha here in Spain, so the hobo´s going to make its debut this afternoon in the gardens on a liter of Cruzcampo cerveza. Let´s hope it fits. Should be dreamy.

I´ll try to add pictures soon, but I hate paying for internet, so we´ll see.

posted by Erin @ 3:10 AM 0 Comments