Some pictures in Valencia...and RAIN!

It rained for the first time last night. And when it rains here, I guess it pours!! 

We kept seeing lighting in the air but we assumed it wasn’t a big deal.  Well, that was false. Good thing we were headed to a bar though, because within 5 minutes of us being there the rain started.  We went to the same bar from last weekend (the crazy sangria place, where the owner loves Americans).  Seriously, the owner truly LOVES us.  He is so interested in English and helps us with our Spanish; it’s pretty cool.  And he knows like everyone in the city because his customers rave about the bar, so he can get us huge discounts on discotecas, tickets, etc. It's cool to have a place like that already, especially since at home we all have those places--Shacklefords/Gino's for us :)  

Anyway, when the rain finally died down a little, we were able to call a taxi to get home.  Roberto, the owner of the bar, came out to the taxi driver and was like these are my nieces, take them straight home.  He gave us all his business card and said if you have any problems call us back here.  Added security is always nice too! 

Ok so here are some pictures from our walk to the Museu Faller--in Valenciano (Museo Fallero in Spanish).  

Our house! Our windows are the two on either side of the lamp post.

Sun with hands coming out of it's head statue.

El Rio (the 10 mile long park throughout the middle of the city)

Gargoyle Bridge!

Ciudad de Artes y Ciencias (City of Arts and Sciences)

The first of the 3 buildings in the Ciudad

Some Palm Trees!

A view of the second building in the Ciudad (we are going to all three on October 8th!)

This cone thing. It's all contemporary art around here

Here is a link to a picture of the outside of the Museu Faller with the 2011 winning structures: 

http://www.cendradigital.com/wp-content/themes/gazette/images/subidas/2010/05/IMG_1379.JPG

Tonight, I am not sure what we are doing.  We will probably go to a discoteca since we had a more laid-back night last night! Tomorrow, we will have to do some homework, and on Monday, the school week begins again! 

Buenos dias!

Museo Fallero!

Hey everyone!

Sorry it's been a while since I wrote! This week of school was good, I like all of my classes.  Literature is my least favorite, but only because at the moment we are learning about like 15th and 16th century Spanish Literature.  I'm more of a 19th-20th century literature girl I guess you could say. It's weird only having 2 classes a day, and only Monday through Thursday.  But, I'm not complaining :)

On Friday, since we have the day off, ISA usually schedules a trip somewhere around Valencia unless we are going on an excursion.  Next weekend we go to Barcelona, but today (Friday) we went to the Museo Fallero.  The Museo Fallero is a collection of "statues" from Las Fallas, the third biggest festival in the world which is in Valencia in March.  After hearing about it and seeing the museum, I wish we were going to be able to see it, it sounds amazing!  It pretty much starts March 1st and the last day is March 19th.  The biggest week is the 12th-19th, where the streets are blocked off from cars, people are up all day and all night, celebrating St. Joseph.  Throughout Valencia, there are like 700 "Fallas" in the streets.  The Fallas are paper-mache (but now, they are made from styrofoam) structures.  Some are small, but most are very big.  The city works the entire year preparing for this festival and the artists who create the structures tend to make a lot of money.  During the day, there is a noise contest using fireworks...although you can't see them, the point is to make the most noise while still keeping a beat.  At night, there are more fireworks, which are obviously visible.  Our ISA director said people from all over the world come to Las Fallas to see how a "real" fireworks display happens.  An important feature of Las Fallas is "los luces" (the lights).  The entire city is lit up at night, whether from fireworks or from strings of lights lining the streets. The most important structure in the festival is the Virgin Mary.  At the beginning of the festival, she is created with only a head and a has a frame with the shape of a dress with a design pattern.  Each day, people bring carnation flowers of all colors and the team of artists puts the flowers in respective places on her body to make her dress.  Each year, the pattern is different.  At the end of the week, before the burning of the Fallas, the artists of each specific structure, take a piece from their structure and bring it to a warehouse type thing where the city votes on their favorite small and big structure.  The two favorites from each year are then brought to the Museo Fallero where they are kept on display.  After the two are chosen, the rest of the structures are burned (another lighting ceremony).  Apparently, it is beautiful.  I'm so jealous we won't be there for this.  At the museum, though, they have structures from 1930 on, I'm almost positive.  So, we got to see the collection of them up until last years'.  It was so cool, it is incredible the talent it takes to make these.  We all thought at least half of them were real people, painted in costume, about to jump out at us.  Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take pictures inside because it can ruin the art, but just look up Las Fallas online and you can see tons of pictures from the festival.  I did, however, take some more pictures of the city as we were walking to the museum, so I'll post those later!

Tonight, I think we are bar hopping, but I'm not exactly sure.  We will see!

Buenos noches!

Cosas Diversas (Various Things)!

Here are some of the winning group enjoying our Horchata (the drink we tried in historic Valencia)!!

Definition of Horchata: it usually refers to orxata de xufa (horchata de chufa), made from tigernuts (a type of tree nut), water, and sugar.


Here is a picture of a lot of the group at the Random Bar! The man in the front of the picture LOVES Americans.  He sang to us our national anthem.  So funny. It might not be that clear if you open it up because I got it from Facebook. 

Hey Mom and other tennis lovers, we just got this posted to our Valencia page-- Spain defeats France in Davis Cup: http://www.daviscup.com/en/results/tie/details.aspx?tieId=100016226

Pictures from Historic Valencia!

Samantha and me at the bar; in the background is the crazy woman and American loving man.

View of Valencia from the top of the Cathedral

Arch in the City Center

Another View of Valencia from the Cathedral. 

Day in Historic Valencia!

We had a Scavenger Hunt today throughout historic downtown Valencia.  A lot of us went out last night and Spaniards start their night at 2...so we tried to blend in; in result, we didn't get home until 6 AM. Needless to say, all of us were exhausted and kind of debbie-downers for the first 20 minutes of the morning.  BUT, a few of us got coffee and it ended up being so amazing.  I'm really glad we all decided to just go and not sleep in.  My favorite part was when we went up to the top of the Cathedral...mind you, we had to climb 203 stairs in the smallest spiral staircase known to man, but it was gorgeous.  The view, incredible.  You could see the entire city. Definitely look out for pictures soon.  We saw some other great landmarks, etc.  And...no one knows how this happened but our team won the Scavenger Hunt.  Literally, every single person on our team was like we don't even care about winning, we're just going to go around, drink coffee and look at the sites.  I guess slow and steady DOES win the race. HA.  Our prize was this cute little bull (Toro) keychain.  Anyone who knows that I love keychains, this was an added bonus to our day :)

We had to end our Scavenger Hunt at a little cafe that is famous for Horchata (Orxata).  It is a drink that tastes similar to soy milk, but not really.  It's very hard to explain and it is like nothing I've ever had before.  It's made from a tree nut which if directly translated from Spanish to English means tiger nut, but  our director said that doesn't really make sense.  He just knows the Spanish name.  We had this dipping bread to go with it as well.  It was delicious!! Cool fact here: my homework for one class was to try this drink.  Killing two birds with one stone always!

Tonight, we are going out again to a discoteca (dance club) near the beach because they close after this weekend so we have to make sure we see them before it's too late!  We met people from UVA in Valencia yesterday and they are going to the same place as well.  They said it is a great time; they've been here for 2 weeks rather than a week like us.  Should be fun!

Buenos noches!

Pictures in Valencia --uploaded with WIFI stick!

Good news, we have our WIFI stick! So, we can use our computers/internet in our house.  Since I last updated, the only new thing we've done is gone to class.  I've met all four of my teachers, and they are all great.  They speak clearly for us and I've already learned so many new words or been reminded of certain phrases, etc. I'm definitely improving with my speech and understanding, but it's still not easy.  Tonight, we had an "intercambio" which is an exchange with Spanish speaking people who want to speak English better.  So, while we spoke Spanish, they would respond or ask questions in English.  It was very cool.  I tried to ask as often as possible if I was speaking correctly but it was a little bit harder to ask in a group of people without interrupting the conversation.  Although, a big part of the Spanish culture is to interrupt each other.  While we may think that is rude and you should let a person finish talking, that's not really the case here.  Interruption is a sign of politeness because it shows that you are interested in what they're saying.  Similarly, "interruption" in the streets is normal too;  for example, may Spaniards walk in a horizontal line down the street and do not move for you if you're coming the other way.  You have to fight for your right to walk by another group of people.  I thought this was really interesting.  Also, a BIG thing that is not normal here but is in the US is smiling at strangers when walking down the streets (los calles in Spanish).  Apparently, when you smile at a stranger, a Spaniard will look at you like you are crazy.  The only times you smile is when you know someone or want to begin a conversation.

Anyway, here are only a few pictures of our room and the beach in Valencia.  I haven't been taking lots of pictures yet, but I will get to it!

Buenos noches.

Kitchen

Our room

The beach (La playa)

Beach again :)

Pictures of Madrid and Toledo

La Plaza Mayor

Cathedral

Samantha and me!

Toledo...so beautiful

Cathedral

Finally a New Update!

This is going to be a little long so hang in there!  Sorry I didn’t post Sunday like I said.  We don’t have Internet in our house so I can only get online at the ISA office.  I got on Monday but mostly to check emails…and Facebook.  Our host mom has an ethernet cable that is just in her computer. So, Samantha (my roommate) and are going to buy a wireless stick made by the same company that our phones are from. We are going to share it so that it’s half the price. When we get that, it’ll be easy for me to post from at home, Skype, check emails, etc.

So, as for this weekend: we toured Madrid Thursday night and Friday and then Toledo on Saturday.  Madrid was ok.  We went to a museum with a bunch of paintings in it. Everything was beautiful and what not, but it’d be different if I was really into art.  I could appreciate it a little more.  Plus, our tour guide spoke ZERO English, which would be good in a month, but the first day is kind of like umm help me a little please.  The city itself is cool, but it’s not one of my favorites by any means.  I can’t really explain why it was just ok but it probably had something to do with all of us being tired, etc.  However, when we went to Toledo on Saturday, I loved it!! It was gorgeous.  It’s like this little walled city that has so many ancient buildings.  Here, our tour guide was great! He would speak all Spanish and then repeat words that were uncommon in English.  It was so helpful and I learned a lot more with him.  We went to a Jewish Synagogue, a Cathedral, San Juan de los Reyes, and walked all over town.  It was so cool.  We stayed the night in Toledo, the hotel had a pool, so I was happy :)  The next morning we got on the bus to Valencia.  It is about a four-hour drive from Toledo to Valencia.  When we arrived at the Futbol Stadium our host families were all there waiting to pick us up! Our host mom is so nice. We love her. She is super fashionable/stylish.  Her favorite color must be purple because the walls are purple and she has a purple couch, purple decorations, etc.  Our house is really close to the campus, which is good because it’s less than a 5-minute walk. It's very quaint but great! Our room is perfect; we have plenty of closet/drawer space.  We have filtered water, so we don’t have to worry about drinking weird tap water.  Our living room/dining room is nice, it's the only room in the house that has AC but at least it has it! We think she has money because all her decorations are beautiful, and she's technologically up to date; at least more so than a lot of other people!   

I love speaking to her.  We definitely have difficulty with some things, but she told us when we first got there to tell her when we don't understand so she will repeat it or rephrase it.  She talks slow for us, which is great. Poor Samantha doesn't really speak Spanish though.  The last time she took it was her junior year of high school.  She just needed a foreign language credit, so she decided to do it abroad--super brave of her! So, I'm kind of like translating what I can between us.  We are both in the Intermediate Level of classes, so we have the exact same schedule which is nice.  Our schedule is amazing.  We start at 9:15 AM and end at 1:15.  Lunch is usually around 2 here, and then we can go to the beach afterwards.  And…there’s never class on Friday!! We went to the beach today, it was wonderful.  The sand is soft soft soft! The water is calm, salty, and so pretty.  It’s like an extended summer.  I love it so much here! The food has been great, people are nice, the traffic isn’t crazy, and it’s beautiful.  I’m having so much fun!

I’ll update as often as I can.  When I get the WIFI stick it’ll be a lot easier! I’ll post pictures of Madrid, Toledo, and Valencia ASAP!

Buenos noches! 

Write Again Sunday!

Hi everyone,

I promise I'll write again Sunday night when I arrive in Valencia.  We're just doing so much traveling/touring with our group this weekend that I won't really have time to compose a detailed post!

I am having SO much fun though!

Buenos Dias!

Pictures of Herculaneum and more Barcelona!

Herculaneum!

The paintings are so well preserved. 

Awesome floor tile. 

Arch at the entrance.

La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona!

Other side of Sagrada Familia!

Pictures of Capri

Capri!

Coral Grotto

Natural Arch

Arch in the water.  If you kiss your true love under it, it brings happiness.

Green Grotto

The lighthouse

Look at the SMALL opening next to the stairs, that's the Blue Grotto entrance.

Highest point on the island!

See the arch in the water down there, that's the same one as in the picture 4 above! 

Boats below...we are so high up!

View going down on the chair lift.

A graveyard at one point below us on the chair lift. 

MIA for the last two days!

Sorry I haven't posted anything recently, the hotels in Naples and Capri caused my charger to get a little hot and I didn't charge it very often!

We're back in Barcelona now.  Our flight from Rome to Barcelona last night was delayed, a lot.  We were supposed to leave at 9:30 and ended up leaving at 1:35 A.M.  But, that's ok, we met two women from Australia and chatted with them while waiting in the terminal.  They've been all over the world, I'm so jealous.  Anyway, I leave tomorrow morning for Madrid to meet my group and mom and Aunt Donna stay in Barcelona another night.  But now I'll talk about Capri...ah it was amazing.

We had to go to Naples and stay the night there to take the ferry over to Capri the next morning.  Naples is similar to Rome, only a lot sketchier and unsafe.  Luckily, we were staying by the water so we didn't have to walk far to catch the ferry.  We took a fast ferry over to Capri, which was interesting; it was set like a plane in that all the seats were inside in horizontal rows.  When we arrived, we took a cab to the Piazza near our hotel.  There are large parts of the island that only allow pedestrian traffic, so we could only get dropped off at certain points.  Piazza Umberto is a huge shopping/restuarant center right near our hotel: Gucci, Channel, Prada, and tons of other name brands were in that area.  Needless to say, I didn't get anything.

Our hotel, Hotel La Palma, was so beautiful, as is the entire island of Capri.  The only drawback was that there was no pool.  While it seems a little silly to go to a pool when you're on an island, the beaches are not sandy, they are rocky and you have to take a bus or walk 30 minutes downhill to get there.  On the first day, we just wanted to relax, so we went to another hotel and used their pool! When I post pictures, you'll see one of me in the pool in front of the glass windows they had in it.

On our second day, we did a lot around the island.  First, we caught a bus down to the Marina to catch a boat tour around the entire island.  We saw so many great things.  Lookout for pictures soon.  Unfortunately, the Blue Grotto wasn't open because the water was so rough near there.  The entrance to that Grotto is only 5 meters high and you need row boats maneuvered by professionals to enter.  When we came around to that part of the island, the water was crashing up against the opening and filling it completely...good thing it's closed, otherwise that would be bad.

After we finished our tour, we went over to the beach near by so that we could swim in the Mediterranean  :)  The water is really salty! It was a little difficult entering and exiting too because of the rocks, it hurt your feet! But once out there, it was gorgeous.  And, already being a good floater, I basically sat on the top of the water the whole time!  It was cool.  Then, we dried off and took the bus to Anacapri, the other side of the island, where we ate lunch and went on a chair lift to the very top of the island... That was by far one of the most beautiful and incredible things I've ever seen. If you ever go to Capri, ride the chair lift.  It is a little scary because it's a single lift and you do go very, very, VERY high.  But, it's totally worth it.  I'll definitely post pictures from the top so you can see.

After all this sun, we were tired so we went back to the hotel to take our siesta.  Mom and I slept for a while, and then we went to dinner.  The next morning, we got up and caught the fast ferry back to Naples.  From Naples, we got our car from the parking garage (great idea to put it in there, a lot safer than parking on the street), and headed to Herculaneum.  Like Pompeii, Herculaneum was destroyed by Vesuvius.  It is right on the water and was once a resort village; however, it's a lot smaller than Pompeii.  A lot of these ruins were more preserved though because as the hot mud dried, it turned into a kind of thick compact blanket, which adhered to every household structure which preserved everything, including wood.  It was pretty cool.

We left Herculaneum with plenty of time to drive back to the airport in Rome.  We arrived 3 hours before our flight was to depart, but just used the time to eat and sit.  With 30 minutes until our scheduled boarding time, we realized we were no longer at the correct gate as our plane had moved.  So, we headed to the correct gate and found out the flight was to be delayed until midnight.  Then, it moved to 12:40, and finally 1:35.  At boarding time, 12:55, everyone noticed there was a gate change...back to our original gate. So, we all rushed over there and finally were able to get on!

While, yes, we arrived late, we slept in a little this morning, so that was good.  We're still tired though, since we stayed up a lot later than usual! Today, we went around Barcelona.  We did some shopping, I got a few things a store called Mango.  Then, we went to see Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family).  It was gorgeous.  It looks like a castle mixed with a church mixed with a sandcastle that an elaborate sandcastle-maker created.  Again, look out for pictures soon!

Now that I've caught you up on our travels a little more, it's time to go to bed so that I can wake up in time to catch my 8:30 flight!

Buenos noches!

Pictures in Pompeii

September 11th memorial before the ruins.  They had several people die in NYC.

ruins

Part of the city, with Vesuvius behind it. 

Snake drawing still preserved.

Original clay piping.

More ruins

More ruins

The town center, or what would have been in their time.

Preserved bodies of the fugitives.