Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Week One: Part 2

After I posted my last blog I left the house because I was late to meet some friends and I thought ohh.... maybe I should have waited to post that or add on to it or something because I probably freaked someone out but I didn't so here is part two!

While I was having my "meeting" with Katie yesterday she shared something with me that I hadn't really thought of while I was here. I thought that I was pretty well prepared for a cross-culture experience... I mean I literally talked about culture in almost every single one of my classes every single day. But when Katie shared her little piece of wisdom with me I was dumbfounded...why had I never thought of this before?! (Side note: my teachers did a great job of teaching me, I think this is just one of those things you just have to experience to know.)

I almost just said the WHOLE time I've been here...but it's barely been a week... SOOOOOO.....

Since I've been here I've been taking in the culture around me, watching people, seeing how they interact with each other, their families, children, me when I don't understand and most importantly how they dress...but what I really hadn't been focusing on was the affect that being in a completely different culture had on ME.   

What Katie shared with me is that when you come into a new culture you basically lose your identity (more or less, I mean I still have my passport so that's good). Nothing is familiar around you, you can't understand what people are saying, you don't know how to express yourself in anyway (mostly), people dress differently and listen to different music and watch different TV shows (Oh, how i miss reality TV). It's just all different. That was kind of my Oprah "Ah-ha" moment, which fittingly took place after my Ah-hahhahahahahahah moment. I even said to Katie, "I don't know how to be funny in Spanish." I miss being able to make people laugh. Now locals just laugh at me when I stumble over my Spanish and then don't understand what they say back to me. I have to find my identity. 

I'm going to go off on a scholarly, Kevin Miller, tangent here real fast so you can skip this paragraph and I won't be upset! This past semester I learned from my new buddy Dr. Miller that the language we use effects every part of our life, our CULTURE, it shapes our culture. Or the words that we use shapes our culture. So, without my native language I have been having a hard time saying what I mean. I don't know HOW people talk here or what they talk about, or that I sound stupid when I use a Latin American word that's not used in Spain. I want to fit in, I don't want to look American, I want to look Spanish (which if anyone did think I looked Spanish, once they heard me talk the hoax would be up). I simply don't know the language, which makes me an outsider, and minority. Last weekend a Spaniard came up to me and a group of my friends on the street and said (in Spanish), "You're in Spain, talk in Spanish." Ewwwwww I felt so gross & mad & mostly stupid. While my appearance suggests that I almost fit in, my language clearly says otherwise. I am a minority here. Here, English doesn't make me "better." When I had traveled to the D.R. before I was looked up to in a way because I was white and knew English. That doesn't matter so much at all here, I'm not in a near 3rd world country or poverty stricken area...While I have never said it so many people in the states have said, "You're in America, speak English..." or something along those lines. YUCK! STOP IT! DON'T EVER SAY IT AGAIN!!! I didn't agree with that saying before anyways but now its real personal. I can now personally identify with people who have had that said to them, it is by no means a good feeling.

BUT anyways back to what I was saying....  
In a way I feel like having my break down so early makes me look weak. I barely lasted a week with all my familiar things and I completely lost it. Which also makes me thing that I really don't know what my identity is, and probably haven't for a long time. But at the same time I'm happy it happened  and that it happened when it did.

Tonight we had a little student chapel at school. It started out with worship songs that are sung at HU chapels & I instantly began to think how awesome of an experience I was witnessing. All 30 of us in one room at the same time. All with different pasts, problems,and all struggling to find our identities in a new culture. Some stripped down or away from their cultures more than others. But the really really really really REALLLLLLY cool part was, we all had one thing in common, we all have Jesus. We were all praising the same God who knows our true identity, regardless of culture, language or whatever else. We all have this awesome opportunity to grow AND to grow with HIM. I'm beyond excited to see where this road leads me.  

Side note: Also we talked about Flamenco classes & the teacher of those classes was there and she somewhat taught us how to salsa. It was awesome & I loved it.  

I came on this trip thinking I was going to learn and language & culture but after the past couple days I think there is more in store for me here.


I haven't worn sweatpants in public for over a week now, 
Audrey

Week One: Part One

So for today I'm going to do 2 blogs.The first part (this one) just as a reflection of what all has happened and then the second part kind of applying it to what I have learned in school and being sort of scholarly because Kevin Miller has more or less turned me into a nerd.

I think I left off on Sunday afternoon.... so i'll start there.

Alyssa and I went to a little pastry shop and had a little snack and talked with some friends. We came back and ate dinner. After dinner I started showing her pictures on my phone of my family and friends and that's all it took. Alyssa, Isabel and I talked for about 3 hours. It was nice to hear about her life and I'm sure she enjoyed hearing about ours. It also made me feel a little less homesick.

Monday we got up and went to class and then came home. After class I just wasn't feeling like myself. We ate lunch and I went and laid down. I don't even really remember what I did the rest of the day it was just kind of a blah-ish day.

Tuesday I went to class and the whole time all I could think of was being able to Skype with my mom as soon as class was over. When class was finally over I could barely keep my tears in because I had been feeling so down and I knew that crying it out with my mom would make it all better. And surprisingly here is where the funny story starts...


I found an empty classroom and began Skyping with both of my parents. My mom was asking my questions about life here and all I wanted to do was cry and tell her that I wanted to come home. I was also trying to hold my tears in because I didn't want to make her cry either. After answering a few questions my dad said he had to go and get ready for work. He told me that he loved me and that he would talk to me soon and I told him the same choking back my tears. My mom, seeing this began to cry too & that's when the flood gates opened and the tears began to freely flow heavily.

At almost the exact time that I let all my tears finally fall the door to the classroom that I was in flies open & my teacher and other classmates come in and Ana (the teacher) tells me that she has class now and I'll have to go Skype somewhere else. What she didn't see (at first) was me crying. I quickly mumbled to my mom that I had to go & then Ana saw that I was really crying. Being Spanish, Ana was talking very loudly at me because she was concerned and me being me hates when people yell at me, which caused me to freak out more. At the time I had no idea what she was saying (because it was all in Spanish).

Meanwhile, my classmates are watching this all happen and I have been holding my breath trying not to cry. I don't know if any of you have ever held your breath while crying, but I wouldn't suggest doing it. Because when doing so, your body makes this really weird snorting like noise because you are not breathing.

So my classmates are watching, a lady I barely know is shouting at my in Spanish, I'm snorting, and crying. All I remember hearing is her say something about Katie and me saying Si. Katie is our American student ministries coordinator  So Ana takes me to Katie's office and I slowly start getting myself calmed down. (At this point I'm borderline hyperventilating). I finally get myself calmed down to tell Katie what happen, half way laughing, half way crying.

She did an extremely awesome job of calming me down and talking about feelings and all that fun stuff. Now I can laugh about this story and believe it or not I feel 8797789475893795 times better about being here & don't want to go home anymore. I know I will have hard days again but I'm extremely happy to be here and want to take advantage of every opportunity while I can. Part two will be coming later today but I just thought I would share this story with you!

Hasta Luego!

Audrey

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Weekend Adventures

Hiiiiiiiiiii

Friday night we all went over to Katie's apartment (she works at the school). It might be the cutest apartment I've ever seen! It was tiny but just so cute. All of the students in program hung out there for a bit. After that Alyssa, Dani, Karleigh and I started to head for home but I got us lost and we ended up by a store that was like a Best Buy and Barnes and Noble combined. So we wandered through there a bit & then headed home for supper with Isabel- at 10:00 PM. After dinner we were exhausted and headed for our rooms for the night. I chatted with some friends from home, took NyQuil, and slept 9 beautiful hours. 

Saturday we had a photo scavenger hunt through are school. So after breakfast Alyssa and I headed there to meet up with the rest of our group and find out what we had to do. We were split up into about 5 or 6 groups and headed on our way thought the city. I was with Karli, Kelsey and Kelly. We are all somewhat mid-westerners so it was kinda cool to talk about places we all knew and where we liked to visit and things like that. Surprisingly I knew exactly where 2 of the spots were that we had to find so we headed there first. From there we went to the tourism office and they marked on a map where all the other spots were located. Four hours later... we found about 11 places out of 22 I think. It was a lot of walking but it helped that it was about 70 degrees outside. We got to see a lot of the city which was nice as well. The native Spaniards all had their winter coats and hats on and my group was walking around shedding layers and sweating haha. 

I then walked home BY MY SELF and made it with no problems at all... a major milestone for me... and ate lunch with Isabel and Alyssa. We then siesta-ed and headed back into the city to meet up with the rest of the group to find out the winners of the scavenger hunt. My team came in 3rd by 2 points! After that we headed to dinner at a place in the city. I couldn't tell you what it was called but we had tappas-which i dont know what that is either but it was soooooo good. It was grilled chicken on top of little round french fries with some sort of sauce but it was sooo yummmy. After dinner we went and had churros con chocolate. It was good but not as good as i thought it would be. A few of us then went and met up with some of the other group and headed to the Flameco Bar again and hung out for a little bit and got to know each other better. 

Saturday I also got to FaceTime with my Dad for a bit! It was so nice to be able to see him. I had honestly kinda forgot that we moved so I was surprised when he answered and the new house was behind him, not our old one.   

The plan was to get up and go to church today but Alyssa and I both decided we should sleep in after we woke up for the first time this morning. What we didn't plan on was sleeping all day... which we mostly did. Pretty safe to say we were a little tired. We had lunch with Isabel and then I worked on homework and this blog as well as FaceTimed with my mom. It was kinda hard to hear her since she was at Allyson's volleyball tournament but it was so great to see her face. Even though it was nice to see her face it still made me sad because I knew she was so far away & I miss her (I miss all my family but in case you didn't know I'm sort of a mamma's girl). It makes me teary-eyed just thinking about it now. 

Today it really set in that I'm going to be doing this for 4 months..not just a little week long adventure. Which makes me happy and sad at the same time. I learned in one of my classes last semester that adjusting to a new culture is a process & that it really depends on you to work yourself through the process and enjoy the good times and pull yourself out of the bad ones as well. 

Alyssa and I are about to go meet up with some of the group to walk around the city and maybe get some ice cream or something. Hope everyone is having a great Sunday!

Love and Miss You All!!

Audrey

Friday, January 25, 2013

siestas, showers, & spain

Holaaaaa

I have really been enjoying my time so far in Spain. Last night I didn't really feel like blogging so clearly I didn't haha. 

Two nights ago my body didn't feel the need to sleep so I slept from about 4 AM to 8 AM (10 PM- 2 AM Indiana time). That morning (Thursday) we had registration with our Profe (teacher) and then a culture and safety "class" with a couple other teachers. I miraculously tested into the intermediate level and through my 2 year old Spanish tried to tell the Profe that I guessed on the test and didn't feel confident to be in the intermediate level of classes. She seemed to be more confident in me than I was myself and told me that I would be fine. The culture and safety thing was pretty basic common sense stuff. 

After we left the school, Alyssa and I came home and then had lunch with Isabel. Its so weird eating lunch at 2 or 3 in the afternoon. Here is Spain its morning until you eat lunch, then its afternoon until its dark. Something that I noticed today was that the news is on at 3:00 in the afternoon where in the states its on at noon. 

After lunch it was siesta time. I love siesta! At about 5 Alyssa and I headed into town to meet up with some friends from school to go shopping! Annnd my goodness! Right now everything is on sale in the majority of the stores! I bought a book bag and a pair of boots for about 40 euros. I'll post a picture of them sometime. We prolly didn't even go into half of the shops either & I can't wait to go back and just look at everything.

We then went back to the school and the whole group of us hung out and played a getting to know you game and then ate some dominos pizza and drank pop and it was so great. I'm sadly what they call here in Spain "ticky-smikey" or a picky eater. I appreciate Isabel's cooking but I still don't have much of an appetite  I was told that the number of times zones you travel that's how many days it takes you to get over jet lag. So for me, 6 days. 

After the pizza party a big group of us went to a bar and watched a flamenco dancer. I'm sure this sentence just sent a lot of people into a spin but trust me there is nothing to worry about. Bars here are the same as restaurants with bars in them in the states but instead of being called a bar & grill, its just called a bar (from what I have seen). Also, if you get a chance YouTube flamenco dancing. Its seriously one of the coolest things I have ever seen! AND I get to take lessons soon :) I'll prolly become a famous flamenco dancer and marry a good looking soccer player soon so here's your heads up! Also, since I'm talking about boys, there are very few bad looking Spaniards. After we watched her dance we all headed our seperate ways back to our houses. I still can't get over that I walk everywhere. I mean here I don't find it a big deal but at home I dread walking across campus. 

This morning started off with a shower. I may lose my religion due to shower taking while here. Here in Spain the water and electricity and everything are set up much differently than at home. When Alyssa got up to shower first this morning she had to first go out to the kitchen and flip a switch on a gas can (like the ones that are hooked up to grills) so that the water would warm up. Because electricity, water and everything else are so much more expensive you have to turn off the water between shampoo, conditioner... etc. Also another important note to this story is that the apartment is extremely cold. Here homes don't have central heating. So it's really really really cold when the water isn't running in the shower & when you get out. But, it did wake me up this morning! Last night I slept about 5 hours so hopefully I start to get this sleeping thing down better. 

Today was also my first day of class. I'm not 100% sure on this but the class I was in this morning was conversation & grammar broken up with a 20 minute break. It's one thing to listen to the teacher and respond (all in Spanish) but it's another to try and learn. I have to pay attention the ENTIRE time. A few times I found myself day dreaming and when I stopped myself I had no idea what the Profe was talking about. I had class from 9-12:30 and will Monday-Friday almost every week. It's really going to be a challenge getting through my classes I think. 


Alyssa and I then came home and had looked at places that we could travel too over some our breaks and then had lunch with Isabel. We're going to meet up with some friends in a little bit and then we have a little get together at one of the girl's house who works at the school. But right now, it is siesta time! 


hasta luego, 

Audrey
   

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

day 2!

Last night I mostly slept great! I woke up around 3:00 AM and couldn't go back to sleep but after that I slept until 8:00 and as usual, didn't want to get up.

My senora Isabel made us toast with a choice of jelly or chocolate spread... I tried both but of course the chocolate was my favorite. I wasn't brave enough to try coffee so I just drank milk with my breakfast. Isabel then took my roommate and I to the hotel where our orientation was held at. It was just around the corner but it was fun to get out a see a little bit of the city.

At orientation we went over basic, boring, common knowledge things and then we took a placement test :/. Again, I was reminded that my Spanish is horrible and not at the level that I thought it was. Tomorrow we meet with one of our teachers and go over what classes they think will be best suited for us based on the placement test. I'm 100% okay with being put in the beginners classes... especially after that test haha.

After the test we had a small break where I tried cafe con leche, or coffee with milk and lots of sugar and I liked it! We then went back to orientation and went over a few other things, one of which was Flamenco classes... naturally I signed up for them! I'm real excited for those to start! We also got our Spanish mobile phones to use while we are here. If you'd like to call me or something message me on Facebook and we'll get it figured out. We also talked about the train, tram, and bus options that we had to travel across the city. These things make me very nervous since I've never had an opportunity to use them in the States before.

After the orientation Alyssa and I came back home, after taking lots of pictures, and ate lunch with Isabel. We had a sort of arroz con pollo, or chicken with rice and veggies.. it wasn't my favorite meal here so far but it wasn't bad. We also ate bread. Since I've been here I really haven't had much of an appetite and Isabel picked up on that. I tried to explain to her through my broken spanish that I really did like her food I just haven't been hungry... I don't think she understood though..

I then participated in my first Spanish siesta (nap) and it was wonderful! Everyday the city basically shuts down from 2-5 for siesta. During this time you don't have to nap... but it is nice :). After siesta Alyssa and I headed to school for the first time to go on a tour of the city.

I learned a few things from the tour:
1. The cathedral in the city is one of the largest types of cathedrals in one category & then largest in another (I'll have to find out exactly what categories those are.)
2. The cathedral was built on top of a mosque & some features of the mosque still exists and are original.
3. There is a royal palace... I don't think I saw the palace but I saw the gate.
4. I started not to pay attention as much at this point but I did see a lot of really cool things that the U.S. just doesn't have to offer.
5. My roommate is real cool and we get along great!
6. We found where the language college students from Seville study. They are cute. I too, will be studying there.
7. I'm horrible at taking pictures.

After the tour my roommate and I started to head back to our apartment. I stopped to get some euros because we had seen a place to buy shampoo and stuff as well as another place to but some minutes on our phones. We were so preoccupied with looking with store fronts that we ended up lost. Thankfully (in typical Cathy fashion) I brought the map along with me and we found our way back home.

We then had dinner with our Senora (at 9:30...typical of Spaniards. It was yummy and I was able to eat a little bit more. Alyssa and I both made more of an effort to try and communicate with Isabel. We watched TV with her as we ate. They had a top 3 dunks from the NBA of the new which I thought was cool and then there so some like talk show on and Taylor Swift was the guest. Isabel said she was ugly & too skinny, God Bless you Isabel! haha

I'm sure tomorrow will bring lots of new adventures as well. I'm not sure if I'm going to blog everyday but I'll just take it day by day and see what happens! I really can't get over how pretty it is here!

Until tomorrow,

Audrey

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Pollo or Carne?

Hello from Spain!

 I'm not sure how blogs are supposed to start out or be formatted so I'm just going to kinda do my own thing and hope it works!

On the way to the airport with my parents I was so excited to get to Spain but at the same time i wasn't ready to leave my family and friends either. With a heavy heart I left my parents and headed through security with some other girls who are in the program. As the time got closer and closer to leave I started to feel more sad that i was going to be leaving everything i knew for the next 4 month, but at that point i knew i had no other choice but to go.

We boarded the largest plane I've ever been on and took off. Within a few minutes we had are dinner brought around to us and that was the first time i realized i wasn't going to understand a lot of what was going on around me. The stewardess asked me, "Pollo o Carne?" And i just sat there with a dumb look on my face like what?! Duh Audrey you learned that freshman year of high school... Chicken or steak?! The 8 hour flight went surprisingly fast because I "slept" even though it didn't really feel like it.

We landed in Madrid and went through customs... AKA stamp your passport and go, so that part was nice and then took another train to the bigger train station. I'm real happy that the SIS people traveled with us because i wouldn't have a clue what to do or where to go. At this point in the day i was 10000% exhausted. Thankfully we got on the AVE train (which is like a high speed train that looks more like a monorail than Thomas the Train). I wanted to stay awake and watch as we traveled but after 5 minuets i was out and slept the rest of the 2.5 hour ride. We departed the train and grabbed a taxi with our roommate to head to our host home.

Here's prolly the scariest part of the trip so far... Because of how big my roommate and I's suitcases were we both couldn't ride in the same taxi. So i had to ride in the taxi by myself.... it was a little nerve racking to say the least but Alyssa (my roommate) and I arrived at the same time to the loud barks of Pammy and a smiling Isabel!

Isabel doesn't speak English so that's been interesting trying to communicate with her because I found out today my spanish kinda sucks real bad. She made us lunch and then let us unpack and relax which is what I'm doing now.

One of the things that I can't seem to get over is this whole time change thing. I left my house at 11 AM monday, boarded the plane at 7:30 PM monday. Landed at 3:30 AM Indiana time (9:30 AM Spain time) Made it to Isabel's apartment at 4 PM Spain time and its still 2 in the afternoon at home... that's just weird to me.

I hear its like 1 degree outside at home today so i wont complain about it being "cold" here... but it is kinda cold haha. Isabel is about to make us some dinner soon and then its for sure going to be bed time! SOY MUY CONSADO! I"M REAL TIRED! Hopefully I can keep up on the blog thing and be a little more detailed next time but my brain is struggling to function at this point.

Be kind & live free,

Audrey


PS if your bored after reading this...check out Dribble for Toledo on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. My cool friends are doing something real neat!