UI Girls Gone Wild… Abroad
Lauren & Brittney do Europe

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Fin.

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

Incoherent at 3 a.m. before flying home seemed like a cheap way to end a full semester of overseas blogging. I’m home now — not home really, but in Iowa — and thought I’d spend a minute or 60 writing here to tie up all my loose ends.

I didn’t sleep before my flight. Instead I said tearful goodbyes and started strategically packing at the last minute to ensure my jar of knockoff Nutella wouldn’t explode all over my jeggings. I took a cab to the airport with another girl from my program, and the cabdriver probably contemplated speeding into a brick wall as two American girls wept and sniffled while passing each cervecería, each bridge and plaza for the last time til who-knows-when. After that I completely stopped crying, because my face hurt and I was too sleep deprived to have feelings. Oh, and a thought: Why do girls my age get so dolled up to sit on an airplane for 10 hours? I was a real coyote ugly when I rolled into the airport at 5 a.m. Friday, makeup-free with my worst-fitting pair of jeans, an over-sized Sevilla FC T-shirt and beat-up black combat boots. I looked like a meth dealer; everyone else in line for the Iberia check-in was on their way to the Golden Globes.

Being home didn’t feel strange. Everything was the way it was when I left, minus the snow and the ice and the misery of winter. I didn’t forget how to drive (although I had a nightmare that I did). I got my new driver’s license, I ran a marathon of errands, I saw my aunt and uncle, saw one of my best friends, went to my little brother’s prom photos and moved to Iowa. Perhaps I’ve been so busy that there hasn’t been enough time for my new reality (or my return to this reality) to sink in, because now it’s starting to feel weird. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little more melancholy than I am excited to be back on this side of the Atlantic. After four months I was finally starting to feel at home in Sevilla. My biggest (and perhaps only) regret is that I didn’t study abroad for a full year.

I don’t want to spit up the same recycled study-abroad-experience dribble that everyone has heard from That Annoying Friend Who Went to Europe. I don’t think that Europe, or Spain, is superior to the U.S.; nor do I think that my own country is superior to Spain. I just know that if I hadn’t broken my Midwestern bubble and gone overseas, I would be short not only the new sights and travels, but the opportunity to completely reevaluate my perspectives and myself. Not everyone I studied with agrees with me — some people liked their semester in Sevilla, but aren’t so in love with it, or so affected by it, in the same ways I was. Before I came abroad I was suffocating in my own mental routine, obsessing over the same petty concerns and insecurities, and getting out of here and seeing the world shook me up precisely when I needed a hard slap across the face. And I think I’m better for it.

I know that I could write another 2,000 words without ever being able to form an adequate summary of what the past four months mean to me. I suppose I’ll save myself the certain disappointment by skipping that summary altogether. I miss Sevilla madly, along with all the people I befriended there. This isn’t some kind of knee-jerk sadness caused by being taken out of one environment and plopped into another. Of course I’ll slip out of my mopey state, because this is my life now — at least until December, I’m living in Iowa. I’m already two days deep into summer school, slowly piecing together my new bedroom, reconnecting with old friends and being distracted by the daily-life crap I haven’t thought much about since December (grocery shopping, cars that leak antifreeze, buying a bed, pending job interviews). But I also know that one day returning to Sevilla isn’t so much a desire, but a necessity. I’m a debilitatingly (not a word, not sorry) indecisive person, but I can guarantee you that my return to Spain is a statement, not a question.

And thanks again to our legion of followers who actually kept up with our (or just my) narcissistic nonsense. The five of you have been great. I contemplated starting a blog of my own, since I’ll miss this little son-of-a-bitch now that the semester’s done, but then I realized that if Brittney and I have a combined legion of five people, a Lauren-only blog would maybe have 2.5, assuming the Brittney-Lauren legion distribution is equal. So don’t worry about it, you’ll never hear from me again after this. LOL JK except for when I continue to write incessantly for anywhere that wants me (or doesn’t want me) until I finally snag the writing career I’ve been dreaming of since age five (the same career that I’ve been depending on since age 18, when I made the ill-advised decision to become a journalism major). Yep, I’m not going anywhere. Besides Sevilla, as soon as I determine my way back.

Besos, kisses, and lots of other flagrant displays of affection,

Lauren

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Huh.

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

Taxi to the airport arrives in one hour. Local time: 3:49 a.m. I woke up this morning: 9 a.m. I went to sleep last night: I don’t know a.m. Three a.m.? Late a.m. Time until my 10-hour flight to Chicago departs: eight hours. Amount of time I must carry on awake, functional, mostly living: eight hours. Amount of time I’m capable of carrying on this way: maybe 20 minutes. It’s going to be a long, long long journey home.

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Snapping out of denial

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Today I made it until 12:45 p.m. before choking back sobs on my walk to class, which means nothing, because I groggily rolled out of bed at 11. I would like to formally say “Fuck you” to my program for specifically scheduling finals for our last two days in Sevilla. They have a strict policy about changing test times, and when I asked to move one of my Thursday finals to today, I was told no, because my schedule wasn’t shitty enough. Then I said, “Listen, I’m going to be an emotional disaster on Thursday and I have no business taking two final exams,” and they responded, “Sucks to be you!” (in so many words, in Spanish) before showing me the door.

I could go on in agonizing detail about my horrific sleep schedule, the way I’ve been abusing my body between coffee and sleep aids while trying to simultaneously study, pack and not cry every time I realize it’s the last time I’ll be doing/seeing/speaking with X, Y or Z. But we’ll leave it at that. People read this, in theory, and perhaps the more maudlin details are best saved to wallow over on my own.

I’m not ready to leave Sevilla, and it feels like I’m being yanked from this place far too early. The taxi to the airport comes at 4:45 a.m. on Friday. By late Friday afternoon Central time, I will (hopefully) land (on time) at ORD in Chicago. By Sunday afternoon, I’ll be moved into my Iowa City apartment. The proximity of all this activity has forced me to snap out of denial, and apparently all I’m missing now are the proper coping mechanisms to accept it.

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LISTS, à la Brittney.

Monday, May 10th, 2010

Things I’ll Miss About Spain

  • The climate.
  • The overall beauty of this place. The Cathedral, the Giralda, the graffiti-covered path along Guadalquivir River, the Triana Bridge…. the churro stand at the end of the Triana Bridge.
  • Cruzcampo…? I’m slightly more Spanish than I was in January, by virtue of my recently developed love for this shittastic beer.
  • The fact that my life is a sitcom. Actually, there are parts of this that I won’t miss. But sometimes I find myself in such ridiculous situations that I have to look around and wonder when the tech guy is going to press the “canned laughter” button.
  • Drinking in public/never being carded.
  • The Misadventures of Lauren and Francesca. Enough said. Subcategory of this bullet point: abusing the word “jovenes” and speaking like a true Trianera, miarma.
  • Constantly improving my Spanish. Living in Iowa doesn’t lend itself well to interacting with native Spanish speakers.
  • The overall life philosophy. People just don’t stress as much as Americans do. I can’t say that Spain has killed my pragmatism, but I have started thinking more whimsically since I’ve been here. Although I guess this philosophy also explains Andalucía’s staggering unemployment rate… meh.

Things I Won’t Miss About Spain

  • The symphony of god-awful noises in my neighborhood: Triana’s anonymous pan flute artist, the neighbor’s dog who is fortunate to still be alive, the other neighbor whose screaming children obsessively listen to Ke$ha (bless her soul), the guy who clanks giant slabs of metal together midday.
  • The occasional important communication that gets hopelessly lost in translation.
  • Semi-regular cat calls, ass grabs and harassment from slimy viejos verdes and gilipollas.
  • Siesta. Because I never actually sleep, and I can’t even buy a freakin’ pack of gum since the whole country shuts down between 2 and 5 p.m.
  • The lack of culinary diversity. I would do unspeakable things for a burrito, for some shrimp tempura, for some grapefruit.
  • Never being able to articulate precisely what I’m thinking. Although I may not appear excessively eloquent, I’m obsessed with words and sentences and the way they’re constructed. I have a nuanced way of speaking in English that simply doesn’t translate in Spanish, which also kills a lot of the bad jokes I try to make to Spaniards.
  • The overall life philosophy. Going back to the siesta: how does a country operate around a three-hour midday nap? Why is it inconceivable to propose a dinner time earlier than 10 p.m.? Sometimes I’m enamored with this idea of, “Hey we’re in Andalucía, live it up! Don’t take life so seriously!!!” Other times, I want to make this country a chore chart and impose a few new house rules; give the place a sense of order.

PS — The volcanic ash cloud strikes back, this time on Spain. Damnit. And I thought I had escaped it’s wrath… here’s hoping that I can get out of Madrid come Friday morning.
PPS — Ohmygod Friday morning. It’s 10:30 p.m. on Monday and I’ve gone all day without sobbing. 10 points for Lauren. 10 more points if I make it to midnight.

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Tori Amos on a Saturday afternoon? Goodbyes commence now

Saturday, May 8th, 2010

In one week I’ll be in Naperville, Illinois. It will be 8 a.m. I will either be awake, rummaging through my parents’ freezer for bagels, or at the DMV retrieving my much-anticipated horizontal driver’s license. I still don’t think I fully realize the gravity of my departure; I also don’t think that sentence makes sense. Going home is permanent, not just a weekend visit. I’m freaking out about it, although my current state of severe sleep deprivation makes it easier to subdue the panic for a moment.

As of ~1 p.m. local time I’ve checked off the first of several important goodbyes, this one to Pedro. Our farewell proceeded the consumption of baked potatoes the size of 10-pound babies, Silent Bob en español and a win for the Phoenix Suns. I was instructed not to cry. Although I wasn’t completely capable of complying with this request, I managed to mostly keep my shit together. Pedro pointed out that if I’m struggling now, a week before I even leave for the airport, I’m going to be a wholly dysfunctional disaster come 7 a.m. Friday morning at the Aeropuerto Sevilla. I tend to agree.

Now it’s almost 3:30 p.m. here. I’m still in pajamas, and the alarming amount Tori Amos coming from my iTunes (“From the Choirgirl Hotel” and “Little Earthquakes”?!?! Christ) is a testament to my dire need (and fervent desire) for a siesta. Finals? Essays? Packing? That’s what next week is for.

note– this blog is being published post-siesta, due to an unexpected Internet failure at the intended press time of 3:30 p.m.

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On leaving my señorita

Wednesday, May 5th, 2010

In the past four months I’ve developed a close relationship with Elisa (or, my host lady; or, the woman with whom I live; or, my señorita). I’ve had to attach a lot of names to Elisa to explain my atypical living situation: Most students in Sevilla live with old ladies (to put it bluntly) and the study abroad lingo for an older woman hosting an American student is señora. Simple enough. But my señora, at only 35, isn’t old enough to warrant the title — it suggests a certain age. “Host lady” is a little cold, and “roommate” isn’t quite right; Tyler never did my laundry or met daily obligations to feed me. But compared to most of my college-aged comrades abroad, my living situation more closely mirrored a roommate setup than anything else.

Ever since my first day here, Elisa and I have had some in-depth conversations, at least for a guiri (me; derogatory Spanish term for foreigners) living with a native Spaniard. I remember talking about abortion, the death penalty and the Catholic priest scandal all within week one. Tonight we chatted over fish pizza and Nutella sandwiches about the mortgage crisis. I read a bunch of cheesy testimonies before I came here about how the best language practice is at home with a host family, and I can now confirm that there is something to those cheesy testimonies.

Most people wrote heartwarming accounts: memories of telling stories to their snot-nosed Spanish host siblings. If my program asked, I could come up with 500 words about Elisa’s philosophy on men and marriage. It’s true that I sometimes feel like an idiot here. I’m often acutely aware of my own foreignness, which only heightens my inhibitions. Sometimes I’m more self conscious at home than anywhere else, especially on a hypersensitive day when I’m tired of hearing my accent mocked. We went a few weeks sporadically where I behaved like a surly teenager, moping in my room and blabbing in English on Skype. But aside from these fleeting frustrations, living with Elisa was one of the best parts of my experience here (and in turn, sort-of living with her sort-of boyfriend, who I would equate to that one uncle, or your dad’s creepy cousin — the guy in every family — who moves in as if to kiss you on the cheek but then goes for your mouth. Whatever, I love him anyways). So when I leave in eight days, expect waterworks.

If I hadn’t lived here, who else would have dragged me to a shady discoteca midday on a Saturday 20 minutes outside of the city? Who else would have fed me snails and introduced me to the kickass dual-flavor off brand of Nutella? Who else would have encouraged me to make questionable life decisions every time I went out on a Thursday night (well, maybe I could have found someone to do that)? Who else would have gotten drunk on a Tuesday for my birthday and then dealt with the resulting hangover when she got up for work at 7 a.m. the next day? You may love your 70-year-old señora, and I’m sure she’s a sweetheart, but I wouldn’t change my living situation for the world.

I’ve never been sure if Elisa liked me all that much, but she made a comment Monday night that after me, she doesn’t think she’ll have a better student. I’m the first one she’s hosted. I told her not to make me cry. Then she said how great I am because I’m the equivalent of a human garbage disposal and will eat anything she puts in front of me. So okay, even if she’s hated me this whole time, she at least appreciates how embarrassingly not picky I am. If that’s not a moving cross-cultural bond worthy of being transformed into a made-for-TV movie, then I don’t know what is.

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Leggy mistakes in Spain, second helpings of Portugal

Monday, May 3rd, 2010

An observation, before I launch into a description of Lagos, Portugal, one of the most beautiful places I’ve seen in my 21 years:

Shorts are a fashion faux pas in Spain. I could have told you this before I got here, but now that springtime in Sevilla has arrived, I’ve given up my ongoing endeavor to be fashionably correct in Europe.

Last week it got up to almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit here. I, like any marginally sane person, decided the time was nigh to bare a little thigh, but Spaniards dress like they’re traveling to the Iditarod until mid-July. What’s worse is the way people stare when you wander around in shorts here, as if you were meandering the city in nothing but a pair of nipple tassels. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t exactly have the body of a Victoria’s Secret model; people aren’t staring because there’s any novelty to my body shape. And I’m not busting out the Daisy Dukes. I just think it’s high time the locals put away their leather jackets, scarves and boots. I know the summer gets a trillion times nastier than this, but c’mon. Does anyone really need so many layers when you could possibly cook an egg over easy on the sidewalk? Survey says no.

I don’t know how to transition from that into my recap of Lagos, so I’m not going to. I went to Lagos this weekend; it was beautiful.

In April I was lucky enough to see two cities in Portugal, Lisbon and now Lagos, and I’ve got to say; Portugal is a pretty great country. I hope to one day return. Lisbon was urban and quirky, with castles and history alongside a young downtown scene and the backdrop of the river. Lagos was a small beach town with an enormous expat community, and my God it was breathtaking. Six of us decided to take the bus from Sevilla to Lagos — a nauseating six-hour ride, although by car the cities are only about two hours away — and book a hostel together. Coincidentally, we chose to go the same weekend as 500 other students from Sevilla. That mass of humanity went with a student travel agency that organizes different trips, complete with bOoZe CrUiSeS and PrIVaTe PArTIeeZzzzz. We went the frugal route and forfeited the booze cruise, although it wasn’t exactly a dry weekend.

We camped out most of our time at a beach about five minutes from our hostel, tanning and eating grocery store goodies including (but not limited to) sandwiches with wheat bread — a novelty on this side of the Atlantic — and Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Also on this side of the Atlantic, I realized it was the first time I swam in that particular body of water. Another notch on my beach belt. We did a little bit of swimming from our beach to another one nearby, going through a grotto or two and avoiding any fatal injuries by rocks. I can’t emphasize how much I loved it… all of it. I reflected not long ago about my striking similarities to my mother and our mutual interest in wine. This weekend I had the same sort of reflection about my likeness to my father. He’s a restless beachgoer, constantly asking Who wants to go for a walk? Who wants to go swimming? Who wants to check out the coral reef? and tirelessly commenting on how amazing the water is, how blue it is, how cool the rocks look, how nice the sand is… this weekend I was something of a Greg 2.0. Imploring anyone in our group to go swimming with me (despite the water being extremity-numbingly cold). Getting restless an hour after laying out and seeing who was ready for a walk. I also pushed hard for a boat tour of the grottos, and I’m infinitely glad we decided to do it. There was a bit of a communication barrier with our Portuguese boat driver, and one or two close encounters when he almost smashed us into a fellow boat and then into the inside wall of a grotto, but I can’t complain too much. I eventually got off the boat intact.

In summary, if you ever find yourself bored in southern Europe, hop a bus to Lagos and it shan’t disappoint. I’m a complete beach fiend, and I’m beyond pleased that Lagos was my one beach trip in this short time abroad. As a rule I become excessively emotional while traveling, always thinking something along the lines of, “Oh my God this is my life? I’m on a beach in Portugal??” Not to sound all Academy Awards, but I’m indescribably grateful to be here, although I still can’t quite grasp that I even am here.

In other news, this depressing new blog countdown has rudely announced that I fly home in 10 days, 8 hours and 37 minutes. Deep breaths, deep breaths, deep breaths.

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Mujer al borde de un ataque de nervios

Wednesday, April 28th, 2010

Another Wednesday, another balmy night in Sevilla, another day closer to my pending anxiety attack over going home. I’ve managed to sleep a little bit since the Great Mosquito Incident of 2010, which helps to postpone said anxiety attack, and I just gracefully uncorked a bottle of Portuguese wine that I brought back from Lisbon. If that doesn’t pacify my nerves, I’m a lost cause.

It might be too early to start with the long, rambly, big-picture, introspective study-abroad-experience blog entries. The problem is, I started forming these thoughts two months ago. Francesca routinely yells at me when I say things like, “Oh my god, only XX days until we have to leave,” or, “Oh my god, do you realize how beautiful Sevilla is? Do you realize that we walk past the Giralda and the Cathedral just going to class every day?? Do you realize that in XX days we’ll be living in much uglier places???”

People told me that studying abroad is like freshman year of college all over again. Fortunately in my case, this semester doesn’t remotely resemble my freshman year at Iowa.

I didn’t come to Spain expecting to fall in love with Sevilla; I already made the mistake of going into college with high expectations only to be disappointed, and since then I was always slightly jealous of my friends who did fall in love with their respective universities and their respective college experiences. The connection I feel with Sevilla is probably the emotional tie I’ve never really felt with Iowa.

A side note, to clarify — I don’t dislike Iowa or my university. I’ve just never felt that unbridled excitement or sense of school spirit that so many of my Hawkeye peers possess. And clearly I’m not trying to prolong my college experience by adding on an extra semester or year; on the contrary, I’ll graduate a semester early in December. This, however, is another factor contributing to my pending nervous breakdown Re: Entering the so-called real world. But I’ll save that topic for another time and another captive audience that doesn’t want to hear me bitch about my masochistic decision to end my academic career prematurely.

Back on topic: I’m more nervous to return home than I was to come here. When I flew out of O’Hare in January there was a guarantee that I’d be back in less than five months. Leaving Sevilla isn’t accompanied by that same understanding. And as I started to explain, my time here has been much more valuable than I could have hoped for. I’ll come back to this idea later when I can do it more justice, hopefully without sounding like a Study Abroad Department propaganda pamphlet. Sometimes I feel a little ridiculous, like I’m living in a low-budget coming-of-age movie about a loser 21-year-old American chick trying to hold her own in Europe. I’d be willing to spice up a few stories about my time here, if anyone wants to buy the rights to the movie.

PS — I retitled this entry after I published it because we talked about Almodóvar in cine today, and yeah… sometimes I think I’m funny.

PPS (PSS?) — Anyone who has known me for a substantial period of time can tell you that I’m an avid journaler with a brain constantly on overdrive. Sorry, Brittney, if my uninteresting introspection substantially brings down our readership from this point on.

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Sleepless in Sevilla

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

I normally don’t update so obsessively, but insomnia and insanity have slowly crept in on me. This is my last refuge before attempting sleep tonight.

I could speculate for days about my inability to sleep, but the primary culprits are mosquitoes. Those pesky bastards have inundated the apartment. I wake up every five minutes to a sharp bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz sound inside my ear and all around me, then spend the next 20 seconds smacking myself in the head in search of bugs, then turn on the light and prey on mosquitoes with a tissue in hand for 10 more minutes, smashing them into the walls and killing them with my bare hands when I have to. I don’t know if I’m more gratified or frustrated when I kill a mosquito that “bleeds,” because I know that sonofabitch is responsible for one of the 50,0000000 mosquito bites lining my arms, legs and neck. I feel very Go Ask Alice right now, very Midwestern meth addict, paranoid and hitting myself in the face to keep the bugs away. My #1 recommendation for this country: SCREENED WINDOWS.

On that note, I ate snails for dinner. Not the kind of snails that are doctored up by a chef so as to make you forget what you’re eating; you slurp these suckers right out of their hard shells, antennae and all. Oh, and then we watched the End of Feria Fireworks from the roof of the apartment. This day would be swell if I could end it on a better note instead of furiously scratching mosquito bites. Somebody please send NyQuil, or a horse tranquilizer.

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A fourth and failed attempt at Feria

Friday, April 23rd, 2010

Tonight started off strong. I put a mild to moderate amount of effort into my appearance — the makeup was on-point. Left the house with Elisa and met with two of her friends before heading to our first caseta (tent) for the evening. I was linguistically on fire; definitely an “on” day for my Spanish. I was being sassy, joking with strangers, actually having a personality while interacting with Spaniards and generally dominating more than usual.

But then my heel broke in half (my favorite pair, Nordstrom Rack, the only ones I brought to Spain), another asshole grabbed me, this time sliding his grimy fucking hand almost halfway up my dress, and once again I was too slow and furious to do anything besides berate him in English and manage one Spanish expletive before flicking him off and walking away. So I limped home at 9:30 p.m., and on my way a group of obnoxious young Spaniards with fugly facial piercings cat-called me out the side of a bus. And right now in Chicago I’m missing what’s certain to be a great night with Rachel and Jean in honor of Jean’s 22nd birthday. Not to mention, I seriously miss those beezies.

We can go ahead and mark tonight as the first time since being here that I really, genuinely just kind of wanted to go home.

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An open letter to the nation.

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

Sevilla’s Feria de Abril makes me feel like a degenerate.

Dear Spain,

My body can’t handle more than two consecutive nights of drinking a dry sherry and 7up cocktail as if I needed it to breathe. Going to sleep two hours past dawn is a routine that my well being simply does not tolerate. Moreover, my pre-beach-trip waistline is furious about the Spanish tortillas and loaves of bread packed with mystery meat masked as meals that form the base of my makeshift personal food pyramid this week. Feria, you’ve been fun. You’ve been memorable — honestly, because diluted sherry isn’t strong enough to give me more than a sugar headache — but it’s Thursday. This shit needs to stop. Just for one night, I want to go to bed before the birds wake up. I want to go to bed with the birds? Goddamnit, I don’t know what I want, but Feria, I need some space. I guess what I’m trying to say is… why don’t we take a break? I’ll come back tomorrow. Maybe.

With reserved and cautious love,

Lauren

Feria is a flamenco-dress festival slash state fair slash week-long party. I am young; I am supposed to be capable of going weeks without sleep. I am supposed to think it’s badass when I roll back home around sunset. I’m not supposed to be an 80-year-old cat-collecting spinster trapped in the body of a 21-year-old (until my body explodes from carb abuse then deteriorates from sherry abuse). I only made it three nights into the week but I’m already cashing in on a personal day to do things like work on my magazine article, go for long walks by myself in a pitiful attempt to “exercise” and write superfluous blog entries.

Copy editing, if nothing else, has given me some purpose this week. I’ve been hunting for comma splices and pronoun errors by day, unshowered with last night’s sins sealed in my hair, stuck to the hairspray helmet I needed to plaster an over-sized Feria flower to the side of my head. Pardon the melodrama.

Francesca and I in front of the main gate to Feria. One of 20 trillion photos documenting the gitana outfits.

Truthfully, Feria has been a hell of a good time. Last night Elisa let me wear one of her flamenco outfits so I got to look the part of a non-foreigner for a little while, and god knows I love any excuse to sport a great costume (see: Halloween 08-09: Pulp Fiction Uma Thurman, Donatella Versace, babymama hillbilly, Lady Gaga [two versions]). Feria is another prime example of why it’s great to have a young señor(it)a in place of a grandmotherly host lady in Spain: If you don’t know someone with a tent at Feria, you’re not getting in anywhere, and the tents are where you want to be. I’ve been able to tag along with Elisa and her friends all week, so you could say I’m getting the full cultural experience. I’m also getting the full verbal beating from Spaniards who think it’s hil-freaking-arious that I’m so awkwardly tall and awkwardly incapable of dancing. Sorry, my hips don’t lie, nor do they move in a fashion that resembles the way you people dance. My hips are an honest specimen and they’ve made it excessively clear that I have no rhythm… now let’s stop commenting on it, mm?

Alright, this entry has been a little weird, a little schizophrenic, a little internal-monologue-under-the-influence. I swear I’m sitting at home sober right now, recovering from the baby-sized slice of leftover tortilla I ate for dinner and contemplating my own lameness.

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Spring break, take 2

Monday, April 19th, 2010

This weekend I went to Lisbon, Portugal with my program’s interest group. It was a fabulous place… here are photos.

Now that I’m back in Espanha(hahaha) as the Portuguese call this place, I just want to sleep for five days straight. Not gonna happen. But luckily I didn’t make travel plans this week, because the small matter of volcanic ash has butchered most people’s European itineraries.

We have off class in Sevilla this week for Feria de Abril. All I know about Feria I know from Elisa. She takes the week off of work and has been slaving at the sewing machine since the day I arrived making flamenco dresses for herself and for others, to earn some money on the side. Tonight she’s having people over at which point there will be certain consumption of rebujito, which is literally sherry and 7up. I previewed this last week with dinner and can’t say I was upset.

I don’t plan to give my body and brain too hard a beating tonight, because I already feel mildly corpse-like from nonstop travel and work since Semana Santa. Tomorrow I need to be lucid enough to copy edit and register for classes at Iowa (inconveniently at 10 p.m. Spain time). Registration is a very unwelcome reminder of the life I left on pause back in the states, and the fact that my tenure as a college student is slowly coming to an end. I can’t think about this right now. I should be thinking about sherry and 7up and what shoes to wear and what color eyeliner is the least street walker-y. You know, everything normal study abroad students think about.

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A Moroccan recap, before I forget…

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

Usually I’m hyper-diligent about blogging within a day or so of getting back from a trip, but I’m losing the proverbial battle against time pretty badly this week. Let’s see if I can remember all the way back to last Friday in some detail…

The Medina in Marrakech.

I expressed a tinge of concern in my last post regarding my then-pending trip to Morocco. Many students on my program travel to Morocco and come back with weird illnesses, food poisoning, missing wallets, whatever. And all of these students go to Morocco with a pre-planned tour by a student travel agency. Adam, who has more confidence as a navigator and traveler than I do, convinced me it was a good idea to do this trip sans the student travel agency to a) avoid the hand-holdy obnoxiousness of a group tour and b) maybe save some money. I’m an extremely paranoid traveler, and I was starting to wonder if I had been talked into a horrible idea, but I’ll go ahead now and say I was wrong, Adam was right. Doing this trip without the travel agency was the best way we could have gone.

Our motley crew — Adam, Caroline and myself — assembled early Friday morning for the flight into Marrakech. We were depending pretty heavily on my mammoth encyclopedia-sized Let’s Go book covering Spain, Portugal and Morocco. I have a fickle relationship with this book. Some of the information is downright wrong, or stupid. But it served us well in instructing how to get from the airport to the city center by bus, from which point we wandered with our backpacks for maybe an hour trying to find our hostel. With the help of a local dude pushed on us at the French Café we got to our hostel, which, aside from smelling a little funky, was great. For 13 euro a night, nobody was upset.

Vendor in Djema'a Al-Fna, Marrakech (I was quite happy with how my photos came out, not to pat myself on the back or anything).

Based on Let’s Go‘s description of Marrakech, we expected the city to be like the warm up of the trip, preceding a much greater adventure in Fes. To quote: “Marrakesh’s medina is less overwhelming than that of Fez, but almost as big and brash.” And: “The colorful, chaotic medina of Fez beats at its own crazy pace. Donkeys rush by with refrigerators on their backs, old men weave carpets and dance around dye pits with huge stacks of leather, children lead tourists out of alleyways, and everyone is selling something.”

Lesson learned about guidebooks. They aren’t always right. I was expecting a donkey with a refrigerator on its back, and instead I got a bunch of stray cats.

Fes’s medina — or marketplace — was bigger than Marrakech’s, with literally thousands of winding unmarked streets. But seeing the Medina in Marrakech at night was one of the most fascinating parts of our trip. The best word to describe it would be “alive.” With a pulse of its own. Before visiting the medina at night, Friday afternoon we also spent a healthy chunk of time getting lost on our way to the train station to buy tickets to Fes for the next day. But the highlight of getting lost was poking around the city outside of the Djema’a Al-Fna, near the medina and our hostel, where we spent most of our time. We also had a classy meal at McDonald’s before deciding to play it safe again that night at a pizza place for dinner. Combined we probably packed a year’s worth of anti-diarrheal meds, but nobody was feeling too adventurous with Moroccan food so early in the trip. And my hat’s off to Let’s Go for offering some solid restaurant recommendations.

Saturday morning we were up by 4 a.m. to catch an eight-hour train to Fes. This part of the trip was the greatest source of anxiety for me when we had been planning. Being a budget-conscience traveler and booking through Ryanair means sacrifices. Our flights to Morocco were astoundingly cheap, but we could only fly into Marrakech and home from Fes. Marrakech and Fes are not close. To my surprise, the train ride — and honestly, the whole trip — couldn’t have gone smoother. We got into Fes by 1 p.m. with plenty of time to meander the medina and be harassed by Moroccan kids trying to get us to stay at their family’s hostels.

In Fes, the three of us capitalized on the opportunity to use our Spanish skills. Not because anybody spoke Spanish; precisely the opposite. We kept running into the same damn kid trying to bring us to his family’s hostel, telling us his life depended on it while dressed excessively well (a la guido/Jersey Shore) to be making such a claim. The best way to respond to the hustling was “No hablo ingles.”

View of Fes from the terrace over the leather tannery.

In Fes we serendipitously fell upon a (free) opportunity to check out a leather tannery and meet a guy who wanted to give us a presentation about blanket weaving. Our Moroccan game plan was pretty much not to have a game plan, and whether it was by chance or by our own travel technique, we were able to get a good feel for both cities during our short stint in the country. We also did some number crunching and realized that we are economic superstars and easily spent less money than we would have with the student travel agency, which accounted for all our expenses, even our absurdly classy and slightly pricy hostel in Fes, two nice dinners and an embarrassing amount of souvenirs. Call us to plan your next trip, only a 40 percent commission fee.

I could go on, but WordPress is telling me I’m at 925 words, and my common sense is telling me no one cares after 200. On Friday I’m going to Lisbon, Portugal with my interest group. I hear it’s damn beautiful, and I’m also excited for what should be a bank-account friendly trip (it’s “free,” aka I already paid for it, within my program).

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I can’t think of any city in the world where I’d rather be.

Monday, April 12th, 2010

On that note, I graduate in eight months. Who wants to hire me in Sevilla?

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QUESTION: What’s less even important than the resurrection of Christ in Spain?

Wednesday, April 7th, 2010

ANSWER: Turning 21.

That didn’t stop it from happening though. And it didn’t stop me from celebrating. Eighteen is the golden age in Spain, and it almost seemed arbitrary to celebrate my Stateside legality in a country that will serve anyone who can reach the bar. But I went out anyways to compensate for my inability to hit the tiny 21-and-up bar circuit in Iowa City (Deadwood, anyone?). I would say my birthday was a success even if for no other reason than that I avoided face planting in the toilet bowl upon my return home in the wee A.M. hours. That is sooooo 2009.

I’d prefer not to rehash last night’s events in gruesome detail on this very public platform, but te lo juro por Snoopy that nobody was arrested, injured or otherwise placed in an (unsolicited) compromising position. That’s all I could have hoped for. I’ll celebrate again the day after I fly home in May by going to the DMV for my horizontal license as soon as humanly possible. Can’t wait to update my height and weight (vom), but I am ready to ditch the picture of 16-year-old Lauren with the flippy haircut. You should remember well if you had the misfortune of knowing me in 2005.

Today I feel like death reheated in the microwave, but left on the turntable for too long and therefor stuck to the plate. I just realized that today is Wednesday, which means — for those of you who haven’t been keeping up — that tomorrow is Thursday, and then comes Friday, aka the day I leave for Africa WTF??!!???? I’m going to Morocco with Caroline and Adam — independent of a pre-planned excursion — and currently panicking about food poisoning and train schedules and the whole not-speaking-French-or-Arabic thing. It’s just us, a massive guidebook and some pre-printed Ryanair boarding passes. Us against the world. Or against Morocco. Or me against feeling like death stuck to a plate.

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Semana Santa in Sevilla

Sunday, April 4th, 2010

The cathedral in Sevilla. The third largest in the world.

Here’s a short clip of El Cachorro exiting the cathedral on Jueves Santo, or Holy Thursday. It’s not a great video, as I was abusing the zoom function from behind a tree, but you can see the whole float pretty well. I always used to associate the smell of incense with going to mass, but I think for the rest of my life that smell will remind me of Sevilla in the springtime.

(Click here to watch. WordPress is an uncooperative wench and won’t let me embed the video.)

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The Resurrection of Christ: no big deal.

Saturday, April 3rd, 2010

Sieben Family Vaycay in Spain ended a few hours of ago. We crammed a lot of this country into one short week: Madrid, Toledo, Granada, Torremolinos, Ronda, Jeréz de la Frontera, Sevilla. I’m exhausted just typing out the list.

Technically, the tour we’ve been traveling with is still going. My family left Sevilla this morning for Córdoba and they’re probably en route to Madrid right now. I’ve been to Córdoba, so I decided to stay in Sevilla and avoid the extra train ride home from Madrid.

The trip was great — cooperative weather, beautiful sites and educational to boot — and it merits a much better recap than the one I’m giving it here. But, my brain is fried. Fried like the fried eggs I’ve been indulging in at the hotel continental breakfasts each morning. Fried like the churros that skyrocket in price during Semana Santa.

Esperanza Macarena, one of the most famous processions in Semana Santa (photo credit: http://comunidad.muchoviaje.com/CS/photos/la_semana_santa_de_sevilla/picture40605.aspx).

This blog title is relevant, I promise, because tomorrow is Easter. My mom brought over an obscene amount of Easter candy. I appreciate it, for real, but is she trying to kill me? I introduced Elisa to caramel-filled Cadbury eggs and I think this should secure my place as her favorite American ever. Or at least it better. Sevillanos don’t do chocolate-covered marshmallow eggs. They don’t sit in empty hotel rooms after their families leave, like I do, demolishing a half carton of aforementioned eggs and then feeling helplessly guilty about it afterward. No, instead the Sevillanos celebrate Holy Week — Semana Santa — a spectacle that one must see to understand. I want to call it a massive Jesus and Mary parade, which would be oversimplifying the matter, but that truly sums it up. A week-long procession of crucified Jesus, weeping Virgin, Catholic brotherhoods with pointed hats, marching bands and incense.

I took some video and photos of one of the processions exiting the Cathedral last night, and I’ll post it soon. Semana Santa was fascinating, and despite my sarcasm, I don’t intend to insult the tradition. The only confusing part of Semana Santa to me is its total disregard for Easter. The climax of the week is Thursday night going into Good Friday morning… when Jesus died… and here, everyone could care less about the resurrection. That was the miraculous part, right?? Christ rising was sort of a big deal, the way I was taught throughout 17 years of Catholic school on Sunday nights. But meh, what do I know. I’m not a practicing Catholic. Let the weeping Mary weep.

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Creepers! At The Disco

Friday, March 26th, 2010

Discotecas are a funny thing. You can’t show up before 2 a.m. The line to get in is at its longest by 3 or 4. After waiting in that line, don’t expect to get in with casual shoes. These people mean business when it comes to shoes. The guys in your group with the Air Jordans or whatever the hell will not be joining you inside.

If you’ve made it in you’ll be greeted by the usual mass of humanity paired with heavy bass and sweat. Here, at the heart of the discoteca, you can see exactly why it’s such a funny thing. Or, mejor dicho, a creepy thing.

I think the unspoken system is to make googly eyes at your dance floor prospect for several minutes, and if that gets you nowhere, move on to the next one. Or at least that’s one part of the system. I went out last night with Francesca and Austin, and Austin is very in tune to who is googly eyeing who. He pointed out one or two brosephs googly eyeing in our direction — but then what? Am I supposed to googly eye back? Start communicating through sign language across the orgy? Or just continue flailing around and singing the words to “Smack That” with Francesca? I stuck to #3.

So then the googly eyed dude gets bored and moves on. Most club creepers are of the googly eye variety, but for every 10 of them I’d say there are one or two much more ballsy bros who will skip the googly eye game and move right on up to your face. One such fellow came up to me last night, blabbering in broken English, asking me I don’t even know what. I can’t tell you how many times I yelled “HABLO ESPANOL” in an attempt to get him to give up on his sorry English. I did understand one part though: “Want to dance?”

Eh… not really. See, I’m with my friends. And if I dance with somebody…….. they need to dance with somebody too….. so yeah, rain check.

(I actually tried explaining this. In retrospect, I realize it makes no sense.)

Bold Broseph #1 retrieved another friend for Francesca at which point the two of us were under siege, trapped in the mass of humanity between two bold brosephs. Vom dot com. Vom punto es.

I continued making desperate eye contact with Austin. Bold Broseph #1 commented that I wasn’t looking at him… probably because I was plotting my escape. Francesca snapped her head in my direction with an unmistakable look of “We need to get the hell out of here” on her face. I concurred. At this point I believe Francesca and I grabbed hands to return to Austin, but when I got to Austin I realized I had the hand of Bold Broseph #1. Goddamnit!

After developing another sorry excuse about why I had to leave (aka, walk downstairs for a minute and then come up to another side of the dance floor), broseph asked for my phone number. Shit. Another brilliant idea from Lauren: give him my number from home… and change the last number. Then he asked me to type my name into his phone so he could find me on Facebook. Damn technology. I stupidly gave him my real name, because I couldn’t think of a good fake one on the fly. But that’s what the “Ignore Friendship Request” feature is for.

The rest of the night was fine except for when we came dangerously close to running into the Bold Brosephs again. I booked it in the opposite direction because this was not a confrontation that I was ready to have.

From then on nobody approached us for the rest of the night. Bad karma from blowing off the bros? Or truly a blessing, given the setting and the people at the club? Or, more likely, a simple matter of no one being interested. My towering over everyone at 5’10″ + three inch heels and functioning under a compromised level of sobriety while dancing up on Austin and Fronch may not be the magic way to encounter non-creeps in a club, but oh well. The three of us converted into the creeps for a while, people watching downstairs and yelling reverse cat calls at good looking European men.

Now, I’ve got a beautiful Friday at my feet, but I’m sitting in bed and still haven’t opened the shade. I’ll get around to it soon. I’m meeting my family in Madrid tomorrow to commence our whirlwind tour of southern Spain which will eventually bring us back to Sevilla at the peak of Semana Santa; Holy Thursday and Good Friday. Consequently, I may not be blogging much this week; I certainly will not be discoing much this week.

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ROME: A novel.

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010

You know what I can’t stand? People who visit Rome, upload their photos to Facebook, and once they’re done slaving over captions and photo order (other people do that, right?), they name it: “When in Rome.”

LOLOLOL get it?! When in Rome! Like the idiom!!! And the city!!!!!! And the Mary-Kate and Ashley movie.

Anyways.

I plan to recap my visit to Roma, Ro-mama by avoiding the old cliche and attempting to start a new, Lady Gaga-inspired cliche. Tell your friends!

An important chunk of my trip was the flight itself – or, my first encounter with Ryanair. I’m not proud of the fact that I paid 3 euros for a bottle of water, but this company robbed me at gunpoint. By some miracle (papal intervention?) my carryon bag met the size requirement, but I knew for a fact that it was overweight, and Ryanair is notorious for weighing carryon luggage before allowing passengers to board. I didn’t know what to do, so I shoved my purse under my jacket in the least discrete way possible in an attempt to alleviate some of the weight. It turns out nobody was weighing the bags that day. Conflict averted.

I took away a lot from my visit aside from the history and the sights and the tourism. Sightseeing solo makes for a lot of quality time. With yourself. In fairness, I wasn’t wandering the city alone very much. My aunt graciously revisited loads of places throughout Rome that I’m sure she passes every day; my uncle gave me a tour of the U.S. Embassy and a ride on the back of the motorino complete with unbeatable views; my cousin wandered through the Colosseum with me, and helped maneuver through the marathon that overtook the city on Sunday (and that both my aunt and uncle ran… someday I’ll run 26 miles, too. Right).

I did, however, visit the Vatican on my own. I got in line for the museum by 8:45 a.m., and after 40 minutes of silently trudging forward and eavesdropping on the Spaniards behind me, I’d had enough solitude. The time was nigh to make small talk with Spaniards. I asked them if they knew where the front of the line was — they told me. They asked me why I speak Spanish — I told them. I learned that two of them, brothers, work as architects in Jaén. The third is a medical resident at a hospital in Sevilla. Soon we were comparing Rome guidebooks and piecing together the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

At this point the Spaniards lost any chance of losing me. I had leeched onto a group of sightseeing companions with no intention of letting go. It was a seamless plan, above all because one of the architect brothers was some kind of Vatican scholar. They surely thought I was an idiot American for my extremely limited knowledge of Roman history, much less Vatican history, and my age likely came to light when I got into the museum using my student ID — their old Universidad de Sevilla IDs were rejected. Student IDs are apparently mean nothing if you’re over 27.

Architect Brother 1 gave me a free tour as we went through the museum and up to the Sistine Chapel, accompanied by architecture lessons that I pretended to understand. In my defense, anything mathematical is doubly difficult to grasp when presented in Spanish.

I only saw the Sistine Chapel and the rooms leading up to it in the Vatican Museum, as the rest would have required another full day to explore. The Spaniards were heading to the Colosseum, and I even received a (pity) invitation to join them, but St. Peter’s was on my afternoon agenda so we parted ways. My uncle asked if I exchanged information with them, but I didn’t bother, and neither did they. It was a one-Vatican stand. And I kind of like that Jesus, Santiago and Antonio will continue to exist in my memory only as characters from that day. Not to get all poetic on you.

In another massive line waiting to go up to the copula of St. Peter’s, I continued to do what I do best — prey on Spaniards. I really never planned on it, but every time I heard Spanish it was like some strange comfort of “home.” I chatted up a couple from Madrid before splitting off and making the ascent on my own. And Holy Curvy Walls, these places aren’t made for non-dwarves. See photo.

From the top of St. Peter’s Basilica I decided that Italy is beautiful. In case you wanted to know the exact moment. I also decided that another drawback of traveling alone is the lack of people pictures. At this point I preyed on American teenagers to take a goobery photo of me at the top of St. Peter’s. And one more time, in the basilica, because everybody needs a pic in front of St. Peter’s tomb!! A word of warning: if you go below the basilica to visit the dead popes, don’t accidentally have your camera out of its case and turned on while passing by John Paul II. The guards don’t like that.

Although the Vatican was great, one of the true highlights of my trip came after. I met up with my aunt and her friend Jennifer after peacing out from the pope’s place and we went for gelato. Jesus, I can’t believe I’m about to type that gelato was one of the highlights of my trip. But it was! Nutella-flavored flavored gelato… my heart melts again just thinking about it. If my life completely goes to shit after college and I’m unemployed for 15 years and living in a rotting apartment with a three-legged cat, I’m going to commit slow suicide by only eating Nutella-flavored gelato for every meal.

On Sunday I went with my cousin to the Colosseum, where those bastards rejected my student ID. Forget the Colosseum, I’ll go back to the Vatican, where people appreciate my scholarly endeavors. Although honestly, I thought the Colosseum was well worth entering. A lot of people told me they didn’t bother going into it when they visited Rome, but the history is so fascinating and grotesque that I’m glad I did. Unfortunately, the Palatine and the forum didn’t have great signage, so Nate and I had no idea what we were looking at for that leg of the afternoon. Lots of… rocks.

There was so much more sightseeing I could describe, but I’d be surprised if anyone’s made it to this sentence. Of note, I did visit the Keats-Shelley house, per the recommendation of one of my favorite people. That was a good Alone Time visit, better than doing the Vatican solo, although slightly depressing if only because of the whole “Keats’-death-by-consumption-in-this-room” thing.

Like I said earlier, I had a moment of introspection on the bus that I’m still grappling with now. I don’t think I’ll realize that I was in Europe until I go back to the States, as ridiculous as that sounds. Although coming back to Sevilla early Monday morning I quickly left vacation mode only to resume real-life mode, a space I currently occupy where I’m stressed beyond reason and losing the proverbial battle against time. Finishing this blog post tonight was my way of accepting defeat against my staggering Tuesday to-do list. Three hours of interviews, an equal amount of time spent transcribing interviews and a frustrating attempt at contacting other sources, and I now remember that oh yeah — I’m a journalism major, too. And a student… perhaps a prime time to acknowledge the midterm that awaits me tomorrow.

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A thought

Friday, March 19th, 2010

I was taking the bus from Ciampino airport to the Termini Station in Rome today, and all I could think to myself was, “Holy fuck,” over and over again. I am 20 years old, in Rome, functioning without the language, using public transportation without getting lost, not being robbed or otherwise taken advantage of. Oh — and once more — I’m in Rome. That’s in Italy. That’s… not the United States, and it’s not Spain.

I thought, “I should pinch myself. This is an opportune moment to pinch myself.” So I did. I pinched myself very, very hard. Not as hard as a nose-piercing pinch, but I left a mark. And I pinched myself multiple times. Maybe the lack of sleep was getting to me, but I really can’t grasp that I’m in Europe, and not just one state over. Italy =/= Indiana.

But I felt a tinge of homesickness for Spain. Is that possible? Homesick, for Sevilla. I kept trying to respond to Italians in Spanish and wishing I could ask questions in the native language instead of needing to speak English.

Rome is beautiful, and I’m excited to see it by daylight. Today was full with a tour of the U.S. Embassy, some solo exploration of Piazza di Spagna and the Keats-Shelley House and taking in city sights at dusk with my aunt. As of 11:31 p.m. local time, no pizza or gelato consumption… yet. I’ll be up early for the Vatican tomorrow, so I’ll put in a good word for all of you with the pope. And of course, I’ll return next week with a novel-length entry and photos to boot.

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Responsibilities? They have those here?

Monday, March 15th, 2010

Keeping up with this blog has been a challenge in the past two weeks. The unexpected sinus infection mixed with pending midterms and actual homework (?!) hasn’t facilitated writing to, as Brittney says, our “legion of followers.” So combined, five people?

View of La Alhambra from the Albaicín barrio in Granada. SWOON.

I never wrote about Granda, but I absolutely adored it. It was worth destroying my ears on the mountain-y drive up. I would gush about the Alhambra or something, but it’d be 90000 words typed in vain. So here’s a photo.

Adam visited this weekend and by some miracle it didn’t rain. I was able to revisit the Alcázar (!), the Catedral (.) and the Plaza de Toros (…). I’ve also taken to using punctuation marks to express how I felt about each visit. The Alcázar was great because there were peacocks; the Catedral was still a gothic cathedral, but going to the top of the Giralda offered a fabulous and sunny view; the Plaza de Toros robbed us (ok, 4 euros) by failing to mention that half of it was closed and under construction. Under construction? In Spain?! QUE VA. We also got stuck in a Jesus parade in my barrio and together slaughtered two boxes of Don Simon sangria, a 40ish bottle of Cruzcampo and a jar of Nutella, among other bebidas y comidas. Despite the fact that I was on antibiotics and presently live in a makeshift pharmacy, the weekend was an enormous success.

The transition back to real life has been difficult, and it’s only Monday. I have two midterms this week and a mammoth article due in four weeks. It sounds like plenty of time, but not when one of those weeks is dedicated to traveling with my family over Semana Santa, and this weekend is dedicated to Rome (Roma, ro ma ma…).

Despite my debilitating indecision, I finally booked the flight. I’m reluctant to make travel plans here because a) I love Sevilla, b) I’m afraid of Ryanair and c) I’m cheap. But I had to do Rome. My aunt, uncle and cousin live there right now, so I have no excuse not to go. Plus, I think this will be my only trip outside of the Iberian Peninsula in my time here. A lot of my friends have already hit up Paris, Amsterdam, London, Brussels… I’ve stuck to Granada, Córdoba, Jerez de la Frontera, Barcelona. And I’m beyond happy with that. But it will be exciting to see another part of Europe this weekend, to visit family, and to hit the town with the Pope.

I’m beyond flustered that my study abroad experience is already at its halfway point. I’m really going to miss my friends here, Elisa, the lack of snow… and why the hell am I already worried about this? I have two months left, but it’s not enough time. I finally developed some sense of direction — it’s been days, maybe even weeks, since I’ve gotten lost! I listen to my iPod when I’m walking to class because I know the streets well enough to not worry (much) about being plowed over by a batshit Spanish driver. The long-awaited sun has finally arrived, and the combination of endorphins + “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” while walking has been most enjoyable. You could even say empowering. It’s probably because I’m one letter shy of sharing her name.

The Puente de Triana, "my" bridge (by virtue of living in Triana).

Also– another sentiment I don’t share with my study abroad cronies, along with my disinterest in Ryanair-ing through Europe every weekend: missing my university. It’s not even a question. Iowa will be there when I get back, save for the possibility of another apocalyptic flood. Chicago isn’t going anywhere. Naperville will be thriving. My family comes in less than two weeks, so I miss them, but pretty soon we’ll be in close quarters on a bus traveling through southern Spain. Maybe I’m insensitive, truly emotionless — this wouldn’t be the first time I’ve wondered — but I don’t miss Iowa at all. By writing this I’ve perhaps jinxed myself into a panic attack/weepy breakdown by the end of the week due to separation anxiety from cornfields and Interstate 80. I’ll be sure to provide a live streaming update if this happens.

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Vengeful immune system: 1. Lauren: 0.

Wednesday, March 10th, 2010

A lovely past week has now been eclipsed by a sinus infection and my first encounter with the Spanish health care system. There’s not much I hate more than missing class. It puts me on edge, and it’s almost always worth just showing up sick, but after several days of feeling like my head weighs 500 kg (yep, European) and battling my dysfunctional respiratory system, I decided to go to the doctor. I’ve dedicated today to quality time with my close friends amoxicillin and ambroxol. Of course, I get sick as soon as it stops raining in Sevilla. And immediately preceding the weekend Adam comes to visit, a time when my immune system (morever, my liver) desperately needs to be in good working order.

But I figure that by this weekend and after two full days of antibiotics I should be capable of enjoying Sevilla outside of the piso, where I alternate from bed to sofa to desk in numerous failed attempts to sleep and do homework. Anyways, this update has no purpose other than to let out a little bit of self pity. Getting sick is a frustratingly regular part of my life, ever since The Great Mono Diagnosis of 2007, when my immune system officially declared war on the rest of my body. It’s a losing battle for me — Lauren : Immune system, USA : Iraq.

My dedication to daily multivitamins, weekly gallons of tea and constantly lugging around a water bottle is entirely in vain. And for the record, I survived the CRAAAZY socialist health-care system of Spain without any horrible repercussions (sarcasm — I’m all about the public option, thanks for nothing, United States [strangely, this has become a somewhat politically charged entry]). But then again, after two years of frequenting Student Health, anything else is a step up.

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Spanish phrase of the day: “Estar mareada.”

Thursday, March 4th, 2010

I did it. Got a new hole in my face. Gathered the nerve to have my nose pierced.

Before pulling the trigger I talked to a few people who have nose piercings, all of whom assured me that it only hurts like a pinch. I don’t know how you people pinch each other, but having a needle  jammed through my nostril hurt considerably more than just a friendly pinch. Or even a malicious pinch, for christ’s sake!

Fronchy came with me, which is lucky, because I almost passed out when the two employees started explaining aftercare procedures. Side note: this experience is a good test of my Spanish comprehension, because if I missed some vital cleaning instructions I could end up with a fatal, flesh-eating nose piercing infection.

Anyways. I didn’t faint, I was just too dizzy to stand. Estaba mareada — I was dizzy. But really, I still can’t think about the part when he stuck me with the needle because I get mareada all over again when I relive the experience, thus putting myself at risk to actually faint and end up on the cold concrete in the living room until Elisa gets home from work. I tried to explain to the employees that I’m usually not a very queasy or nervous person — I saw someone get a tattoo once! For two hours!! — but I was still That American Girl who almost passed out. My leather jacket wasn’t fooling anyone either.

Magical machines for sherry distillation at the Gonzalez Byass bodega.

Overall, this abbreviated week has been pretty jam packed. I went to Jerez on Monday to the Gonzales Byass bodega — adorable town, potent sherry, not upset that I’ll be going back with my family next month. Yesterday I went to a high school near Las Tres Mil Viviendas with my editorial projects class to interview/chat with students there for our first major writing assignment. Las Tres Mil is on the south end of town and is, to oversimplify, sort of like the projects of Sevilla. The barrio is almost entirely removed from the rest of Sevilla’s public services, and it has evolved into something of a political disaster. There’s a lot of history behind the complicated dynamic of the neighborhood (if you happen to understand Spanish). Oh yeah, and then today I paid some guy 25 euros to stab me in the nose.

But today wasn’t all dizziness and needles. I wandered around Plaza Nueva and bought gifts for my CHBs back in Chicago and Champaign, respectfully. I suck at haggling. I only talked down one vendor, by only one euro… good thing I’m not a business major or a lawyer. This weekend we go to Granda, where I’m going to be a huge nerd (per usual) and take fifty thousand photos of the Alhambra, all while recalling unrelated facts from my Islam class/intensive Spanish history class. We also have loose plans to salir de marcha tonight and hit up a discoteca, but that remains to be seen. I’m really not in the market for any of the gilipollas and capullos this town has to offer.

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Churros for breakfast

Sunday, February 28th, 2010

Elisa’s friend brought over a sack of churros for breakfast again. AGAIN. This sack is probably the size of two babies…two greasy babies meant for dipping into chocolate. It’ll be a miracle if I don’t come back to the states with a heart condition or 100 pounds heavier.

We have a long weekend because tomorrow is Día de Andalucía, aka a day off work and school for the whole region. Most people I know traveled throughout Europe this weekend. I did not. Instead I went to the Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, and it was worth my 1,80 euro entrance fee. I have a volatile relationship with contemporary art — I love the abstract and the deceptively simple, but some pieces are simply simple. And simply pretentious. I.e., the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, junior year field trip with my American Studies class. “alternating pink and gold.” Is this art? I don’t know. I’ve seen more artistry in my neighbors’ “alternating green, red, blue, yellow and orange” Christmas lights.

The museum in Sevilla was interesting and unpretentious. The temporary exhibit we visited focused on Madrid in the 1970s, which is a fascinating time period, I think, in terms of Spanish history (Franco’s death = 1975). But enough of that. I’ll continue being a cultured adult and and contributor to Spain’s tourism revenue tomorrow when we go to Jerez de la Frontera to visit a sherry bodega. Planning this trip led to a poignant moment of introspection yesterday when I realized, “Holy shit, I am a clone of my mother.” I remember going to a winery years ago with my family and nearly perishing of boredom. A 9-year-old has no business in a winery, and the highlight of the trip was when the winery folks gave my brother an ample amount of wine corks. To do what with, I don’t know, but it led to Robbie collecting corks for several years, keeping them in a gallon-sized Ziploc bag that he sometimes brought on road trips (I remember distinctly because one time he left the bag open and we lost wine corks between seat cushions and in the crevices below the bench in the old Ford Windstar).

Anyways, the point of that tangent is that I am, in some ways, Heidi 2.0. My mother bestowed me with her lousy taste in television (I watched “General Hospital” and “Inside Edition” every day after school), and apparently I’ve also inherited the wine gene. Morphing into my mother at the age of 20 isn’t all bad — I like my mom — but it’s a scary thought. Everyone wants to think they’re somehow a completely separate entity from their parents, not destined to one day evolve into the very people they came from and battled throughout adolescence. At least I liked to think that. Now, I’ve just given up.

So it’s official: I’ve aged into a vino-guzzling wine geek. My 9-year-old self would be floored. I’ve never been to a winery when I was old enough to enjoy it, nor have I been to Jerez, where apparently the mice are a major attraction at this bodega. Mice, as in the rodents I avoid and kill in cold blood when necessary. Spain is a strange place.

I’m also considering piercing my nose (don’t kill me, family members). I’ve wanted a nose piercing for a few years. I’m not sure why, exactly, other than I think they look cool. But is it really a good idea to accent my already enormous schnoz with jewelry? Is it pretty, or just tacky? Elisa did her own nose piercing and very generously offered to do mine. “Go buy an earring at El Corte Inglés,” she told me, then come home, ice my face, and we’ll do the damn thing. I politely declined.

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Oh girl, shock me like an electric… fire.

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

My weekend started off with a bang. Literally. I’m not purposely abusing a cliche. On Thursday night I was sprawled on the living room couch when I heard explosions, and naturally I didn’t get off my ass to look out the window. Every day is a new orchestra of mind-numbingly loud, ugly sounds, so I assumed it was a neighborhood kid setting off fireworks. Two hours later when Elisa came home she asked if I realized there were firemen up and down the block… oops.

Park Güell in Barcelona. I wonder if I can live there as a vagabond?

The electrical box across the street was spewing fire all the way over to our side of the street. The firemen basically stood and watched this happen for a while, probably in the interest of not melting their faces off. Also of note, it was pouring rain. Perhaps another hindrance. Within an hour we lost power, which wouldn’t have been so bad if I hadn’t put off packing for my early flight to Barcelona until the last minute. It was sort of cute, though. We ate Nutella sandwiches by candlelight and I packed my suitcase by cellphonelight. And eventually, by the time I went to sleep, we regained power. So there’s one thing I can cross off the bucket list — observe an electrical-box-turned-dragon while eating Nutella by candlelight. It was easily the most romantic experience I’ve had since I got here.

All electrical fires aside, I made it to Barcelona this weekend and I loved it. I went to visit my friend Adam, who’s studying there for the year, and he graciously revisited all the major sites in the city with me, probably for the 80000000 billionth time in his tenure as a Barcelonian. Really though, if college/being a real person doesn’t pan out, he could easily relocate to Barcelona and become a tour guide. We visited an impressive number of places (I think) for how little time I had in town:

  • All the necessary Gaudí (Park Güell, Casa Batlló, La Pedrera, La Sagrada Familia)
  • INSIDE La Sagrada Familia, which, if we’re Facebook friends, you already know from the seventy thousand photos I posted
  • An old bomb shelter built during the Spanish Civil War
  • The beach (fabulous, will return someday in warmer weather)
  • Old Roman columns, complete with a rock-hugging tourist photo
  • A bar where I had my first encounter with flaming absinthe
  • A bar that was (is?) owned by Manu Chao (!!!)
  • The main drag-y commercial area, the name of which I don’t even know
  • Other places that I’ll omit for the sake of your attention span

I’m not sure how to explain why I liked Barcelona so much. It helped to wander around with someone who knows the city, rather than being dumped off by my program and told “Good luck!” It was a distinct side of Spain that I hadn’t experienced yet. I expected Barcelona to feel like a completely different country, based mostly on the perception of Cataluña projected by people I’ve met in Andalucía (so yeah, slanted). And sure, it’s a city very unlike Sevilla, but also with a few similarities. Hearing Catalán and seeing all the signs in Catalán was different, but Spanish was still prominent, and it seems like anyone with reasonable Spanish skills could probably function in Barcelona. Actually, I met two girls from Barcelona who spoke Spanish more clearly than what I’m used to in the south. I’m definitely able to recognize the distinct Andalucían accent now that I’ve been away from it.

Looking up at La Sagrada Familia. The most interesting unfinished church I ever did see.

Aside from my linguistic observations (fascinating, I’m sure), I enjoyed the Gaudí architecture way too much. Too much, because I wasn’t kidding about the amount of photos I took, and because it required a lot of self control not to buy out the entire Sagrada Familia gift shop. It was indescribably REFRESHING to see a side of Catholic Spain other than the baroque and the gothic. Plus, Barcelona just has that intangible cool factor. It’s Barcelona for god’s sake. I’ve always associated it with cool things, and people who also possess that intangible cool factor. This is definitely one of my (many) thought processes that only makes sense to me, but to give one example: I woke up Saturday morning to the sound of Adam’s upstairs neighbor playing The Velvet Underground & Nico (“Femme Fatal”). How could I be upset about that? I want to live in an apartment in Barcelona and play The Velvet Underground and sort-of understand Catalán and go to bars owned by Manu Chao. Someday… maybe, if I ever develop that intangible coolness.

Visiting Barcelona and meeting Adam’s friends, who are all in Spain for the academic year, made me wish I had more time here. It’s already week five, and although I’ve hardly made any travel plans I only have a handful of weekends left in Sevilla, which creates even less incentive to travel. Adam and I talked about this at length, and a couple other people on my program agree, that there are basically two types of study abroaders: those who go overseas to experience their selected city and to practice the language as much as possible and those who come for a semester-long Tour de Europe. I’m not knocking the latter group. I just know that I came to Sevilla because I want to improve my Spanish and get to know the city, the region, the country. I like to think that someday I’ll come back to Europe and do justice to its major cities, rather than spend a weekend in a shitty Parisian hostel eating fast food to save a few euros. Oh yeah, and that reminds me — going out in Barcelona isn’t exactly a bargain. Nine euro for a gin and tonic?! Hostia.

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On romance, and caves

Sunday, February 14th, 2010

Happy February 14. This Valentine’s Day is arguably less meaningful than any other I’ve experienced in all my 20 years. I won’t spend it scrambling to book a restaurant reservation (see: 2009), nor will I hand deliver Snoopy and Charlie Brown valentines to every little troll in my third grade class, including the boys I don’t like (see: 1999). If you must know (which you mustn’t), or if you care (which you don’t), I’m spending this Valentine’s Day with…. the space heater! I also picked up a 2-euro bottle of Rioja for this special, solitary day, but it turns out that I’m sick as an unruly Spanish dog (the dogs here shit everywhere, wear sweaters and don’t have leashes). The only liquid celebration I foresee today is the crushed up Ibuprofen mixed with water that Elisa sometimes prepares when I’m sick. So yes. Happy Valentine’s Day.

Although I’ve been blowing my nose on a nonstop loop since Friday night, today began with some revelry. Elisa’s friend brought over a mountain of churros for breakfast. I wish I had taken a picture, because I’m not exaggerating: a mountain. I could vom, I indulged in that many churros. Elisa declared that our meals for the rest of this week will consist solely of lechugita — in English, we will survive on iceberg lettuce for a while to compensate for this week full of churros and pastries.

Nobody cares much about Valentine’s Day here. There’s no overwhelming pressure to have a significant other or to go anywhere with your significant other. It’s just another Sunday, another hangover, another day when most of Catholic Spain forgets to go to mass. I discussed Valentine’s Day traditions in the States with Elisa and she explained that nobody here gives a flying flamenco about the holiday, other than El Corte Inglés — the only Spanish business that tries to market V Day goodies and specials. I tried to explain the stigma of celebrating Valentine’s Day alone, but it ended poorly. The phrase “Killing a bottle of wine by yourself” doesn’t translate into Spanish.

I like being in a country where it doesn’t matter that I’m in my pajamas eating churros on February 14. Unfortunately, I’m still very much connected to my own country, where it does matter. Even Dictionary.com is rubbing V Day smut in my face with today’s Word of the Day: “billets-doux.”

Bootlegged photo from La Gruta de la Maravilla. Please don't turn me in to the authorities.

Most of my study abroad cronies won’t celebrate much today either, not because they are sick or wallowing in self pity, but because they all went to Carnaval in Cádiz last night, a coastal town about an hour south of Sevilla. To American students, Carnaval is a cracked-out Mardi Gras-esque drinking marathon. To Spaniards, it’s a drinking marathon combined with men in costume performing comedy and music routines. I don’t have a strong grasp of what Carnaval truly is, just that I’m the only student I know on my program who didn’t go. I felt lame about this at first, but in retrospect, I made the right decision for my sickly self. The bus for Cádiz left by 8 p.m. last night and didn’t come back to Sevilla until 6 or 7 a.m. today. Twelve hours of binge drinking, which would have proceeded a day full of nature appreciation in Andalucía.

Yes, nature. I rose before the sun yesterday and ventured off to the Minas de Riotinto in Huelva and La Gruta de la Maravilla in Aracena. La Gruta de la Maravilla was about thirty billion times more interesting than the Minas de Riotinto, but of course we weren’t allowed to take pictures in the cave, because this would somehow destroy the beauty of a ton of rocks. Being a rebel with reckless disregard for rules and rocks, I managed to snap one clandestine photo from inside the cave. The tour guide noticed and yelled at me, but whatev. I won’t lose any sleep over being blacklisted from Aracena.

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Syllabus week in Spain

Monday, February 8th, 2010

Today was the start of my “real” classes, which is great — it marks the end of 7 a.m. wakeup calls, at least on most days.

The beauty of my program is that classes are only offered from Monday to Thursday. I’ve never been able to piece together such a flawless class schedule at Iowa. My first class of the day was Editorial Projects, because I’m still a J-school nerd, even overseas. We put together a bilingual magazine, and it’s also a chance to work with students from the Universidad de Sevilla who study English and translation (you can check out previous issues here). They don’t use Associated Press style in Spain, so I’m going to learn new style rules from the El Mundo guide. I’m almost embarrassed by how thrilled I am to learn from a new style guide… and how nervous I am to wander from my totes fav AP guide that I’ve worshiped since my days as a high school journalist.

My second class was a Spanish film class at the Universidad de Sevilla. The professor is very passionate about Spanish cine, which I think is great, and we kicked off the class by watching two short films (“El Censor” and “El Columpio”). I am in love with both — YouTube it if you happen to speak Spanish. If you haven’t noticed, today has been a giant Nerd Day for me. I will always be a loser who gets excited about the first day of school, as hard as I try not to be that girl.

Most parts of my daily routine have slowly become more beautiful, and more importantly, less confusing. I learned a new “shortcut” to the river, if you can call it that. It still takes me 35 minutes walking like my feet are on fire to make it to class on time.

I meandered through Plaza Nueva and the Paseo de Colón on my way home earlier and it was sunny and warm, but not too warm, and it started sprinkling even though the sun was out, and there was a freakin’ rainbow that stretched all the way across the center of town. I shit you not. I never witness things like this in person, only through photos on postcards and travel documentaries. I could have cried, it was that absurdly picturesque. I also felt like a badass when a Spanish couple asked me for directions earlier — I couldn’t help them at all, but does that mean I don’t look entirely out of place here?

I still deal with the little frustrations of living in a new country, but the weeks here go too quickly to spend much time fretting about it. I’m finally starting to write more (outside of this blog), and luckily I have good friends at home to keep me motivated (or, intimidate me into writing), even when I’m feeling less than inspired (shoutout Team Shreya!). My, my, a lot of parenthetical abuse in that sentence.

Ah, but it’s the times like right now when I remember the annoying parts of Sevilla: the constant honking of horns and car alarms and the asshole in my neighborhood who plays a mind-numbingly loud pipe flute at odd hours of the day. Almost makes me miss the subdued streets of suburbia.

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Hombre!

Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010

Córdoba, Andalucía, home to even more architecture that I've studied.

Ohhhh, dear blog, how I sometimes abandon you. I often think to myself, “I should write a post tonight,” but instead I fall asleep or begin huddling so close to the space heater that I can’t type at the same time. Speaking of the space heater, it started making sparks last night when I turned it on, so I’m now operating out of the space heater-equipped living room, which is at least 15 degrees warmer than my own room.

Class this week has been tolerable. Most of us are still resentful of the ungodly early hour of our class compared to the rest of our peers, who don’t roll out of bed until noon or three or six in the evening. I just hammered out six pages in rusty Spanish about mudéjar and baroque architecture, so at the very least, I’m learning. Even if I am rising before the sun.

Yesterday was monumental — I booked a flight to Barcelona, my first trip outside of Sevilla and also the first time I will truly fly solo. When I booked my flight from Chicago to Spain I assumed it would be my first time flying alone, but since I met an entire tribe of kids from my program, I really didn’t make the trip by myself. Luckily, flying from Sevilla to Barcelona should be No Big Deal. I feel like I’d have to go out of my way to get lost or screw it up. Hopefully I’m right!

Actually, yesterday was doubly monumental because it also marked the first time I broke down and offered my patronage to a Spanish McDonald’s. That seven-hour stretch between lunch and dinner is a killer, and I fell prey to a 1 euro “Cono Kit Kat” — a vanilla ice cream cone with a Kit Kat bar sticking out the side. Best-spent euro of my life. I haven’t been tempted much by the sangria or the tapas here, but nobody warned me how many pastry shops there would be in this town, nor how divine the churros are. Churros con chocolate with be my demise before anything else in this country (that, or the erratic drivers heading in all directions down one-way streets). Francesca and I prefer to refer to buying sweets as “supporting local business.” There’s a surplus of healderías and dessert shops, and somebody’s gotta keep them afloat.

Aside from the sweets, I’ve also experienced Sevillian nightlife on one occasion since I’ve been here. A miracle! Elisa, the woman I live with, invited me out with her and her friends last Saturday. I don’t think I was paying attention when she told me where we were going, because suddenly we were driving 20 minutes out of town to a discoteca at 6 pm. I was confused; I thought these people didn’t go out til midnight?? Regardless, I enjoyed myself. I looked like an idiot. People dance flamenco here… I don’t dance, period. I think I was that goofy American girl who existed to provide entertainment for locals, with my new collection of Spanish swear words and insults and my inability to dance. But whatever, at least I got away from the now-defunct space heater.

Airport layover buddies engaged in a bit of botellón.

One mistake I made at the discoteca was wearing jeans. The Golden Rule of Sevilla: LEGGINGS LEGGINGS LEGGINGS. TIGHTS TIGHTS TIGHTS. And more tights. All you need to survive here is one pair, and it doesn’t even matter what goes on top. A potato sack or a Longaberger basket molded into a bustier would suffice. Spanish fashion warrants its own post, and someday there will be one, but for now I’ll leave it at that. Leggings and tights, tights and leggings. People wear all kinds of weird shit here, and I generally look frumpy and unshowered (because I am). I don’t know what came over me, but I bought a jumper yesterday. A jumper. Apparently J. Lo and I switched bodies in some kind of Freaky Friday scenario, because the Lauren I’ve known for 20 years would never look in the direction of a jumper, much less purchase one, but being in this strange place has convinced me that I can get away with wearing a silk-ish jumper that I snagged on sale. I’m not the only one who’s lost her mind to Spanish fashion. Last weekend we went to botellón (drink near the river), and all of the girls in my program got the memo about dressing like a vamped up Endora from “Bewitched” and marching around in heeled boots. I’ve stopped resisting the metallic leggings and neon tights, and perhaps for a few months I’ll welcome them into my wardrobe.

I’m starting to feel more comfortable with my living situation, my knowledge of the city and the friends I’ve made here. I can’t believe it’s already February, and the rapid movement of time has hit me especially hard this month. I prefer not to write about anything very personal outside of my private journals, but for the past few days I’ve had a hard time grasping the fact that it’s been almost a full year since my cousin Neil passed away. It’s these times that I hate being away from home, being away from my family, because over the past year I’ve become acutely aware of how quickly life can slip away from any one of us. I’ve also seen my aunt and uncle in an unimaginable amount of pain, and it’s an agony I wish I could erase more than anything. Though I’m happy to be here, this is perhaps one of the only points of the semester that I regret not being back in the States.

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Uf.

Friday, January 29th, 2010

I’ve been here just under two weeks, but it feels like a month. I started my intensive course this week. It’s essentially a general overview of Spanish history starting with the Romans in II B.C., and ending…? At the end of week one, we’re in the 15th century. I’m assuming we’ll skip ahead to Franco sooner or later.

I saw too many buildings/churches/museums/cathedrals/palaces this week to possibly recall. On Tuesday I took a cab over to the Macarena barrio with two girls from class to check out the muralla (giant wall) and Basílica de la Macarena (shiny church). This was not so much a choice as it was a mandate from our instructor. I’m not a practicing Catholic, but being raised in the church has served me well in this town. I can’t imagine how confusing Catholic customs are to non-Catholics. Being Christian wouldn’t help much— I know plenty of protestants and non-denominational Christians who still can’t quite grasp the Catholic mentality. And hey, I’m right there with them.

GOLD

One of several altars for the Virgin Mary in the Basílica de la Macarena.

Sevilla has almost as many Catholic churches as it does churro stands, and if you multiply the number of churches by the number of churro stands, that’s probably how many bars there are throughout town. My advisor was right when she said Spain is a very homogeneous country. I don’t know what the actual demographics are in Andalucía, but good luck finding a non-Spanish, non-Catholic in Sevilla. Coming from an upbringing in west-suburban Chicago and attending the University of Iowa, one might assume that I’m accustomed to racial — even religious — homogeneity. Still, I feel like I’ve encountered more diversity in my Midwestern homeland than I have so far abroad.

/tangent. I was going somewhere with that, before my religion blurb. So, the basilica: shiny, ornate, barroque. Holy crap (no… pun…intended?). It was interesting, in some ways pretty, but it was also the gaudiest, glittery-est place of worship I’ve ever seen. I would probably have a seizure if I went to mass there, or I’d just be blinded by a gold-encrusted Jesus.

I also went to the famous cathedral of Sevilla yesterday, which was not so glittery. Simply colossal. I think it’s the third largest cathedral in the world? Don’t quote me on that. Either way, the size of the cathedral and tall, arched ceilings are incredible. I wanted to get a photo with me in front of Christopher Columbus’ tomb with a cheesy pose… Leaning up against it? Pretending to mack on one of the statue men nearby? But I was with my class, so I resentfully restrained from doing so.

Alcázar

Gardens at the Alcázar.

So far, my favorite tourist trap/historic spot in the city is easily the Alcázar. It was constructed after the reconquest of Sevilla by the Catholics in the 13th century, but it’s all Muslim-inspired design. Estilo mudéjar. One very small part of the alcázar — the mihrab — remains from the original Muslim construction. The rest was built after the Catholics took over Sevilla. I received a pretty slanted, pro-Muslim education at Iowa regarding the Muslim invasion of Spain in 711 and the Spanish Reconquest. Although I’m not sure what to think of this era in history, since the rhetoric in my class swayed in favor of one group, at least the Catholics took heed from the Muslims when it came to architecture. Catholic architecture, at least what I’ve studied, is uninteresting, ugly and arguably dysfunctional. So kudos on the Alcázar, guys. You may have violently pushed the Muslims out of al-Andalus, but the Alcázar is quite nice. Bravo.

When I’m not learning history or being a tourist, I spend a lot of time here with the space heater. It’s freakin’ cold. As I tell everyone, these palm trees are deceiving. I triple layered my jackets yesterday. Dónde está el sol????? Why am I so pale???? Why, why??

Tonight, I intend to go out and stay awake past 2 a.m. Baby steps. I’ve met more people in my class this week, which is good. More people who are similar to me, and can’t function while in a constant daily cycle of drunk/hungover, drunk/hungover, like the majority of the kids in my program. Drunk/hungover is fine, durante los fines de semana.

I also went for tapas with my friend Emily the other night, which was great because a) she’s a fellow Jezzie, b) she despises leggings worn as pants, and c) it got me away from the space heater for a while. Hopefully we’ll salir juntas tonight, along with my new friend/neighbor/classmate Francesca. Francesca and I finally visited the churro stand at the end of the Puente de Triana last night, where we couldn’t enjoy our dessert without laughing because churros are so very phallic, and we are so very immature.

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Piropos and ass-grabbing

Sunday, January 24th, 2010

Before I arrived in Sevilla I mentally braced myself to live in a country that’s considerably less concerned with the politically correct than my own. In study abroad orientation I took away that a) Cat calls — piropos — are frequent and inevitable in Spain, b) Everyone in the world thinks American girls are easy and morally loose and c) That I can’t do anything about the piropos or the general misogyny, so get over it.

I wasn’t so worried about b), mostly because it’s not in my nature to wander home with strange men whether it be at home or overseas. Many of you know that I watch a lot of MSNBC documentaries, so I know better than to get friendly with strangers. The piropos in Spain occur from time to time, but it’s not like a girl can’t walk a block without a gang of men hanging out car windows and whistling. We’re strongly encouraged not to react to cat calls, understandably, although I sometimes find them difficult to disregard. In Iowa, if a group of hillbilly frat boys drives by in a Ford pickup and starts hollering, my natural reaction is to swiftly raise a middle finger and make fierce eye contact with the primary cat calling culprit. So far, I’ve managed not to do that here. I worry that perhaps the middle finger isn’t an insult in Spain, but some kind of nonverbal agreement that I’d rather not enter into.

Aside from the hollering and piropos, there is one piggish, slimy move that I cannot ignore — the ass grab.

I was pushing my way out of a crowded bar last night when some local bro boldly grabbed my rear. Mind you, there was no mistaking this ass grab for an accidental graze. When I say boldly, I mean this fellow had an asinine amount of nerve.

To clarify, ass grabbing isn’t a strictly cultural thing. I distinctly remember encountering this at the Picador in Iowa City — perhaps eastern Iowa’s only “hipster” bar — and not a place where I’d expect any skeazy creeps to grab at me like a bread basket at the Old Country Buffet. Unlike cat calls, physical contact penetrates the two-foot bubble of personal space that I prefer to maintain around strangers. Also unlike cat calls, physical contact, in my opinion, is far more threatening and demeaning.

Instead of flipping the bird last night, I simply turned around, looked the jerk in the eye (eep, I hope it was the right guy), and said, “Are you kidding me?” along with a few more expletives. As far as I’m concerned, I kept my cool, but I was still heated. Fuming. Ablaze. Conflagrant.

I don’t exactly know how to articulate the root of my disdain for such brazen physical disrespect. It’s the equivalent of someone walking up to me and saying, “We don’t know each other, but you are a woman, therefor my subordinate, so I can grab you as I please.” No, you can’t, and don’t expect me to respond kindly to it. Granted, I don’t want to get into any kind of physical altercation here — because I will lose — but, you know. I’ll swear at you.

In completely different news, I’ve turned my host lady onto Lady Gaga. This was wonderful initially, but yesterday she played The Fame album at least eight times in a row. Who knew there was such a thing as too much Gaga? I start classes tomorrow, and I was informed that I’m in the group that scored highest on the Spanish placement test. Although I speak like a gringa supreme, my ability to read, write and understand the language must count for something.

I do enjoy Sevilla thus far, but I’m still waiting for the day  I can navigate from point A to B without becoming hopelessly lost. The enormity of my program also doesn’t facilitate making good friends very quickly, but I’m finally starting to spend time with people similar me, who didn’t come here with large groups of BFFsssz and besties from home. If nothing else, I’ve already learned a lot. Namely how to say “hangers” (for clothes), specifics about the drug laws in Spain and all about the Roman ruins in the nearby city of Itálica. And really, that’s all anyone needs to know.

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Alive, in Spain

Thursday, January 21st, 2010

Things I’m no good at: updating this blog.

In my defense, I have only been here five days, and my program does a damn good job of ensuring that its participants have minimal time allocated for things like “free time” or “sleep.” But now that I have a few minutes and I’m beginning to recover from an obscene amount of travel + sleeplessness, I think I owe all two of my loyal followers a post from Sevilla.

This city is beautiful. I’d post a few photos to prove it, but you’ll have to Google “Sevilla” til I get my life together and quench my touristy thirst for photos of La Giralda and el Rio Guadalquivir at sunset. Like I said, the program I’m with takes an approach to study abroad that I would call Cramming Way Too Many Activities Into Short Periods of Time. Most of my sleep-deprived American cronies would agree. But now that we’re out of the hotel and living in our homestays, life is beginning to calm down, ever so slightly.

Most students live with a señora — an older Spanish woman whose children have moved out of the house. Other options are a family or a “young couple.” Most kids ranked the family as their first choice… I opted for the “young couple.” I guess I’m the only soulless wench who didn’t want to live with kids. When I received my homestay assignment the other day it listed the name the woman who I assumed was my señora. If your señora has children living at home, the assignment sheet lists their names and ages below her name. Below my señora’s name were the words “chica joven.” That’s it. “Young girl.” I assumed I was living with a single mother and her anonymous baby girl, who went by “chica joven.” I consulted a fellow student, who wisely pointed out that “chica joven” was probably referring to the woman I was living with, not to a mystery baby. As I type this story out, I realize it’s not very good, so ok. Bottom line — I live with a young woman in her 30s, and there are no nameless babies involved.

That said, I’m quite happy in my homestay. My host’s name is Elisa, and she’s lived in Seville her entire life. She’s younger than all of the señoras (you wouldn’t really call her a “señora” because of her age, so I’m not sure how to refer to her in that respect. The woman with whom I live?). It also seems like we have some common interests, and she saw Madonna in concert, which in my book merits a great deal of respect. Her apartment is in the Triana neighborhood of Sevilla — most students are scattered between Triana, Los Remedios and El Centro. The apartment is a solid mile and a half from the Universidad de Sevilla, and the university is currently the only place I can confidently navigate to from home. If you’ve ever had a strong desire to feel like a dumbass, study abroad. More specifically, study in Sevilla. There are street signs from time to time, wherever someone felt like putting one up, on the sides of buildings. I came home twice yesterday and got embarrassingly lost both times. And I swear to god, the doors here are different. The DOORS. You don’t just unlock and open like in the States, or at least not at this apartment. And you can’t even get out of the apartment building without pressing a certain button. I was trapped in the building for a while this morning until I finally swallowed my pride, walked back up to the fifth floor, and explained to Elisa that her stupid American student couldn’t figure out how to get out of the apartment.

When I first met her, Elisa commented that I spoke Spanish well. I think she may be eating her words now that I’ve been here a full day. Several times I’ve responded with an eager, “Si!!” to an open-ended question that I didn’t understand, or I’ve simply stared back at her expressionless after she rattles off a few phrases in rapid, Sevillian Spanish. But for the most part, my Spanish skills are functional. I don’t usually have a problem understanding anyone else, it’s more a problem of Sevillanos being able to understand my spoken Spanish through my abrasive American accent.

I could ramble on further, but soon I must voyage across the river in search of shampoo and other toiletries at El Corte Ingles. How American of me. I’ve met a lot of cool people thus far, although our program has a surplus of stereotypical study abroad drunkards. On the first night here, most of us — the sane ones — went straight to bed after 2342342345555 hours of travel. Several people on my floor, however, were obnoxiously overzealous about their ability to buy booze legally in this country. W0000oooo0oOoO hooooo, I <3 AmEriCa, GeT wasTed! May their hangovers be epic and treacherous.

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Sevilla: T-Minus 24 hours

Saturday, January 16th, 2010

In exactly 25 hours and 19 minutes, I’ll depart from O’Hare International Airport in Chicago and head to Madrid (at which point I’ll sit in the Madrid airport for several hours, perusing duty-free shops and marveling at signs in Spanish, until I finally hop on my last plane for Sevilla).

I’ve been mentally mapping out my study abroad plans since I was in high school. I’ve literally waited years for this flight, and now that it’s finally here, I’m in denial.

Everyone’s question: “Aren’t you so EXCITED?!” Sure, I’m excited. But mostly I try not to think about it. Thinking too far ahead leaves room for me to begin panicking, like, “Oh shit, what if I forget to pack something crucial?” or, “What if something great happens in Iowa while I’m gone and I miss it?” (doubtful). There are a few things I’ll miss dearly, however, namely my family and my good friends between Iowa and Illinois. I also won’t have the opportunity to watch my younger brother perform a Lady Gaga medley in full drag at his high school talent show, and as you can imagine, I will be mourning my own absence from the event.

I’ve avoided becoming too excited or nervous about my trip by focusing on wholly trivial items and obsessing over my luggage. To give you an idea: I spent 10 minutes deciding whether to buy a pink or black umbrella at Meijer the other day (I went with black, it seemed like the classier rain repellent of the two). I also created a word document with a table divided into categories of what I need to pack. Yes, I am that anal. It paid off, though, because I’m only going to have one checked bag at the airport tomorrow. This is mostly thanks to my mother’s packing expertise, but I still think it’s an accomplishment that deserves recognition. I’m patting myself on the back as I one-handedly type this.

I think my excitement — and the full effect of my unruly nerves — will ultimately sink in tomorrow, after my family drops me off at the airport. I’ve never flown solo, so that will be an experience. Luckily I have three books, two magazines and a bag of Swedish Fish to keep me company. Until then, here’s hoping that I don’t slip into a panic attack at the terminal that ends in me sobbing so uncontrollably that I forget to board the plane. To everyone back home, you will be missed, but I will be here. See you on the other side.

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Lauren’s first post, and a losing battle with WordPress

Friday, January 1st, 2010

Hello, dear readers (or: friends who I’ve successfully coerced into visiting our humble blog). Brittney is presently gallivanting somewhere near the equator, perhaps with a daiquiri in hand and a few strapping young pool boys at her side. But I’m not bitter. It’s roughly one degree Fahrenheit in Chicago, and I’ve commenced 2010 by hiding out in my room with a mug of tea and a Ghirardelli square as I struggle to understand WordPress.

As mentioned in the first post, we aren’t web gurus. I took a few liberties with the blog theme and it’s looking a little dull right now, but don’t you worry — I’ve got two full weeks to dedicate to the site’s aesthetics before I catch a plane to España.

In the meantime, here’s an actual post to entertain you. That is, if you aren’t already entertained by our fabulous URL. When Brittney sent me the link to the site, I was confused. I braced myself for topless chicks and an abundance of Hawkeye logos (it’s Iowa, after all). I truly did not understand that she sent a link to our blog. My first thought was, “Oh, god. What’s my family going to say about me writing on a ‘Girls Gone Wild’ website?” But then I thought, hell — if the domain name reels in a few more readers (perverts or otherwise), I’m not going to complain. Come one, come all, even pervy Mervs.

Brittney leaves the country soon; next week, I believe? Unfortunately, I have until January 17 to panic about my trip. And I’m a worrier, so don’t doubt that I’ll be panicking. I’m already strung out over plug adapters, finances and horror stories of students who gain 20+ pounds abroad after becoming overzealous about their host culture’s food and booze. I worked at a Spanish restaurant for a summer, so maybe my familiarity with paella and Rioja wines will help to keep my zeal at bay.

So for the next two weeks, I’ll be here. Living at home, without a job, in a foggy haze of voltage converters and pre-departure planning. What does this mean? The pressure’s on Brittney to offer up some interesting posts. You go, girl!

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