Lisboa

Okay...I was writing about the weekend, but I was giving a lot of boring details and so I'd rather talk in bullet points and add a bunch more pictures (sorry I have few of myself).

-This weekend me and 4 other guys decided to go to Lisbon, Portugal.

-It was fun.

-Arrival: Saturday morning 7ish (we took a bus to Madrid, metro then an overnight train)

Couldn't check into our hostel until 1, but left bags there and walked around

Our room, the wall of portugese to get you by. The hostel was awesome...the staff was chill and we milked 2 days out of them...aka we hung out there before we checked in, and Sunday we were able to leave out stuff there and hang out until 10 (when we left for home)...we met some Brazillians and people from Poland, also a girl from Minneapolis (she was kinda weird though)

-What else? Oh yeah, Lisbon, the rest of Sunday we slept, walked around a bit more and hung out with ppl at the hostel...then tried to go out at night, it's always hard to know where to go in big cities.

-Sunday was cool and we had sunny days...and it got hot. Like t-shirt weather. We did a lot of sightseeing like...a castle and we got a half off discount being a student. Great view of Lisbon

and we saw some peacoacks...

Later, we took a ferry ride across the river to see that tiny statue in the same pic of me. It's a giant statue of Jesus...we decided we had to go see it...it was a long walk, but I'm glad we made it. We took an elevator to the top and supposedly its the highest point in Portugal. Great view.

-Sunset, hung out a bit, headed out. Got on the train at 10:30, sat with a girl from Maine and a guy from Germany-both studying in Madrid-we were laughing for the first few hours until they turned the lights off in the train. Got back this morning and went straight to class (1/2 hour late, but it was fine)

Well, today I have a bunch to do. Tomorrow is Carnival (Europe's version of Mardi Gras for a few weeks before Ash Wed). This wed we are going to Andalusia. It's going to be a lot of Muslim history. I'm really excited. Alright. Take care...and go learn another language....a lot of ppl over here know at least 3 or more. :)

David

p.s. the formatting on this website sucks

Salamanca

We left for Salamanca on Saturday morning. Fairly quick bus ride (2.5 hours). We took a tour of the cathedral and saw the university (oldest in Spain). There is a sculpted frog on the university and as the legend goes, if you can find it, you have good luck. So every gift shop was filled with frog related memorabilia and is kinda their mascot. We saw the Plaza Mayor which was my part of the city (and Vantage point was filmed here; it’s recognizable if you’ve seen the movie). Salamanca is a bit of a college town and all day people would sit in the plaza, eat, drink, mingle, relax in the sun.

Gladys planned for this to be a day trip but most of us wanted to stay and scrambled to get accommodations. I was lucky and only had to pay 14 euro to stay in a pension (someone’s house that rents out thanks to adam). My favorite part of the night was going to this hip hop club and watching these 17 year olds break dance (at least they looked that old). It was so mesmerizing that I had to try out my own dance moves. We’ll just leave it at that, I’m sure pictures will come to the surface in due time.
Sunday we hung out in the Plaza and we were blessed with another sunny day. I bought a bufanda (a scarf because they are pretty popular among Spaniards…it’s been sunny for the past 4 days straight so I may not even need it in a week). We caught the bus back at 5:30 and got back home around 8:15. Coming into Segovia at night was the first time I had seen the Alcazar castle lit up at night. It was gorgeous and I will definitely go by there in the near future.
Sunday night I had to laugh to myself about what Marisa served me. The other day (probably Thursday night), I had a little argument/conversation with my mom about me needing more vegetables in my diet. For dinner (on Thursday), I was served hot dogs, chicken nuggets, and an egg. I have been regretfully eating those semi warmed hot dogs for a while and have been able to balance the flavor with the potatoes, but something about those nuggets made me tick. They weren’t the fresh and juicy or greasy nuggets that actually have the taste of real food, more like a warm rubber flavor, thick breading, like they were warmed from a frozen thaw…similar taste to how one knows that hotdogs don’t have an origin other than a processing plant. I didn’t know how much longer my body could endure such torment. I had to speak up.

Of course there was confusion, and I tried to explain that there is high cholesterol in my family and I just needed more vegetables. Having little faith that I made an impact on her whatsoever, I was delighted by what I was served. She made a salad and fried mushrooms with garlic and peppers. No meat other than some tuna in the salad. I didn’t know if I had transported to another country. It was a gift from God.
Today for lunch, another vegetable suprise bowl of mush (since so much oil is added, it looks like decapitated baby gerber...I can identify orange carrots, mooshy potatos, canned asparagus, oil, probably garlic too)...then we had fried fish w/ lemon and more fried peppers. This went up there for one of the better meals...the peppers added a lot of flavor.

Well, in about 20 minutes I will be attending my first french class. Since high school, I thought it would be cool to take French, but thought Spanish was more versitle. It's a free class and hopefully with spaniards so I thought I might as well try it. Details to come.

My residence

I stitched this picture of my rooml to give you an idea. The picture is taken from my bed, those are my legs on the right side...use your imagination.

It’s hard for me to compose my blog when I'm not at school; somehow I forget about the weird things that happen in the day. Here are a couple things worth noting.

Yesterday at lunch, there was an argument at the table. Gemma’s boyfriend Juan came up a few times and so did ‘pisos’ in different places around Segovia. I think Gemma wants to move out and live with him but the places they are looking at are too small. Although this may be true, Gemma thinks they are elegant. There was pause. Marisa caught me like a deer in headlights and smiled. I asked foolishly, “Donde esta ubicada?” thinking that they were talking about where Gemma wanted to live. They informed me that they were talking about barrios or parts of Segovia. I’m sure I said si or nodded my head while I was still confused why my response wasn’t sufficient. I should have asked why they were talking about them, but like usual I stuck my tail between my legs and retreated in bewilderment. Then they started pointing to the wall or the tv and all chimed in about something I should be aware of. I can’t help but laugh about this. Luckly I smiled and stayed silent and the subject was changed. Then Marisa said (but of course I didn’t pick up the words fast enough), “Me entregues un mangurina.” Based on the last word, I pretended to understand and said, “Ya dos” referred to the two oranges I had. She asked me to pass her one and Gemma did it for me. A smiling idiot, I felt the urge to start talking to them in English, maybe throw a couple of swear words in there just because they wouldn’t know what I was saying, but I held my tongue.

What else, oh I have plenty more. The laundry situation. Really no major complaints. The first time she washed my red long sleeve shirt, it felt softer than my laundry at home and I thought I may want to learn her secrets. These first few washes must have been a fluke because I have begun to notice she doesn’t use fabric softener. My clothes have been coming out really dry and stiff. This is because, well they don’t use a dryer at all; they hang everything. Good for the environment, a little more rough. But really who cares about the stiffness…better to get all your clothes back. So Marisa has had a tendency to lose some of my clothes. I will get back the random 1 sock, because this is very useful. I thought I lost my black polo shirt, but it just had a long turn-time (from laundry basket back into my room, oh in about 2 weeks). Last week, I regretfully gave her my jeans because they had gotten to an unforeseen point. I thought if I didn’t give them up to the laundry gods, they would be irreparable. The next day I saw them hanging up on the drying rack and foresaw promise in getting my pants I’ve worn almost every day. I still haven’t gotten them back and I don’t think Jeans has a literal translation. I don’t know if the cliché ‘better luck next time’ applies but at least I look a little dressier wearing my corduroys and kaki pants.

I’ve been enjoying the company of Bruno, their dog, although he probably understands more Spanish than me. It’s a bit weird because they keep him in the closet for most of the day except for the occasional walks that last about 5 minutes. If animal rights activists are reading this, I can’t send you my address because the dog is too cute and I’m the only one that pets him…kind reminds me of Santa’s Little Helper…but better fed.

I may not have mentioned to the occasional reader that I live above a garage. I wasn’t told this and the first time I heard the loud garage door open below my bed, I thought we were getting taken off to the moon or platetechtonics were shifting below me. It is an uncanny grinding noise that happens at any time in the day. Speaking of sounds familiar to my bed room, about every 15 minutes a car will pull up alongside or drive by with blaring techno (usually it’s at night and since Spaniards don’t party until later, it’s between 11p.m.-4 a.m.) There is also a water heater located on the adjacent wall in the kitchen so any time water is running, (in comparison to the rest) a soothing flow of ambient water rushes forth and is probably the culprit to my frequent visits to the bathroom. I have been drinking a lot of water though which is keeping me healthy. It’s a great neutralizer to the oil, salt, sugar, oil, greasy meat, and other diabolical concoctions one can do with food.

Maybe I’ve been too harsh. I think I would make a good food critic. Maybe it’s the language used in the book Sophie’s Choice. I have been reading it for my Senior Seminar class (the theme being civil war, it’s a story about a girl’s guilt from Auschwitz) and the author uses great descriptions. If I had an English dictionary or wasn’t so lazy as to write the scholarly words down, I would be even more invincible at Scrabble.

Well, I am going to Salamanca this weekend. It's Tito's 21st on Valentine's Day so we'll make sure he has a good time. Happy Valentine's Day in 2 days!

David

Barcelona

Hey there...I'm sorry to say that blogging has been kinda a chore, but I like to update you all. I have been keeping a journal and have been sending emails and wanting to do more skype but I'm limited on when I can get internet access. Anyway Barcelona was a fun excursion/a break from school.

We left at 6:30 on friday morning. I (kidding) thought it may be a good idea to leave my house at 5:30...go to a club because this is when its really going and stay until we had to be at the bus station. I reluctantly, intelligently decided against it. 7 hour bus ride...it went quick, didn't get much sleep on it. Got to Barcelona around 3 or 4 and went to Guell park, build by Gaudi, unfinished..it was supposed to have 60 houses but he died and only built 3. Really cool outlay, reminded me of something outta Star Wars...I wouldn't have been suprised to see an ewok or maybe some of the members from Alice and Wonderland. Actually Gaudi was my favorite from Barcelona, more than the Picasso Museum (that we saw on Sunday).

Anyway, we went back to the hotel (much nicer than the one in Madrid), with a 24 hour included buffet. We saved a ton of money on this, but it also hindered us from going out to Barcelona restaurants. A love hate relationship you could say (cuz the food got a bit repeditive...sorry for the English majors out there, not 100% on my spelling). Naps...then a few of us met up with a friend who is studying abroad there, walked down the Ramblas (supposedly the most pickpocketed place in Europe)...went to a few bars, and declined a club that was on the beach because it costed 20 euro (not like that has stopped me before). We decided to leave our new friends and head home, only to get lost for an hour :). Walking is the main attraction in spain so it was a fun night anyway.

Saturday, the rain in spain stays mainly on the plain...and barcelona. Luckly I was napping when it was pouring perros y gatos. We saw Montjuvi (check spelling)...a castle with a good view of Barcelona and an overlook of the mediterranean, from there it reminded me of San Francisco...anyway...we had a good balance of staying with the group and being able to explore on our own.

Sunday, Picasso Museum and La Sagrada Familia...went shopping on the Ramblas and bought a FCB aqua jersey-probably will be my best buy in Spain. Then we went down to the Pier, enjoyed the atmosphere and palm trees. Overall, big city=fun but glad I don't live there.