Excursion: Cordoba

This past Saturday I had the joy of going on an excursion with my program to Cordoba, Spain. Cordoba is a semi large city about 2 hours  north east of Seville. It's one of the tourist destinations i.e. a "must see." It was a pretty dreary, rainy day since it's been raining now for what feels like a month but is more like a week. I would've love better weather but after a quick nap on the bus I was ready. 

Cordoba dates back thousands of years. It was once the largest city of Roman Spain and for 300 centuries it formed the heart of the Islamic Moorish empire. This is what makes Cordoba so charming. The distinct mix of alot of different cultures all in the same area. The must see part is the Mezquita-Catedral which is an amazing sight. The Mezquita was a mosque (of muslims) but 300 years later after Spain had been Christianized, Carlos V decided that it should be a catedral (church). Everyone told him not to do it but he realized it too late and today there is the mezquita. The mezquita has all the structural significance that mosque should, including pointing towards Mecca but then it kind of changes to a totally different architectural style with angels and crosses and all kinds of gold, gaudy, decoration. 

Read more!(click the link)

Quest to Fluidity: The journey continues

Ok so I declared my mission, my goal, my objective, my end to my means...but how am I doing?

I think I'm doing ok. I could probably be doing better. I didn't speak spanish all weekend because I was with Americans and nobody wanted to speak spanish. I could've practiced but I guess I needed a break too. By Monday evening I kind of missed speaking spanish.

But what have I been doing right?!?

• Today I went to a grammar workshop by my program. It was a review of nothing new but I was glad I went.
• Friday there's an excursion to Osuna (a small town).
• Saturday there's a cultural fair type thing/ cultural exchange with Morrocan students.
• Sunday there's another senderismo (hiking).

Of course it's all in spanish. On top of that I'm also trying to talk more with my family. And more with my co workers at my internship. And more in general. But it's an uphill battle. It's really hard to practice and speak constantly. I'm always thinking about my next word, sentence, conversation. I would say I'm doing much better but I'm not where I'd like to be...and I may never be my idea of what I should be.

I just have to keep working on asserting myself and, more than that, just talking. The problem is that I don't like to talk alot in englsih so it doesn't feel wrong when I don't have much to say in spanish. I MUST force myself to make comments, even if I think they're redundant or sound childish.

The quest continues!

Dia de Andalucia: Lisbon, Portugal

This weekend I had a four day weekend because Monday was Dia de Andalucia (Andalucia is the province/region of Sevilla). SO what did I do? I fled the country! I didn't come to Spain to travel (which seems to be why alot of students choose Europe) but Portugal is just so close. Lisbon is about 7 hours away because it's further north but my host family has a beach house about 1.5 hrs away in Portugal.

I had an amazing time. Lisbon is beautiful and the rest of the country is awesome too (from what I saw).  The most difficult thing about being away was that I missed Spanish. I know it sounds crazy but even though I don't speak spanish 24/7 here, it's quickly become my default language. In stores, on the streets, in restaurants, etc. We all felt completely helpless when we realized that we couldn't communicate. Of course it wasn't that bad but I kind of forget that people can speak english too. Alot of people spoke to us in english and that doesn't happen here in Seville because not many Sevillanas know english. I kept defaulting to spanish instead of english. It was quite the experience. Portuguese is written kind of similar, like we could figure thing out, but the pronunciations are completely and totally different. It sounds like french and spanish mixed. I don't think it would be difficult to learn though after learning spanish. But then again I don't really know pronunciations.

Check out these pictures from the first place we went to in Sintra, Portugal.

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Buckle Down Time: Class

I officially started classes last week and completely started classes this week. What do I mean? I started my classes from my program last week but this week I started my class with españoles as well as my internship. Not only did I start everything...but I also changed homestays (more on that later). So how do I feel now that I have a full course load and my first internship???

Here is my schedule:
Monday:      10:30-12:30 Sales Merchandising (with spanish students)
                     1:00-3:00    Cervantes: Estudio de Quijote (a literature class
Tuesday:        9:00-10:30   International Marketing
                    11:00-6:00    Internship (with an hour for lunch)
Wednesday: 10:30-12:30  Sales Merchandising
                     1:00- 3:00    Cervantes
                     3:00-4:35     Intership classroom component
Thursday:       See Tuesday
Friday:           NO CLASS!!!

As you can see I have a pretty nice load this semester. Compared to last semester it's really difficult. All of my classes are in Spanish and there's actually work to do. Plus the internship is more of a time committment. None of this is bad but it's a difficult adjustment because last semester was like a vacation.

The highlights:
Antonio Navarro: He's the professor of both Sales Merchandising and International Marketing. I think I'm going to like both of these classes. In marketing we basically watch commercials and see powerpoints of the info. In Merchandising there's also powerpoints and the highlight is that he starts about 15 minutes late and will probably let us out early too. On Wednesday, he let us out 30 minutes early and started 15 minutes late. I have no problem with this. Between the 2 classes I see him everyday and he seems to be a good professor. He teaches lecture style but he also asks for light participation but it's not really required and he answers all the questions he asks himself. I have to listen really carefully though because he tells his jokes without a smile so I need to pay attention to figure out why people are laughing. He's kind of strict but he's also seems to be a really nice guy.

Internship: I'll probably dedicate a complete post to this but here's what I know so far. My tutor/supervisor is really nice. She smiles alot and understands that everything is really new. There's not a whole lot of work to be done. So far I'm making powerpoint presentations, IN ENGLISH, to recruit american students. The company teaches spanish to non-spanish students. So far I am not improving my spanish that much except for the fact that powerpoint is in Spanish. But it's a relaxed, small office and I think the internship itself will be pretty easy. But I'm not sure that this will be what I hoped for as far as improving my spanish. But then again, I've only been there 2 days.

No class on Fridays: This is self explanatory. Most people travel on the weekends, atleast some weekends. I don't know what I'll be doing when I'm not traveling but it's always nice to have a perpetual 3 day weekend.

The classes are challenging both academically and linguistically. Everything is still new so I'm still really excited. I have to prepare a group presentation everyweek for marketing as well as write a 600 word diary for my internship every week so I'm sure the excitement will start to wane soon.



   

Sand and Sun: Cadiz!

Also on the itinerary this weekend was Cadiz. A beach town about 2 hours south of Seville. It was a culturally enriching experience as well as a really fun day. This was an excursion by my program so it was already paid for. First we took a tour with a guide through the city then my friend played tour guide and we saw some more stuff we missed. The beach was beautiful but I really like the cities  and gardens and plazas here. The close buildings and mosaics make me fall in love with everywhere I go.



At a castle.

Jerez de la Frontera

On Friday I took a short notice one day trip to jerez de la Frontera. It's a small town about an 1.5 outside of Seville. I went with a friend from class. It was an amazing day because a) we spoke spanish the ENTIRE day (except for like 5 minutes when we were lost) and b) the weather and views were gorgeous.

Jerez is one of the many pueblos in Andalucia (the southern region) that is in the industry of wine. So our prinary purpose was to visit a bodega that specializes in port and sherry. We went to Sandeman which is a winery that dates back to 1790. We took the tour in spanish even though they asked us if we were sure like 15 times. The tour itself was really short but very informative about the origins of Sandeman (who was Scottish) and the actual process of making the port. There was a tasting at the end. Neither one of us are drinkers so we really had no idea what we were drinking.

Quest to Fluidity

I have no intentions of leaving Spain "fluid." If I have learned anything it's that fluidity is more of a state of mind. It's a very subjective term and really means nothing. There's no test that you can take that comes with a certificate that says "fluidity accomplished!" We are our toughest critics and I've never heard anyone say that they are fluid and perfect spanish speakers (or any language for that matter). I know people whose second language is english, they've been speaking it for years, yet they don't feel like they're good enough. It's the same for me.