Me quedan once días...

Me quedan once días doesn’t have a good exact translation but it basically means I have eleven days left.  I finished my classes on Tuesday and have been soaking up as much of Barcelona as I can since.  Today we had a “re-entry orientation” in which they tried to help us remember things, good and bad, about our time here, warn us of reverse culture shock, and they gave us some tips on how to use this experience in resumes and other professional applications.   I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much I’ve learned, how much I’ve changed, and all the great people I’ve met and I’m going to miss.  Barcelona is and forever will be a part of me.  My language skills have obviously improved drastically.  I don’t know how many times I’ve thought in the last few days “I didn’t even know how to say (insert ridiculously easy word) when I first got here.” Perhaps a good example is my list of goals for the semester.  The first day of orientation they had us write down our goals (in Spanish) and seal them in an envelope.  Well, today we got the envelopes back. The first thing on my list was “improvar mi español.”  Now, to you non-spanish speakers that isn’t funny so let me explain.  Improvar isn’t a word.  Yes, it looks like improve and that’s clearly what I meant but it’s not a word.  For me, that pretty much sums up my language experience here.   

Skiing...

A few weekends ago (ok, more than a few, it was the 12th of February), I went skiing in the Pyrenees with some friends from church.  We woke up really early in the morning, took a train for 2.5 hours to the mountains, got off the train and asked where the snow was, proceeded to board a bus that took us to the ski place, found the snow, and hit the slopes.  We had a blast!  Needless to say the snow wasn’t nearly as good as the snow in Michigan but the view was a little better.  It was an interesting experience for me to ski in warm weather.  Normally, I have to go inside and thaw out every few hours but here I took off my gloves and hat on every chair lift.  Also, I have the greatest host family.  They gave me a snow suit and gloves to use and insisted that I wear one of their turtlenecks (I really hate wearing turtle necks but I couldn't refuse...haha).

 

Zach and Rebecca on the train

 Tyler and Rachel

Just a view while skiing, no big deal

 Me at the top of one of the runs.  Those mountains in the distance might be French, depending on which direction we were facing at this point.

 

Another view while skiing.  I loved this one!

View from the Gondola

Me in my "mono" as my host dad calls it.  This really doesn't look as bad as I thought it did.

Another view.  Rough life.

Tibidabo...

Ok, so, I missed a couple of days... let's be honest, we all knew that would happen...haha.  Anyway, on to the good stuff.

Yesterday I went to a part of Barcelona that is know as Tibidabo.  Before I went, I knew it was an "old-fashioned" amusement park at the top of a mountain however, I didn't end up spending anytime in the amusement park.  There are also two churches, or basilicas rather, built at the top of the mountain; one on top of the other and they're different styles.  The base was built in the Islamic/Romantic style while the top was built in the Gothic style.  In case you're not familiar with the different styles, Islamic/Romantic has rounded arches and is often more dome-shaped.  The Gothic style arches come to a point, and the walls are always smooth.  (I'll post pictures when I finally put them on my computer.) So, I ended up spending the majority of my time in these churches, examining the differences.  The rest of the afternoon was spent eating lunch, and talking with friends while overlooking the city scape of Barcelona. 

Classes...

A lot has changed since I last updated you about my classes.  I've started 3 new classes, taken mid-terms, written papers, given presentations and finished the only classes I had when I last wrote about my classes. So what's new?

Historia del Mediterraneo Antiguo...

I’m done with this class!  I took the final last week Thursday and this week I have been blissfully sleeping in when I normally would have been at this class.  I got a 7 (out of 10) on the final.  I know, you’re probably thinking 7 out of 10, not your best work Leah but I was shocked I did this well.  First of all, this is my class with other Spaniards so I figured if I was able to understand and regurgitate half as much as they could I was doing well.  Secondly, during the exam, there were two questions 1)describe the founding of Rome and 2)describe the Mycenaean trading in the central Mediterranean.  Foundation of Rome, ok, pretty standard.  Mycenaean trade routes?  We never talked about trading! We talked about things found in graves and to be honest I always zoned out during that part because I never thought it was important.  (Side note: I took me 3 weeks to figure out what micénico was.) So during the exam I had my three or so (short) paragraphs about Rome and maybe 5 bullet points of things that were found some place (which I pretty much made up) while the Spaniard next to me was on the back of her third page.  This really didn’t instill confidence in my answers…  And finally, I already knew that the 2 other Americans in my class got a 4 and a 4.5. So, in short, I feel great about my 7! (I also might note that a 7 here doesn’t exactly translate to 70% in the US)

Other classes…

I don’t have nearly as much to tell about these classes: Art and Artist, Contemporary Spanish Literature, and a Spanish Grammar class.  I’ve taken 2 mid-terms, given 2 presentations, and written a paper (along with a few smaller activities).  Overall I really enjoy my classes. 

Sorry...

I know, I know, I haven't written in forever.  I'm sorry. You see, in the past month and a half, I've been out enjoying Spain, spending time with friends both new and old and, well, actually studying.  This leaves me with a crap ton of stories to tell, little desire to spend several hours writing a monstrously long blog post, and still more studying (that is what I came here to do after all), not to mention all the fun things still left undone.  So, I have a proposition.  I will not spend my time on a wall of text for you to read, instead I will post something everyday for the last month that I'm here.  Sound good?

Hace un mes...

In English “hace un mes” means one month ago.  One month ago, I arrived in Barcelona not knowing what I was getting myself into; but now, here I am, with a daily routine.  So what has this month taught me? 

I’ve learned not to wear new dress shoes to church when you have a 20 minute walk to get there and that even though you put on band-aids half way through the trip you’ll still get blisters.  I’ve learned that when buying band-aids you should also buy scissors because it’s easy to buy one that is literally 3 feet long.  I’ve learned that just because it’s a green lay’s chip bag and there’s what looks like an onion on the front doesn’t mean the chips are sour cream and onion and that’s it’s probably best to learn the words for different types of fruits and vegetables.  I’ve learned that just because that’s where you got off the bus doesn’t mean that that’s where you should get on the bus again and that if you just walk to the other side of the street to the same number bus going the same way, you’ll probably save yourself an hour or so.  But most of all, what I’ve learned so far, is to appreciate the people in my life.  There aren’t many places in the world where you can surround yourself with people that love God with all their being and you know you’ll have good clean fun together.  I’ve also learned the importance of “a people” as Trygve (Hope chaplain) likes to say.  I miss my people, my Hope people, but I’m so thankful God led me to my Barcelona people.  It’s such a blessing to have people here who encourage me when I’m down and are willing and want to talk about more than what bar they went to last night or how hot that waiter is. 

Long story short, I’ve made some mistakes (hopefully they won’t happen again), but life is good.  I have friends; I have a people (albeit a much smaller people than in Michigan).  I have hope.   God is so good.

Once upon a fortnight...

So it’s been almost two weeks since I last wrote anything.  Sorry about that.  So what’s new?  Let’s see…

Classes

I’ve started two of my five classes.  Tuesday’s and Thursday’s I have Ancient Mediterranean History from 9-11.  It’s completely in Spanish which automatically makes it ten times harder than any other class I’ve ever taken. There are about 30 Spaniards and 2 other Americans in this class.  One difference that I noticed right away was that of those 30, I would say 10 are 40 or older.  The other class I have right now is an intensive language class, every day, for 3 hours… I only have one week left of this and then I’ll start my three other classes: Art and Artists from Picasso to Topias, Modern Spanish Literature, and Spanish Language and Society (although I’m thinking of switching that to another Spanish grammar class).

Food

I love the food here.  I even like things here that I didn’t like before.  For example, one night for dinner this week we had pizza with not only cheese and ham, but also mushrooms, onions, and olives.   And I liked it! Other things I like here include croquetas (an assortment of meat inside a breaded crust), tortillas de patatas (basically potato chunks fried in eggs), patatas bravas (potatoes, again, cubed, fried, and topped with a delicious sauce), wine, sangria, salad with tuna in it, breaded fish, pan con tomate (I must admit this isn’t my favorite- it’s bread (hard bread) with tomato juice squeezed on top),  hamburgers, lamb, rice, some sort of bean thing that I don’t know the English or Spanish name of, and probably a lot more that I’m not thinking of right now.

Daily habits

Eating habits are pretty straight forward.  Spaniards eat all the time.  Technically the meals are only: desayuno (breakfast) -around 8 or so they have coffee or tea and maybe some toast or cereal; almuerzo (lunch)- around 2 or 3 they have a bocadillo (basically just a sandwhich but it’s made with one loaf of French bread and not slices of bread like we’re used to) with ham and cheese; and cena (dinner)-around 8 or 9 they have any one (or more) of the various things mentioned above.  Besides the three meals, they pinchar (snack) during the rest of the day, well, mostly at 11am and 5 or 6pm.  During my class from 9-11 we have a 15 minute break in which most of the students leave the class to either smoke, or buy/eat food.  We also have a 20 minute break during my 3 hour class to eat something if we want. 

Everything is later here, not just the main meals.  Max and Berta have school from 9-5 everyday.  Stores don’t open until 10ish and most are open until 8 or 9. 

What else?  … Everyone smokes (basically).  Thankfully, it is now illegal (as of December 26^th) to smoke inside any public building or within so many meters (50?) of a school.

Language Ability

 They say having dreams in another language is when you know you’ve really mastered a language.  Well, I haven’t mastered Spanish, that’s for sure, but I have had two dreams that I remember in which someone spoke in Spanish.  Don’t get too excited though, it was the same short phrases and broken Spanish that I attempt to use during the day.  Apparently, now I’m trying to use it at night too. I thought I would be doing a lot better by now.  I guess I had unrealistic expectations.  I must admit, I am getting better.  I can tell when one word ends and another begins when people talk to me now.  I’m not (too) afraid to say something in the past tense and future isn’t too bad either.  Maybe my feeling of not getting any better is really because I make the same number of mistakes and forget just as many words as before but now I’m trying to use more obscure words and more complicated phrases (at least I can hope, right?). 

Other things

I’m freezing right now.  I know all of you back in Michigan are thinking “it’s nowhere near as cold in Barcelona as it is here.”  And you are correct, however, you don’t have to walk outside for 20 minutes to get to/from your car, and your heating systems actually keep your house warm.  It’s around 60-63 degrees in my room right now.  The house is heated by a couple of space heaters.  There is one in the living/dining room and one in the bathroom.  That area of the apartment isn’t too bad…  Another thing, I didn’t bring sweatshirts/sweatpants to wear around the house like I normally would in the US if our house ever got this cold.

I have a correction to make.  In my last post I said that there were only two days every year on which things go on sale.  I was wrong.  Las rebajas are still underway and apparently they last until the end of February and each week things are marked down more and more in order to get rid of the winter inventory.  This happens again throughout July and August.

So, to recap, I love it here.  The language is difficult at times which makes other things difficult but I love my family here and they make delicious food for me every night.   What more could I ask for?

…maybe an extra blanket…