one week down...so fast

I cannot believe how much I love it here. It is so fun and so beautiful and I have great friends and family. But in spite of all that, I still miss home and everyone there. Classes are really fun and challenging, but my professors are super nice. I have been around center city Sevilla more, and every time I see more things that are so beautiful.

I can't believe that it has already been a week! I am having such a great time! much love to everyone at home!

FRIENDS: lauren, mary, and I

El Primer Día de la Escuela!

Photos: Top: The Guadaliquivir River that runs through Sevilla Bottom: Me, Arianna, and Mary in center city Sevilla.




Yesterday was my first day of classes. I was really really nervous because they were all to be taught in Spanish. My roommate Lisa and her friend Lauren turned out to be in my first class. This was handy because I was definitely not late for my first class. My first class was a Literature class that focuses on "El Quijote." It will certainly be a challenge seeing as it means that I have to read an entire book in Spanish...yikes. At least I know people in the class so we can work together some. My professor seems really nice though and I could understand everything she said! yay! It turns out that if I focus really hard on the professor, I can get a lot. It was also encouraging to hear lots of students who had been to other Spanish speaking countries and were really good at Spanish, say that Spain's dialect is reallly reallly difficult to understand at first. They speak really fast here, lisp their s's and z's into "th", and if their happens to be an s at the end of a word, they just drop it. CONFUSING. anywho. The professors are really great, and going home after school, I understood Lola a ton better. She had just gotten back...she was in Madrid visiting her son for a few days.

My second class is sort of like Reading and Composition at an Intermediate level. It will be hard, but I think I will learn A LOT in there. Useful things too, I hope. My third class is a Culture and Civilizations class and the professor is hilarious. I don't think he speaks any English whatsoever. If the professor wasnt good, that class would be horrifically boring I think. My first class is at 10:30 and I get out of my last one at 2:50. What a fantastic schedule, eh? That is perfect: I get home just in time for lunch and siesta! Which is perfect because everything is closed during siesta, so why go out anyway? (siesta is from 2 pm to 5pm). I officially think there should be a siesta in every country. It makes the general stress level of life go down significantly. Today (Thursday) I only have one class, and it is from 1:30-2:50. SO NICE! It is a Phonetics and Linguistics class...eek. I am a little worried about it, but hopefully it will be interesting and doable!

So, it is actually a bit colder here than I thought. Well, no. That's not true; I just thought that the warm would feel warmer. haha. And it is freezing in my house. No heat. When you live in the Mediterranean, and you only have one "cold month" a year, it is definitely NOT cost efficient to have heat in your home. I invested in some 3 euro slippers first thing. I also just purchased the cutest coat in the entire world. It was not expensive, and it will keep me very warm. The wind here is CRAZY. Kind of like Boone, except not as cold by far. It is so beautiful here! I just love it.

The exchange students are going on an "excursion to the Roman Ruins of Italica" in two weeks!!! yayayayay ITALICA....which is in Spain....
I will continue to keep you posted :-)
xo
ks

tour + friends + beautiful downtown sevilla = awesome

Downtown Sevilla is the most beautiful place in the whole entire world. Hands down. At least, it is the most beautiful place that I have ever been or seen. Some of the exchange students went out on a free walking tour of the city last evening around 7 pm. It was so incredible. Before that, me, Arianna, Mary (the girls I traveled with), Lisa, Lauren, and Jenn (my roommate and her friends) went out shopping for a little bit. We had so much fun! The tour was amazing! The architecture and history of the city is breathtaking. We learned some fun facts (example: any soccer - futbol - team that has "real" in front of their name - Real Madrid - is only called that because a member of the royal family was a big fan and attending lots of games), and some incredible history (the Moors from Africa reigned over most of Spain for 800 years, and heavily influenced the language, the art, and the architecture), and saw amazing sites of historical and current significance (El Mercado de Triana - the market of Triana - is on the site of the original Spanish Inquisition / we saw the home of La Esperanza de Triana a rival statue of the Virgin Mary that is seen during the parades during Semana Santa, prior to Easter...her rival in fame and beauty is La Esperanza de la Macarena). We concluded the tour with a cup of free arabic tea (yummm) and great visiting. After that new friends went out with old friends to get to know each other and to explore the city and have some fun!
What a great day!

Today, I had a super long (but helpful) orientation session, and got my class schedule. I got all the classes that I requested and I have an amazingly awesome schedule. All of my classes are in Spanish, so it will be quite an adventure. Any and all prayers are appreciated.

xoxo
ks

pictures to come!

Nueva Comanpera

Photos: (Top) how I usually take my meals... (Bottom) the view from my bedroom window

When I woke up this morning, my roommate Lisa was here! Yay new friend! She is wonderful so far and is very helpful. She speaks incredible Spanish and has been here one semester already. Woo hoo. She is an excellent wealth of information on things that I need to get and stuff. It is really good so far. Maria is also incredibly helpful and sweet. She took me out this afternoon to see if I could find an ATM that would take my debit card. WE FOUND ONE! woooooo. I was very happy to find that I did, in fact, have access to my money. It would have been a serious downer if that had not been the case.

I still am adjusting to my new time schedule. It is very strange to me that I have to wait until the afternoon before I even consider calling home. I still need a phone, but Lisa says that it wont be a problem at all, and we can go tomorrow...after my placement exam. I am really worried about that. Ugh. What if it turns out that I dont know any Spanish at all? Boo. What if I cannot even place into the classes that I need to take? I pray that these are idle worries. The clouds are finally parting and I can see some blue skies. I hope they are here to stay!

La lluvia :-/

So it rained all day today. Blah. I was hoping to get some good exploring under my belt but no such luck. It let up a bit early this afternoon and I was able to make the quick trek to UPO (the university) I couldnt get far or see very much, because of the immediate and strong recurrence of the rain. (As it seems the Rain in Spain does not only Fall Mainly On the Plain). It then proceeded to pour its guts out all day long. Ah well. Then I had the inspired idea to take pictures of the house to post, only to find that my camera battery was dead. Oh well. So i took a nap instead. I am still recovering from jet lag I think, and the rain multiplied this effect.

Last night the big news story happened:
I woke up to a giant crash in my room. It scared me awake and I sat up and immediately looked around. I didnt see anything out of place, so I went back to sleep. Five minutes later I heard another loud crash. Again I got up and turned on the light but saw nothing of interest. So now that I was wide awake I decided to check my emails etc. Since it was still pretty early at home in the States. I proceded to pull out my desk chair and see the reason for the crash. The entire contents (not that much) of my desk drawer were laying on the floor along with the bottom of the drawer. Awesome. Not even in the country 36 hours and already I broke something. Great.
Not to mention that I had to look up like thirty words to explain to Lola what happened.

At any rate she saw it this morning and laughed, explaining that it would be inexpensive for her to repair it. She spent the day in Madrid today.

Thats about all for today...I am posting a picture of my room, since my camera is charged again and its the only lit room in the house at the moment (electricity is very expensive) and it is dark outside.











I love you all dearly.

te amo
kms

AQUI!

I have finally at long last arrived in Spain. Of course it is beautiful, but I am almost too tired to notice. It was a very long trip. Almost as soon as I was ready for the trip to get underway, I was ready for it to be over. The flight from Charlotte to Chicago was pretty painless and was passed in crosswords. The layover in Chicago was bizarre and longer than expected. Our flight ended up leaving over an hour late and we sat on the runway for what seemed like hours waiting to take off. I ended up having a section of two seats to myself for the nine hour flight which was really great.

But I officially have my first multicultural horrifyingly embarrassing moment: I packed a pretty hefty backpack (courtesy of Brian Lakin) and for comfort I had it strapped to a set of attachable wheels. "It will definitely fit in the overhead bins!" (-Mom). right? WRONG! Although I definitely should receive an A++ for my effort. First of all I had to stand on my tippy toes with my 22 lb bad over my head to even reach the bin. great fun. I begin the cramming process but nothing happens. Absolutely nothing. I, of course, PERSEVERE! again and again I attempt this impossible feat and finally a very short, very middle aged, very balding man offers to assist me. Does his sudden outburst of sweaty yet valiant efforts yield positive results? Well, seeing our obvious failure, the flight atttendant comes over to offer his services. Hoping to be of some assistance, he begins rapidfire instructions in Spanish. I am fulstered and cannot figure ot what he is saying, that poor man is sweating and still cramming and Fernandes our flight attendant is gesticulating and jumping and shouting. Finally I catch the word "ruedas" which I think maybe means wheels. And suddenly i understand. I must (of course) remove the oh so easily removable wheels to fit my backpack in the overhead compartment. yay.

anyway, I got to enjoy my first in flight meal on a plane. Not too bad, all things considered.

I also was annoyed by some chatty Italians (or maybe Portuguese?) gentlemen sitting behind me. They somehow managed to talk above the volume of my iPod for the entire nine hour flight. the ENTIRE nine hour flight. It was great. However, it was a cultural experience.

I conked out on the one hour flight from Madrid to Sevilla. It is so beautiful here; and aside from the fact that the ATMs in the airport dont take my debit card, it was a painless taxi ride to Lola's house. It is perfect. This neighborhood is absolutely amazing. So many colors! The house is delightful and I have my own little room. Lola is the sweetest woman ever, and makes me feel very at ease even though she speaks zero English. Zero.

She made me a delicious tortilla espanola for dinner, and I might have a new favorite food. I am very happy so far, but I definitely miss home a bit. I think for now though I am going to hit the hay. I am very very tired.

Love and (as Lola says) Un Beso!

ready to go!

I have been waiting forever. and ever.
and ever.
I AM READY TO GET ON THIS FLIGHT AND GET TO SPAIN! fortunately airports are semi entertaining...and I like them. I feel like I should contribute a "thanks" section to everyone who expressed excitement for me at any point in time in my preparation to go to Sevilla. I have heard from many loved ones that my trip has been duly "prayed up" and will be blessed and super fun. I just know they are right! not that it is all fun and games going to a new country to attend school and to take classes in another language entirely.... a Little teeny tiny bit intimidating. yes? YES. But I am SO DANG EXCITED.

hopefully the bilingual-ness will be hasty in its arrival. :-)
also...this flight.

adios para ahora.
ks