SAIIE PROGRAM JOURNAL

This was my first week in Sevilla! (For this program). My mom was born in Cordoba and went to high school and university in Sevilla, so I have been here almost every summer of my life for a few weeks. Before the program started I arrived about a week and a half before to beat jetlag before class started and settle in. I also went to Córdoba to visit family for a few days before my program started. Next to my abuelo's apartment building is a Nicaraguan restaurant he goes to everyday. My family also goes there when we visit so I went there a few times to hangout and catch up with people there. Last Friday was the first day we had class, it was orientation day at the University of Sevilla and SAIIE. It went well and I met my new classmates in the program. We went out that night for dinner all together with Stuart, Sam, and Sean (the program directors) and after dinner I went out with my new friends in the program to a few different bars. As the week went on I got used to my class schedule. In some of my University of Sevilla classes I made new friends, I forgot to ask for some of their contact info though so I'll go out with them next weekend. In my class about Andalucía the professor has a bit of an andaluz accent and is from a pueblo in Córdoba, I like him but half the people dropped the class because they couldn't understand him. I also plan on going to a flamenco show later tonight with some friends from SAIIE. The show is SCHEDULED to start at 11pm and end at 5am which is insane but I doubt I'll stay that long, good thing I cleared my schedule for tomorrow.

Front view from sunset boat.

This week went well. I'm getting to know the people in my class more and I'm having to use google maps less. I've also been learning a lot of what some buildings I walked past as a kid were and just never really investigated, especially in the city center. This weekend about half of my program and I went to Málaga to do some sightseeing. I have family there so I stayed with my aunt, uncle and cousin in a town just outside the city. The subway system there is really good and took me 20 minutes to get from outside of town to in for less than a euro a trip with a subway card. I went out both nights I was there and most the people I met were tourists or recent immigrants. My program group only went out one night, the second night I went out with a friend from Córdoba I know that studies in Málaga and her friends went out with us as well.  The last full day in Málaga we went out on a sunset boat to see the view of the city from the ocean, and of course the sunset. As for getting to and from Málaga the bus was cheap and nice, the round trip tickets cost 40 euros. This week I'm going to meet up with a student who's professor teaches me in another class and wants to practice English, and another person in a language exchange program through the university.

La Plaza de España in Sevilla

This week I got back from Málaga and took it easy. I met a few new friends that wanted to practice English so we hung out and I practiced my Spanish and vise versa. One of my new friends told me about a strip of bars I should check out to meet people and hangout so Thursday night (I don't have class Friday) I may swing by and check it out. He also told me about a bar that has a language exchange from 9pm until closing every Wednesday so I'm going to check that out too this week. Also this weekend my uncle and cousin came to visit. We went out to eat and spoke a lot about a trip I have coming up I'm planning around a lot of the Mediterranean.  I didn't go out with friends this weekend as I was exhausted from going out late every weekend and wanted to knock out all of my homework for the next week or so, I'm glad I stayed in because now I don't have to do work during the week when I'm tired.

Here's a picture of me with a group of new friends I made at Carnaval in Cádiz.

This week I started working on a massive project for my social psychology of language learning class. It's a half hour presentation with a question and answer portion after. Besides that nothing happened until the weekend started. I went to Cádiz for Carnaval on Friday (Carnaval is a big party that started hundreds of years ago and has happened every year since). There's costumes and singing and dancing it's a great time. No one else I know was interested in going so I went on my own. The first place I went to was a local pub where the people there told me the big party starts Saturday night, not Friday night as on Friday everyone is at home watching a carnaval theater show on tv. I talked with the bartender and his dad for a while then went to another pub. This pub was rock and roll themed and here I met a theater group from Stockholm (the capital of Sweden). Two of the people in the group were from Cádiz, the rest were from different places. I got to know them for a while and then talked to the bartenders for a while as they were cool people as well. 3am came and I had to head back to my hostel in Puerto Real (a town just outside the city). I ended up finding a group of people who were also looking for a taxi to Puerto Real, all the taxis were busy so we had a while to talk. We ended up becoming friends and deciding to go out the next night together, they're graduate students from different parts of Latin America (mostly) and most of them live in Cádiz, a few were from out of town visiting people. Saturday comes and the bald guy behind me in the picture brought a water balloon filler/squirter thing full of rum. The Carnaval of Cádiz is primarily people drinking alcohol in the street with different costumes on, so it was perfect for the occasion. I ended up getting to sleep at 8:30 that morning and left on my bus for Sevilla at 3:30pm. It was awesome and I will never forget it!

I also know a few words of Arabic so a few people were interested in talking to me. A taxi driver after hearing me use 5 words of Arabic asked if I wanted to marry a Moroccan girl and tried setting me up with one which was funny. Another time on the street a guy noticed someone had asked me for money and said "hey that guy asked me for money too" and we walked around the main street for about an hour just talking about life and music since he's a musician and I'm big on music, I used to play but sadly I don't have time anymore.  He also told me a lot about Morocco and how it's changed a lot over the past 2 decades. I also made our tour guide laugh when he was telling us to be careful of poop on the sidewalk and I pointed at it and said "shit" in Arabic.  Overall I had a great time, saw beautiful sites, ate lots of good food, bought cool things to bring home and met cool people. I didn't want to go back to Spain at the end of the weekend!

This is a picture of Christopher Columbus's tomb in the cathedral in Sevilla.

This week was fun! My friend Marco visited me from the US since it's spring break now. We went to a bunch of monuments, Italica (roman ruins), the cathedral, the fine arts museum, the mosque (in Córdoba) and the roman bridge (also in Córdoba). We also went to a few bars around calle Feria with some people from their hostel. Calle Feria is a street in Sevilla with multiple bars on the street and in the general area. I also took 2 exams at the start of the week, one of which went well the other I think went ok.  Also I started wearing my djellaba I bought in Morocco around and multiple people of Moroccan descent complimented me in the street, that's been pretty cool. 

I sadly don't have any cool pictures from this week. I ended up getting sick on Tuesday night and didn't go to class all week. On Friday I had to go to the American consulate to get a new passport as mine expires in a few months, after I went to Córdoba to spend time with my abuela. I went back to Sevilla on Sunday, that was my whole week.

Here's a picture of the beautiful wall art of the Alhambra.

This week I had a lot of homework. I had two presentations that I just did today as I'm writing this (week 10). I went out with some new friends this week I made at a language exchange at a bar. A new friend of mine is Puerto Rican and from NYC and moved here from Florida a few months ago. He invite me and a few people over to his place to make us pizza. He has a very expensive fancy wood burning pizza oven he used to make Neapolitan style pizza. While hanging out at my new friends place, another friend that was there told me can get us into 2 private tents at la feria de Abril (normally it's hard to get into the private ones) so that's a relief. I won't be stuck at the public ones the whole time. Also, my friend is coming to visit me in a few weeks when class is over! He's going to meet some of my family here in Sevilla and Córdoba, and then we're visiting Italy and Greece together.

It's the week before holy week, professors are starting to talk about final exams and the last material that will be taught before exams. I woke up with multiple missed calls on friday because there was a daytrip people thought I was going on to Córdoba but I never said I was. That was funny, I felt bad at first but they said they didn't wait more than 10/15 minutes so I didn't feel too bad. Normally I go on every included trip but since I already go regularly to see my abuela and I stay with her for a few days at a time going for just a few hours didn't make much sense. Also another friend of mine said he was going to visit me here and also go to Italy and Greece with me after the program, so that's pretty awesome.

During semana santa I didn't do much honestly. I went out to a salsa bar with friends a few times and visited my abuela in Córdoba for a few days. When I was there I saw some friends of my abuela and we watched a semana santa procession from her balcony. It was interesting but a bit boring, my abuela and her friends seemed to really like it though. I also started planning more of my trip for after the program. One night when I was walking home from a bar the largest procession in Sevilla was happening right in the middle of my way home, that was a bit annoying to get through to go home lol.

The end of the program is in sight. It really sucks but I can't complain, I'm staying in Europe for longer than everyone else. There's also still a lot to look forward too. Tomorrow is the trip to Ronda and I'm excited I've always wanted to see it, my family always spoke well of it. I've seen pictures and it looks beautiful.