Last Friday- 2/9/7… my friends and I, and a bunch of students from our program went to a cideria! It was really fun- posted some of the new pictures. The cideria has like a family style dinner, with bread, fish, meat, and stuff that is brought out to a looooong table. Everyone eats and talking and stuff… and all along the walls there are barrels of Cider. Cider is like a hard apple cider, kinda weird tasting but the taste grows on you. Its awesome how big the barrels are and how many there are! Theres someone who opens and closes the valves of the barrels, and it shoots out and you just hold your glass underneath it and fill it up. It was fun.

This weekend is a 4day weekend for us… in celebration of the Carnaval! Its a big celebration here… for Lent I believe, and we are going all the way down South– To Cadiz. Its a city that celebrates it BIG TIME! Supposedly with costumes and all kinds of stuff. We leave tomorrow, and will be back late on Tuesday night.

ALSO— soon enough, I will unveil pictures of my new bike… Yes one of the greatest purchases made here for me in Spain. haha The bike is beauuuutiful. so wait for those.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Barcelona! It was such an awesome city! My friend and I left on Thursday night (feb 1), around 11.. for an 8hr train ride. The train was cool, first time on one… and our rooms had beds so we could sleep (saves a night in a hostal and a whole day or traveling!) Sabrina, Caitlin, Brett, Aaron, and I all had a room together on the train and drank wine and sang while Brett played the guitar.. So fun! We arrived in Barcelona on Friday morning around 830 and trecked around to find our hostal. After checking in and getting sorta settled.. we all went out to breakfast. We had an awesome group with us… all the people mentioned above plus Lauren, Aubrey, Christy, Aaron, and Javi. The first day had beautiful weather!! The sun was shinning and it was such a great change from the cold. We walked around, took pictures, checked out the water, did some shopping, found a starbucks!, and then took a little nap before we got ready for the night. The nightlife in Barcelona is a complete change from what it is during the day. The day is gorgeous with so many people and pretty things, and the night (at least the part we were at) was kind of gross. Prostitutes, she-men, and lame bars. Haha It was interesting to see it though! We ended up just cruising around, checking out some stuff, and ended up a pincho-bar for some wine. The bar was right next to Barcelona’s cathedral. (but it was to dark to take pictures). Then Saturday we wanted to go to all the monument and touristy stuff… so we first set out to the Temple of the Sagrada Family (its like the royal temple) The architect is Antoni Gaudi… and he designed lots of building all around Barcelona. I posted pictures of not only the Temple but Park Guell, and some of his other work around the city… Needless to say, this guy was amazing!! The Temple itself was started in 1882… and is still being worked on today! Gaudi finished the drawing of what the whole Temple would be around 1890, and then he died in 1926. A lot of the Temple is complete, but so much more is being done. The expected year for it to be finished is 2025. I would love to go back and see the finished piece!! After seeing the inside, and out of the Temple, we went to Park Guell. It is the Museum of Gaudi, and it was once his house.. from 1906-1926. The view of his backyard is goegeous! (look at the pictures) something I definitely wouldn’t mind waking up to every morning. The house had some of his original work, he also did furniture and ceramic pieces. The park itself is just filled with buildings and sculptures, and tiles, and all kinds of stuff in such beautiful colored ceramic tiles. It had a view of the city and.. ahh.. I just cant express how amazing it was! Luckily we had Sabrinas camera, and Caitlin’s friend Beccas for back up, because my battery died!!! I was so bummed but still got a good amount of pictures to show for. After eating some lunch (amazing pizza!) and drinking some “café con leches” we ended back for the hostal. On the way, we stopped at this store, Cortez Ingles, which is like the “”Target”” of Spain, but better! It has everything!! The bottom floor is a grocery store with everything imaginable. (except goldfish crackers) They even had peanut butter!!! Which is so weird that they don’t have it really in Europe. Definitely haven’t seen any in San Sebastian. I finally bought a straighter for my hair too… cuz mine broke in Madrid the first week! My hair has been outta control and now I finally feel like I am looking normal. Haha. We bought some snacks for the train ride home and some other stuff and then headed to the hostal. We all got ready for the night, and then all the girls hung out and drank wine and talked for a couple hours. Our group was sooo great!! Got along so well, then we all headed to these bars and discotecas above the water. This night was definitely better than the previous. We danced away for a while… had our fun, called it a night. Good times. Sunday was our last day there, and unfortunately half of the group was heading home in the afternoon. Our train was leaving at 10pm that night. That’s really the best way to travel! After they left, Caitlin, Sabrina,Aaron, Lauren, and I went to the Picasso museum. It was interesting.. all of his work was divided by his life. With the first room starting with his first drawings and training, to the last room having his amazing work!! I got some posters and stuff and am excited to frame them when I get home! Look for the pictures!! Afterwards Sabrina, Caitlin, and I walked around and looked at all the people and bought some souveniers. The streets were filled with people dressed up in costumes and stuff… the first day we saw Edward scissor hands!! I loved it!! There were lots of cool costumes. We ended the night all eating at the Hard Rock Café before the train ride home. It was nice to hear the fun music and eat some good ol greasy American food! Mmmmmm. The train ride home was kinda lame, the air conditioner was broken, and the door kept making lots of noise.. Oh and my Ipod died! Ha buuut I studied for my test and then just passed out! We got back to San Sebastian at 730am on Monday(feb 5).. and I had a test at 230! I ended up getting a “b” with is good.. but not what I wanted ☺  Next time I am going to get an “a”!! Although school is getting a lot more tough, Il be able to handle it!

So that was my Barcelona weekend! This weekend Im staying in San Sebastian and I am really going to explore the city.. theres still some places I haven’t been, and would like to see. Tomorrow night (Friday), I am going with a huge group of people to something called a … Cideria? Cideria is this drink here, and theres like barrels of it on the walls? Ha I am not to sure yet… only have heard some stories.. but its family style dinner, with a whole bunch of people. Something a lot of locals go to, so I am excited to speak some Spanish!! Me and my friends met some Spanish woman who lived in California for like 50 yrs at the café this morning, told us it was so nice to hear English. Haha Aww that was nice!! But, Ill post more about the cideria, and pictures of course. Hope everything is wonderful with everyone and talk with you soon. ☺

Miss youuu! Love youu!

Its been again.. way to long since I have written! I was suppose to keep it updated all the time… but the internet time here is so scarce. After reading and replying to my emails.. and of course myspace It seems like ive already been on for hours! Sooo the snow is over! Only lasted for a few days, thankfully! It was sunny for a few days, but still extremely cold! It was between -1 and 6 degrees celcius. Yesterday though it did start to drizzle.

Last weekend I went to a “sociedad” dinner with some of my girlfriends. It was really cool. I had actually learned about them a few days prior in my culture class. Sociedads are these groups of friends that have a meeting time everyweek, same place, same time roughly… and they make these dinners for everyone. So our local friend that we met invited us, cuz he was going to be making dinner. Some guys from the Real Socieodad soccer team came… (not the big time team, it was like second string or something haha) and it was awesome just trying to communicate in spanish. We were all around the same age and laughed so much because we didnt know each others languages. I have been meaning to post some pictures, but you know how that goes…. Look for them though!!

ALSO– on Sunday, I went to this monument of Jesus (i forget the name of it) and its up this huge mountain. The scenery from the top is gorgeous!! I just keep thinking how romantic it looks and how I can wait to share the experience with Ryan when he gets here   I would looove for everyone to be able to hike up there with me, but I hope you enjoy the pictures just as much. (they will be up soon too!)

This weekend a group of us are going to Barcelona!! I am soo excited, lots of pictures will be posted about that, and a blog as well We are leaving tonight at 11ishpm and will arrive there tomorrow about 730ishAM by train. Long ride, but I plan on sleeping and studying!! I have my first exam on Monday at 245pm. (my train is scheduled to arrive back home at 730isham that same day) sooo lets all hope everything goes smoothly!!

Wish me luck for this weekend, and my exam on Monday. Love you all. miss you!

Yes it did snow a little bit this morning!! It was weird, Ive never really seen it before…I tried to take some pictures but they didnt turn out that great. Buuuut look at them! I also put some other cool new pictures of the river by my house. The storm brought in these awesome big waves.

I posted them under.. “my home” … so its not a new set of pictures but it does have new pictures in the album. Ill post new ones there alot, so make sure you always are looking.

okay i miss you guys. love you.

ps. last night i actually hung out with Mertxe and her family. A little step cuz I have been kinda quiet here, cuz I still am frustrated with not being able to communicate as much as I want. There was a lot of english last night, but also spanish! yay

Okay, so I am in need of talking about whats been going on these past couple of days. Ill start with last weekend… It was the festival de San Sebastian! It’s a huge holiday and festival that takes place pretty much all weekend here. It starts at 12am on friday Jan 20- and continues until 12am the next day, Saturday the 21st. I already posted some pictures of it. At 12am in the Plaza de la Constitucion, which is near my house… they kicked off a huge parade. Hundreds and hundreds of people are in the street watching as hundreds of other people (young and old) are dressed up as soldiers and cooks.. playing drums and singing the hymn of San Sebastian. The reason for the cook outfits and hats, has to do with the history of San Sebastian, and the revolution that took place. The people of  San Sebastian are sort oft doing a parody of the soldiers. Instead of wearing soldier uniforms they wore cook uniforms. It was way interesting. There were sooo many people and lots of drums. My friends and I just hung out with some people at Sabrina’s house and later went out to the bars… ironically we went to a bar called Molly Malones (reminds me of home!! Haha) Its pretty much a touristy bar, because a good majority of the people there are Americans. The drums continued all night, and a parade started in the morning again with more drummers in the street. Many people were baracha allllll day. The same kind of thing continued on Saturday .. drums and people all night. It was an interesting experience.
Last week was also the start of school. The classes were not even half as bad as they were made out to be. The program director was so rude about how hard the classes were going to be, and totally stressed me out for nothing! I am taking an elective class however that does seem to be a little difficult.. I am suppose to write 2 10 page papers… and a presentation, which I hate doing… but it has to be done so no use getting worked up over I guess?
The lack of accessibility to the internet is probably one of the most frustrating things that I am learning to deal with.. (aside from the different food, not having my bed, being away from the ones I love… haha and the other obvious things) My internet sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t, so its frustrating when I want to email, or update my site! I wanted to write on Monday about my issues with the rain. Its been raining soo hard these past couple days, with yesterday having hail and thunder. Me and my poor boot have a hard time getting through the rain. Monday was probably the worst, ha and I look back now feeling like I was in a movie. I had to take the bus, because it was raining so hard, and the walk to school is about 40min (which I don’t mind when the sun is out). I totally got on the bus the wrong way, cut everyone in line and stood there clueless while the bus driver yelled at me in Spanish.. it was like a deer in headlights when I looked back for help from the other people on the bus. But everyone looked away like they didn’t realize I was totally lost. Then.. I got off on the wrong stop… way farther than where I needed to be. So I ended up having to walk anyways ha. Then on the way home.. my umbrella broke!! So yesterday I had to buy a new one.. especially when it started hailing.
Sooo.. yes that is my experiences here with the rain. It is so so cold, and very windy nothing like San Diego.
My friends and I are talking about our traveling and how we really want to start. We were talking about Barcelona within these next couple of weekends.. and definitely Ireland for St Patricks day! Theres other places we want to go, just gotta find the time and money to do it! Any recommendations of some cool places to go..? Just let me know…
I miss and love everyone and hope everything is going wonderful at home. ☺