The days here are absolutely flying by! Well, not really the ones that I spend sleeping until noon and blogging until it's time to go to class at 4:30, like today, but I'm starting to realize that 4 months is really not that much time to be here, especially when you're an ambitious little ball of Spanish energy (and cuteness) like me! I have been in the midst of planning all the trips I want to take while I'm here in Europe, and the fact that I only have about 9 weekends and 2 breaks to travel makes seeing the 3,829,374 places I want to see a tad problematic. I'm sure you all feel so bad for me! Anyway, upon figuring out that we will not, in fact, live in this dreamworld forever, my friends Margaret, Amy and Matt and I decided to make a spontaneous day trip to the southern coast of Spain in the magical city of Málaga! Granada is still far from the tropical 80 degree weather we were all expecting upon our arrival here, so we were all just tickled when we stepped off the bus in Málaga and found that this is where the beautiful beach weather had been hiding all along! It was in the mid-70's and smelled like North Carolina in the summertime, and after exploring the city, visiting the Cathedral and doing some illegal picture-taking at the Picasso Museum, we were able to slip off our shoes and take a walk down the beach! I've learned later this week that Spaniards actually consider Málaga's beach to be sub-par in comparison to the white sand that most coastal cities in Spain sport, however if someone had told me this information while I was enjoying a plate of calamari and glass of sangria with the Mediterranean wind in my hair, I probably would have told them to stop talking and enjoy the view. After the beach we walked around a little more, ate some ice cream, visited the Plaza de Toros, and then cried when it was time to go home. Que lastima!
It has also come to my attention that I've never talked about my school (Because contrary to popular belief, I do have to learn while over here)! My school is called El Centro de Granadí, or CEGRÍ for short, and it was basically a school built for UofI, University of Michigan, and Wisconsin-Madison students to attend. We don't go to school with any actual Spaniards, however the teachers are all from Granada and no English is allowed to be spoken in any of the classes. It's sweet! I don't feel embarrassed to speak in Spanish like I used to in classes at UofI, and the professors are so helpful. I love my Historia de Arte class, because every Monday we get to actually go to the place who's art and architecture we're learning about and actually have class in the building (so far we've been to the Granada Cathedral, and the Royal Chapel where Ferdinand and Isabel are buried)! I also like my Arab-Muslim class a lot because strangely I know a lot about Islam so I'm doing well in it. My culture class is a favorite as well because the main goal of the class is simply for us to become fluent speakers...and it doesn't really matter what we speak about as long as it relates somewhat to Spain (In the last conversation we discussed the overwhelming amount of Caca that owners leave on the streets of Granada without cleaning up. Caca is dog poop. People are gross.).
In other news, I'm still fine, tonight I'm having seafood pasta for dinner, and last night I went to a bar to watch the Barcelona-Madrid game on a 20 foot screen while drinking cerveza and cheering for Real-Madrid (they tied)! I think I'm becoming a real Spaniard...although my host madre tells me I still have to work on not smiling so much. I tell her I was born smiling, and then we laugh together. I think she finally understands how funny I am!
That's all for now, next time I won't leave you hanging for as long as I previously had...that was just rude of me!
Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere's Málaga (not in any order...sowwy)!
And how could we forget Molly's First Day of School?? :)
Adios!
So Beautiful...so jealous!
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