I'm home!

So I do realize that this blog is a few days late, seeing that I have been home since Monday. Well my apologies, but I was welcomed back to the United States with a nice 102 degree fever and the 24 hour stomach bug... so I wasn't doing too much of anything for my first few days back. On today's agenda was my wisdom teeth surgery, so after amusing the oral surgeon and his nurses with my reaction to the laughing gas, I spent my third straight day in bed watching Gilmore Girls and noshing on soft-foods galore. Oh pudding. Tomorrow I'm looking forward to breathing some outside air and I may make it to the pool (but only to pass out on a lounge chair, nothing too crazy just yet.)

As for the end of our time in Spain. The last week flew by and included a flamenco concert, exams, and "graduating" from the university of Cádiz and receiving our very official certificates. We traveled to Granada for our last weekend, and despite the 45 degree Celsius (yes, that DOES convert to 115 degrees Farenheit) temperatures it was definitely worth the trip. We got to see the tombs of Ferdinand and Isabella in La Capilla Real, La Catedral de Granada and of course La Alhambra (which was absolutely AMAZING). It was really cool to see so many of the things we had learned about in Alberto's Art History class. (The Alhambra is significantly cooler in real life as opposed to a picture on a powerpoint screen, just saying.)

Well, I just felt like I should have a final blog entry for some closure. Thank you so much to everyone for following my time in Spain and I hope that you at least sort of enjoyed reading my ramblings about our experiences. I uploaded some more pictures from the last few weeks of the trip (it's amazing how quickly photos upload when you're not using the free WiFi in Plaza San Antonio!! Claro!!). Thank you again!

ADIOS!!!!

~Katie~

Last day of art history class with Alberto (we thought seriously about kidnapping him and bringing him back to Davidson to teach in the Spanish department...)

The Alhambra

One of our last lunches with Pepa... my stomach misses her cooking :(

WELCOME HOME!!!!

One of our last sunsets in Cádiz

Only in Spain...

Time continues to fly by here. I remember thinking about writing a blog about five times this week, but it never happened. So here it goes.

To start off on a random note, yesterday Amy, Pat, Pacious and I witnessed something I have never encountered before. And kind of feel like could only be found in Spain. Rounding a corner on our walk to school, what do we come across (and nearly run into) but a woman walking her pig. Yes, her pig. We tried not to stare too much, but weren’t very successful. So we have added that to the list of things you can come across in the streets of Cádiz. Other items on the list include speeding motocicletas who do NOT adhere to the yield to pedestrians rule, Spanish men who enjoy staring at you and yelling “hola guapa” (my personal favorite… not), and millions upon millions of pigeons that absolutely will not move for me (for everyone else yes, but for me they just sit there. I’ve started a point system actually to see how many I can kick each day. They deserve it after I was pooped on twice in one day last week). Okay now I’m making Cádiz sound terrible which was not my intention at all. Today Amy and I have to face the fact that we officially only have one week left here, and we’re really not too happy about this porque:

1) Pepa is the most adorable host mom in the world. Reasons why: (I like numbering things)

1) She is the best cook ever. You all already know this and probably are tired of hearing about it. But allow me a few lines to share this week’s amazing culinary creations. The menu included paella de arroz negro (rice dyed black with squid ink and filled with pieces of calamari. I know it sounds gross but it is AMAZING), mejillónes con picadillo (mussels with a mix of onions, green and red peppers, cucumbers and tomatoes), merluza fish “Pepa style” for the second time (our absolute FAVORITE dish), átun encebollada (tuna with carmelized onions and eggplant), and much much more but I’ll stop there. We keep telling Pepa she needs to open her own restaurant and that she is la mejor cocinera en todo el mundo (best cook in the world). And she just smiles and says “Gracias, guapas”. It’s going to be strange to go home and not be called guapa (which means pretty) all the time. I think I’m really going to miss Pepa.

2) She bought us these funny little triangular towels for our hair (she and Alba both have one). Mine is blue and I look like a little smurf once I’ve wrapped my hair up in it. The button on mine broke today and Pepa sewed it back on for me. She takes such good care of us.

3) Amy and I really like her daughter Alba. The other night we helped her make pancakes using this packet of pancake mix and little bottle of maple syrup that was a gift from a girl from Vermont who stayed here at the beginning of the summer. She didn’t really understand the concept of American pancakes, but was very pleased with the final product. Amy and I can make some mean pancakes.

4) Pepa is so patient with us and I have a HUGE list of new words that she has helped us learn in my travel journal. I also just love sitting and talking with her and I’m actually able to understand her speedy Andalucian accent most of the time now!

2) I really like our classes and I’m going to miss Miguel and Alberto. In culture we’ve studied the Spanish Civil War, the Andalucian dialect (which my fruitería friend Antonia continues to try to teach me with no avail), the youth of Spain, the government of Spain, festivals, flamenco dancing, food, vocabulary, etc. etc. etc. In art we started with arte rupestre (cave paintings) and have progressed through arquitectura romana, el arte hispanomusulmano, el arte gótico y mudéjar and el Renacimiento (the Renaissance). The names just sound so much cooler in Español. Grammar is rather complicated at times but I feel like that is inevitable when you are learning difficult conjugations such as how to form the preteritó pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo en oraciones temporales con el condicional compuesto from a professor speaking in rapid Spanish gaditiano style. But I feel like I’ve learned so much and I’m beginning to notice that I don’t stumble over my verb conjugations as much when I’m speaking. So combine this with all the new words I’ve learned from Pepa, and my conversations are actually semi-coherent instead of a babbling amalgamation of un-conjugated verbs and partially relevant vocabulary.

3) Just random things such as… (another list, yay)

1) The ability to hop on a bus and travel to a completely different city for the day. Sevilla was amazing. We saw the Giralda Tower, El Torre de Oro, La Catedral, La Plaza de España and beautiful gardens. It was definitely worth the trip. (And we went to Starbucks three times. No joke.)

2) Harry Potter in Spanish is a fun experience. Except when the characters start speaking demasiado rapido (too fast) and all the Spanish people in the theater are laughing and the joke goes right over your American head.

3) The constant sounds of Michael Jackson in our little Spanish casa. Alba is SO OBSESSED. Amy and I find it to be a constant source of amusement. If anyone has any questions about the life of Michael Jackson, please ask me. There is a 99.9% chance that I will know the answer.

4) Coffee

5) Babysitting for Professor Kietry’s little boys the other night. After many hours of Peter Pan action figures, stories, coloring and Looney Tunes in Spanish, Amy and I did manage to get them to bed.

6) Watching The Lion King (El Rey León) and Beethoven 2 in Spanish on Sunday afternoon while laying on the couch eating the espinacas y garbanzos (spinach and garbanzo stew) that Pepa made for us before leaving for the beach with her little flowered lunch box and bocadillo in tote. She took juice boxes of sangria with her. Oh Spain.

7) Salsa classes. Need I say more.

8) Coffee

9) Coffee

10) Spinning class. The music is amazing. My iPod has definitely received a makeover thanks to this trip.

11) Pepa’s cooking

12) Coffee

Okay, I think that’s about it for now. Plus my computer is about to die and I need to go pack for our trip to Granada. We leave tomorrow morning and get back on Sunday night. Apparently it’s even hotter in Granada than Sevilla. Ay de mi. Hasta luego and I will try to be better about blogging next week!

adios íngles

This week certainly proved to be quite eventful, filled with some hilarious moments, multiple pruebas (quizzes) and papers and of course muchas tazas de café. Claro. (Our new favorite word… it’s the equivalent of “obviously” in English, but just sounds much cooler in Spanish. Pepa uses it at least 1,000,000 times a day. So we’ve followed suit and added it to our ever-increasing vocabulary).

On Wednesday morning our group met in front of the one and only Burguer King for our bodega adventure, on time for the most part. There were a few stragglers who got a bit turned around courtesy of the ADD layout of the streets in Cádiz. We boarded a catamaran and crossed the Bahía de Cádiz to Puerta Santamaria, arriving at the Osbourne winery after a tour of the city. We snapped a group photo with the huge bull statue of course and then embarked on our tour of the wine cellars. I’m not much of a wine connoisseur so having the ins and outs of the wine making process explained in rapid Spanish was a little difficult, but interesting nonetheless. We saw the huge vessels they used to stomp around in and juice the grapes (I’ve always wanted to do that. Too bad that wasn’t included as part of the tour) and the antiquated cork machines. As always, our tour included entertaining tourists. This particular one featured a little boy with the most epic rattail I’ve ever seen. (He started fiddling with the cork machines and was promptly reprimanded by the tour guide. I was about to do the same thing, so good thing he bit the bullet for me.) Then came the tasting portion of the tour… keep in mind that this was at 11:00 in the morning. Hence, I wasn’t really feeling it, although some people in our group were not at all affected by the awkward hour. I tried a sip of each wine and then kept myself busy polishing off nearly all of our table’s tapas, all the while sneaking pictures of the rattail kid of course. We then meandered back to the port and caught another catamaran (the wind had picked up substantially, so we were all quite damp and seasick upon our arrival in Cádiz.) This was quickly remedied by a good old Pepa lunch however. Warner girls, I’ve decided that if Nancy ever abandons us, Pepa is going to be our new chef. I am fairly certain she would not disappoint.

Wednesday night brought about round two of Spanish spinning class and I was excited to receive fewer strange looks this time. I think they’re beginning to accept me as one of their own, especially since they like that I know all the words to the American songs. I was given an official laminated membership card to replace the dinky little paper slip I’d been using before and after class the instructor asked me if I’d taken spinning before. I replied “si, pero solo dos veces” and received a “¡Que bueno!”. I was excited. I can’t wait for Monday. To top it all off, I visited Antonía and my frutería on the walk home. After a thirty-minute conversation in which I also got to meet her husband and daughter, I left laden with her recommendations of paraguayos (a type of peach) and ciruelas (yellow, plum-like and my new obsession).

Then came some intense studying for Cultura and Grammatica at our café as well as the writing of my codigo de honor, which marks the official end of my English for the next two weeks. As we were traveling to the bodega, Professora Kietrys informed us that it was indeed time to write up and sign our contracts and decide how much English we would use for the remainder of the trip. Amy and I decided to go all Español except for fifteen minutes of English a day (for emergencies and when we’re just too tired to think solely in a foreign language) and communication with our families and friends at home. So potentially I could have committed myself to ONLY Spanish and anyone reading this blog would have had to promptly enroll in some intensive Spanish classes. J But I decided against that.

It was a little frustrating Thursday night during our cooking class, since most people in our group haven’t committed themselves to that much Spanish. To avoid the temptation of speaking in English, Amy and I ended up talking mostly with Diego and Elena, the two Spanish students that joined us for dinner. We bonded over homemade paella and they invited us to dinner next week. They want to take us to the most popular tapas street in Cádiz and introduce us to some authentic Spanish dining. Elena asked us for our email to figure out a time and place to meet and I just have to share this email. It’s without a doubt the greatest message ever to appear in my inbox. I’m keeping it FOREVER.

"Hello! We're Diego and Elena ( We were talking with your in paellas's time xD). This is the elena's emails. Soon we' re going to send email about we meet for eat at the evening. Kisses"

In addition to new Spanish amigos, Amy and I also scored some free tickets to see (drum roll please) HARRY POTTER tonight!!! I can’t even express how excited I am on here since I feel like exclamation points and smiley faces would just lose their meaning after typing one hundred or so. Our MundoLengua professor Rosilla had three tickets to distribute among our group and Amy and I beasted the number guessing game and will therefore be heading to Corte Ingles tonight at 9:30 for a Spanish Harry Potter experience. Should be quite interesting. We’ve reviewed the plot together so we aren’t completely confused. J J J J

Other than that, I am glad that it is el fin de semana. Pepa made us seafood pasta and delicious salad for lunch and I just woke up from a glorious siesta. Now off to the gimnasio and then to view la major película en el mundo (the best movie in the world). Tomorrow Amy, Pat and I are heading to Sevilla for the day. Some people from our group are leaving this afternoon and spending the night in a hostel but we decided we just wanted a day trip. So I’m sure this weekend will result in another long entry. ¡Hasta luego!

week 2 begins

I’m having trouble grasping the fact that week two in Cádiz is already almost halfway over. The days seem to fly by here, even though everything about this culture screams relaxation. I think it has something to do with how we’re constantly learning, both in and out of the classroom. (Although our daily four-hour dose of classes conducted solely in Español certainly could get the job done on its own.) I keep on finding new things that I love about this city though. Por ejemplo, every single inch of Cádiz is jam packed with history. I feel like I’ve died and gone to history nerd heaven, and there just happens to be a gorgeous beach and culinary whiz of a host mom included as part of the package deal.

In place of Cultura y Historía del Arte this morning we paid a visit to the Museo de Cádiz. (Amy and I were already very familiar with its location since the entrance is about twenty feet from our café. See?? All that late night coffee drinking DOES pay off in the end.) Our workload has picked up substantially this week (although we’re not up to the Davidson pace of six-hour days in E.H. Little Library just yet…) and we have three compositions due on Friday, one of which was the reason for our museum visit. Our art professor Alberto accompanied us to the museum for a guided tour of the arqueología floor. The other two floors of the museum feature contemporary art and ethnographic artifacts from all over Andalucía, but the archaeology portion is special since everything in it was discovered in Cádiz. We started with artifacts from the Paleolithic, Neolithic and Copper Ages, then moved into the second room which focused on the Phoenician colonization of Cádiz. The city was originally known as Gadir before the Arabs began calling it Qadis, which in turn evolved into Cádiz. (Although the gaditianos pronounce it Cái… the ‘s’ here is a forgotten letter. This oftentimes results in some serious blank stares on our end when the locals start talking to us at their normal pace.) Then we saw sarcophaguses, Roman statues, vases, jewelry, terracotta sculptures, masks y mucho más before heading back to la Universidad for afternoon classes (but only after Amy and I made a café stop of course. It didn’t measure up to our Café Piccola though. That’s impossible). In Grammar this afternoon we had more oral presentations. Thus far people’s topics have ranged from international dance to secret societies to the TV show West Wing to the Bermuda Triangle. Mine isn’t until the 27^th so I’m still pondering…

After class, as is tradition, Amy and I met outside the school to commence our daily sprint (not kidding…) back to Pepa’s house for lunch. There are a TON of things I love about Spain, but the eating schedule is not on the list desafortunadamente. Each day, despite endless snacks and multiple cafés during class hours, we always seem to find ourselves FAMISHED at the 2:30 “lunch” hour and our noses always perk up as we round the corner onto Calle Adolfo de Castro, hoping to catch a whiff of the culinary bliss we are about to consume. As always, Pepa did not disappoint. While we were eating Amy and Alba (Pepa’s daughter who just got home on Sunday) were comparing L.A. sights such as In-N-Out Burgers, Disneyland and Hollywood Boulevard. And of course we heard all about Michael Jackson’s funeral. She really is quite obsessed. Reporters from the Cádiz newspaper actually came to the house today to interview this girl that flew hallway around the world for the occasion. And his songs occupy quite a few spots on the top 40 list of songs here while his music videos are always playing on the TV. In other words, he’s kind of a big deal in our household and in this country it seems.

After stuffing myself with Pepa’s magical soup and fresh bread from the panadería on our street, I went back to the museum to do some more research for my paper. I was quite proud of myself actually… I must have looked like a pretty official student with my backpack and notebook and all so museum workers waived the one-euro fee and I proceeded to write my essay while walking through the museum, rereading all the exhibits. Then I went back outside, sat at our café (recall its convenient proximity to the museum), and had a good conversation with our waitress buddy before heading to my gimnasio.

Speaking of the gimnasio! I joined Millennium Gym on Friday and went to my first spinning class last night. I received a few weird looks at first, but was quickly accepted once they realized I understood what they were saying and knew how to adjust my bike on my own. Davidson’s Fitness for the Athlete can take credit for that. Not the Spanish part, just the bike. THE CLASS WAS SO HARD. But I loved it. I’m obsessed. I’m going back tomorrow. It’s a very good thing the owners are extremely nice and graciously lent me a towel since I didn’t know you had to bring one… spinning class with INTENSE Spanish instructors barking orders at you + no air conditioner + no towel = mal idea. I have also discovered a new love for Spanish techno music. (Although the fact that the last song played was Barbie Girl did kind of make my day. Bopping alongside a muscular Spanish dude singing “I’m a Barbie girl, in a Barbie world” is something I will never, ever forget.)

I left the gym looking like I’d just jumped in the water at Playa Caleta and made a stop at my favorite frutería on the way back to Pepa’s casa. Like our dear little café, this frutería has become part of my daily routine. I went again this afternoon after the gym and spent twenty minutes talking to the owner Antonía. She is adorable. The frutería has been in her family for 80 years and she has worked there for the past 25. She lives right above the store with her two sons, 15 and 20, and five international students that are taking Spanish classes here this summer. I told her I’ll probably pay a visit every single day (she sells the best grapes and nectarines in all of Cádiz, hands down) and she smiled and told me she can’t wait to talk with me more and that my Spanish is muy bueno. Did I mention that she is adorable? Then on the way home I noticed that the bookstore I have been wanting to go in was finally open (the whole siesta phenomenon creates some weird shopping hours ciertamente) and I bought Tercera Verano en Vaqueros (The Third Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants book). J I figured a Spanish version of a favorite book at a semi-easy reading level posiblemente could improve my Español. (Plus I wanted to read it again and there are no English books to be found here.)

Whoops, another freakishly long entry. Tomorrow we go to a bodega (vineyard) in Jerez de La Frontera in place of classes. Yes, we are going to a vineyard, not class, you read that correctly. We meet in front of Burguer King (not a typo, that’s how they spell it here) at 9 AM sharp, so we have to get up a little earlier than usual. Hence, we’re going to head to bed now… much earlier than usual for us! Anything before midnight qualifies as early now. My tummy is full of café descafinado delicioso, I’m starting to warm up to Coco (the yappy Chihuahua) after he fell asleep in my lap earlier today, and I’ve finished all three of my compositions due on Friday… all is right in the world. Buenas noches!

WE FIT IN HERE!!

Guess what just happened. Amy and I sat down at our café (we just call it "the café" now since we have been here four out of the past five nights) and the waitress came up and recited our order, asking us if we'd like our usual! We played it all cool and said, "si muchas gracias", and then after she left we kind of flipped out. She knows us. We fit in. We're locals. (Okay Amy more so than me, I still got lots of weird looks with my blonde hair today in the Corte Inglés. But who cares! Our waitress knows our order.)

I know this seems like a trivial occurrence, but it's just one example of how I feel like I'm getting the hang of España. Another example: took my first SIESTA today. It was a huge success. I completely understand the whole mentality behind this glorious Spanish tradition now. You wake up feeling completely rejuvenated and ready to start the second part of your day. I think Amy and I have slept for the majority of the day... actually I am certain that we have. We woke up at 10:30, went for a swim at Playa Caleta (went to the buoys and back 4 times today, I've got to keep training so I can keep up with you when I get home mommy!) and came home to probably Pepa's best meal yet. Tomato, corn and cucumber salad (sounds very simple I know, but Pepa is a whiz with herbs and seasonings, let me tell you) and then a sort of ratatouille-like vegetable dish of eggplant, potato, onion, peppers and squash with more perfectly seasoned chicken. I do realize that I just spent four lines describing food... but anyone reading this blog should know that that is completely normal for me. :) Then came the siesta, a trip to Corte Inglés and more amazing Pepa cooking.

Our waitress just came back and we told her that this place serves the best coffee in all of Cádiz. She agreed and told us she ONLY drinks coffee at work, nowhere else. We're well on the way to becoming amigas mejores (best friends).

más fotos

A beautiful Cádiz sunset :)

Playa Caleta Roman ruins at Merida

some pictures!

Funny chairs at Montserrat



The ferocaríl ride up to the monastery

La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona

La Boqueria = GREATEST FRUIT MARKET EVER

La Casa Batiló by Gaudi