In the grooooooove

Today was our third day of out intensive spanish class. Our professor is soo cute. He is mid thirties and very energetic and spanish. Also, he speaks some words in english because it would be harder to describe certain business words in another language (survey, personal income tax, etc ) When he does speak english, he has a british accent because thats how he learned so he is just adorable.

We have class en the Universidad de Sevilla, and its referred to as La Facultad. We get to be around the spanish students ; ) yayy

My roommate and I finally bought internet!! Once you have lived with it for any period of time its hard to go without.

I also need to explain our pet. We have a bird. He knows how to do cat calls, so he flatters me everyday with a nice whistle. If you whistle back at him, he screams. hahah he is great

My roommate and I went shopping today and it made me feel like I was back at home. All of the stores play American music and I literally feel as if I am back in the states until I hear some lady ramble off in spanish. I also bought a trench coat which I am quite excited to wear! Anddd I bought nocilla aka nutella.

I'm going to add a little bit more to this post!! So while in Sevilla, IU makes the students either takes classes until June or the students can take an internship. (this is only for the business school kids) We had a speed-dating type event with a bunch of companies and then everyone chooses who they like best. I got one of my top picks which was a tourism company! I think itll be fun to speak with people this way (the point of the internship is to be in a work environment and learn the language). It is unpaid, but I'm excited and hope I get to learn a lot of cool stuff about Sevilla since it is aimed at tourists.

We've had more time for night life since being adjusted and there seems to be certain places that get repeated- at least so far. We have a place called O'neills that we usually start at or at least meet before we continue to another bar or discoteca. It's an irish pub and plays random american music that is not meant for anything related to what is going on (champagne supernova came on one night) BUT its comforting and the downstairs is a cool area. Then we've gone to calle betis which is a long street along the river with a lot of fun places to go at night. We also made it over to Buddha which is a fun discoteca with three intense floors for dancing.

Tonight we actually were able and lucky enough to get tickets to the Sevilla FC game! They played Valencia and it was a big game for some tournament that was going on in Spain. Both teams were ranked pretty highly and tonight determined something for one of them..(sorry that is vague) I wans't quite sure, but the energy was awesome and it made me miss soccer! I could easily sit and watch another game, unlike baseball or football. We were way up high, but the seats were vertically topped on top of each other it seemed. It reminded me of a quidditch game in Harry potter! haha ..im exaggerating but you get the point. I'm soo glad we got to go.. I went with 4 girls from IU. Christine, my roommate, Pam, Laura and Jen. We did tapas before the game and got an assortment of different foods. I still love it all..croquetas are fried breaded meat dumplings which are tasty, we also got potatoes with ailioli sauce (sp) and switching from tapas, but our "mom" made a stuffed eggplant type dish with meat and cheese on it. Everything they cook is with olive oil by the way so some things taste weird (aka eggs) but the eggplant was soooo good with it! I've begun to drink coffee here. It's called cafe con leche (coffee with milk) and its sweeter than in the US. I tried a differnt coffee called Bombon today too. We were practically kicked out of the coffee place today though while we were studying. The waiter was rude and told us we had to leave and couldn't use our computers...i had literally JUST gotten my coffee when he told us. I dont quite understand the customer service here, and I was warned before coming it would be like this but its just different at some of the restaurants. They are normally better but this one was exceptionally bad. Haha despite that, I still am likking everything!

Jumping around....Rabajas are going in Spain. This means that it is a huge sale in all of spain because its mandated by the government (i think!) it is in all of january and some of feb so ive been buying a lot more stuff now than I normally would. They also happen again in july/aug. I've bought a lot of scarves for 2 or 3 euro each (including a seville fc one that was NOT on rebajas) and also a shirt and some shoes!

Sorry some of my spelling is really bad but its late and I know that I'm missing some e's and punctuation is off and whatnot, but please ignore

; )

Moved in!

So on Friday we found out our homestay, and I am actually living with another girl from IU!! Her name is Christine, and its been awesome having somone to be with for multiple reason...1. she is awesome 2. we each pick up different parts of spanish conversations and can put them together 2. its less awkward with the family when we dont know what to do 3. we can walk home together and complain-compare everything that is going on. Overall, very comforting.

Before we met our families, we had a scavenger hunt around Seville. There were five places we had to find. The post office here seemed much more intense (third point on our map). We also had to go to the Torre de Oro (on the river and GORGEOUS scenery here), la catedral (muy famoso), la fabrica (the oldest university building in Seville), the town hall, and an area of the city where all of the shops are. The tour was helpful because up until this point we had no idea that so much of the city even existed. We are in the neighborhood of Nervion, which is more east than everything else. Once you get more in the downtown area, the shops are so cute and look more like your typical european streets. By the way the little streets are litterally big enough to fit a car far in yet somehow the europeans manage. Later on Friday we met with our guide groups to go get tapas and then later in the evening we do what Spaniards call ´Botellon´ where you hang out in the plaza until the discotecas open. Pretty much all of our CIEE program went out that night and went to our first discoteca!! Lots of dancing!

During the days leading up to our homestay we´ve had meetings and appointments to help get us situated with living in a foreign country. We´ve done a lot of tapas for dinner which is basically ordering a bunch of different smaller dinner plates and sharing them with friends and getting to try a lot all at once. Also we went to a flamenco show Thursday night. It was pretty interesting..one guy sang, one played the guitar, and then there was one woman dancing. I wish I could flamenco! It looked pretty intense...apparently during Feria de Abril Flamenco is everywhere.

Also, I need to comment on the food-apartment we are in. We each have our own room (and are very thankful for that) and our ´parents´are an older couple who have grandkids around the ages between 5 and 9. They come over a lot, and its fun to here them speak in Spanish and see what they like to do. The two girls are learning english in school and like Hannah Montana.. ..I asked them if they knew party in the usa. Off course they did : ) Also the one girl apparently likes ABBA. The food that the mom makes is sooo yummy. Our first meal consisted of spaghetti with ham and egg in it, little hamburger patties with this meaty salsa (no buns though), and some white rice. Then our mom made homemade coffee ice cream. Our next big meal was a pizza like dish but the dough was similar to a croissant in the United states and there were large thin pieces of ham spread on top. As for dessert we had homemade chocolate mousse. This has by far been my favorite food since being here, and its the BEST chocolate mousse ever. SOOO good. Hahaha apprently i like the food in Spain....

I am trying to think of random things I think of that I can't post while I'm at home sin Internet!

1. there is a bike path that runs all around the city and you can rent bikes to go from place to place really cheap..which i like

2. my window shutters look like they are made for a bombshell because they close from the outside and are made of metal (ish?) material.

3. We eat really late here..which can get hard for me at times. We sat down to dinner last night at 10pm

4. There are wild or loose cats everwhere

5. There are only small dogs here...not sure why but its the thing to have and they are never on leashes

6. They do everything in army time. I still have to sit about what time it is when its 17:00

7. Obsessive PDA is apparently socially acceptable.

8. We walk EVERYWHERE. Its not like IU where your farthest walk is 20 minutes (for me at least). One of my classes is at least 35 minutes, so im getting a good work out everyother day from just that.

First impressions

So once at the airport, I knew Pam from classes and I was flying over with her and a few other kids. There were 7 of us in total, and it was comforting to have friends to travel with. We flew from NewYork JFK to Madrid to Seville. It was the longest day ever.. on top of it the flight from JFK to Madrid, was about 7 hours, and I couldn't sleep comfortably so it seemed like forever.

Once we were in madrid, things got better, and we were fine once we got to Sevilla, but we were soon incredibly tired that every time someone sat down there was a possibility of falling asleep. Three of the kids in our group had their luggage lost in Madrid by the airplane. We all showered and then tried walking around the city. It was right around 5ish local time, but nothing was open because they were still on their siesta break. During the hours of 2-4ish or even a little later spaniards will take their breaks and nap. We couldn't find a place to get a meal anywhere except the restaurant attached the hotel, but we then found out that they weren't serving actual food, just pan (bread) and drinks. We were starving and decided to go get some bread and cheese from a grocery store a block down and ate it outside on the square.

Once 7:30 hit we went back to the tapas restaurant, and finally got real food. The portions were small but very tasty. I accidentally broke a glass at the restaurant and everyone STARED at our group. I had no idea what to do. I've notice the customer service in Spain is not anything like America. Finally a worker came over and cleaned it up. Outside of the customer service, our program people have been super nice and we had lunch with them the next day. There were about 6 students all around our age who were talking and joking with us. Right before lunch, we had to check out of our hotel rooms that the 7 of us were staying at re-check in with CIEE. We each had one roommate from the program. My roommate was a girl named Sheila who is also from IU! It was nice to see other familiar faces today in general, and I've seen a few other kids that I knew.

Sevilla in general is pretty warm and was almost humid. There are orange trees EVERYWHERE which is awesome, and it kind of reminds me of florida in a way. It was probably between 50-60 degrees here but a little overcast. There are a lot of palm trees too ; )

We have orientation starting soon, but tomorrow I think we get a tour of the city and hopefully find out our homestay!

Last Night in America

It is my last night in America, and I am up finishing my last minute packing. I had a nice last dinner with our neighbors, the Pavs, and all of their family. I've gotten some good tips the past few days from friends and family- so thank you to those who are reading!! It's been really helpful as I was clueless to a lot of things (such as the three ounce rule had to be in a one quart bag and taxi tips haha). Last night we went to dinner at Don Quijote with two other families, one of which was from Madrid. They were so nice and helpful in giving us tips and advice for our travels in Spain (my parents are coming in March). I asked the wife if she thought our family would stick out in spain as tourists...she laughed at that and said my mom looks quite european, but that my dad would be pretty obvious with his gringo self. She didn't quite finish telling me where I stood...probably not a good sign. But we got to eat some typical spanish food and my personal favorite was tortilla de patatas. It is similar to an egg omelette with potatoes cooked throughout the dish. Sooo yummy! I'm excited for tomorrow and to see what an international flight is like! It's my first time leaving the country, so this is just the start of an interesting semester. Next stop is in Espana!! Can't wait.