Sunday

We got up and had a traditional Irish breakfast courtesy of our hostel! There is nothing more comforting while traveling after living in Spain for a while then waking up to a filling breakfast. We traveled to a town called Bray by train, but we came back after only being there for a little bit because it was cold and rainy and there was nothing to see. After we came back we visited some cathedrals and went to the famous “Carrolls” to do some souvenir shopping! And then we had.. wait for it.. SUBWAY for lunch! I used to hate subway but I had never looked forward to it this much in my life. Afterwards we tried to see the famous book of Kells at Trinity College but it was a fail because we didn’t want to pay too much. We got back to the main part of the city and had burgers! Then we walked around for a while and then bought some drinks to celebrate our final night in Ireland.

Saturday

On Saturday we got up early to take the bus to spend some time experiencing Dublin. We were very sad to leave Paddy but we left him a very nice card and said our goodbyes. Once we finally got there and found our surprisingly nice hostel (Maggie is a beast at finding great hostels) we got ready and then had a delicious lunch of REAL pepperoni pizza (not with the scary Spanish meat) and a donut! I eat so healthy when I travel. Then walked to the one and only Guinness factory!! After we spent a lot of time in the factory, and enjoyed our free pints of Guinness, we had a took through the famous Trinity College. Then we had dinner in a Chinese buffet! It was grand. We got back later and after an internet binge we all passed out for the night.

Continuing the Journey

On Friday we got up and had bran flakes, instant coffee and orange juice with Paddy. Then we set off to have our own personal tour of the Irish countryside by car! We also visited a beautiful castle but could only take pictures from the outside. After driving for a long time enjoying the views and stopping to take pictures (and getting pretty motion sick)

We arrived at a place that Paddy had been talking up all day for their soup and bread. I had the clam chowder and some really good bread. Afterwards we were driving around and Paddy realized this friend John's farm was right around the corner! haha He was so excited that we see John's farm, that we drove through the off roads and Paddy kept lifting up and unlocking the gates for us to get through. We then got some fresh water from John's well and couldn't believe that John was 77 because he looked about 55 and works on the farm everyday. We talked to some of the random farmers there which was pretty hilarious, and then got back in Paddy's car.

Then Paddy took us to one of his favorite restaurants which was delicious. Apparantly there was a Irish movie star there who stars in a Irish soap opera (not like we would have known) so that was interesting. Once we got home Paddy insisted we have some wine with him but we were so exhausted we went to bed early. I have really learned how to appreciate going to bed early since I have been traveling so much.

Thursday, April 28th... The beginning of the journey to Ireland!

Maggie and I got up at 5:15am and had breakfast at our house and then met our friend Jenna at the hotel sign (our common meeting point) It was a strug to get there in the dark with all of our stuff but we finally made it there, and we were lucky enough to see a taxi right by us so we didn't have to call one. We took the taxi to the Granada bus station and ate again before the 7am bus to Malaga. We always either have to go to Malaga (2 hours by bus) or Madrid (5 hours by bus) to travel out of the country because sadly, Granada is not an international airport. We got to Malaga early before our 12pm flight, so what to do, but eat again! So we had starbucks at the airport and I had a fail like always ordering an iced coffee with milk since it's never on the menu and I always end up speaking spanglish.

We finally arrived in IRELAND! As we walked off the plane Jenna yelled, "Smell that Irish air!" and we all cracked up. Then we were so excited because we saw american-like food at the airport and we chowed down on chicken chunks and potato wedges... It was grand! they even had snapple, I almost died from happiness. Afterwards we got on a 3 hour bus to travel from Dublin to Galway.

Thus begins the Strug:

Here's some background information: We were all planning to stay with Jenna's mother's friend's friend who is a retired fillipino pastor and had access to a castle. Two things we soon found out... he's not Filipino and lives in a regular house.

We waited around in the bus station and after 30 minutes of not being able to find the pastor, Jenna was panicking and calling her mom, when the lady at the information booth (who had been helping us use the telephone) came over and said, is one of you Jenna? A man over there is holding a sign that said Jenna. So we ran over to the man (who wasn't Filipino and definitely wasn't late we just weren't looking for someone like him) and realized it was PADDY! our full irish tourguide and host for the next couple of days, who lives in a rented house haha but it was still just as nice as a castle because we felt at home.

So we packed our stuff in Paddy's car and he put the donuts Jenna had bought them in the trunk with our stuff (and they ended up staying there all weekend, we think he just forgot) and I crammed myself in the back seat which hadn't been cleaned out and I had to avoid sitting on screws. It made for a very entertaining ride home. We dropped our stuff back at Paddy's house (he insisted that he lift everything, he was such a sweetheart!) and he dropped us off on the beach where we walked around for a while and then ate dinner at a random place where I had jalapeño poppers and a corona for dinner haha. Of course that made for another interesting experience since we got a waiter who's first day was that day. Jenna was very unhappy because the sign said they served breakfast all day, but apparently it meant until 5pm.

We tried to call Paddy to come and pick us up, but since we weren't in Spain our phones wouldn't work, so Jenna being the great extrovert that she is, just asked a random guy walking along to use his phone and we got ahold of Paddy! Meanwhile some creepy young girl who appeared to be on drugs was staring at us and asking for a lighter. Gotta love the strug life!

Paddy picked us up and then insisted that we have some wine with him so we did and listened to his old stories before we went to bed in beds that had heated sheets! It was wonderful.

Bullfight April 10, 2011

I had no idea what to expect when I was on my way to a bullfight. I knew I was naive going into it, especially since I thought only one bull got killed. My friends and I were excited to find our seats and wait for the bullfight to start. We thought we paid for seats in the shade, but sitting in the direct 80 degree sun sure provided for a nice tan! Luckily Maggie brought sunscreen. Once the bullfight started and the band played, I was excited and anticipating how this was going to go, since Maggie told me actually 6 bulls get killed and it lasts about 3 hours.

When the bull was released and started running around and being distracted by the "Capote" (cape) I realized that the bull gets stabbed multiple times by small bladed type swords that stay in their body through the whole thing. After the first bull was stabbed many times, and then stabbed for the final blow to make him lay down, the crowd was cheering loudly, and my eyes started to water, realizing bullfighting was not for me, and that this was going to be a LONG 3 hours.

All I had known about bullfighting before was from a segment on 60 minutes. I remember thinking I always wanted to go and experience that part of Spanish culture. I was surprised to see that there were so many young children at the fight, but then I realized that if you were brought up with this gruesome custom, you wouldn't think anything of taking your small child to witness it.

The bullfighters that stab the bull in the end to bring him down, are the most respected. But I thought that the ones who stab the bull first many times to weaken him have the harder job. It seemed to me that all the respected bull fighters have to do is stab it once with a giant sword, and they don't even kill it. To win, they just have to make it lay down after stabbing it. So if it doesn't lay down after a while, they just keep stabbing it until it does. When I was thinking about how disgusted I was with this, I felt hypocritical because I eat meat. Even though it's not the same. Oh, speaking of eating meat... after the first couple bulls are killed you start to smell food.... which would be the bulls that were just killed cooking to be sold after the fight. This experience put me one step closer to becoming a vegetarian.

It found it interesting that as the first bull was being tortured and killed, I was about ready to cry, but as more came and went, I found myself becoming desensitized to it; but still disgusted, as my group left before the last giant bull came out to fight.

The last one that we watched was as difficult to watch as the others, but was also awesome. Because as it was stabbed in the head for the final blow, it got back up... My friend Jenna and I cheered and wanted the bull to tackle the fighter. (yes I know that's gruesome, but after the first fight we were cheering for the bulls) He took about 2 more blows to the head before he wasn't able to get back up again.

The cheapest and worst thing I found about bullfighting is that, the bullfighter doesn't even kill the bull. After he stabs him with the sword and the bull lays down, the crowd cheers and waves their pañuelos in approval, another guy comes up and stabs it in the neck a couple times until they are sure it's dead. I could only watch that part twice. Then they cut the ears off and throw them into the crowd, and if the crowd really likes the bullfighter, they cut the tail off and the bullfighter holds a hot bloody tail and waves it around and receives the crowd's applause.

So after reading this you probably don't want to hear any more about bullfighting, but I took a lot of videos for people who want to see it "first hand" So, the videos are taking way too long to load, so if you want to see them, you'll have to visit me when I get home!

Saturday April 2nd. The best day in Mallorca!

After eating breakfast we headed on the extremely crowded bus to spend the day beach hopping in Palma! We started out at one beach laying out until we got hungry and went to.... you guessed it... SUBWAY!! We were loving life. After subway we were going to go shopping, and then we all realized we didn't care about shopping and went to another beach! It was an amazing surprise to spend the rest of the day on this gorgeous clear water beach. We played cards, frolicked in the water, and laid out. We had so much fun. Afterwards we continued the amazing day having dinner at Hard Rock Cafe! I actually didn't have a burger this time (because I had one the last weekend at another Hard Rock haha) We all got drinks and got nachos as an appetizer, it was so great.

Then we had to head back to our hotel :( We weren't able to sleep in because our flight left early in the morning. We were all sad to leave because it was such a great weekend!

Friday April 1st

We ate breakfast at the hotel and then went to the tour of Palma, the major part of Mallorca. It was nice to see because our hotel was far away from everything except the beach and there were only 15 people who went to Mallorca so the tour wasn't bad. On the tour was got to take a tour of a castle, cathedral, the town square, and we were able to purchase some Mallorca pearls as gifts! It was really cool but the weather was cool and cloudy so I wasn't fond of that. Once we came back we laid on the beach again and ate lunch. We were very excited that we found out on the tour that there was a subway in Palma! I never liked subway too much before but I was so excited to see that something was there that resembled American food.

Later on, we got bored of laying on the beach so what did we do.... RENTED A FOUR PERSON BIKE! Maggie, David, Gloria, and I toured the beautiful island via 4 person bike. It was wonderful and hilarious at the same time. I think I was laughing for 10 minutes straight once we took the bike on the beach.

After we had to take the bike back, we went to the cuban place again! We ate some delicious pizza and had some cocktails. We took some more pictures and then played cards and hung out on the beach for the rest of the night. Life is great in Mallorca!

MALLORCA!!!! Thursday March 31st

Today Maggie and I got up early to get to the Mallorca flight that had changed. Luckily I only had to miss one class, but Maggie had to miss three. We all met at correos at about 9:30am. Our friend David forgot his passport and he had to run all the way home and come back. We were all amazed that he made it. We all got on the flight and made it safely to the island of Mallorca! Of course the first thing my friends and I did was eat at a pizza place haha! Except our friends Gloria and David didn't eat because their Señora packed them bocadillos (sandwhiches) to eat for lunch, but Maggie and I couldn't handle eating ours so we were the awkward ones who ate giant pizzas ourselves while they just got a drink haha.

After lunch we were all excited to put on our swim wear and lay on the beach! Unfortunately it was about 70 degrees and windy but we were still loving it. We took some pictures and then ate at a cuban place for dinner that ended up being our favorite place for the weekend. Except for dinner a couple of us had nachos... which turned out to be American doritos with cheese melted on them. But I was content since I had a tropical margarita! After dinner we all hung out and talked on the beach for the rest of the night.

Sunday March 27th

On Sunday we had a relaxing day. We slept in and went to the Sagrada Familia again. We were going to go in, but the line was way too long. We just enjoyed the weather and walked around the park surrounding the Sagrada Familia. Then we went to Park Guell again because we loved it so much. It was more relaxing that time because we had seen everything before so we just took in the environment. We had dinner at the airport and had some random annoying old lady from Bosnia or something asking us questions. She only knew English and was constantly asking us if that was the way to Granada. We could tell she was pretty disheveled. But then we got back and her luggage got lost, so we felt bad for her. Another trip back home safe in Granada!

Saturday March 26th

On Saturday we had breakfast and then tried to find the Cathedral. We got pretty lost and then hung out at the city center instead. We loved taking pictures by the water and looking at all the sailboats. Maggie was loving the giant statue of Christopher Columbus haha. We had lunch at Hard Rock Cafe. Then we bought tickets for Camp Nou, the famous soccer stadium. We learned about the history of Barcelona's team and got to see the world cup and the stadium which was pretty cool. After we had dinner at sandwhich and friends again, and had homemade gelato! It was great.

Friday , March 25th

We had a good breakfast (it was included! gotta love that) at the hostel and then set off for our first real day in Barcelona. First we visited Park Guell. It was my favorite part of Barcelona. This amazing park was designed by the famous architect Gaudí. The park was huge, and we had to walk up a giant incline with escalators to get to it. It was full of interesting and beautiful buildings and nature. It took about 2 hours just to see everything in the park.

After we enjoyed the park in the beautiful weather, we headed to another of Gaudi's famous works, the Sagrada Familia. We decided not to go inside because it was too expensive, so we eat right along side of it at a pizza place so we could enjoy the good view and good food. We took some more pictures of it after lunch and then we walked around and shopped along the souvenir places along the street that were really cute. We also visited other Gaudi works, La Pedrera which is a very eccentric looking apartment, (I don't know how to describe architecture) and then visited the Casa Batilo. We had hagen daz icecream... of course!

Later on we went to dinner at a place called sandwich and friends. (we wanted to go to Hard Rock Cafe but the wait was too long) We celebrated our first night in Barcelona with a Margarita! And then headed to bed :)

Barcelona! Thursday March 24th

Today after our classes Maggie and I packed for Barcelona!! We still needed to print our boarding passes and since our host sister's printer is conveniently out of ink and broken, we had to find a store that would help us print documents. After bouncing back between 2 different stores, we finally got our passes. We had Cristina (our host sister) call a taxi for us and we were on our way to the Granada airport. I was disappointed to find that the best looking Spaniard I had seen remotely close to my age was the taxi driver haha. We made it to the airport and got through security. We ate half of our sick ham bocadillos and then went through security and immediately checked out the snacks. Maggie got some cookies and I got some peanut m&ms. I had a fail trying to say peanut m&ms in spanish and the woman was laughing it me. Atleast I got them! Our plane had been delayed but we finally got on...

The Strug Begins...

Our baggage took forever to get out of the terminal.... After many announcements every 10 minutes that it would come out we finally got it, and had to rush to the metro because it was about 11pm and the metro closed down at midnight. Once we got out on the closest metro stop to our hostel, we beasted up a huge flight of stairs with our suitcases, only to go back down because that exit looked really creepy... Luckily we saw a woman coming out of the metro station who was just getting off of her shift. We asked her where to go, and we were on our way to the other exit. We started walking up a giant hill, and were scoping out "non creepy" people to ask for directions, considering it was midnight. As we started to turn around, thinking we were going in the wrong direction, a man stopped us and said, "Do you know where you're going?" and we said we were looking for the Agora hostal. and he said he lived there and would show us where it was. We were actually headed in the right direction and continued up the hill.

We were soon forced into awkward small talk, and he asked our names. Since I couldn't think of a fake name fast enough, I said Lauren. He thought I said Morgan so I just went with it. Maggie soon came up with a fake name too haha. We finally checked in to a surprisingly nice hostel. We were getting nervous because creeper was hanging around and wanted to hang out with us tomorrow and we didn't want the front desk to give up our real names and room number in front of him. But he was gone soon enough and everything was fine. The hostel was like a university type and the rooms were super nice. They even had a mini fridge and a nice bathroom in each room. We went right to bed and were ready to get a fresh start in the morning on our trip.

Sevilla, Saturday, March 12th

Today I ended up falling back asleep while Maggie was getting ready but good thing I didn't oversleep! Maggie and I had breakfast with our friend Audrey and some other people in CEA. Of course all of the Americans were loving the breakfast and eating as much as we could! And then one of the hotel staff made an announcement that we weren't allowed to take food back with us because apparently he had seen Jenna try to take a sandwich before. But of course a couple of us took food with us since lunch wouldn't be included. I was already prepared with snacks I had taken on the bus and stolen from the secret pantry. Over all breakfast was pretty good, even though Maggie and I never figured out how to use the rotating toaster haha. After breakfast we got on the bus and started the day with a panoramic view of the city which was great since we were all pretty tired of walking around from tours the day before. Then we made a stop at the Gardens of the Alcazar. They were beautiful and made me want to go on a beach vacation. Luckily Mallorca is coming up! I loved taking in the sights and the atmosphere especially since the temperature had improved by that time of day. I wanted to spend a whole day there.

After visiting the gardens we pulled into the Plaza de España and walked around taking pictures and listening to the history. Many people in our group were freaking out because one of the star wars films movies had been filmed there. I pretended to know that it was filmed there. Next we got back on the bus to get to the cathedral. I had to withstand another guided tour but the Cathedral was really beautiful. Then we went up the 30 some flights of ramps to get to the top of the tower! I wanted to take pictures along the way up but it was too crowded. The view from the top was beautiful... until I almost got strangled by a balloon that some wild kid was carrying around in the tower. (yes Lauryn Reiners I added that detail just for you :) Once we got down, we had some free time to get lunch at a sandwich place. Which happened to have an amazing ice cream menu so I just had to get some of course. I think the sundae I got was called banoffee. After a nice lunch with Audrey, Maggie, Jenna, and our new friend Jerod, we bought some post cards and made our way back to the bus. I really loved Sevilla and wish I could have spent more time there.

The bus ride home was just filled with so much awkwardness I was laughing most of the way home. First of all I need to explain that it is "culturally/socially acceptable" for spanish couples to get friendly where ever they feel like it even in any public place. But I was not accepting that two American couples wanted to get friendly on the 3 hour crowded bus ride home. So I had to sit by that, and then low and behold some girl close across from my seat is puking! She had been shopping that day and apparently just dumped her new clothes out and then threw up in the bag. So luckily for her (and the rest of the bus) it was time to pull over and give the driver a break. I pulled a pear out of my back pack for a snack and a chunk was missing out of it. Due to my senora only buying overripe fruit. And then I couldn't find the pear chunk in my back pack (I later saw it was wedged in between one of my folders for school, every teacher likes homework with pear stains right?) And then the only other awkward moment was that the rest of the bus ride was filled with animal noises that the kid behind me seemed to think he was great at impersonating animal noises so that was hilarious to listen to all the way home with everything that had already happened.

Trip to Córdoba and Sevilla! Friday, March 11th

On Friday morning Maggie and I hauled ass with all of our weekend bags to catch the bus with the rest of the CEA group. The drive to Cordoba was only about 3 hours so it wasn't too bad. I learned that in Spain it is a law for bus drivers to take a break at least every 2 hours for about 20-30 minutes. After learning this, I felt stupid for complaining and being worried when taking the bus to Madrid when the driver pulled over to a rest stop.

After arriving in Cordoba, everyone went on a long tour to see the Mezquita de Cordoba and an awesome bridge. I enjoyed the sights but the tour was way too long. Maggie and I even took some, "we hate tours pics" haha. After the long tour we had free time for lunch and bought some post cards after. Maggie and I were so hungry after waiting for lunch until 3:30 that we ate a big pizza, one for each of us. Then we got back on the bus heading for Sevilla.

After a couple more hours on the bus we made it to Sevilla at around 7pm. We checked into the hotel and Maggie and I were very excited to find out that we would be rooming together, and even more excited that the girl who was also placed with us, wanted to stay with her friends in another room.

I ate a peanut butter sandwich before dinner because I was so hungry and had no idea how the "free buffet dinner" would pan out. I had the right idea because the buffet was pretty bad and everything tasted like fish, even if it's wasn't fish. But I was very excited to have a giant salad. After dinner we hung out with our friend Jenna for a bit after the dinner and then, being the big party people that we are, Maggie and I went to bed at about midnight.

Busy Busy Week! Monday March 7- Thursday March 10th

On Monday I had a regular day at school and then came home for a short lunch before getting ready for volunteering. I came more prepared for volunteering with a lesson plan in hand with a review of spanish to english numbers and basic colors. I also drew a picture of a beach (a very crappy one) for another english lesson. I was happy that my "favorite guy" was there who is actually interested in my lessons and is the only older man who doesn't seem creepy at all. My lesson actually went pretty well. I was getting frustrated with the guy who really creeps me out (of course he was the first one there before anyone else) because every time a person would ask me how to pronounce something he would answer for me. And I wanted to say hey, I'm the american here. But other than that it went pretty well and two other girl volunteers showed up so creepy guy was distracted by them more than me. I realized how bad I really am at drawing when we all took time to relax and draw with step by step drawing books and I took the easiest one, and my favorite guy thought my peacock was a dog. It was actually pretty hilarious.

On Tuesday after fighting to stay awake through literature class I came back home and did some homework. Afterwards I met up with Francisco, who spoke in my islamic culture class about his work in Jordan. I got to know more about his job and get to know him a little and we got gelato! Which is always a highlight of any day.

Today I had a long day of classes. I was sad because the one day that I would allow myself to buy a coffee from the machine because it was a rainy day, it was out of order! But luckily I had gone grocery shopping the night before and was well equipped for the day with snacks. After an awkward moment of never understanding what the lady at the grocery store said to me. I said both yes and no to her question and neither worked haha so my safety answers failed me. Before dinner I went out with my friend Eli who I have conversation exchanges with once a week where she takes me to a different cafe each time. It was fun even though I wished we could have spoken more spanish. She has an exam in June and is very nervous about it so we mostly practice english, but I am going to change that soon!

The Granada Bullring

Last week some of the CEA group traveled to our city's very own bullring. The bullring is located very close to where I volunteer about a 50 minute walk from my house. Even though I liked the bullring a lot better in Ronda, I still really enjoy walking in a bullring and learning about the history of the sport. I always feel like I'm walking onto the set of Gladiator when I walk through a bull ring. The best part about visiting this bullring was that there were people actually practicing bullfighting inside! Maggie and I thought it was interesting to watch, but also kind of funny. We got a tour with an old tour guide who was very hard to understand. We got to see the prayer room, medical rooms, and every part of the ring. Except I was disapointed because I wanted to see some stuffed bull heads but he didn't take us to that part. If I had the opportunity to the see a bullfight I probably would, but they are way too expensive. Enjoy the pictures and video!