When we were in the streets of Burgos, we came across this insane accordian and xylophone player.
I wish I had a longer clip, but my friends were embarrassed that I was taking video.
Random trivia: After I stopped the camera, there was an unrelated gunshot sound in the plaza that scared us all to death. It ended up being a firework.
Another random trivia tidbit: The same thing happened on our Madrid tour, with the whole fireworks/gunshot thing. Apparently Spaniards like setting them off in public places.
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Sunday, September 20, 2009
A few select pictures
Our school recently had a Study Abroad picture contest. There were four categories, which I cannot remember, and you could submit pictures to each one. There'd be a winner in each category and the prize was $50. You could only win one category at most.
So I compiled a ton of pictures from my study abroad experience, but I didn't enter the contest. Why? Because this semester is so unbelievably busy that it's ridiculous.
Here are some pictures I just love, some are repeats, but it's really the creme de la creme of the photos I have from my whole semester, which is a LOT.
So I compiled a ton of pictures from my study abroad experience, but I didn't enter the contest. Why? Because this semester is so unbelievably busy that it's ridiculous.
Here are some pictures I just love, some are repeats, but it's really the creme de la creme of the photos I have from my whole semester, which is a LOT.
A boy (or girl?) whistling to the tunes played during the parade on San Sebastian Day.
A child dressed as a leprechaun for the parade.
A group of girls in costume for the parade, banging barrels to the beat.
A young boy in a chef hat, blue and white (San Sebastian's colors) carrying a drum to play along with the La Tamborrada.
Overlooking the water in Lisboa, Portugal, from the castle entrance.
Raquel, Natalia and Ana sitting by the water in Barcelona.
Me and the lizard fountain in Parc Guell in Barcelona.
Cool rock archways in Parc Guell, Barcelona.
Weird Samurai man in Parc Guell, Barcelona. I watch him with a smile as he does some sword moves.
More kids from the parade from San Sebastian Day.
Entraince of Parc Guell, this man poses for pictures dressed as the famous lizard fountain.
Palm trees in a park in Barcelona
Obama's face...in a window of a sushi restaurant...in Barcelona...
Sleeping/laughing in the sun on the dock in Barcelona.
Raquel, Me and Ana in front of the water in Barcelona.
A view of Toledo, Spain as we drive towards it during the Madrid Tour.
The creek/river in Toledo as we drive over a bridge.
I just love how European I look right here, don't you? This is at Palacio Royal in Madrid.
View of Madrid as we drive from the airport to our hotel.
Raquel, Ana, Natalia and I scream as we are eaten by a shark in Barcelona
Fishies in the Aquarium in Lisboa, Portugal.
Interesting graffiti in Porto, Portugal.
Giant cider barrels in San Sebastian
View from the 2nd bridge with Ana, walking home one night from the bars.
Toledo? Ohio?! In Toledo, Spain.
Natalie, Me, May and Cassi in a garden in Sevilla.
The beautiful beach in Lagos (and the first time we saw great weather during spring break)
In the same garden as the previous group shot, in Sevilla, with May, Natalie, Mary Kate and myself.
View of Lisboa, Portugal from the castle rooftop.
Alex (or Mary Kate?), Natalie and Cassi in awe at Lisboa's aquarium.
Cassi, Becky, Megan and Annette walking in the fog on our 3 hour hike in Burgos.
I just love these pictures.
The pics from Toledo and Madrid are from the Madrid tour, the Barcelona pics are obviously from when we went to Barcelona over Valentine's day weekend, San Sebastian day was January 20th (some USAC students wore aprons for the celebration, but wrote "Obama" in big letters, too, as it was his inauguration that day), the Lagos, Sevilla, Porto and Lisboa pics are from Spring Break (Holy week) and Burgos pics are from the week after that, for our overnight trip with USAC.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
EVEN MORE Videos!
Here are the rest of 'em!
Again, all are also viewable on youtube at youtube.com/missy8888
And may I remind you that sometimes the best part is at the end...so be sure to watch them all the way through.
Music at the Plaza de Espana in Sevilla:
Alex laughs for a LOOONG time. I don't even know why this happened, or how. Cameras capture the best moments.
May and Natalie comment on a fried, dead lizard they find on the streets of Sevilla.
Foodism: May explains her new religion: food. In Real Alcazar de Sevilla.
Labyrinth in Real Alcazar de Sevilla. Alex has the camera this time...
"Authentic" Flamenco in a Granada restaurant. There are quotes there b/c it's pretty touristy.
Go Johnny Go in Granada. El Mirador de San Nicolas in Granada, near our hostel, hosts some interesting people. Like hippies who play Chuck Berry.
Steel Drum in Barcelona. One of the many unique musicians encountered in Parc Guell in Barcelona.
In Parc Guell, these guys seemed to be playing all the hits of the 90s, including Champagne Supernova
At Parc Guell again, this time Fastball's Outta My Head
Lute Player in Parc Guell More music we came across in Barcelona
Si Fuera un chico in a durum restaurant in Barcelona: AKA Beyonce's "If I were a boy" but sang by her in SPANISH.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Especially if those lemons are crazy street dancers in Barcelona, and making lemonade means taping them. On Las Ramblas in Barcelona, we encounter this man, performing for no audience but himself.
Universong (name of the band) on the streets of Barcelona. We are walking around this maze of old streets when we turn a corner and find this. SO COOL.
On the plane back to Santander from Barcelona, there was a leaky ceiling. Natalia tries to tell the story, but when they re-enact it (hence Ana's weak "achoo" at the beginning), they can't handle themselves
Natalia asks the question that she knows everyone will ask her when she gets back from Barcelona...and she's prepared to know why.
Santander airport needs better decor.
Teleporter AND Hand Dryer! Ana being weird in the bus station in Santander.
Megan shows us around the Sagardo Eguna, or cider fest, in Irun.
New, Not necessarily Bad... Alex comments on art in the Catedral de Burgos.
Again, all are also viewable on youtube at youtube.com/missy8888
And may I remind you that sometimes the best part is at the end...so be sure to watch them all the way through.
Music at the Plaza de Espana in Sevilla:
Alex laughs for a LOOONG time. I don't even know why this happened, or how. Cameras capture the best moments.
May and Natalie comment on a fried, dead lizard they find on the streets of Sevilla.
Foodism: May explains her new religion: food. In Real Alcazar de Sevilla.
Labyrinth in Real Alcazar de Sevilla. Alex has the camera this time...
"Authentic" Flamenco in a Granada restaurant. There are quotes there b/c it's pretty touristy.
Go Johnny Go in Granada. El Mirador de San Nicolas in Granada, near our hostel, hosts some interesting people. Like hippies who play Chuck Berry.
Steel Drum in Barcelona. One of the many unique musicians encountered in Parc Guell in Barcelona.
In Parc Guell, these guys seemed to be playing all the hits of the 90s, including Champagne Supernova
At Parc Guell again, this time Fastball's Outta My Head
Lute Player in Parc Guell More music we came across in Barcelona
Si Fuera un chico in a durum restaurant in Barcelona: AKA Beyonce's "If I were a boy" but sang by her in SPANISH.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Especially if those lemons are crazy street dancers in Barcelona, and making lemonade means taping them. On Las Ramblas in Barcelona, we encounter this man, performing for no audience but himself.
Universong (name of the band) on the streets of Barcelona. We are walking around this maze of old streets when we turn a corner and find this. SO COOL.
On the plane back to Santander from Barcelona, there was a leaky ceiling. Natalia tries to tell the story, but when they re-enact it (hence Ana's weak "achoo" at the beginning), they can't handle themselves
Natalia asks the question that she knows everyone will ask her when she gets back from Barcelona...and she's prepared to know why.
Santander airport needs better decor.
Teleporter AND Hand Dryer! Ana being weird in the bus station in Santander.
Megan shows us around the Sagardo Eguna, or cider fest, in Irun.
New, Not necessarily Bad... Alex comments on art in the Catedral de Burgos.
Monday, September 14, 2009
More Videos!
Here's some more from my youtube!
In Sevilla, the hooded people walk the streets in a somber procession to begin Semana Santa (Holy Week: The week of Easter)
A bit of info: They apparently won't let you purchase alcohol after a certain time during Semana Santa (or maybe just every day), but Alex did a little Spanish convincing and paid the guy in cash and he let her have a 40 of beer. I don't know whether or not that money he took went into the register...we were hiding from the security camera of the store so his boss wouldn't know. Oh well!
More to come!
In Sevilla, the hooded people walk the streets in a somber procession to begin Semana Santa (Holy Week: The week of Easter)
A bit of info: They apparently won't let you purchase alcohol after a certain time during Semana Santa (or maybe just every day), but Alex did a little Spanish convincing and paid the guy in cash and he let her have a 40 of beer. I don't know whether or not that money he took went into the register...we were hiding from the security camera of the store so his boss wouldn't know. Oh well!
More to come!
VIDEOS!
So I uploaded a bunch of miscellaneous footage from my travels on youtube. These are unedited tidbits that I captured from everywhere I went. This includes Burgos, Barcelona, Sevilla, Granada, Porto, Lisboa, Lagos, and Irun.
Some of the footage you may recognize from the Spring Break and Barcelona videos. Some of it is new, though! And I am still making videos with all the footage I have, trust me.
They are all pretty short, under 2 min each. Check them all out either here or on my youtube page, which is http://www.youtube.com/missy8888.
A man, dressed as the Sandeman Wine logo guy, gives us an explaination of what Porto wine exactly is. From my Spring Break footage.
We went walking around Lisboa, Portugal, and took a tour of this castle. A man inside played music. Alex approaches to find a CD for a friend.
A sign warns against falling! In Lisboa, Portugal, in an outdoor castle
In our hostel in Lisboa, Portugal. Cassi has the camera. When she says "take two" she is referring to the previous botched attempt when she ran out of tape.
When in Lagos... But really, when in Lagos, Portugal, the girls (Alex, May, Cassi) decided to hop in a random dude's boat. Jordan later joined. The commenting in the background is Natalie, Tyler, Mike and Chris (who we met in the hostel, who are from Texas and studying abroad in Sevilla for the semester). We later caught up with those three boys when we moved on to Sevilla after Lagos.
At midnight on Easter morning, the bells rang out at the Catedral de Sevilla!
Some of the footage you may recognize from the Spring Break and Barcelona videos. Some of it is new, though! And I am still making videos with all the footage I have, trust me.
They are all pretty short, under 2 min each. Check them all out either here or on my youtube page, which is http://www.youtube.com/missy8888.
A man, dressed as the Sandeman Wine logo guy, gives us an explaination of what Porto wine exactly is. From my Spring Break footage.
We went walking around Lisboa, Portugal, and took a tour of this castle. A man inside played music. Alex approaches to find a CD for a friend.
A sign warns against falling! In Lisboa, Portugal, in an outdoor castle
In our hostel in Lisboa, Portugal. Cassi has the camera. When she says "take two" she is referring to the previous botched attempt when she ran out of tape.
When in Lagos... But really, when in Lagos, Portugal, the girls (Alex, May, Cassi) decided to hop in a random dude's boat. Jordan later joined. The commenting in the background is Natalie, Tyler, Mike and Chris (who we met in the hostel, who are from Texas and studying abroad in Sevilla for the semester). We later caught up with those three boys when we moved on to Sevilla after Lagos.
At midnight on Easter morning, the bells rang out at the Catedral de Sevilla!
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
50 things to do before I die
According to the list at
http://thetravelersnotebook.com/activity-guide/50-things-to-do-before-you-die/
I have accomplished quite a few!
The bolded/italicized are those I have completed.
50 Things to do Before you Die
1. Set foot on each of the seven continents. Antarctica might be a tough one, but once you’ve reached all seven you can truly call yourself a world traveler.
2. Cross a country on a bicycle. A bicycle tour takes some planning, but it beats being separated from a country though a passenger-side window.
3. Ride something bigger than a horse. Trekking through the jungle on the back of a two story tall elephant will surely be something you remember forever.
4. Live like a local for a month. The experience of visiting native peoples will give you way more insight into another way of life than two years hopping from one backpacker ghetto to the next. (obviously, a semester is much better)
5. Visit a “real” blues bar in Chicago. What better way to leave music’s commercialism behind and find the soul of the blues? (This is not the first time I have seen Chicago praised in a list of things having to do with the ENTIRE WORLD. I can now fully appreciate living in such a great city)
6. Learn another language. This is definitely a weighty and time-consuming proposition, but there are plenty of resources out there to ease the process. (English, Spanish...Basque?)
7. Go heli-skiing. The access to snow and terrain via heli is different (read: better) that anything else you’ll ever experience.
8. Travel India by train. With its extensive rail network, this mode of transport is the best way to see one of the world’s most colorful and diverse countries.
9. Climb one of the world’s Seven Summits. Climbing mountains is not for the faint-hearted, but everyone has had a dream of standing atop one.
10. Dive with a whale shark. Swimming with these gentle giants is among the most powerful wilderness experiences in the world.
11. Participate in a Carnival parade in Brazil. You haven’t had a good night out until you’ve been to the biggest party in a nation of big parties.
12. Dance Tango in Argentina.
13. Surf. It’s not about being a ripper but just catching waves. (If the weather actually gets nice here in Spain, maybe I can try it here, but if not, I've already completed the task in Hawaii)
14. SCUBA in the Great Barrier Reef. The largest coral reef in the world is a must for dive enthusiasts. It is the world’s most unique aquatic environment. (Well, I put on some scuba goggles and went fishing around in Hawaii, does that count?)
15. Publish an article about your travels. Part of traveling is sharing your experiences with others. Plus, getting published might be easier than you think.
16. Volunteer abroad for a month.
17. Follow in the footsteps of your favorite travel book. What better guide than a book that inspired you to travel in the first place?
18. Take a bush plane ride into Africa’s interior. These lightly visited regions are filled with unique cultures and diverse wildlife.
19. Cross a glacier on foot. Traversing these fast-disappearing natural wonders is an adventure that future generations might not be able to experience.
20. Visit the source of one of the world’s great rivers. Great rivers, like the Nile, have humble beginnings.
21. Climb an active volcano. (okay, it wasn't active, but I walked across dormant ones in Hawaii)
22. Buy a boat and learn to sail. Before the Brothers Wright, everyone traveled by wind power. It’s still the most sustainable way to travel there is.
23. Follow your food from field to table. Most people in the world still eat what they have picked with their own hands. Why not get back to these basics? (like the time we picked potatoes in southern illinois and brought them home to eat)
24. Bathe in the Ganges. What better way to experience the spiritual heart of India?
25. Travel around the world. Sure, you could do this without ever setting foot outside of planes and airports, but few people ever truly traverse the entire globe. Round the world tickets are great for budget-minded wanderers.
26. Photograph an endangered species. Aside from an image you can keep for a lifetime, it will remind you, and others, how fragile life can be.
27. Participate in Burning Man . As they say: “Trying to explain Burning Man to someone who has never been is like trying to explain color to a blind person.”
28. Spend 24 hours alone in the jungle.
29. Learn how to make a national dish. What is the one and only thing that everyone has in common? Eating. (I will bring home to Chicago my wisdom of travelling along with my skills of making a tortilla de patatas. Hey, if the gastronomic society said I was good, then I am GOOD.)
30. Teach English in a foreign country. Sure, it’s a way to fund your travels, but also the experience of a lifetime. (I taught classes that one day at the Toki Alai school near SS a couple weeks ago)
31. Attend a music festival in another country.
32. Cross a country using only public transportation. See a country the way most of its people do: from the window of a bus, train, or ferry. (I think nine buses in two weeks across Portugal and Spain counts under this category...plus the trips to Burgos, Barcelona, and Toledo also count)
33. Spend the night in a storied/historic hotel. You might not even have to leave town to experience a night of classic atmosphere. (of all the places I have gone with my family, I know some are storied. Like the one in Silverton where I almost died by falling in the bathtub...that place was like the hotel from the Shining)
34. Attend the Olympics. Whatever you say about the commercialism of the Olympic Games, they are one of the biggest events on the planet. (Maybe in 2016 in Chicago...?)
35. Meet your favorite (living) travel writer. They’ve inspired you; now thank them for it.
36. Travel to Germany to experience Love Parade. It’s one of the biggest festivals, attendance-wise, on the planet.
37. Partake in a Japanese Tea Ceremony. This timeless tradition is at the heart of Japanese culture.
38. Join a caravan in the Sahara. See how people can thrive in one of the world’s harshest environments.
39. Go to Oktoberfest. The meeting of over 6 million beer afficionados and drinking song singers is one of the biggest parties in Europe.
40. Stand at the North or South Pole.
41. Be in the stands when two rival South American club teams play each other in soccer. Soccer (sorry, football) is a passion for most of the world’s population.
42. Visit the birthplace or gravesite of a cultural icon. Could be Che Guevara or Picasso or Levi Strauss or the guy who invented widgets; anyone you think is important. (I've been to JFK's grave)
43. Find your version of “The Beach.” One of the best travel books ever inspired a generation of backpackers. Why not find your own version of untouched paradise?
44. Enjoy a freshly rolled cigar in Cuba. Taste a hand rolled specialty close to its source.
45. Visit every capital city in Europe. The crowded continent is full of beautiful architecture and diverse cultures.
46. Watch an orchestral performance in Vienna.
47. Skydive. It is the ultimate thrill, unless you add a wingsuit, and actually fly.
48. Bike the Pacific Coast Highway. (maybe not, but I have ridden a bike over the Golden Gate Bridge)
49. Shake hands with someone who has truly changed a country.
50. Participate in the world’s biggest water fight during Thailand’s New Year’s festivities (Songkran).
http://thetravelersnotebook.com/activity-guide/50-things-to-do-before-you-die/
I have accomplished quite a few!
The bolded/italicized are those I have completed.
50 Things to do Before you Die
1. Set foot on each of the seven continents. Antarctica might be a tough one, but once you’ve reached all seven you can truly call yourself a world traveler.
2. Cross a country on a bicycle. A bicycle tour takes some planning, but it beats being separated from a country though a passenger-side window.
3. Ride something bigger than a horse. Trekking through the jungle on the back of a two story tall elephant will surely be something you remember forever.
4. Live like a local for a month. The experience of visiting native peoples will give you way more insight into another way of life than two years hopping from one backpacker ghetto to the next. (obviously, a semester is much better)
5. Visit a “real” blues bar in Chicago. What better way to leave music’s commercialism behind and find the soul of the blues? (This is not the first time I have seen Chicago praised in a list of things having to do with the ENTIRE WORLD. I can now fully appreciate living in such a great city)
6. Learn another language. This is definitely a weighty and time-consuming proposition, but there are plenty of resources out there to ease the process. (English, Spanish...Basque?)
7. Go heli-skiing. The access to snow and terrain via heli is different (read: better) that anything else you’ll ever experience.
8. Travel India by train. With its extensive rail network, this mode of transport is the best way to see one of the world’s most colorful and diverse countries.
9. Climb one of the world’s Seven Summits. Climbing mountains is not for the faint-hearted, but everyone has had a dream of standing atop one.
10. Dive with a whale shark. Swimming with these gentle giants is among the most powerful wilderness experiences in the world.
11. Participate in a Carnival parade in Brazil. You haven’t had a good night out until you’ve been to the biggest party in a nation of big parties.
12. Dance Tango in Argentina.
13. Surf. It’s not about being a ripper but just catching waves. (If the weather actually gets nice here in Spain, maybe I can try it here, but if not, I've already completed the task in Hawaii)
14. SCUBA in the Great Barrier Reef. The largest coral reef in the world is a must for dive enthusiasts. It is the world’s most unique aquatic environment. (Well, I put on some scuba goggles and went fishing around in Hawaii, does that count?)
15. Publish an article about your travels. Part of traveling is sharing your experiences with others. Plus, getting published might be easier than you think.
16. Volunteer abroad for a month.
17. Follow in the footsteps of your favorite travel book. What better guide than a book that inspired you to travel in the first place?
18. Take a bush plane ride into Africa’s interior. These lightly visited regions are filled with unique cultures and diverse wildlife.
19. Cross a glacier on foot. Traversing these fast-disappearing natural wonders is an adventure that future generations might not be able to experience.
20. Visit the source of one of the world’s great rivers. Great rivers, like the Nile, have humble beginnings.
21. Climb an active volcano. (okay, it wasn't active, but I walked across dormant ones in Hawaii)
22. Buy a boat and learn to sail. Before the Brothers Wright, everyone traveled by wind power. It’s still the most sustainable way to travel there is.
23. Follow your food from field to table. Most people in the world still eat what they have picked with their own hands. Why not get back to these basics? (like the time we picked potatoes in southern illinois and brought them home to eat)
24. Bathe in the Ganges. What better way to experience the spiritual heart of India?
25. Travel around the world. Sure, you could do this without ever setting foot outside of planes and airports, but few people ever truly traverse the entire globe. Round the world tickets are great for budget-minded wanderers.
26. Photograph an endangered species. Aside from an image you can keep for a lifetime, it will remind you, and others, how fragile life can be.
27. Participate in Burning Man . As they say: “Trying to explain Burning Man to someone who has never been is like trying to explain color to a blind person.”
28. Spend 24 hours alone in the jungle.
29. Learn how to make a national dish. What is the one and only thing that everyone has in common? Eating. (I will bring home to Chicago my wisdom of travelling along with my skills of making a tortilla de patatas. Hey, if the gastronomic society said I was good, then I am GOOD.)
30. Teach English in a foreign country. Sure, it’s a way to fund your travels, but also the experience of a lifetime. (I taught classes that one day at the Toki Alai school near SS a couple weeks ago)
31. Attend a music festival in another country.
32. Cross a country using only public transportation. See a country the way most of its people do: from the window of a bus, train, or ferry. (I think nine buses in two weeks across Portugal and Spain counts under this category...plus the trips to Burgos, Barcelona, and Toledo also count)
33. Spend the night in a storied/historic hotel. You might not even have to leave town to experience a night of classic atmosphere. (of all the places I have gone with my family, I know some are storied. Like the one in Silverton where I almost died by falling in the bathtub...that place was like the hotel from the Shining)
34. Attend the Olympics. Whatever you say about the commercialism of the Olympic Games, they are one of the biggest events on the planet. (Maybe in 2016 in Chicago...?)
35. Meet your favorite (living) travel writer. They’ve inspired you; now thank them for it.
36. Travel to Germany to experience Love Parade. It’s one of the biggest festivals, attendance-wise, on the planet.
37. Partake in a Japanese Tea Ceremony. This timeless tradition is at the heart of Japanese culture.
38. Join a caravan in the Sahara. See how people can thrive in one of the world’s harshest environments.
39. Go to Oktoberfest. The meeting of over 6 million beer afficionados and drinking song singers is one of the biggest parties in Europe.
40. Stand at the North or South Pole.
41. Be in the stands when two rival South American club teams play each other in soccer. Soccer (sorry, football) is a passion for most of the world’s population.
42. Visit the birthplace or gravesite of a cultural icon. Could be Che Guevara or Picasso or Levi Strauss or the guy who invented widgets; anyone you think is important. (I've been to JFK's grave)
43. Find your version of “The Beach.” One of the best travel books ever inspired a generation of backpackers. Why not find your own version of untouched paradise?
44. Enjoy a freshly rolled cigar in Cuba. Taste a hand rolled specialty close to its source.
45. Visit every capital city in Europe. The crowded continent is full of beautiful architecture and diverse cultures.
46. Watch an orchestral performance in Vienna.
47. Skydive. It is the ultimate thrill, unless you add a wingsuit, and actually fly.
48. Bike the Pacific Coast Highway. (maybe not, but I have ridden a bike over the Golden Gate Bridge)
49. Shake hands with someone who has truly changed a country.
50. Participate in the world’s biggest water fight during Thailand’s New Year’s festivities (Songkran).
PARTY ANIMALLLL
Stumbleupon.com takes you to random websites that users have marked as interesting, funny, or just intriguing.
I stumbled upon (literally) this website today.
http://matadornights.com/20-craziest-party-hostels-around-the-world/
It ranks the top 20 party hostels IN THE WORLD.
In this semester alone, I have stayed in 10% of those listed: The Rising Cock (Lagos, during spring break) and Hostel Kabul (Barcelona, for a weekend trip).
Funny enough, the reasons we chose the hostels had nothing to do with the fact they were ranked party hostels. We had no idea they were party hostels before we booked them.
Hostel Kabul we booked just because it got a great rating on hostelworld.com and it was cheap.
Cassi booked us the Rising Cock (it was a couple dollars more than other hostels we could have stayed at) just because she wanted to be able to say that she stayed at a hostel named the Rising Cock.
And neither was that bad. Except for the showers. But you can read about that in the previous post.
PS. I just read about the hostel in Louisiana. I really want to go to New Orleans and this just made me want to go home just to be closer to the option of going there. This hostel seems pretty cool, especially with the beer vending machine. Not that I'd use it (I don't drink) but the idea of it just BEING there is interesting.
I stumbled upon (literally) this website today.
http://matadornights.com/20-craziest-party-hostels-around-the-world/
It ranks the top 20 party hostels IN THE WORLD.
In this semester alone, I have stayed in 10% of those listed: The Rising Cock (Lagos, during spring break) and Hostel Kabul (Barcelona, for a weekend trip).
Funny enough, the reasons we chose the hostels had nothing to do with the fact they were ranked party hostels. We had no idea they were party hostels before we booked them.
Hostel Kabul we booked just because it got a great rating on hostelworld.com and it was cheap.
Cassi booked us the Rising Cock (it was a couple dollars more than other hostels we could have stayed at) just because she wanted to be able to say that she stayed at a hostel named the Rising Cock.
And neither was that bad. Except for the showers. But you can read about that in the previous post.
PS. I just read about the hostel in Louisiana. I really want to go to New Orleans and this just made me want to go home just to be closer to the option of going there. This hostel seems pretty cool, especially with the beer vending machine. Not that I'd use it (I don't drink) but the idea of it just BEING there is interesting.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Las Duchas Horribles
While many people may rank their favorite restaurants or hotels while travelling, the thing that comes to mind that can make or break a place is the SHOWER.
Here I will rank the showers at the places I've travelled to in order from best to worst.
Enjoy.
BEST SHOWER THUS FAR: Hotel Abril, in Sevilla.
Pros: It was a private shower, in other words, I didn't need to wear flip flops in fear of catching some viral disease. But it was super nice. Hot water, great water pressure, and the stream spanned the distance of most of the shower's length.
Cons: NONE.
Close second: Hotel Regina, in Madrid.
Pros: This hotel that we stayed in during the Madrid tour was really cold. The benefit was HOT SHOWERS. The only place to be warm the entire trip. The cold really sucked. I mean, we'd go on cold walking tours of the city and large cathedrals that are just as cold as it is outside, then we come back to our hotel hoping for warmth, and the hotel is about 50 degrees inside. It sucked especially since the heater only works when the keycard is in the light switch, which means you have to be IN the room to heat it. So, yeah, it never got warm. But I digress...the shower was hot, nice pressure, and just nice overall.
Cons: It wasn't my own PERSONAL shower, like the one in Sevilla (in Madrid I had a roomie)
Next: Black and White Hostel in Lisbon
Pros: The showerhead was an overhead rain showerhead. RAIN. It was glorious gallons after glorious gallons of water. Even though right next to it the placard said it was energy efficient, it sure didn't feel like it.
Cons: A shower CURTAIN. Ugh, when this was paired with a small square shower space, I had great fear in touching the possibly moldy curtain. Also, the bathroom was co-ed. Luckily I didn't have issues. And, since it was public, it warranted flip flop usage.
Next: Hotel Codina in San Sebastian
Pros: This hotel we stayed in during orientation was REALLY nice. Read: heated towel rack. The water was super hot.
Cons: No shelves for the soap and shampoo. And the shower was a tiny tiny square. Smaller than the one in Lisbon. Like, this was 1.5 feet by 1.5 feet.
Next: My host family's shower in San Sebastian.
Pros: It's in a home, so obviously no flip flops required. And the water is nice and hot.
Cons: The door is this weird accordian thing that never stays closed...it always slowly opens, and it opens inward, toward the tub, so when I am standing there it seems to slowly close me in. PLUS, the water pressure is like that of a garden hose with holes in it. It doesn't SHOWER you, it's more of a dribbling. And because of this, the hot water isn't as effective since there is a HUGE space in front of you for cold air to circulate while your body tries to adapt to the temperature of the water.
Next: Porto Downtown Hostel in Porto, Portugal
Pros: This was a ONE-MAN BATHROOM. It was great. I could lock the door and not have to worry about walking through the hostel with a towel wrapped around me when I returned to the room to change. The water was hot, the pressure was great.
Cons: The drain wasn't very effective. The rubber foot grip thing was also covering the drain, which made it even MORE ineffective. Plus, it was public, which meant flippy floppys. While the water was hot, the temperature couldn't be adjusted..it was just on or off. Oh, and to conserve water, the water button turned off every 15seconds or so. Which meant you had to press it a LOT.
Second to worst shower this semester: Hostel Kabul, Barcelona
Pros: Erm, the one stall I was in had a door?
Cons: The rest of the stalls didn't have doors. The pressure was not very concentrated, which meant the water seemed to be in a HUGE circle, but not anywhere in particular, so it was a light rinse as opposed to a stream of water. The water button was also like Porto's...it turned off every 10 seconds, so it had to be pushed like 3 times when I was just washing my face. The water was also pretty cold, but it did warm up to a reasonably warmish temperature that was bearable. But, the water was NOTHING compared to...
THE WORST SHOWER EVER (not just in my lifetime, but probably in history): The Rising Cock Hostel in Lagos
Pros: It was a one man bathroom, which meant I could change in the bathroom.
Cons: The drain did not drain water. The water came out of a hand-held showering spout thing, but there was no holder for it, so you couldn't hang it up...you had to hold it. The stream was pretty bad, too. Oh, and the TEMPERATURE, or lack thereof, was the most memorable thing. Seriously, if you gave the people who froze in the ocean after the Titanic sank an option between that and this shower, they would choose the former. Okay, maybe not, but this water was COLD. I thought Barcelona was cold, until I felt this. I think icicles were forming on the showerhead as I bathed. Seriously, it was unbearable. SO unbearable that my showers were approximately 30 seconds long. I would do a swoop with the showerhead, shiver, put on body wash, swoop the water over me, shiver, get my hair wet, shiver, think about shampooing, then decide not to, then turn off the water. Seriously, if I had to shampoo I think I'd lose like 20 degrees of body heat by rinsing my head under that stream. The two days we spent in Lagos, all of us had dirty hair. Shampooing just could NOT be done. I actually filled my water bottle up (a 1.5 liter bottle), then let it warm up, then rinsed my hair over the sink. At least then I could get my hair completely wet without shivering as though I was having an epileptic seizure.
And there you have it.
Here I will rank the showers at the places I've travelled to in order from best to worst.
Enjoy.
BEST SHOWER THUS FAR: Hotel Abril, in Sevilla.
Pros: It was a private shower, in other words, I didn't need to wear flip flops in fear of catching some viral disease. But it was super nice. Hot water, great water pressure, and the stream spanned the distance of most of the shower's length.
Cons: NONE.
Close second: Hotel Regina, in Madrid.
Pros: This hotel that we stayed in during the Madrid tour was really cold. The benefit was HOT SHOWERS. The only place to be warm the entire trip. The cold really sucked. I mean, we'd go on cold walking tours of the city and large cathedrals that are just as cold as it is outside, then we come back to our hotel hoping for warmth, and the hotel is about 50 degrees inside. It sucked especially since the heater only works when the keycard is in the light switch, which means you have to be IN the room to heat it. So, yeah, it never got warm. But I digress...the shower was hot, nice pressure, and just nice overall.
Cons: It wasn't my own PERSONAL shower, like the one in Sevilla (in Madrid I had a roomie)
Next: Black and White Hostel in Lisbon
Pros: The showerhead was an overhead rain showerhead. RAIN. It was glorious gallons after glorious gallons of water. Even though right next to it the placard said it was energy efficient, it sure didn't feel like it.
Cons: A shower CURTAIN. Ugh, when this was paired with a small square shower space, I had great fear in touching the possibly moldy curtain. Also, the bathroom was co-ed. Luckily I didn't have issues. And, since it was public, it warranted flip flop usage.
Next: Hotel Codina in San Sebastian
Pros: This hotel we stayed in during orientation was REALLY nice. Read: heated towel rack. The water was super hot.
Cons: No shelves for the soap and shampoo. And the shower was a tiny tiny square. Smaller than the one in Lisbon. Like, this was 1.5 feet by 1.5 feet.
Next: My host family's shower in San Sebastian.
Pros: It's in a home, so obviously no flip flops required. And the water is nice and hot.
Cons: The door is this weird accordian thing that never stays closed...it always slowly opens, and it opens inward, toward the tub, so when I am standing there it seems to slowly close me in. PLUS, the water pressure is like that of a garden hose with holes in it. It doesn't SHOWER you, it's more of a dribbling. And because of this, the hot water isn't as effective since there is a HUGE space in front of you for cold air to circulate while your body tries to adapt to the temperature of the water.
Next: Porto Downtown Hostel in Porto, Portugal
Pros: This was a ONE-MAN BATHROOM. It was great. I could lock the door and not have to worry about walking through the hostel with a towel wrapped around me when I returned to the room to change. The water was hot, the pressure was great.
Cons: The drain wasn't very effective. The rubber foot grip thing was also covering the drain, which made it even MORE ineffective. Plus, it was public, which meant flippy floppys. While the water was hot, the temperature couldn't be adjusted..it was just on or off. Oh, and to conserve water, the water button turned off every 15seconds or so. Which meant you had to press it a LOT.
Second to worst shower this semester: Hostel Kabul, Barcelona
Pros: Erm, the one stall I was in had a door?
Cons: The rest of the stalls didn't have doors. The pressure was not very concentrated, which meant the water seemed to be in a HUGE circle, but not anywhere in particular, so it was a light rinse as opposed to a stream of water. The water button was also like Porto's...it turned off every 10 seconds, so it had to be pushed like 3 times when I was just washing my face. The water was also pretty cold, but it did warm up to a reasonably warmish temperature that was bearable. But, the water was NOTHING compared to...
THE WORST SHOWER EVER (not just in my lifetime, but probably in history): The Rising Cock Hostel in Lagos
Pros: It was a one man bathroom, which meant I could change in the bathroom.
Cons: The drain did not drain water. The water came out of a hand-held showering spout thing, but there was no holder for it, so you couldn't hang it up...you had to hold it. The stream was pretty bad, too. Oh, and the TEMPERATURE, or lack thereof, was the most memorable thing. Seriously, if you gave the people who froze in the ocean after the Titanic sank an option between that and this shower, they would choose the former. Okay, maybe not, but this water was COLD. I thought Barcelona was cold, until I felt this. I think icicles were forming on the showerhead as I bathed. Seriously, it was unbearable. SO unbearable that my showers were approximately 30 seconds long. I would do a swoop with the showerhead, shiver, put on body wash, swoop the water over me, shiver, get my hair wet, shiver, think about shampooing, then decide not to, then turn off the water. Seriously, if I had to shampoo I think I'd lose like 20 degrees of body heat by rinsing my head under that stream. The two days we spent in Lagos, all of us had dirty hair. Shampooing just could NOT be done. I actually filled my water bottle up (a 1.5 liter bottle), then let it warm up, then rinsed my hair over the sink. At least then I could get my hair completely wet without shivering as though I was having an epileptic seizure.
And there you have it.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Three pictures are worth about...20 words.
Since I mostly took video on the Burgos/Atapuerca trip, I only have a few pictures from the daytrip. And of the 10 I took, three are uninteresting, two are picture versions of what I already had on video of the super foggy hike, one is the unlit cathedral at night (but it might as well be a picture of a room with the lights off, since it's just black), and one is an out of focus picture of flowers.
PS: Click any picture to see a larger version
Therefore, that leaves me with this picture of the sign on our hike:
Along with this picture of a cool looking shrub.
It's swirly!
Oh, and the picture of the stonehenge-like thing behind an "i-was-just-sleeping-on-the-bus-for-two-hours-can't-you-tell?" Melissa.
My friends took some good pictures too, but as of right now, I only have this wonderful picture, depicting us as a cross between construction workers and lunch ladies with our lice-shield caps and hardhats.
(From left to right: Angela C., Me, Cassi, May, Ana, Natalia)
PS: Click any picture to see a larger version
Therefore, that leaves me with this picture of the sign on our hike:
Along with this picture of a cool looking shrub.
It's swirly!
Oh, and the picture of the stonehenge-like thing behind an "i-was-just-sleeping-on-the-bus-for-two-hours-can't-you-tell?" Melissa.
My friends took some good pictures too, but as of right now, I only have this wonderful picture, depicting us as a cross between construction workers and lunch ladies with our lice-shield caps and hardhats.
(From left to right: Angela C., Me, Cassi, May, Ana, Natalia)
Friday, May 1, 2009
Three Point Turn FAIL.
On our way home from Burgos/Atapuerca, our bus driver attempted a three point turn on a narrow street. The result was a 206 point turn, with each one getting us more and more perpendicular with the road until the windshield was a foot away from a tree, the back end was hanging over a ditch, and the back tires were dug deep into mud.
FUN!
Visual Proof:
FUN!
Visual Proof:
Thursday, April 30, 2009
They just keep getting better...
My skills, that is.
I learned how to use a bow and arrow on our recent trip to Burgos/Atapuerca.
At the end, it looks like the arrow I shot was the one in the fake animal's eye. As much as I'd like to say it WAS my arrow, that was the demonstrator's arrow. Mine is very close to the animal, on the right, in the ground, which I think is just as impressive.
Check out this awesomeness:
I learned how to use a bow and arrow on our recent trip to Burgos/Atapuerca.
At the end, it looks like the arrow I shot was the one in the fake animal's eye. As much as I'd like to say it WAS my arrow, that was the demonstrator's arrow. Mine is very close to the animal, on the right, in the ground, which I think is just as impressive.
Check out this awesomeness:
Burgos Video
By embedding the video directly onto Blogger, all problems were avoided. YAY!
You may recognize some familiar faces from my Barcelona video, like Ana and Natalia.
In order of appearance:
Ana (always creepin)
Maria (Girl next to Ana in opening scene, and one who speaks Norwegian at the end)
Sonia (girl asking how to do the handprint to the guide)
Jenny (leather jacket handprint girl)
Natalie (Trying to smell Maria's hand?)
Mary Kate (sneaking into the shot with Maria and Natalie)
May (making prehistoric tools out of rock)
Mary Kate, Dixon, May and Luke (throwing Javelins, one after another)
Cassi (playing Orlando Bloom with the bow and arrow, as well as 'translating' Maria at the end of the video)
Carter (making fire with the guide)
Natalia (The one who is 'not cool' according to Ana)
Jenny (appearing once again, fetching a ball that rolled under an SUV)
Alex Ireland (The girl who's just trying to figure out who this Jesus guy is. Have you heard of him? He's pretty famous, I guess.)
Megan (warning Dixon of moldy candy)
Annette (the Becky blamer)
Becky (The Annette blamer)
Angela (the one dancing on the bus, and who has to 'piss like a racehorse')
Peter (the one slowly creeping up to the camera with a suspicious look)
Lindsey (The one in the pink scarf, who claims she needed to sit in the back row of the bus b/c then she could have BRAIDED)
Lindsey (in the leather coat and hood, who mocks the fact that they could have braided.)
So here's what went down on the trip:
We got on a bus at 8:30am and drove off to Burgos. On the way we stopped in Atapuerca, where archeologists have found the oldest human fossils in Europe, belonging to the homo antecessor species. When they found them, they were able to identify this species, since they had not discovered it prior to finding the fossils. This chart explains a lot.
We went to a site where a friendly guide showed us the typical evolution poster, of a monkey converting into a human. Then, we went on a "tour" of history, as he introduced us to evolving inventions and ideas along the way. It felt a bit like a caveman version of Donley's Wild West Town, where I go with campers every summer.
Along the way, he told us about early tools made of rock, and that three "entry points" or breaks in the rock, show that it was intentionally broken to be used as something, as opposed to a regular broken rock, which would have one or two "entry points."
He told us about cave paintings, about early homes, burial rituals, making fire, hunting tools like javelins and bows and arrows, and other things.
Then we hopped on a bus to the Atapuerca dig site, which was about 8 minutes away, which is seen in the video as us wearing hard hats. We wore them and looked at some high stone walls with lots of cards with numbers and letters on them where we are told fossils were found. It wasn't as exciting as I thought it would be. But I DID get to hold a real human skull, not just a reproduction of one. But it's not on my camera, so when Peter posts it, I will be able to show it to you.
We then ate at a restaurant (USAC paid for it), which had good lentil soup and flavorless, tepid fish. I didn't try the fish b/c it got to the other side of the table first and my friends described it as...well, flavorless and cold, so I wasn't really sold on the idea. But the prepackaged ice cream cups we got were good!
We went to Burgos and went to the Cathedral. It was just like the other bajillion cathedrals I've been to since being here in Europe, but still there were some interesting parts. Apparently whenever there was any sort of damage in the church, Spaniards like to blame it on Napolean. Usually, they are right. But sometimes it's just old and crumbly. One thing he told us was that there is a stained glass window from the 1200's, and the rest are from much later, since Napolean and his gang tried to blow the place up and consequently broke all the original windows, except for the one. And then they replaced the broken ones.
Also, in the chapel part of the church, there was a Jesus statue, where the head was "articulated" (as you can see in the video by the guide bobbling his head around at the beginning). It had real human hair and other human things which I can't remember. It sounds a bit gross.
Also in this Cathedral there was an original DaVinci, which is seen behind the guide in one clip of the video as well.
After that, we got to the hotel and settled in. Of course, being college students, all of my friends went straight back out to the grocery store to buy vodka, boxed wine, and coca cola (Kalimotxos, which are wine and coke mixed together, are super popular in the Basque country).
I didn't want to be left out of this pre-party bonanza, so I bought myself some pineapple juice and oreos.
We went back to the hotel and "raged." And by raged, I mean "tryed tossing gummi candy into peoples' mouths," "got ready to go out," as well as "drank my juice and ate cookies."
Many hours passed, then I went out with the Lindseys, Jenny, and Tara to eat tapas as dinner. I just ordered a platter of Croquetas for myself. They taste like a mozzarella sticks, but instead of cheese inside, they taste like mashed potatoes and cheese and there's ham in the very center. I am not even sure if that's what they are made of. They just taste that way. And I like to keep thinking that, or it may ruin one of my only favorite foods here in Spain.
We ran into people like Dixon, Megan, Angela, Luke, Dave, and Cassi along the way to the bar area when we left, as well as friends I made on the Madrid tour from Bilbao (the overnight trip was for the SS program and the Bilbao program...we stayed in the same hotel and went to everything together), like Adam and Brett. It was great to see Adam and Brett (who you might recognize from my trip to Barcelona...they are in that video!). I haven't seen them since my trip to Barcelona at the beginning of the semester!
After a long night out, we went back to the hotel. My roommate was drunk and puking, and our hall neighbor (a USAC student) was trying to get into her room without a key by banging on the door hoping her sleeping roomie would awaken. (Note: We later found out no one was in the room, hence why no one answered.) My other friend was "sexiled" momentarily (exiled from their room b/c the roommate was having sex), until he was let back in about 20 minutes later.
So yeah, they partied PRETTY hard.
Oh, did I mention that there was an 8am 3hour hike the next morning? Yeah, well it was fortunately optional...only about 30 or 40% of the entire SS/Bilbao group went on the hike. 99% of those people were extremely hungover. Especially since people came home around 3am.
After the hike on the path to Santiago de Compostela (a famous pilgrim hike that allowed a free ticket to heaven if you did it from the start, literally. There are many entrances to the hike, since it can start from as far as Germany or France. I am not sure what the whole rules for that heaven deal was, but I do know that back then, no matter where you started from, you could get to the church and get a free meal and shelter for the night), which was a foggy, cold, wet experience, we got to a bar where we warmed up a bit before heading back to the hotel. Then we had a bit of time before our 3pm lunch at the hotel (a grand feast of spaghetti with red sauce, roast chicken and french fries, salad, and natillas[a delicious pudding type dessert]). I used the time before lunch to go shopping for souvenirs and then playing spoons in the hotel lobby with Luke, Dave, Natalia, Ana, Angela, and Katie.
After lunch, we hopped out, saying goodbyes to our Bilbao friends (probably for...forever, sadly).
And you might wonder how nice the hotel was. It was very nice. How nice, you ask? Well, when I asked for the oh-so necessary match box for our family collection at the front desk, they instead handed me a LIGHTER with the hotel name, number and address on it. CLASSY!
Oh, and on the way home we stopped at Dolmen de Aizkomendi (Egilaz) which is basically very similar to Stonehenge. It is a rock formation that dates back to way back when, when there wasn't the machinery to construct such a heavy, large thing. It was pretty small, but still cool.
Oh, and on the way out of the narrow path that lead us here, our bus had some MAJOR issues doing a three point turn. It turned into about a 213-point turn, most of which just wedged us more and more into a perpendicular position to the road, with a tree in front of the windshield and a deep ditch behind the back tires. We had to evacuate the bus so the driver could get us out of the rut. Literally.
He also may have wanted us to leave so he could get his bearings since everyone was fearing that we would fall into the ditch and then have no way back home.
And I know what you are thinking: YES, there is video footage of all of this going down. I will post the "failed 3 point turn" video as soon as I am done editing it, which should be soon.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Okay, who left the brown shoes?
In the USAC program, once you sign up for travelling abroad, it also entitles you to the two trips arranged by USAC in the semester, for no extra charge. The first trip was a day trip (left in the morning, returned late afternoon) to some place nearby with a Basque farmhouse. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend since USAC arranged it on a certain day, then told us they needed to change the day and during this confusion my friends and I booked our Barcelona trip. Of course, right afterwards, we find that the trip was scheduled on the same weekend.
But this time, the trip was overnight, and it was to Burgos and Atapuerca, which is southwest of San Sebastian in Castilla y Leon.
I don't have much time to go into detail now (I know, I know, I also haven't updated on my Spring Break either...but I will get to it eventually), but we did get this email today from the USAC office.
But before I show you the email, let me tell you a couple things as background info. We had to each pay a 20 euro deposit before the trip in case of hotel damages. We also made this trip with students in the Bilbao USAC program, some of which I already knew from the Madrid tour before the semester began.
When we got on the bus to head home on Saturday, Patricia said, "Guys, I have to say, the hotel was extremely upset this morning, telling us that there were many noise complaints and some damage to the rooms. However, we believe this is the Bilbao students' who did the damage, and therefore we will look into it further to get the specifics and pinpoint which rooms are to blame. Therefore, you will not be able to get your deposits back until we sort this out. But I will send you an email this week once we know more."
We got the email, and it is as follows:
______________________
Enviado el: lunes, 27 de abril de 2009 14:08
Para: us
Asunto: excursion deposit/brown shoes
Dear Students,
I am very happy to tell you that we will be able to return the deposit to all the students on the San Sebastian program. We have just heard from the hotel and have been able to determine exactly where the problems originated. Thank you very much for all of your cooperation. We certainly wanted everyone to have fun and were convinced that this is entirely possible without disturbing the other guests at the hotel. I am satisfied and grateful for the way things turned out, at least as far as our group is concerned.
Muchas gracias a todos. Espero que lo hayáis pasado muy bien. Podéis pasar por la oficina con el recibo para recoger el depósito.
Saludos, Patricia
P.D.
Alguien ha dejado un par de zapatos(¿zapatillas?)marrones en el autobus. Los tenemos en la oficina.
_______________
The first Spanish part says "Thanks to everyone. I hope you had a good time. You can stop by the office with the reciept to get your deposit back."
And that little PS part says "Someone left a pair of brown shoes/sandals on the bus. We have them in the office."
So in conclusion of the trip, we partied, but not hard enough to have to pay, and someone lost a pair of shoes.
But this time, the trip was overnight, and it was to Burgos and Atapuerca, which is southwest of San Sebastian in Castilla y Leon.
I don't have much time to go into detail now (I know, I know, I also haven't updated on my Spring Break either...but I will get to it eventually), but we did get this email today from the USAC office.
But before I show you the email, let me tell you a couple things as background info. We had to each pay a 20 euro deposit before the trip in case of hotel damages. We also made this trip with students in the Bilbao USAC program, some of which I already knew from the Madrid tour before the semester began.
When we got on the bus to head home on Saturday, Patricia said, "Guys, I have to say, the hotel was extremely upset this morning, telling us that there were many noise complaints and some damage to the rooms. However, we believe this is the Bilbao students' who did the damage, and therefore we will look into it further to get the specifics and pinpoint which rooms are to blame. Therefore, you will not be able to get your deposits back until we sort this out. But I will send you an email this week once we know more."
We got the email, and it is as follows:
______________________
Enviado el: lunes, 27 de abril de 2009 14:08
Para: us
Asunto: excursion deposit/brown shoes
Dear Students,
I am very happy to tell you that we will be able to return the deposit to all the students on the San Sebastian program. We have just heard from the hotel and have been able to determine exactly where the problems originated. Thank you very much for all of your cooperation. We certainly wanted everyone to have fun and were convinced that this is entirely possible without disturbing the other guests at the hotel. I am satisfied and grateful for the way things turned out, at least as far as our group is concerned.
Muchas gracias a todos. Espero que lo hayáis pasado muy bien. Podéis pasar por la oficina con el recibo para recoger el depósito.
Saludos, Patricia
P.D.
Alguien ha dejado un par de zapatos(¿zapatillas?)marrones en el autobus. Los tenemos en la oficina.
_______________
The first Spanish part says "Thanks to everyone. I hope you had a good time. You can stop by the office with the reciept to get your deposit back."
And that little PS part says "Someone left a pair of brown shoes/sandals on the bus. We have them in the office."
So in conclusion of the trip, we partied, but not hard enough to have to pay, and someone lost a pair of shoes.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Nightmare?
again, portuguese keyboard. deal.
Let me lay down a play by play of my portugal/southern spain trip so far.
It was NOT going well for QUITE A WHILE.
We began in SS, where we hopped on a bus at 12.40pm to bilbao. We arrived in bilbao at about 2pm. Our next bus from Bilbao to Madrid was at 3, so we chilled in Bilbao for a bit. OH, but did I mention that on the way to Bilbao that May realized she hadnºt bought her ticket to portugal yet? Well, we had to deal with that in Bilbao. There was no room on our bus, but luckily for us there was another bus leaving at the exact same time. But, for some odd reason, the ticket lady moved Cassi to Mayºs bus, I guess b-c she was helping her out at the window and assumed they wanted to be together?
Anyways. We got on the bus from Bilbao to Madrid and said ciao to May and Cassi. I went to sit down but there was a lady in my seat and she asked if I could move to hers in the back. I obliged. I fell asleep on this bus, then about an hour into the journey, I woke up and realized the driver pulled over and there were national guards all up in the cargo with some kind of sniffing dog. Drug-sniffing? Bomb-sniffing? I donºt know. All I know is that there was a female guard staring at my window the whole time, holding a machine gun at her waist.
Also, Spain has a law where bus drivers cannot drive for more than 4 hours straight, which means they stop after less than that, which means they stopped about every 3.25 hours. We took our first stop around 7.30 and had to hang out there for about a half hour until the bus left. Apparently when the dogs sniffed the cargo, Cassie woke up May and asked her if she had any drugs in her bag and she was so sleepy and confused when Cassi woke her that she responded by talking about the Advil and Mydol she packed.
Then when we got on the bus, i coaxed the woman next to natalie to move to my seat b-c it was a window seat and it had more legroom, and she happily traded. I now was seated by natalie and alex and jordan were in front of us. They played Ocean~´s 13 on the ride, but i had no headphones and therefore stared at the silent screen until the movie was over. Around that time we were in Madrid.
We got to the Madrid bus station and got off and that was the end of that end of our journey. We got in aroun 9pm and our next bus was at 10pm from the same station, which would then take us to Porto, Portugal. We hung out, got some dried fruits and nuts at some place at the station, everyone but me took a sleeping pill, then we grabbed our stuff and got on the bus.
It was pretty dead since we knew we would make some stops along the way to pick up more people. But, to our surprise, we were only 10 minutes on the bus when we stopped at a different station and they were telling us in spanish to get off the bus and that they werenºt leaving until 11pm. We were so confused that we just took our ´´carry on´´ luggage (the stuff not in the under-bus cargo), and walked to the main station. The driver was like ´´you can leave your stuff behind if you want!´´ but we were so confused as to what was going on, and angry that we were being kicked off and forced to wait. We wandered around a bit, and Cassi was frustrated because the sleeping pill had already kicked in for about an hour by now, and she was groggy and angry. The rest of the group left the station to get burger king across the street. Cassi and I opted to stay, and I grabbed a turkey and grilled onion sammy from the station. We went back to the bus right around 10.50 and saw the rest of our group there. Natalie, french fries hanging out of her mouth, was told that she couldnºt eat on the bus. Therefore, she stood outside and scarfed everything down while Cassi and I got on and returned to our seats. May somehow got on with her BK bag of food, and Cassi told her that Natalie got yelled at. We were feeling the wrath of the driver, so we suggested May eat it off the bus. She went to get up and leave, and they wouldnºt let her off the bus, so she was like ´´okay, then deal with the fact that I am totally eating this right here.´´
Finally we all got on the bus, a few more passengers than there were when we arrived at this station, but it was still only 30% full. THEN, out of nowhere, the bus driver was telling us we needed to get off and that we were on the wrong bus. But really that wasnºt the case. THEY overbooked the bus and just decided to kick off some random people in the front...and guess who they were? ´´Ýou need to get off, ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR´´ the lady shouted as she counted off me, cassi, natalie and may. She frustratingly was like ´´do you have luggage?´´ uh, YEAH, we DO. Why are YOU so mad? We were the ones kicked off our bus 10 minutes in, told to wait 50 minutes, then told to get on a completely different bus and separate from our friends on a journey to a foreign country!!! We got our luggage, put it on the cargo part of the other bus, said farewell to Alex, Jordan and MaryKate, then went onto the other bus.
All four of us were as pissed as one could be. We are in a freaking train station in Madrid, being yelled at in Spanish to get on a bus that we didnºt buy tickets for, being told that weºd get to the same place as our friends. We get on the bus and HELLO we are in Portuguese town. We are the whitest people on the bus, everyone else looks like they are south american and of course, everyone is staring. Every woman had some kind of cotton scarf wrapped around her hair and the men were all wearing denim farm wear and work boots. There were some empty seats, which some younger guys were conspicuously spreading out on so we wouldnºt sit there. I sit by a stranger, then Cassi gets offered two seats together because a married couple told their son to move. So we sit together and by this point Cassi is unsuccessfully trying to hold in her tears of frustration and hopelessness of the situation. Meanwhile, creepy seat-hogger guys are just staring at us. And they are in the other row of seats, about 4 rows in front of us. So yes, itºs EXTREMELY obvious that they are staring. They keep staring at Cassi, while she tries to hide her face as best she can by staring out the window. Natalie and May are at the front of the bus looking at seats before they sit, then when I was looking down, I looked back up and couldnºt see them so I thought of the possibility that they somehow got back on the other bus. I honestly had no idea where they were. Meanwhile, still, the guy is staring. We give up and ignore him and I fall asleep, clutching my purse, scared for the creepy guys and I put my ´´carry on´´ between my feet on the floor. Also, when the bus was boarding, a woman came on with a baby. Cassi and I were seated about 3 rows from the very back, and as she walked by us, I think a couple people groaned or commented that they didnºt want to sit near a baby. She told them, in Spanish, not to worry because her baby wonºt cry.
I woke up about an hour into the trip because I felt movement by my feet. Thinking someone was trying to steal my bag, I quickly woke up and looked down. The busº interior lights were off because it was a night trip, and I thought I saw a sweater on the ground. As my eyes became a bit more adjusted I realized there was a man laying down on the aisle floor trying to sleep. The movement I had felt was his elbow brushing against my shoe. I looked down the aisle to see if anyone else was amazed by this...only to find about 3 more men sleeping on the aisle floor. Also, that baby was crying. And crying. And crying...I somehow managed to fall asleep to the sound of a baby crying and a man snoring by my feet.
At the first rest stop, I got off and went to the bathroom and got on the bus via the front door and finally confirmed, after 3 hours of paranoia, that May and Natalie are in fact on this bus, and they are sleeping in two separate seats towards the front. I also looked around the rest stop for the other bus, but it was nowhere in sight. Finally, after the bus driver started up the engines to head out, the other bus pulled into the stop and I saw Mary-Kate get off.
Our bus rode off once again, and in the next few hours I tried a variety of sleeping positions: leaning my head against the seat in front of me, scooting my butt low on the seat to have my knees lean on the seat in front of me, and try leaning back. The latter was the most unsuccessful, because what kind of crazy person would think to sleep by reclining the chair and resting their head where the headrest is?!
Once we entered Portugal, a national guard guy got on the bus to check our passports. He went through the bus reading them, and he took some people~s passports away, telling them he~d return them in a minute. To one Portuguese lady, he said that her passport was bad and she needed to fix it. Nevertheless, he gave it back and let her continue on her journey. That~s cool...
I also faintly remember there being a part where Cassi told me to lean my head on her shoulder. When I woke up my head was on her shoulder and her head was on my head, and she told me that she had earlier found me leaning diagonally forward in her direction, and she knew that wasnºt comfortable so she re-adjusted my head position.
Finally we arrived in Porto. But whatºs this? Oh, not an actual bus station! Instead we were dropped off in the middle of some business district. Also, our bus arrived early! We were actually unsure of that last part, since our watches were still on Spain time and the bus clock was somewhat off. I am still pretty sure we were at our ´´destination´´ at about 5:30am. So here we were, Natalie, May, Cassi and me, shivering in the darkness of some public park place of some sort, with a taxi stand nearby. However, due to my observation at the rest stop (that their bus arrived as we left), I knew they were at least a half hour behind us. We had to call them to give them the hostel address and number, so we tried doing that for a while, since Cassiºs hands were so cold and she was so nervous that she literally couldnºt aim her fingers on the keys on the phone.
After we got in touch with a zonked-out Mary-Kate, we got in a taxi. Oh, but of course he doesnºt speak English or Spanish. Only French. Thatºs not even one of their top 3 languages spoken here. We took the cab to their hostel and the guy reluctantly opened the doors, let them lock their luggage in the luggage room, then kicked them out, saying checkin was at 3pm.
We called my hostel and found my check in was at 1pm, but I still had all my luggage. We wandered only a block until we found an open cafe. By now it was about 6.30am or so. We hung out there for about an hour and a half, then we found out the rest of our group was nearby. We met up with them and found out that their bus WAS a half hour behind, plus they were dropped off way further away than we were: we paid a 7 euro fare, and they paid a 12 euro fare.
We then loitered in that cafe until about 9am, then we decided to move on. It was about 50 degrees outside and drizzling! Of course, the weather said itºd be above seventy the whole time on our trip, so we were wearing our warmest clothes, which consisted of jeans, short sleeves and a hoodie.
I needed to find my hostel and we knew it was nearby so I used my friendsº hostelºs internet service and they donºt have flash, so google maps was basically useless. I had to use HTML mode which showed the map at about the size of half a playing card.
We knew it was somewhere northwest, and decided to get in that direction by walking along the river. We stumbled upon a street market with about a bajillion people selling stuff. I ended up getting a gift here for Eric.
We finally found my hostel, dropped off my stuff, then ate food next door. Alex and Mary Kate were feeling ultra queasy and throwing up every once in a while due to either the sleeping pills, the Burger King, or a combo of both.
We then went to this church that has a museum and catacombs which was cool. After we went to a place for lunch. We wandered some more until it was time for us all to check in and we parted ways to go to our hostels.
By this time it was about 2.45 pm. The ongoing joke was that we never wanted to look at a watch because time was passing so SLOWLY. We were already in the city for about 10 hours, for Godºs sakes!
We met up again at 8pm, where I found out that the other group took a solid 4 and a half hour nap while I had meanwhile just been hanging out at my hostel.
We went to an internet place to buy tickets to the Alhambra in Granada (um, episode 3 from star wars was filmed there...it also looks like Aladdinºs palace!). We wandered some more, ate at a restaurant along the river, then went home at 10.45 to just sleep.
So let me give you a run through of how much sleep I´ve gotten. Wednesday night i got 7 hours or so. No biggie. then Thurs night, b-c i was packing and then had to wake up early for the teaching thing, i went to bed around 3...and woke up at 6.20. so thatºs about 3 hours.
Then, on the bus i got 1 hour increments of sleep, and only about 5 of them, none of which were quality. Finally I got about 9 hours of sleep Friday night.
Let me lay down a play by play of my portugal/southern spain trip so far.
It was NOT going well for QUITE A WHILE.
We began in SS, where we hopped on a bus at 12.40pm to bilbao. We arrived in bilbao at about 2pm. Our next bus from Bilbao to Madrid was at 3, so we chilled in Bilbao for a bit. OH, but did I mention that on the way to Bilbao that May realized she hadnºt bought her ticket to portugal yet? Well, we had to deal with that in Bilbao. There was no room on our bus, but luckily for us there was another bus leaving at the exact same time. But, for some odd reason, the ticket lady moved Cassi to Mayºs bus, I guess b-c she was helping her out at the window and assumed they wanted to be together?
Anyways. We got on the bus from Bilbao to Madrid and said ciao to May and Cassi. I went to sit down but there was a lady in my seat and she asked if I could move to hers in the back. I obliged. I fell asleep on this bus, then about an hour into the journey, I woke up and realized the driver pulled over and there were national guards all up in the cargo with some kind of sniffing dog. Drug-sniffing? Bomb-sniffing? I donºt know. All I know is that there was a female guard staring at my window the whole time, holding a machine gun at her waist.
Also, Spain has a law where bus drivers cannot drive for more than 4 hours straight, which means they stop after less than that, which means they stopped about every 3.25 hours. We took our first stop around 7.30 and had to hang out there for about a half hour until the bus left. Apparently when the dogs sniffed the cargo, Cassie woke up May and asked her if she had any drugs in her bag and she was so sleepy and confused when Cassi woke her that she responded by talking about the Advil and Mydol she packed.
Then when we got on the bus, i coaxed the woman next to natalie to move to my seat b-c it was a window seat and it had more legroom, and she happily traded. I now was seated by natalie and alex and jordan were in front of us. They played Ocean~´s 13 on the ride, but i had no headphones and therefore stared at the silent screen until the movie was over. Around that time we were in Madrid.
We got to the Madrid bus station and got off and that was the end of that end of our journey. We got in aroun 9pm and our next bus was at 10pm from the same station, which would then take us to Porto, Portugal. We hung out, got some dried fruits and nuts at some place at the station, everyone but me took a sleeping pill, then we grabbed our stuff and got on the bus.
It was pretty dead since we knew we would make some stops along the way to pick up more people. But, to our surprise, we were only 10 minutes on the bus when we stopped at a different station and they were telling us in spanish to get off the bus and that they werenºt leaving until 11pm. We were so confused that we just took our ´´carry on´´ luggage (the stuff not in the under-bus cargo), and walked to the main station. The driver was like ´´you can leave your stuff behind if you want!´´ but we were so confused as to what was going on, and angry that we were being kicked off and forced to wait. We wandered around a bit, and Cassi was frustrated because the sleeping pill had already kicked in for about an hour by now, and she was groggy and angry. The rest of the group left the station to get burger king across the street. Cassi and I opted to stay, and I grabbed a turkey and grilled onion sammy from the station. We went back to the bus right around 10.50 and saw the rest of our group there. Natalie, french fries hanging out of her mouth, was told that she couldnºt eat on the bus. Therefore, she stood outside and scarfed everything down while Cassi and I got on and returned to our seats. May somehow got on with her BK bag of food, and Cassi told her that Natalie got yelled at. We were feeling the wrath of the driver, so we suggested May eat it off the bus. She went to get up and leave, and they wouldnºt let her off the bus, so she was like ´´okay, then deal with the fact that I am totally eating this right here.´´
Finally we all got on the bus, a few more passengers than there were when we arrived at this station, but it was still only 30% full. THEN, out of nowhere, the bus driver was telling us we needed to get off and that we were on the wrong bus. But really that wasnºt the case. THEY overbooked the bus and just decided to kick off some random people in the front...and guess who they were? ´´Ýou need to get off, ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR´´ the lady shouted as she counted off me, cassi, natalie and may. She frustratingly was like ´´do you have luggage?´´ uh, YEAH, we DO. Why are YOU so mad? We were the ones kicked off our bus 10 minutes in, told to wait 50 minutes, then told to get on a completely different bus and separate from our friends on a journey to a foreign country!!! We got our luggage, put it on the cargo part of the other bus, said farewell to Alex, Jordan and MaryKate, then went onto the other bus.
All four of us were as pissed as one could be. We are in a freaking train station in Madrid, being yelled at in Spanish to get on a bus that we didnºt buy tickets for, being told that weºd get to the same place as our friends. We get on the bus and HELLO we are in Portuguese town. We are the whitest people on the bus, everyone else looks like they are south american and of course, everyone is staring. Every woman had some kind of cotton scarf wrapped around her hair and the men were all wearing denim farm wear and work boots. There were some empty seats, which some younger guys were conspicuously spreading out on so we wouldnºt sit there. I sit by a stranger, then Cassi gets offered two seats together because a married couple told their son to move. So we sit together and by this point Cassi is unsuccessfully trying to hold in her tears of frustration and hopelessness of the situation. Meanwhile, creepy seat-hogger guys are just staring at us. And they are in the other row of seats, about 4 rows in front of us. So yes, itºs EXTREMELY obvious that they are staring. They keep staring at Cassi, while she tries to hide her face as best she can by staring out the window. Natalie and May are at the front of the bus looking at seats before they sit, then when I was looking down, I looked back up and couldnºt see them so I thought of the possibility that they somehow got back on the other bus. I honestly had no idea where they were. Meanwhile, still, the guy is staring. We give up and ignore him and I fall asleep, clutching my purse, scared for the creepy guys and I put my ´´carry on´´ between my feet on the floor. Also, when the bus was boarding, a woman came on with a baby. Cassi and I were seated about 3 rows from the very back, and as she walked by us, I think a couple people groaned or commented that they didnºt want to sit near a baby. She told them, in Spanish, not to worry because her baby wonºt cry.
I woke up about an hour into the trip because I felt movement by my feet. Thinking someone was trying to steal my bag, I quickly woke up and looked down. The busº interior lights were off because it was a night trip, and I thought I saw a sweater on the ground. As my eyes became a bit more adjusted I realized there was a man laying down on the aisle floor trying to sleep. The movement I had felt was his elbow brushing against my shoe. I looked down the aisle to see if anyone else was amazed by this...only to find about 3 more men sleeping on the aisle floor. Also, that baby was crying. And crying. And crying...I somehow managed to fall asleep to the sound of a baby crying and a man snoring by my feet.
At the first rest stop, I got off and went to the bathroom and got on the bus via the front door and finally confirmed, after 3 hours of paranoia, that May and Natalie are in fact on this bus, and they are sleeping in two separate seats towards the front. I also looked around the rest stop for the other bus, but it was nowhere in sight. Finally, after the bus driver started up the engines to head out, the other bus pulled into the stop and I saw Mary-Kate get off.
Our bus rode off once again, and in the next few hours I tried a variety of sleeping positions: leaning my head against the seat in front of me, scooting my butt low on the seat to have my knees lean on the seat in front of me, and try leaning back. The latter was the most unsuccessful, because what kind of crazy person would think to sleep by reclining the chair and resting their head where the headrest is?!
Once we entered Portugal, a national guard guy got on the bus to check our passports. He went through the bus reading them, and he took some people~s passports away, telling them he~d return them in a minute. To one Portuguese lady, he said that her passport was bad and she needed to fix it. Nevertheless, he gave it back and let her continue on her journey. That~s cool...
I also faintly remember there being a part where Cassi told me to lean my head on her shoulder. When I woke up my head was on her shoulder and her head was on my head, and she told me that she had earlier found me leaning diagonally forward in her direction, and she knew that wasnºt comfortable so she re-adjusted my head position.
Finally we arrived in Porto. But whatºs this? Oh, not an actual bus station! Instead we were dropped off in the middle of some business district. Also, our bus arrived early! We were actually unsure of that last part, since our watches were still on Spain time and the bus clock was somewhat off. I am still pretty sure we were at our ´´destination´´ at about 5:30am. So here we were, Natalie, May, Cassi and me, shivering in the darkness of some public park place of some sort, with a taxi stand nearby. However, due to my observation at the rest stop (that their bus arrived as we left), I knew they were at least a half hour behind us. We had to call them to give them the hostel address and number, so we tried doing that for a while, since Cassiºs hands were so cold and she was so nervous that she literally couldnºt aim her fingers on the keys on the phone.
After we got in touch with a zonked-out Mary-Kate, we got in a taxi. Oh, but of course he doesnºt speak English or Spanish. Only French. Thatºs not even one of their top 3 languages spoken here. We took the cab to their hostel and the guy reluctantly opened the doors, let them lock their luggage in the luggage room, then kicked them out, saying checkin was at 3pm.
We called my hostel and found my check in was at 1pm, but I still had all my luggage. We wandered only a block until we found an open cafe. By now it was about 6.30am or so. We hung out there for about an hour and a half, then we found out the rest of our group was nearby. We met up with them and found out that their bus WAS a half hour behind, plus they were dropped off way further away than we were: we paid a 7 euro fare, and they paid a 12 euro fare.
We then loitered in that cafe until about 9am, then we decided to move on. It was about 50 degrees outside and drizzling! Of course, the weather said itºd be above seventy the whole time on our trip, so we were wearing our warmest clothes, which consisted of jeans, short sleeves and a hoodie.
I needed to find my hostel and we knew it was nearby so I used my friendsº hostelºs internet service and they donºt have flash, so google maps was basically useless. I had to use HTML mode which showed the map at about the size of half a playing card.
We knew it was somewhere northwest, and decided to get in that direction by walking along the river. We stumbled upon a street market with about a bajillion people selling stuff. I ended up getting a gift here for Eric.
We finally found my hostel, dropped off my stuff, then ate food next door. Alex and Mary Kate were feeling ultra queasy and throwing up every once in a while due to either the sleeping pills, the Burger King, or a combo of both.
We then went to this church that has a museum and catacombs which was cool. After we went to a place for lunch. We wandered some more until it was time for us all to check in and we parted ways to go to our hostels.
By this time it was about 2.45 pm. The ongoing joke was that we never wanted to look at a watch because time was passing so SLOWLY. We were already in the city for about 10 hours, for Godºs sakes!
We met up again at 8pm, where I found out that the other group took a solid 4 and a half hour nap while I had meanwhile just been hanging out at my hostel.
We went to an internet place to buy tickets to the Alhambra in Granada (um, episode 3 from star wars was filmed there...it also looks like Aladdinºs palace!). We wandered some more, ate at a restaurant along the river, then went home at 10.45 to just sleep.
So let me give you a run through of how much sleep I´ve gotten. Wednesday night i got 7 hours or so. No biggie. then Thurs night, b-c i was packing and then had to wake up early for the teaching thing, i went to bed around 3...and woke up at 6.20. so thatºs about 3 hours.
Then, on the bus i got 1 hour increments of sleep, and only about 5 of them, none of which were quality. Finally I got about 9 hours of sleep Friday night.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Quick!
Tomorrow I am getting on a bus to Bilbao where I am getting on a bus to Portugal!
I am going with Cassi, Alex Ireland, Mary-Kate, Natalie and May to Porto, Lisboa and Lagos in Portugal, then Sevilla and Granada in southern Spain.
I have 2 weeks of spring break here, so I will be gone for basically the whole 17 days.
I will update you all on more details when I get back!
I am going with Cassi, Alex Ireland, Mary-Kate, Natalie and May to Porto, Lisboa and Lagos in Portugal, then Sevilla and Granada in southern Spain.
I have 2 weeks of spring break here, so I will be gone for basically the whole 17 days.
I will update you all on more details when I get back!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Unexpected Voyage
POOF!
My friends and family in the US of A, did you feel that?
What, you ask?
The time change!
For a brief two weeks we were a mere 6 hours apart.
But alas, time has changed here last night in the European Union and we are back to seven hours apart again.
Well, I have the unfortunate news of my grandmother's passing. For the past couple months she has been in an assisted living place where she has been suffering from cancer. When I would talk to my parents on video chat over these past two months, they would inform me with great news: she had a great day today and was laughing and chatting! Or with bad news: we don't know how long she can hold on.
It was this tug of war for what seemed like forever, but right before St. Patrick's day my parents informed me that she was more and more sick and they had mutually decided to let her pass. Two days before St. Patrick's, I talked to my dad on video chat and planned my trip to come home. We bought tickets from San Sebastian to Madrid and Madrid to Chicago, then the reverse for the way home. Fortunately I had a 5 day weekend that weekend because here in San Sebastian it's basically Father's Day on Thursday, so we had no school then or on Friday. That week before I left was hard, because it was difficult to contact my family since they were often out of the house visiting Nana. When I got on my plane to the US that Thursday (two days after St. Pattys) morning, I honestly was uninformed whether or not she was alive or not.
When I arrived home to big hugs from my parents at O'Hare, they sadly told me that Nana had passed that morning, about a few hours into my flight. It was sad, but it was so unreal because I have not seen my grandmother since before I left for my trip, to show her and my grandpa the video camera I had gotten using the Christmas giftcards they gave me. And at that stage, she was completely fine. All of this information about her being sick was all told to me, and I hadn't contacted her via video chat or anything. When my parents told me, my dad told me it was good that she was gone before I arrived, because he wouldn't have wanted me to remember her as the bed-ridden hospitalized Nana that she was, but instead as the happy, healthy Nana I saw back in January. I agree. It was just...strange to be told that someone you haven't seen in two months was now gone, forever.
Basically when I arrived home the whole weekend we were busy going to Grandpa's to visit him with my mom's side of the family, and making plans for the funeral service and visitation. It was very busy indeed, and of course just a very sad time in general. The first time I broke down when I was home when I finally saw my Grandpa, who you could just tell was stressed from making phone calls non stop about the saddest event in his life, the passing of his wife of 62 years. We decided to compile some pictures for a board to put at the visitation and funeral, as well as the lunch at Hackney's afterward. That was fun to look at all the family pictures from way back. I wish I had some pictures here of Nana back in the day, when she looked like a gorgeous 40's pinup! I do have some great family pictures of me and my cousins, though:
I especially like my brother's Dick Tracy shirt in the first one.
We also decided to write a eulogy amongst the grandchildren (me and my brother, my cousins Nicki and Pat, and Olivia). We all gathered in a room at my Grandpa's apartment, discussing our favorite memories of her and us. As my cousin Nicki put it so well: "Do you guys realize how proud she was? She was such a proud woman. Any time we met her friends, they always knew of us. We were her pride and joy. She loved us SO much."
When Pat read the eulogy he wrote, compiling all of our memories, it was wonderful. My favorite parts he touched on were:
"Nana always referred to Eric and me as her little terrors...but of course, Nicki, Olivia and Melissa were her little angels."
"She and Grandpa had nicknames for us all, like Melissa: Miss Madam, and Eric: Beeler."
"We grandkids always remembered arguing over who had the most pictures on her and Grandpa's mantle, which constantly changed until Nicki's wedding photos blew us all out of the water."
Again, I was mostly fine at the funeral, and when I broke down, my brother jokingly commented in a serious tone: "hey, get a hold of yourself, this is a funeral!", always turning the situation into a comforting one.
We went to Hackney's for lunch afterward, where we saw Dorothy, my grandparents' friend and piano player from Hackney's. While talking with the elderly woman, I teared up as she solemnly noted that it has to be so hard for Grandpa, who has lost his "buddy" of 62 years, his friend he was with for nearly every moment of his life. At that point, I realized I was crying not just for my Nana, but for my Grandpa, since I was almost more sad for him that he doesn't have anyone he can talk to like that anymore.
But, it was still nice to be home for it all, to get and give big hugs to the ones I love, and to console everyone in such a sad time. Getting together with my cousins is always a fun time, especially listening to my brother and cousin Pat joke around, which always has me laughing. It's what my grandmother would have wanted: to see her family enjoying one anothers' company and having a good time.
The travel home was interesting itself, since I had a chance to get some things that they don't sell or are rare here in Spain, like Ranch Dressing, BBQ sauce, Peanut Butter, cookie mix, Cosmo magazine (in english) and A1 Steak Sauce. Most of those things were for my friends, for which they reimbursed me when I got back to Spain.
And for disease control, the customs have to ask you about whether or not you were on a farm, or are bringing fresh food into the country. In addition to the form you fill out upon entering the USA, you also are randomly questioned before you exit the baggage claim, where it is asked in such a way where the guy just seems to be either very hungry or weird:
(To man in front of me) Security guy: Do you have a sandwich? No? Ok, thank you.
(To me) Security Guy: Were you on a farm? No? Ok, thank you.
And even though I was in O'Hare, I found myself saying "Perdon" in Spanish when I would bump into people. That wore off once I was back in the suburbs.
When I got back to San Sebastian, I literally hopped on a bus back to my host family's house, got my backpack together, ate breakfast, and got on a bus to go to class. I told my teachers about the situation, and I knew I'd miss my first class. My second class, Basque Language, I was late to by about 30 minutes (it's a 70 min class) and people looked at me all laughing-like, thinking I got there that late b/c I slept in or something. I was definitely NOT in the mood for those people at that time. It was also annoying to be asked "how was your weekend?" by people I hadn't told my weekend plans to. Of course, they were just trying to be nice, but still, it was like "Hmm, alright, considering I went to my grandma's funeral, and you?"
But in all, I am glad I went back home for the event, since I didn't want to have to deal with it by myself here, where no one can emotionally relate to the situation. But at the same time, I feel like I "cheated" in a way by going home during my big semester away. It really didn't feel like I'd been gone for very long, and I know once I go back the same thing will happen. But at least then it will be for the end of the semester and I will have camp to look forward to.
I miss you Nana.
My friends and family in the US of A, did you feel that?
What, you ask?
The time change!
For a brief two weeks we were a mere 6 hours apart.
But alas, time has changed here last night in the European Union and we are back to seven hours apart again.
Well, I have the unfortunate news of my grandmother's passing. For the past couple months she has been in an assisted living place where she has been suffering from cancer. When I would talk to my parents on video chat over these past two months, they would inform me with great news: she had a great day today and was laughing and chatting! Or with bad news: we don't know how long she can hold on.
It was this tug of war for what seemed like forever, but right before St. Patrick's day my parents informed me that she was more and more sick and they had mutually decided to let her pass. Two days before St. Patrick's, I talked to my dad on video chat and planned my trip to come home. We bought tickets from San Sebastian to Madrid and Madrid to Chicago, then the reverse for the way home. Fortunately I had a 5 day weekend that weekend because here in San Sebastian it's basically Father's Day on Thursday, so we had no school then or on Friday. That week before I left was hard, because it was difficult to contact my family since they were often out of the house visiting Nana. When I got on my plane to the US that Thursday (two days after St. Pattys) morning, I honestly was uninformed whether or not she was alive or not.
When I arrived home to big hugs from my parents at O'Hare, they sadly told me that Nana had passed that morning, about a few hours into my flight. It was sad, but it was so unreal because I have not seen my grandmother since before I left for my trip, to show her and my grandpa the video camera I had gotten using the Christmas giftcards they gave me. And at that stage, she was completely fine. All of this information about her being sick was all told to me, and I hadn't contacted her via video chat or anything. When my parents told me, my dad told me it was good that she was gone before I arrived, because he wouldn't have wanted me to remember her as the bed-ridden hospitalized Nana that she was, but instead as the happy, healthy Nana I saw back in January. I agree. It was just...strange to be told that someone you haven't seen in two months was now gone, forever.
Basically when I arrived home the whole weekend we were busy going to Grandpa's to visit him with my mom's side of the family, and making plans for the funeral service and visitation. It was very busy indeed, and of course just a very sad time in general. The first time I broke down when I was home when I finally saw my Grandpa, who you could just tell was stressed from making phone calls non stop about the saddest event in his life, the passing of his wife of 62 years. We decided to compile some pictures for a board to put at the visitation and funeral, as well as the lunch at Hackney's afterward. That was fun to look at all the family pictures from way back. I wish I had some pictures here of Nana back in the day, when she looked like a gorgeous 40's pinup! I do have some great family pictures of me and my cousins, though:
I especially like my brother's Dick Tracy shirt in the first one.
We also decided to write a eulogy amongst the grandchildren (me and my brother, my cousins Nicki and Pat, and Olivia). We all gathered in a room at my Grandpa's apartment, discussing our favorite memories of her and us. As my cousin Nicki put it so well: "Do you guys realize how proud she was? She was such a proud woman. Any time we met her friends, they always knew of us. We were her pride and joy. She loved us SO much."
When Pat read the eulogy he wrote, compiling all of our memories, it was wonderful. My favorite parts he touched on were:
"Nana always referred to Eric and me as her little terrors...but of course, Nicki, Olivia and Melissa were her little angels."
"She and Grandpa had nicknames for us all, like Melissa: Miss Madam, and Eric: Beeler."
"We grandkids always remembered arguing over who had the most pictures on her and Grandpa's mantle, which constantly changed until Nicki's wedding photos blew us all out of the water."
Again, I was mostly fine at the funeral, and when I broke down, my brother jokingly commented in a serious tone: "hey, get a hold of yourself, this is a funeral!", always turning the situation into a comforting one.
We went to Hackney's for lunch afterward, where we saw Dorothy, my grandparents' friend and piano player from Hackney's. While talking with the elderly woman, I teared up as she solemnly noted that it has to be so hard for Grandpa, who has lost his "buddy" of 62 years, his friend he was with for nearly every moment of his life. At that point, I realized I was crying not just for my Nana, but for my Grandpa, since I was almost more sad for him that he doesn't have anyone he can talk to like that anymore.
But, it was still nice to be home for it all, to get and give big hugs to the ones I love, and to console everyone in such a sad time. Getting together with my cousins is always a fun time, especially listening to my brother and cousin Pat joke around, which always has me laughing. It's what my grandmother would have wanted: to see her family enjoying one anothers' company and having a good time.
The travel home was interesting itself, since I had a chance to get some things that they don't sell or are rare here in Spain, like Ranch Dressing, BBQ sauce, Peanut Butter, cookie mix, Cosmo magazine (in english) and A1 Steak Sauce. Most of those things were for my friends, for which they reimbursed me when I got back to Spain.
And for disease control, the customs have to ask you about whether or not you were on a farm, or are bringing fresh food into the country. In addition to the form you fill out upon entering the USA, you also are randomly questioned before you exit the baggage claim, where it is asked in such a way where the guy just seems to be either very hungry or weird:
(To man in front of me) Security guy: Do you have a sandwich? No? Ok, thank you.
(To me) Security Guy: Were you on a farm? No? Ok, thank you.
And even though I was in O'Hare, I found myself saying "Perdon" in Spanish when I would bump into people. That wore off once I was back in the suburbs.
When I got back to San Sebastian, I literally hopped on a bus back to my host family's house, got my backpack together, ate breakfast, and got on a bus to go to class. I told my teachers about the situation, and I knew I'd miss my first class. My second class, Basque Language, I was late to by about 30 minutes (it's a 70 min class) and people looked at me all laughing-like, thinking I got there that late b/c I slept in or something. I was definitely NOT in the mood for those people at that time. It was also annoying to be asked "how was your weekend?" by people I hadn't told my weekend plans to. Of course, they were just trying to be nice, but still, it was like "Hmm, alright, considering I went to my grandma's funeral, and you?"
But in all, I am glad I went back home for the event, since I didn't want to have to deal with it by myself here, where no one can emotionally relate to the situation. But at the same time, I feel like I "cheated" in a way by going home during my big semester away. It really didn't feel like I'd been gone for very long, and I know once I go back the same thing will happen. But at least then it will be for the end of the semester and I will have camp to look forward to.
I miss you Nana.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Cute!
This weekend I am going to Barcelona with Ana and Natalia and their friend Raquel.
For research, I was looking in my Spain guide that Barb and Emily got me. One of the places to go was this little cafe and bakery. I went to the website and this is what I found...
That candle is on a cake. A cake the size of a ring! It says it's a wedding anniversary cake. ADORBS!
That flower on the left? That's a ring too. MADE OF CANDY!
The Spain book says this is a great place to go for the "Art Nouveau fittings" that can only be enjoyed while having a cup of coffee or hot cocoa. I hope this place isn't too expensive because I DEFINITELY wanna go there.
It also says to try the "ensaimadas" because they are irresistable. We shall see.
OH! I am looking at this site and they have chocolate postcards! And CD's! And money! And a little tree that looks like it's made out of icicles but it is caramel!
Who cares about the cathedrals and plazas when you could see THIS?!
They make exploding cakes. Real useful.
Explore.
http://www.escriba.es/
For research, I was looking in my Spain guide that Barb and Emily got me. One of the places to go was this little cafe and bakery. I went to the website and this is what I found...
That candle is on a cake. A cake the size of a ring! It says it's a wedding anniversary cake. ADORBS!
That flower on the left? That's a ring too. MADE OF CANDY!
The Spain book says this is a great place to go for the "Art Nouveau fittings" that can only be enjoyed while having a cup of coffee or hot cocoa. I hope this place isn't too expensive because I DEFINITELY wanna go there.
It also says to try the "ensaimadas" because they are irresistable. We shall see.
OH! I am looking at this site and they have chocolate postcards! And CD's! And money! And a little tree that looks like it's made out of icicles but it is caramel!
Who cares about the cathedrals and plazas when you could see THIS?!
They make exploding cakes. Real useful.
Explore.
http://www.escriba.es/
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