New classes and other fun stuff

So this week is the first week of our new classes, which will go until December. We started the week with a placement test on Monday and then went to our first classes that afternoon. I surprisingly placed into the highest level for all of the classes I'm taking, which I was happy about. That means that in terms of levels, I'm supposedly at a "superior" level in Spanish, one level above the level I was in for the 3 week course. When I found this out it was definitely a confidence booster, and made me realize that I actually have gotten better at Spanish since I've been here. Yay!

So far the classes I've had are Spanish cinema, History of Spain, Spanish Culture, and Language. Tomorrow I have my first Literature class. So far I think I'm going to like all my classes, so hopefully it stays that way haha. All of the teachers seem really nice and I think I'm going to learn a lot.

Last night, I went to a Spanish-themed party at one of the bars that often organizes events for students, and it was really fun. They played all Spanish music, which is rare in bars and clubs here, and there were demonstrations of typical Spanish dances. I took some pictures, but none of them came out very good. I'll post some anyway to give you an idea:

Flamenco

 Bachata

Flamenco for 3 people

Salsa

Then today, there was una huelga general, a general strike, in the entire country. Many people were encouraged not to go to work in protest of the government, I think because of certain taxes or something that many people don't support. It was strange because as I was walking to class this morning, almost none of the stores were open yet like they usually are at that time, and they all had stickers on the windows that said Cerrado por la huelga (closed for the strike). Once I got out of class many of the stores had opened though, so it seemed like a lot of places opened late and closed early today. There were only a few that I saw that were closed all day. Teachers weren't required to go to work today either, and some of my friends didn't end up having any classes because their teachers just didn't show up. I only had one class and my teacher taught today. I also saw a demonstration as I was walking home from class and the police had blocked off a bunch of roads for it. I wanted to take a picture of the crowd but I forgot my camera so I couldn't. Another difference was that all of the buses had had limited service today, which I imagine made it much harder for people who normally take buses to get around.

Now onto the food portion yet again. The following are various soups that we had eaten over the past few weeks.

Bean and rice soup

Rice and veggies

A sort of potato puree with fried croutons

Lentils with rice

Then for our main course the other night we had this, which is meatballs in gravy with peppers and peas:

And for dessert, another one of my favorites, yogurt. This one is coconut flavored:

And I guess that's it for now. My group is taking a trip to Toledo and Madrid this weekend, so even if I don't post anything before that I will definitely have lots to tell about the trip when I get back.

Final day of break

So it is now the final day of our break from classes, and we start our new classes tomorrow. I'm actually pretty excited  to start classes, which I'm usually not (haha) but I'm looking forward to being in a routine again (except for getting up for 9am classes every day) and I'm really interested in the topics of all of my classes. I'm taking Spanish language and Spanish literature (which I have to take) and then Spanish Cinema, History of Spain, and Spanish Culture. I'm hoping they are all fun, and I'm looking forward to learning more about Spain.

In terms of my break, I wasn't all that productive but I got to sleep in and relax every day, which was nice. I also went to see another movie, this time The Karate Kid, which I also saw already in English. This one was even easier for me to understand than the last one, but next time I want to challenge myself and see one that I haven't seen so I can see if I can actually follow a storyline in Spanish haha. The next one I want to see is called Lope, and it's the only movie in theaters right now that is actually made in Spain.

Probably the highlight of my break was last night when I went out with two girls that I met a few days ago. One of them is from England and the other one is from France, which is really exciting because one of the things I was looking forward to about coming here was meeting people from a bunch of different places. They're both really nice, and we had a lot of fun bar hopping and dancing a little. At one bar we ordered chupitos de la casa (shots of the house) just to see what they were, and this is what we got:

If you can't tell, that's whipped cream on top of them, and I got so excited when I saw that. I'm pretty sure it was something like Irish cream with whipped cream on top, and it was really fun! Then we realized that the brown part inside the glass (it basically looked like a smaller shot glass inside the glass one) is actually edible! It tasted like a cookie with chocolate on it. Overall, it was probably my favorite discovery that night haha.

I guess I'll also give some more examples of food we have eaten so far. We usually start with soup so here's a picture of one of the soups we've had:

This is one we have pretty often. It's basically just broth with pasta in it, but it's really good. Usually she changes it up and puts a different pasta in every time.

This is chicken and potatoes with peppers. I don't know what my host mother does to make the potatoes extra special, but they are soooo good. I always get excited when we have them.

This is a pretty common Spanish food, called a tortilla. It's mostly made out of potatoes and it's really good. Another one of my favorites.

This is flan, my favorite dessert food. :) It comes in a cup (you can see it in the background) and you have to flip it upside down onto the plate. We have flan a lot, but I don't think I'll ever get tired of it. I want to bring some home with me when I leave haha. Other than flan, we usually have fruit, yogurt or natillas (kind of halfway between yogurt and pudding) for dessert.

Well, I guess that's it for now. I'll try to write about my new classes as soon as I can.

Beginning of the break

So today is officially the first day of our break from classes, and almost everyone from my group is gone on trips to various places. I was still able to entertain myself pretty well though. In the morning I ate a late breakfast and just hung out in my room until lunch, reading and catching up on some things I wanted to get done. After lunch, I met again with Cristina, my intercambio, to practice Spanish. I really like her, and she's really easy to talk to because she's a talkative person, which I normally am not, so that helps me out a little haha.

After that, I met up with two of the girls who are also around for the break and we went to see Toy Story 3 in Spanish. It was really fun! It helped that I had already seen it so I knew the story, but I found that after awhile I didn't have to concentrate too hard on it and could understand quite a bit of what they were saying. The ticket was only 5 euros because I got a discount with a student card I have, which is probably about equal to what a movie costs in Vermont, but in comparison to other places, like Baltimore, I'm pretty sure it's cheaper, even taking the exchange rate into consideration. The snacks were definitely cheaper than in the U.S. though. I bought a drink and small popcorn for only 3 euros! I was so excited!

The other day in class I got a taste of the differences between classes in Spain and at home (although our classes are for international students so they're not exactly like normal Spanish university classes). In Spain apparently it is normal for teachers to single out students who did not do well on tests, because when my professor handed our tests back, she pointed out by name the 3 students who did the worst on the test. We were shocked by this because in classes at home grades are always completely private if you don't want anyone to know, and the teachers never tell the class a specific person's grade. But here it's just common practice, and it was a surprising to find out.

For those of you interested in food, I figured I would give a few examples of food we've eaten in each post so there's not one big long post only about food. I'll start with what I had for lunch today, which is something we've had before so I have a picture of it.

This is two eggs, rice and sausages. Eggs and sausages are things I'm used to eating for breakfast but here they are lunch and dinner foods. I really liked this meal, so I was excited I got to have it a second time.

Dinner last night was also a meal we'd had before, so I also have a picture of that:

It's a mini pizza that our host mom made for each of us. Obviously pizza is something we are very used to eating in the U.S. but this had a different flavor than I was used to. It had some kind of meat on it with a barbeque sauce kind of flavor, and it was sweeter than most pizza I've had before. It was really yummy!

Ok, i guess that's it for now, sorry this post was not very focused haha. I'll hopefully write again at least once this weekend, and also give more food updates.

Just an update

I don't really have anything specific to write about at the moment so I thought I would just give a little update on the past few days.

Like I mentioned in my last post, I did what's called an "intercambio" the other day. The two girls I live with went with me since we all wanted to go together for our first one. The girl we met with was really nice, and we ended up talking for two hours straight. We decided to meet again, but individually this time so it would be more beneficial for each of us. I'm hoping to meet with her again soon. Intercambios seem to be the best way to improve my spanish speaking skills, because it's one on one and more relaxed than other situations. I'm also in contact with a few other girls who I'll most likely talk to also.

I had fun last night too. A few friends and I went out to a bar that was having a Spanish themed party with free samples of typical Spanish food, and it was really fun. It was nice because they played more Spanish music than most places usually do, it seems like wherever I go all I hear is American music. I also like this place because it's not quite as over-run with American students as some other places I've been too, it was a pretty good mix of foreign students and Spaniards. Also, as we were leaving, we started talking to the guy who I guess owns the bar. He's so nice, and really funny, and he started talking to us about where we went to school, and he actually knew about Goucher because he meets a lot of foreign students and people from Goucher come here every semester. He said I seemed pretty normal for a Goucher student, which made me laugh because it's kind of true, there are lots of people at Goucher who are a little "out there." The guy was so nice that he even called and paid for a taxi for my roommates and I because one of them was in a lot of pain from her shoes and could barely walk. We tried to ask how we could pay him back and he just said come to my bar. haha.

I got a request to talk more about food and customs, so I will try to do that in the near future. My roommates have been taking pictures of a lot of the food we eat so I can ask them for some. I'll have more time this weekend because we have a few days off from class (our last day of classes for the intro course is tomorrow) and even though lots of people are traveling over the break, I'm staying here, along with a couple other people from my group. I sort of wish I was going somewhere (my roommates are going to Italy and I'm a little jealous) but the timing didn't work out for any of the trips I wanted to take to visit people who are also studying in Europe this semester, so I'm sure I'll have fun here. And I'm going to visit Danielle in Seville in two weeks, and I'm really excited! I can't think of anything else of interest right now, but hopefully I'll have a new post soon.

New friends and football

So I've been here almost 3 weeks now and it's exciting because I'm starting to meet new people. Yesterday I played soccer (or football as it's called in Europe) with 3 girls from my program and some guys that one of my friends introduced us to. 3 of them are from Brazil and the other was from Poland, I think. They were all really good at soccer, but the girls showed them that our skills weren't too shabby either. Even though I've never played on any sort of team, and it's been forever since I've even played just for fun with friends, I managed to get a goal for my team! (And accidently get one for the other team too but whatever haha). The guys were really nice and it's really cool to meet people from other countries. That's one good thing about taking classes for international students, but the downside is that the majority are from the U.S. which makes it very tempting to speak English all the time. I'm hoping to get out of that habit soon.

To help with that, we have the opportunity to do what are called "intercambios," which is basically meeting with a Spanish student to talk so we can practice Spanish and they can practice English. I have my first one tomorrow and I'm really excited, but also a little nervous. I know I shouldn't be worried because she's probably feeling the same way I am and I know it's a great way to meet people who are actually from Spain. Tomorrow I'm also meeting a girl from England who I started talking to through a facebook group for international students. She just arrived here and doesn't know anyone yet so I invited her to hang out with me and my friends tomorrow night, so that should be fun too.

Also, on an unrelated note, I went to a bookstore the other day and bought a copy of the second Harry Potter book in Spanish. I'm really excited to read it and I hope it will help me with my Spanish reading skills. One thing I noticed while I was in the bookstore is that books seem to be slightly more expensive here than in the U.S. It's the first time I've noticed a significant difference in price (even taking into account the exchange rate) and it was interesting to see. Some of the smaller paperback books were 10 euros or more, when I would guess they would be about 7 or 8 dollars in the U.S. So unfortunately for me, one of my favorite pastimes is more expensive here. :(

I feel like there are so many things I want to share about my trip so far, but whenever it comes time to write about them I can't remember what they are. Oh well, maybe I'll remember eventually haha.

I don't know what to title this entry...

So another week has begun in Salamanca. Yesterday we took a Historical Tour of some points of interest in the city. Many of them I already knew about, but we got more information this time because we had a guide with us. And we got to go inside the cathedral that I have been taking so many pictures of. I was super excited! Here are a few pictures I took:

This is one of the most beautiful building I've ever seen, and it's amazing to think about how much work it must have taken to build it all those centuries ago. I don't remember exactly when it was built (I guess I was too amazed by everything to listen to the guide), but I know this is the "new" cathedral, as opposed to the old one which was built a few centuries earlier, but this one is still very old.

Also yesterday, I went to a Centro Comercial, which is basically the Spanish version of a mall. But instead of being a bunch of stores, it was one big store that had at least 6 floors and sold pretty much everything. It was interesting to see so many different things in one store. I was thinking about buying a book in Spanish because I'm almost done with the one I'm reading right now, but I decided to wait. I'm going shopping later with my roommates and I think I want to buy a Harry Potter book in Spanish. I think that would be fun to read because I already know the story which should probably help me understand the Spanish a little better.

Below are some pictures of my host family's dog, Luna. I don't see her that much because she is usually in the daughter's room, but when we got home today she was hanging around so we took pictures.

In addition to Luna, I have seen tons of dogs around Salamanca. It seems like everywhere I look there are more little dogs! It's great for someone like me who gets excited every time I see a little dog. I'm guessing most people have small dogs because a lot of them live in apartments, but small dogs seem to be even more prominent here than in American cities, not sure why. The one time I saw a big dog, it looked like a Saint Bernard mix, and I was shocked to see such a large dog after seeing so many small ones.

Just a note

Sorry to post again right after the novel I just posted lol, but I just wanted to say that a few people have commented on my blog and I can't tell who it is, so if you are going to comment could you sign the post? I think for people who have an account with this site the name will show up automatically, but not for those of you who don't. And I would love to know who it is when I read a comment. :) Thanks.

Fun filled weekend

Yesterday was a pretty packed day. I had classes in the morning and then after classes I heard from a friend in the group that there were free open houses and tours because of the festival going on. So we go to see several places that we wouldn't normally have gotten to see, which was really cool. Here are some pictures:

This is the entrance to an apartment in the Plaza that we were able to go into. It was so nice, and had a really nice view of the plaza, I can't even imagine how much a place like that must cost.

The next set of pictures is of the old university building at the University of Salamanca, where my classes are. The University is about 800 years old, and is the oldest University in Spain, and it might even be the oldest in Europe. Usually you have to pay to go in, but yesterday they had it open to the public for free.

My favorite room was the old library. So pretty.

The picture could be better but you can kind of get the idea.

An old classroom.

A church inside the old school building.


Then, later that day, I went to a bullfight with my two roommates. I wasn't sure I wanted to go at first because I don't like that they kill the bulls, but I figured if I'm in Spain I should experience it because it's such a well known part of Spanish culture. It wasn't as bad as it could have been in terms of the bulls dying because in most cases it's pretty quick, but we ended up leaving halfway through anyway since we had seen what we came to see. But what we did see was pretty eventful. At one point one of the matadors (it was actually one of the guys who comes out first before the featured matador but I don't know if they have a specific title) had to jump over the side of the ring because the bull started chasing him. Then one of the bulls knocked over a horse and the ride had to jump off and then get the horse standing again. After watching for awhile I started to appreciate how fearless the matadors have to be to stand right next to a running bull and not flinch. I didn't get pictures that were that great, but here are a few anyway:

The arena from outside.

The view from our seats.

The two girls I live with, Kayla and Jessica.

The procession at the beginning.

The later in the night, a bunch of us went to the fair that is going on. It was really fun! I went on a really fun ride and ate a chocolate covered churro filled with something sweet (not sure what it was exactly). We didn't stay for too long, but I had fun. I don't have many pictures of this because I forgot my camera and only have a few from friends.

Today hasn't been nearly as exciting as yesterday, I've basically just stayed at home all day, but I'm going out later tonight with some of the girls in the group so that should be fun. There are always a lot of people out in the streets, I think especially now because of the festival. It still surprises me how late people stay out, even with their kids. It's normal to see young kids still out with their parents around midnight.