No pasa nada

La segunda semana

Since I last posted, I've explored a few more things in Spain. On Saturday I went to Valencia with my program. I went swimming for the first time in the Mediterranean on Sunday! And I began looking for classes alongside other Spanish students at the university because classes at the university began Monday.

Valencia

Ciudad de los Artes y las Ciencias

Catedral de Santa María

Valencia was beautiful! Did you know that Valencia is the third biggest city in Spain (Barcelona and Madrid being the biggest)? I didn't until Saturday. And it's only 2 hours up the coast! Our first stop was at the Ciudad de los Artes y las Ciencas (a museum called the City of Art and Sciences). We didn't go inside but we got to walk around the outskirts and try some horchata, a traditional spanish beverage made from chufas (tigernuts in English?). Our next stop was the Mercado Central (Central Market) of Valencia which is huge! People come there to buy produce, meat, seafood, bread, etc. It was super crowded and super hot. And it was the first place I've ever had to pay to use the restroom (weird side note)! After that, we toured a little bit of the city and ended up at the famous Catedral de Santa María. After our tour of the church, we were given two hours of free time, so my friends Andrew, Kiersten and I went and had paella for lunch! After lunch we went to our final stop: a Ceramics Museum (that even had pieces by Picasso!) that used to be a palace. The first two floors are the restored palace, and the top floor contains the ceramics. It was such a beautiful museum, I absolutely loved it.

Paella de marisco (spanish rice dish with seafood)

La playa de Prostiguet, Alicante

La playa

On Sunday I went swimming in the Mediterranean for the first time in my life...and it certainly won't be the last! The water feels so good on these hot, humid days. And the water isn't too hot or too cold; I think it's perfect. I can't wait to spend my next few weekends lounging on the beach under the sun. Speaking of the sun, I am so dark! It's only been a week and a half and I'm the tannest I've ever been in my life (most people know that this is a huge accomplishment for me)! But alas, people still come up to me in public and ask if I speak English so obviously I'm not as dark as a typical Spaniard...yet. *crossing my fingers*
                                                                                                         

Las noches

Vanessa, Kiersten, Me, and Andrew with our sangria :)

Practically everyone has heard of Spain's crazy night life (if you haven't, watch the 'La gente está muy loka" on youtube, it's a little graphic--be warned ). I can't say I've experienced the real night life (partying until 6 a.m.) but I did go out with Kiersten, Andrew, and my brazilian roommate Vanessa on Friday. We couldn't stay out too late because we had our field trip to Valencia, but we went out to a bar and all of us ordered sangria for the first time (my first time ever ordering a drink!). Man that stuff is strong! I hadn't even finished my glass and I was giggling up a storm. Anyways...we stayed out till about 1:30 a.m. which is really when things actually start to get going. I hope to go out and see more of the night life this weekend. Tomorrow we're going out to celebrate/say goodbye to Vanessa who is leaving Alicante and traveling to other parts of Spain. I'm really going to miss her, it's been so interesting and fun getting to know her.

Las clases

Like I said, university classes began this week. So on top of my 3 hour grammar class, I'm now enrolled in two more classes. Due to necessary credits and schedule conflicts, I ended up in a History of Modern Spain class and a Women's Psychology class (so excited for this one!). I really like both of the professors and they seem like pretty good classes to me. For my history class, we have to create a blog about a topic that interests us from the 16th century on (when they say modern history, I guess they mean it). Naturally, I chose to blog about when the Spanish explorers came over to the U.S.  My psych class is going to cover all sorts of thing, the role of women vs. men, why we are who we are, and address aspects of sociology as well. Pretty stoked! Plus my professor seems like the sweetest lady ever; that never hurts. It's definitely interesting to step out of a typical Spanish class or grammar class and actually take two different subjects in Spanish.
Next month, my grammar class ends and I begin my Social and Cultural Realities class through the program, my internship, and I believe the cooking class. Can't wait!

Mi familia

Now that almost two weeks have gone by, my family and I have have warmed up to each other even more. My host parents are always play flighting which cracks me up, always disagreeing with each other and playfully asking Vanessa and I to take sides. One night I addressed my mom with 'usted' (formally) versus 'tú' (informally). She immediately told me that 'usted' is for old ladies and professors. But Alfredo, her husband, mumbled under his breath, "but you are an old lady." Of course this started a playful argument between them which was hilarious. They give each other such a hard time but at the same time you can tell they love each other a lot. It's fun to watch them interact. We have a lot of interesting talks (well mostly my mom or dad talks, and I nod and throw something into the conversation occasionally). We've talked about politics, movies, various crimes in Spain, how common abortions are in Spain, how kids live with their parents until they're at least 28 if not older, the change in education systems, Franco, differences between countries' customs, the prince of Spain, all sorts of stuff!

Other random stuff: the amounts of food I'm given always seems to differ, some meals there's a normal amount of food on the table, other nights they make a normal amount of food for 4 people but give it all to me. Today I walked into the kitchen and my mom said to me, "¡qué guapas eres hoy!"(you look so pretty!) and then proceeded to make me the biggest lunch ever (usually it's just a sandwich and a juice box). Didn't quite understand the connection with being pretty and thus getting lots of food. But hey, I'll take it, I like food. Also, I've incurred 23 mosquito bites in the last two nights...not sure I look too pretty with all these welts all over me. Luckily my mom gave me some spray, so hopefully no more bites tonight!

A few more Spanish words and phrases!

• "No pasa nada" - the most common phrase in Spain: "no worries" And it's not just a phrase, it's the culture. I love it. I'm still getting used to it (because you all know I'm a worrier), but I love it  and choose to embrace it :)
• Taco - in Spain, a taco is a swear word
• Repipi - girly girl, fussy
• Tiquismiquis - finicky, a little OCD (this is my new favorite word!)
• And of course there are bad words (tacos) that I've started to pick up on, but they're a little vulgar for this blog. :)