"gracias a Dios por la palabra escrita."

(Thanks to God for the written word.)


In my Women Writers of 20th Century Spain class, we've talked a lot about feminism (!!), equality, lives of different women around the world & their rights, and now we're getting to the women writers. and to preface this, my professora, magdalena, spoke about the 4 major writers in Spain that wrote works, hoping that in inspired hope within other women during the hard times of fraco (the dictator from the 30s to 75).
the written word has an unbelievable power. i never thought of it before until she said that exact phrase: gracias a Dios por la palabra escrita. i learn best with examples: the Bible, the bill of rights, journalism uncle tom's cabin, watergate....the list really goes on and on. but think where we'd be without such written works?
especially lately i realize how powerful it is. to receive long emails from friends at home. to write pages and pages in my journal reflecting on my life here, to write here to the people at home...
it all means a lot to me.
i'm not sure where i'd be, personally, if i wasn't able to write everything i've felt in these last 8 weeks (that's right. it's been 8 weeks). i'd probably have exploded on some street or in my señora's apartment by day 5.

it was all a dream!

dad's gonna be sounding like biggie when he gets home.
since they landed on friday morning until we parted yesterday morning,
all he could say was that someone needed to pinch him.
this must be a dream!
"sitting here. drinking coffee, after a motorcycle ride to the shore, with my daughter, on my birthday."

i'll let him tell his own story. but there's a preview.

so i started my volunteering yesterday.
with my social justice class, one class was dropped per week,
and we each have our own assignments across sevilla.
i'm working in a school...in an after school program
where kids do homework and stuff together in the library.
i think i'm supposed to mill around and talk half in spanish and half in english with them.
i thought middle schoolers would be worse than younger kids because they'd make fun of me...
well it's the opposite. hahaha
i met some cool 15 year olds. diego was the first. a pretty cool kid!
i sat with them and we were comparing our two countries and they taught me some stuff!
but then i went to talk to a teacher who was with younger kids...
and they mocked every word i said and laughed and laughed! hahaha
a real morale booster for my accent & language, let me tell you!
i ride a bus (to the opposite end of the map) to the school every monday and wednesday afternoon.
so...we'll see how that goes!

ellos van a venir!

(gracias a tía bobbie por su foto!)

un cambio?

spain may or may not be changing my opinion about 2 things:

almonds & coffee.

you wouldn't really catch me consuming either at home.

alright that's a lie. 

twice i had coffee during my tour time in admissions.

i had to be there at 9:30 on thursday mornings...

and we all know the later in the week, the more exhausted we are. 

so i filled up half a cup, the rest with creamer and sugar.

and i drank it for energy. 

i gotta be peppy with perspective students & families! haha

but almonds? nuts in general i'm not really a fan. 

(especially in chocolate or ice cream)

now i'm not changing my mind about that. 

i'm not going to be drinking loads of coffee and buying hershey's with almonds...

but almonds make for a nice little snack!

let me tell you, lecki was impressed!

i had been holding out on telling my best friend, the nutritionist, that my señora was frying hot dogs and feeding me 3 of them at a time. i finally broke the news to her, which upon hearing this, she started using all sorts of combinations of exclamation points and question marks. 

"you gotta get out of there!!?!"

so i had to console her with some sort of good news.

"well, i like to snack on almonds. they're pretty cheap here in andalucia."

well... that just made her day. 

she was very impressed that i was getting my share of healthy, essential fatty acids.

jackpot.

so i'll continue to pop almonds every now and then.

and drink "un cortado"(half coffee, half milk) less often than almonds, but still sometimes.

since i don't ever really have anything caffeinated,

a little bit of spanish coffee goes a long way.

days, maybe!

la red social

aka... the social network.

my first 'cine' experience in spain. 

so we've seen spanish movies and stuff.

shoot! i'm in contemporary spanish film class!

but i haven't been to the theaters, until today.

not that this aaaactually counts,

but i'd say it kinda does.

the next step is to see a spanish film.

here you have two options when choosing your movie experience:

going to a normal theater or seeing the movie in V.O.

V.O. = version original (original version)

so if it's in english, it'll remain in english and not dubbed over!

but with spanish subtitles

which i ended up looking at a lot.

so i guessed i learned a little about spanish

AS WELL AS

the creator of facebook!

The Social Network... my opinion?

pretty interesting, funny, accurate (i'm not sure about the legal details, but when portraying college life -- i mean...everyone wore north face jackets.)

i had to remember i was in spain when i walked out of the theater. 

and i definitely am a little bit more homesick after that movie.

(knowing i'll soon be missing out on hoops mania and halloween at nova)

BUT

i'm in spain for the semester! haha i guess this time i can't have my cake & eat it, too.

but i almost can. a big part of home is coming to me! 

in 48 hours i'll have a small bag in a sevilla hotel...

staying with my parents! 

i truly, truly cannot wait.

little victories

that's how i'd describe my trip to barcelona!

1. i realized this was my first trip that i did just for me. 

i mean... i made the plans, i flew there alone. i figured it all out. 

not gonna lie, i was pretty proud of myself... kinda adult-like. 

2. kaitlin holl! i think this was the first "big hug tight" i've had since i've been here. 

you don't realize how much that physical touch really means until you're kinda without it for a while.

3. speaking spanish because if i didn't, we'd be up the creek.

i was nervous at first because catalan is not spanish, it's its own language!

so i thought i would have trouble getting by, but everyone was very nice and helpful!

i realize now why it's harder to learn spanish in andalucia (southern spain)... they REALLY do smush their words together. i knew that already, but comparing it to hearing the people speak in barcelona... shoot.

4. seeing the 'free walking tour' flyer at the front desk in the hostel.

this made our day. we walked for about 3 hours and learned SO MUCH about barcelona. then we learned about a cooking class... so we could eat paella and 

and now for a multitude of pictures!

tapas on our first night..

the beginning of our walking tour...

this is what's left of the aquaducts.

this building doesn't really fit in, right?

it's function? the barcelona's school of architecture.

it was actually designed by picasso, who drew those characters around the bottom to spite his rival.

these blocks were taken from the jewish quarters... see the hebrew written in the stone?

our lovely, swedish tour guide - massar!

the bridge that connects the bishops house to the government buidling.

during the plague, the heaps of bodies were taken out of the city under this bridge so that the bishop could bless them from the window above. 

now you're supposed to walk backwards under it and make a wish.

space invader!

wax leftover from candles that were placed in this plaza as a memorial.

many died here because of franco and the bomb that he dropped

(catalunya was franco's biggest opposition during spain's civil war. franco enlisted his friend, hitler)

also, soldiers were lined up along this wall and shot, point blank.

 see the damage, not only from the bomb, but also the bullet holes?

and can you see where franco repaired this building? he did so so that he'd look less guilty in court.

this used to be a building for childcare...until the bombing.

kaitlin & me

aaaaaalmost touching both walls.

this is in the jewish quarters. they were only given a limited amount of room to build...

so they built in the shape of a cone, getting wider as it got higher. 

the taller people in the group could touch both sides with ease.

i got pretty enamored by the graffiti here. you'll see more farther down...

these are some of the palm trees that were brought to barcelona from hawaii! they did this to restore and refine barcelona before the '92 olympics! apparently no one knew of barcelona or could tell you in which country it was until 1992 when the olympics were held there. they made beaches for the olympics, too! there were no beaches but now there are 7 man made beaches. from where did the sand come? the sahara desert!

again with the graffiti...

salvador dali's  lobster

loving rick steve's & my bocadillo (like a sandwich on a long roll. we eat them all the time in sevilla)

THIS is the sagrada familia - the cathedral which Gaudi started. he dedicated the end of his life to this project. so much so that he began sleeping there! not that i really had a favorite architect before, but now it's antonio gaudi. this facade is the one that he saw through all the way before he died. it's called the nativity facade.

and this is the opposite facade...the bottom is not gaudi for his plans were ruined. but this is another architect's version.  it's the passion facade.

 it's full of symbolism. the numbers in this grid add up to 33, jesus' age when he died.

 jesus' hair is composed of pages of this book, symbolizing the pages of the bible.

 this is a representation of what gaudi's desk looked like when he died. see the bag hanging up? inside was toast with honey on it. it's like i'm paying my respects every morning when i eat breakfast!

 the inside of the nave. beautiful. eventually all the windows will be stained glass...

rick steve's said:

"part of gaudi's religious vision was a love for nature. he said 'nothing is invented; it is written in nature.' his columns blossom with life, and little windows let light filter in like the canopy of a rain forest, giving both privacy and an intimate connection with God."

 we rode an elevator to the top of the nativity facade...and here's barcelona from the top!

 the stairs on the way down? pretty intimidating.

this is what we found on our way back through the barri gotica... a community project. you were to pick up a marker and write why you love barcelona! i wanted to check it out more... but we were late for our cooking class!

how to make paella!

SUNDAY.

we visited parc guell..another gaudi work. doesn't it look like dr. seuss? rick steve's called it "cake-in-the-rain."

 and the mosaics? awesome.

casa mila, also by gaudi. we only had time to walk by...

but shoot. so cool!

it was quite the awesome adventure! it wasn't hard to say goodbye to kaitlin, however. i'll see her in about 5 weeks when i visit paris!

and then there was lagos

portugal, portugal, portugal

it rained, quite a lot, on and off and on and off...
BUT that doesn't stop us from having a good time, right?
of course not!
DAY 1: friday
so this is dona ana, the beach outside our hotel!

in a cave! (we climbed up in there while hanging out on the beach during our first day)

DAY 2: saturday

 kinda eerie looking because it wasn't raining, but the threat was there, for sure.

 a view of the center of lagos... from a beach

 sunny, right? that's what we thought too.


then BAM.

 less than awesome.

 chocolate-covered oreos and my first pretzel-sighting!

then we went to "the end of the world"
where they thought the world ended, well at least until 1492!
if i didn't know better, i sure would have believed it!
nature has a real easy time making me feel small.

 then we walked to the center of lagos for food!
the chef and waiter were AWESOME... in a little hole-in-the-wall portugese place!

 i had the lamb!

 and for dessert...

DAY 3: sunday

we thought we were getting a day of sun!
but it was about 60 minutes of sun...

 but the sun we did have, we enjoyed!
soaked from getting hit on the beach, we ran back to the hotel,
changed clothes and played cards until our ride home...

 with an amazing rainbow!