Sevilla

Sevilla
Where I will be this Summer

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Last week in SEVILLA

can't believe this is my last week in sevilla...only tuesday, wednesday, thursday and friday.

Tuesday was normal, class and class and had a quiz. I rocked my quiz ... see i study even when having fun. :)       i ended up packing tuesday night because couldn't sleep and everthing fits :)  yeah. i decided that wednesday will be my day to get gifts for the fam and the host fam.

Wednesday: had class and class but then shopping. I got gifts for the host fam just to say thanks for their hospitality. I really like my host family and I will miss them a lot. I have enjoyed my stay here a lot.

Thursday: had an exam then class..one more exam tomorrow then donzo. I got the gifts for my home at home home and i finally packed everything and yeah :) today was sad though because MJ is not going to be at the office tomorrow or coming to the airport with us so i was sad, because today is the last day i get to see her. she is great and such a sweetheart. I have a pic with her and Quique our other director. he will be at the bus tomorrow but not coming with us to the airport :( so sad. tonight i plan to give my host fam gifts and eat with them then grab a drink with friends tonight :)  tomorrow is a day of class class and waiting for the bus and running through a checklist in my head til im on the bus. im going to be sad tomorrow but i am also happy to be going home because i do miss the people at home and my AC and my puppies :)

until tomorrow

WEEKEND in PARIS!!!

PARIS!!!!!

Friday Morning I left to meet Jess at Hotel Bequer so we could grab a taxi and head to the airport and get on our flight to Paris. We met up at like 530am. The taxi driver drives CRAZY. he was like speeding way over the speed limit. We got there and we were impressed how fast we got there. WE were told to treat our trip like an international flight, so we arrived 2hrs before. We got to the airport and had to find RyanAir's desk to checkin and figure out gate but we didnt end up finding gate when we checked in at the desk. After check in we went to security and did that and then we had breakfast. I had some bread, oj and jamon. so did jess. It was filling and simple. we hung out and talked. We found out our gate about 45min before boarding so we went to the gate and waited in line. RyanAir has no specific seat for you so you get to pick your seats. Luckily we got there earlier than the others so we could get on plane quicker and get seats together. We both slept on the flight, because we were tired. The plane took about 2.5/3hrs. We got off and went to go see if Jerome was picking us up or we had to get cab. We were both hungry so we got something to eat before. I got an Orangina (french yummy pop) and a croissant filled with chocolate :) french croissants are more flakey and tastey than spanish one or american ones...they know what they are doing. We found Jerome and to our surprise, he brought us some treats too but I was full and didn't eat any of it...Jess did.

Jerome lives on a military base and it is in Versailles, not Paris. It's about 30/40minutes from Paris. He gave us a tour of the base and we met some of his friends when we went for lunch on the base. The spoke little english so we communicated a bit. After we ended up relaxing for a little, to have the food digest then we went on a "bike ride". i put bike ride in quotes because it was more of like a ride through all of versailles. We biked to the gardens of versailles and these bikes are not made for short people like me. after taking some pictures around the castle and gardens we then biked through the city itself. It was a lot of fun and a work out at same time. That night one of Jerome's friends came over and we had some wine and pizza and watched Dexter and Spartacus...spartacus is sick i need to finish season one and 2. :)

Saturday= Paris
We kind of got an early start on our day. We had breakfast then got ready for Paris. We went everywhere. We saw all the tourist sites and it was awesome. we went to sacre couer, eiffel tower, notre dame, louvre, arc de triomphe champs elysees. It was an amazing day with some great people. we ate at a good places and had some good wine and the food was amazing..my pics say it all :)  We learned how to take the metro and i think i am pro at it now and we learned some french and we tried our best to sound them out..it was all fun:)

Sunday: We ended up going back to Paris and do some shopping and have fun. We met up with Cesar and Jerome's sister and Cesar's aunt, uncle and cousin. We met them on the Champs Elysees to watch le tour de France...it was really cool. We had a lot of fun and it was super nice. After Paris, we went back to Versailles and relaxed. Jerome made some food, we had crepes for dessert and some wine :) and rocher ferrero chocolate and Spartacus. That is about it. we didnt do much. IT was a nice relaxing night.

Monday: we leave Paris :( the weekend flew and now i was sad to leave because Paris is one of my favorite cities. It's so pretty and the food is nom  nom and yeah. i love it.  We had our flight at 445 but Jerome couldnt bring us to the airport so we had to take the metro and a bus. We didn't get lost so that was good. We got to the airport and had bfast and lunch, we didnt eat at all til we got to airport, then our flight was delayed and such so  i sent a msg to my host fam. It took forever, we waited and waited. it was poop. once we got there, we ended up finding two seats in back of plane but that was ok because the crew opens the front and back exits for people to board and get off. We slept on flight and we got back to sevilla.  I got back to sevilla just in time for dinner then i crashed ...

Paris is amazing and if you have the chance to go...GO...i love the city and hoping next time i can have my loved ones with me :)

i KNOW....i slacked

why hello everyone....i know i am so sorry for not posting, things have just come up and i forgot and yeah...lemme up date you...

Sunday the 15th....I ended up going to alcazar. We went early so we could beat the crowds. I was told that we were going to leave by 9am, well we didnt leave til about 1030. Typical Spanish ways, but that's okay. Alcazar was GORGEOUS...took so many pictures of the gardens and the buildings itself. Eugenia was funny, she acted like a typical kid. It was cute. Alvaro, my host dad, explained to me the history of the Alcazar and the architecture....he is an architect so he can talk about it for days. He also mentioned that he worked at the Alcazar for a few years doing research and such. I found it interesting. After that, we walked around a little bit then headed back to the house. Back at the house we had lunch and relaxed nothing too exciting.

Monday 16th, Typical long day of classes :( Spanish at 9am and EU at 3:30. We were all gettin excited for Kayaking on Tuesday. I love kayaking and havent kayaked since my WVHS days in our pool...lol oh AP Swimming (that is what we called it) how i miss you. It was such an easy class.

Tuesday the 17th: KAYAKING DAY!!! before kayaking that night, I had class...i know boring but it is what it is. Kayaking was that night at 8pm. We hauled ass to get to the place we were kayaking. MJ, our director like sprint walked and maneuvered around people, i was impressed by this. I find myself able to do this but she has some talent. We finally got to the Kayaking thing and there was the option to do single and double persona kayaks. I did not mind either way. I ended up kayaking with MJ :)...man was it INTERESTING. let's say we weren't in sync  with one another for a for awhile and it was hard because we are really short/tiny people and yes we had difficulty. It was funny though. We were kayaking for about 3hrs. it was awesome. The people who ran the kayaking took pictures of us and we all had a good time. We were drenched by the end of the night and cold but it was a blast.  i loved it.

Wednesday 18th. again nothing too exciting just class as usual and it was hump day so that was cool, because that meant another day closer to the weekend. and for the weekend was going to be in Paris which is AWESOME!!!

Thursday 19th: just like wednesday meant another day closer to Paris and i am so excited.


Sabado

Well Saturday wasnt much. The day consisted of me looking over notes watchin the tourist in Spanish and that is really about it. Tonight went to go see what to expect when you are expecting with madi Jessica Clara and kaitlyn. The movie was funny. I understood most of it and also used my imagination. Cant wait to redbox it and see how much i understood. Tomorrow morning my host family and I are going to alcazar and pretty excited for it. Shall be fun just going to charge camera tonight. After that I will probably do more homework :-/ can't believe in 2 wks I am home in Illinois then after like a week I am back I. Michigan. Crazy!!!

Friday, July 13, 2012

Lo siento ... Jueves y Viernes

Sorry been busy and hot. Thursday was ok classes weren't bad. I signed up to go kayaking. I bought a really pretty dress that my mama said I needed to buy but I had to wait til after my class. I couldn't just leave my class to buy a dress. I went walking around with kaitlyn and Carrie. Asp watched the aristocats at my host family's house during lunch. Overall it was a nice day but very hot.

Friday today was good. There were hardly anyone in class because like everyone left. Most were going To Portugal. My plans were to relax and hang out. My host fam and I are going to alcazar on Sunday and that will be fun. Saturday is going to be of studyin for European union class and a movie with the girls. Tonight was fun madi Jess and I went to a flamenco show and went and got shisha ( hookah) and glass of wine and madi got a hot dog aka street meat lol it was a good night with great people and good convos. I'm gonna miss these girls and everyone else I have become friends with during my trip. Can't believe I'm going to be home in 14 days!!! This is cray lol

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Hump day!!!

Well I slept like poop. Woke up at like 440 in the morning and couldn't fall asleep. I ended up going back to bed around 630. While I was awake I was on Facebook twitter and pinterest . I pinned a lot!!! I found some things that were cute or funny and shared then on the walls of my friends Facebook page. I then ended up callin asleep at like 630 and then woke up at 8 and still got to class by 850!!! That's some awesomeness right there. Well classes went well both easy and long. We had a debate in Spanish and it was funny and interesting. At 145 we had a tour of the cathedral. It is gorgeous and the 3 rd largest in the world!! It's so pretty inside. We also went inside the ghiralda which has 34 little ramps that are kinda a pain in the butt to climb but it's a workout legs and butt are gonna look good :-) lol it was nice I enjoyed it. I also found out that there is a kayaking outing on Monday next week that I'm thinking about doing its only 10 euro and it's at night on the river where u can see Sevilla lit up at night. Still thinking about doing it. Well that's all for my wednesday.

Tuesday

Well my tuessday felt like monday LONG!! Classes were classes. I just did some studyin then took a short nap because I needed it. Yesterday wasn't just long but productive. Productive because gettin some studyin done for exam that is now next wk. but I am gettin things ready for GVSU athletics. Plans for FanFest are in the works. Thank goodness I live in a world of technology idk what I would do without it. It helps me communicate with my fam and friend and to do tho things for work! Tomorrow we are takin a tour of the cathedral which I didnt do last summer session. I have camera and phone to take some pics.. Yay!!! Well I'll be back later to let ya know how my hump day is!

Monday, July 9, 2012

Monday no exciting

Like I said Monday was moday nothin to exciting just class and hw and class and read and that is about it. It is getting really hot again:-( missing my AC. Enjoying my time and like the new people! Til tomo

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Tuesday hasta Domingo (spanglish i know)

Just wanna say sorry for not being on top of my blogging....things have been busy and I have forgotten to do this everyday. So here is a recap from Tues to Sun

Tuesday: new schedule.
Had class at 9am. I have class with a mix of ppl, some from summer 1, summer 2 and some others who are here with another school program. They are all nice and the professor is really cool. During the day, I did not do much, I am so happy that I can go back during lunch for meals, I can eat earlier instead of getting bocadillos every day. So I am a happy camper, minus walking back to class at the hottest time of day. Tuesday was just a really chill day, we are going to go all out for the 4th of July.

Wednesday= 4 of JULY!!! 
Well, we Americans in Spain celebrated our 4th of July with style. We pretty much rocked our Red, White and Blue all day. It was pretty awesome. We still had class and so I went to class and had a good time. Wednesday Night a few of us went to this Texan Saloon and had dinner and a few drinks. After, we met up with some other people from our program and got a drink at one place before going to this bar that had a shot for each state in the USA. I have become a fan of this beer called Desperado in Spain, it is beer and tequila. It tastes like cider to me. Well at the new place we had one and then since we were celebrating our Independence day, we took a shot for the state we are from. I took 2 though, one for IL and then I got talked in to taking one for where i go to school. Lemme say the IL shot is better than the MI one. Also at this place, there were all different banners and such of different FB teams, and schools. To my surprise I saw 2 GVSU triangle banners. One with the traditional GV logo, the one with the "V" inside the "G". Then I saw the Louie the Laker one too. I was so shocked that I took pictures of them just to have it. Almost  all the Chicago Teams were represented, Bears, Sox, Bulls, Cubs but no Blackhawks :(. And since they were there...i also took pics of them :) Yay Chicago Teams!!!! After we went to another bar because it looked like it had a dance floor. Well we weren't there long...it was too small for our group. We were there for a little before going to one that had a big dance floor. We were there for a while and we all danced and had a good time...both summer 1 and 2 and locals. 

Thursday; the day after....
Well I felt AMAZING...I really did. I was up early and was ready to take on my day. I did dress in comfy clothes tho because I didn't want to wear jeans and a cute top. Well, I was surprised at how many people showed up to class (especially morning class) there were a few who did not come but we can each miss 2 days and not get penalized.  Thursday was just chill, nothing big. Just an ordinary day at ISA office. I ended up staying in that night to just be with my host family. 

Friday= another ordinary day.
Nothing really happened in class...some people were leaving for the weekend to go see the Running with the Bulls. Others were going to Cadiz and Jerez (like i did in summer 1) and staying in the area. I really did not have plans I just wanted to relax. My host mom and I were discussing books, I have read a lot while being here :), i know i do read...weird lol. She recommended two authors to me and I wrote down their names and titles of books. 

Saturday= was HOT.
I ended up going out with a friend to this 3 story mall in her part of town. I bought some cute clothes and we had a really good time. We enjoyed the mall, then our lunch right by the mall then a nice convo in the park. We just talked about our class we have together and how we view things . We learned a lot about each other and we have some things in common. It was nice. I enjoyed my day. After, I got back I got ready to go out with my host family for dinner. We went to a nice tapas place and had about 5 different tapas. Fish, shellfish and chicken. It was all good. We then went to the club that they belonged to and walked through there and then got an ice cream. It was a nice night out with the family. After that I met up with Madi and Jess and we went out on calle betis. I wanted to hear bout how they liked Cadiz and Jerez. They enjoyed it. It was a nice evening out with them. 

Sunday=today...RELAXATION!!!

Today was a day of doing nothing but homework and reading. I finished yet another book and i did my homework. Nothing really exciting. I hung in my room and did homework but then I also hung out with my family in the salon and read. It was funny, my host parents and I were all ready while the two little ones were playing. 

To another week....usually same stuff to come but if anything exciting comes I'll post..Plans for weekend are to go to this amusement park in SPAIN...it is like a six flags. can't believe after today I am in the teens until im back home. 19days starting tomorrow. I have been learning a lot about myself, the culture here and of course spanish. I will be taking in the most out of these next few days. I do like it here and could see myself here maybe for a while working or something but i do miss my family puppies and friends and of course my AC and outdoor pool (Oakhurst North Pool I want to jump in you now)

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Monday = New people for Summer 2

Well, ISA office was really quiet and sad. I miss my Summer 1 friends. Today was first day of classes, I didn't have my first class, because the new people had to take their language exam. So i had class at 3:30 with Carrie and Kaitlyn. The E.U class seams interesting and fun...there are only 8 of us so not to crazy.  I went shopping, because i needed to break my 50 euro, so I bought a cute dress for 12,99 euro..quite a deal because it was 25,99euro. I think I may wear it to my friends wedding which is in 1month 2days :) yay can't wait!!!! We also had dinner with the 12 new people for summer 2. We had some tapas and they were yummy. We mingled then Madi, Jess, Me Cheyenne, Carrie and two new girls , Kirsten and Stephanie, went out for a drink and we just had a chill night. Nothing crazy, because they were tired and it was along day for them.  They seem like a good group and that the 32 of us now will all get a long and enjoy the next few weeks together. I like the new group but do miss my friends from Summer 1.


Domingo = Viva Espana

well SPAIN WON the EuroCup!!!! Yay!!!

Madi, Jess and I went to this English pub which was right by my host family and we had dinner and few drinks watching the game. The Eurocup was Spain vs Italy. We were sitting at a table that was close to the italian fans...It was a intense game. Italy gave up pretty much after the 3rd goal maybe after 2nd. Spain did well and you could tell that they really wanted the WIN. I have pictures and videos that I will post on Facebook, soon. I have just been busy. After the win, we walked around a little to see the craziness, people were funny. AFter a little we went on own way and went back to our host house. I passed out that night...I am glad I could be in the country that won the eurocup...soccer is a big deal. The fans are so funny!!! yay ESPANA!!!!!

Sunday, July 1, 2012

oops....sorry

Heyo, sorry havent posted in a while...been busy and not a lot of things have happened.

Wednesday = poop day lol it was because i was so hot and i felt terrible lol it happens BUT Spain played Portugal and SPAIN WON!!!!

Thursday was not bad, had a presentation and got a 93 on it so i was happy. After class we went out with the ppl who were going to be leaving because summer 1 was over. It was sad. Taryn, Cortney and  I went to this little place and got a drink. Taryn and I had Aqua de Sevilla and Cortney had a Gin Fizz. Umm, the drinks were not that good, but it is what it is. We met a nice English couple, we asked them to take a picture of us and we conversed a little. After Madi and Jess met up with us and then Jess, Madi and I went to meet up with Alli and Elise. Taryn and Cortney went home because they were gonna eat dinner and pack.  We wanted to go to this English Pub, but since the Germany and Italy game was on it was FULL. We went to the place next door and had a glass of wine. After that Alli took us to this cute little restaurant and we got a dessert and a nice drink. It was only 5euros not a bad deal. After that I went home because I was carrying some school stuff and didn't wanna haul it around with me.

Friday was sad day. I had my last presentation and my summer 1 friends were leaving. Next week is going to be weird because there is going to be like no one in the school. We are only having 8-10 new people come and there are 25 of us who are staying that already did summer 1 so instead of the 90 some we had now will have like under 35ppl. CRAZY.  Well we were supposed to meet for our marketing class but only Tyler and I showed up so we went to a cervercita with our Prof and talked and had drink. It wasn't bad. After I met up with Madi and Jessica for dinner then we went out for a bit.

Saturday was not bad, the weather was nicer. I slept in...which was nice. I watched the movie War Horse in Spanish and talked to my mom and phi. I had lunch with the family and then went out and met Carrie and Cheyenne at La Plaza de Espana. It was a lot of fun!!! We walked around took pics and walked inside the park. Clara, a friend from Malaga met up with us and her and I decided to go shop...for me window shop. I really dont wanna spend money at all until the end of my trip. I saw some cute things but didn't buy any.  After I just came back to the house.When I came back, my host mom and her sister-in-law, was at the house and they were watching desperate housewives. It was nice to see the show in spanish. After that, we ate dinner which was light just some turkey sandwich. Then my host mom and I watched another episode of Desperate Housewives. It reminded me of being home and watching movies with my mom and sis :) i miss them. They also invited me to go to the beach with them next weekend at their beach house they have, and I am excited for it because some of my friends are going to be gone on the Cadiz and Jerez trip. So it all works out.

Tonight is the final of the EUROCUP...VIVA ESPANA!!!! Going out with friends tonight to watch it :)