Portugese food, Movies, DJs,

I had a really nice weekend here in Pamplona. It is nice to travel but being home is great aswell.

This friday my Friend Caetano from Portugal had a gig as a DJ at this club-bar near where all of us live. All of the international students are friends so we all planned on supporting him last friday.

He lives with Carlota who is also from Portugal and she had about 15 of us over to their apartment before his big night to eat dinner and hang out. They have a really nice apartment and are both law students that are here for a semester.

They made us some homeade pinchos, and then we had a really cool dish which i can´t spell nor pronounce. It was a typical dish that the Portugese have at holidays. It consisted of tons of eggs and veggies mixed with cod all cooked on the stove. It was really really good and I am glad I got to eat some traditional food of Portugal.

We had dessert which was apple crip which was so good cause Spaniards don´t eat these delicous foods so I therefore love the Portugese. Emanuel brought some Flan and it was just a really good meal with new foods.

I met a few new people and it was interesting. One girl, Crystal is from Venezuela and she had loads of interesting stuff to say about her government and I love learning about these sorts of things. There were people from Portugal, Hong Kong, USA, Germany, Venezuela, and Finland so it was a rather mixed crowd as usual.

We all then caught the bus and rode for a half hour to the place where Caetano was DJing. It was standard music I guess, but I don´t know a thing about Djing. We left then and went to some club where there was a med student party. I however, and some of my friends didn´t get in so I walked home. This was unfortunate for some, but I prefer to save my money instead of dancing around to techno music and breathing in tar.

Saturday I woke up early for once and ate some toast and just relaxed. I tried to watch some Spanish shows but it gets really boring and you can´t day dream cause I end up getting lost. Some of my friends were gone so I didn´t accomplish much but that night was the Rugby World cup so all these people where psyched.

We ended up going to some portugese guy´s house and watched it on a 13 inch television. I haven´t ever watched rugby so I asked tons of questions.

Most rugby fans make fun of football cause of all the pads and different rules so they asked me all these questions. I would have to say that rugby is much more physical and like war than football is. It isn´t harder or easier but just different. Football is much faster and more explosive. The rugby playes must be really dumb because of their sport, but they don´t get hit like football players do. I haven´t played rugby and they haven´t played football so I don´t think anyone can judge then so permaturely.

I then went to Emanuels house and we hung out. He is on the bball team for the college, but they are terrible and sports aren´t competitive like in our schools. THere will be a track team in the spring and I should join to get more Spanish experience.

Sunday I went to a movie with Fernanda who is from Bolivia. We watched Promesas del Este which was an american movie but I understood it all in Spanish so I was proud. We had to eat at mcd´s afterward though cause she can´t cook and like many of the South American people here has had the luxury of having a maid and mother do everything for them. She is really nice and we had a birthday party for her last night.

I had a test today but it was really easy except for the fill in the blank parts. I hate those cause you have to think of what someone else is thinking. A lot of people struggled with it thoguh cause most of my classmates are newbies to Español. This weekend we think we are gonna travel to Salamanca which is west of here. Halloween is next week so I better find a costume but they dont have thrift shops so creativity is a must.


Have a nice tuesday. ...I just learned that in Spanish they don´t capitalize the days of the week.

Little things of interest

SO there are some little things that are different and they are kind of amusing.

In the states we have notebooks with lined paper and 3 holes in the sheet. Here, and all over europe, they use graph paper always and their notebooks have 4 holes in them. It is really weird and I have no idea why we use different types of notebooks.

The doors here are so frustrating. If you ever come here you will feel like an idiot cause their doors always open inward so you have to push to enter. It is a small thing but i sometimes run into it and look like a fool.

One of the most interesting things is what I look like. Whenever I speak to Spaniards here they will always ask where I am from. Many many times people think I am from England. My friends say I don´t have an american face and so everyone always thinks i am English. One thing though it is only when I am speaking Spanish obviously. My aunt maureen is the only one in my family of English blood, but not really. It is a good thing, but British people aren´t known to be beauties so maybe it is an insult. Oh well...

They cut the grass really short here so it looks a lot better than our grass. The grass around my school looks like a golf course.

No one is ever eating outside of their house. In the states you always see people drinking or eating things on the go. Here they never do. I always eat my breakfast on the way to class so I stand out.

I will add more when i think of them! I need a nap

Photos

This is of the church in Zaragoza. Note the mound of flowers.



This is the streets of Zaragoza.



This is San Sebastían in the North of Spain on the atlantic.

Zaragoza = THARAGOTHA

Hola everyone,

This Friday we didn´t have school because of a holiday. I really don´t know much about this holiday but they celebrate the -politically correct- invasion of america and their Saint. The town i live in didn´t do anything special so we all left for Zaragoza.

The bus station sent 13 buses to this town because there was a huge festival. Zaragoza is 2 hours south east of here and it is the capital city of the state next to this one. The state i reside in is Navarra. I got to sit in the front seat of the bus and due to ticket issues I couldn´t sit by my friends. I however got to sit by a priest. I don´t know much about priests but i felt like i needed to sit up straight and behave. I even offered him some food i had cause i just felt obligated.

Along the way we had to pass thru all these toll booths and the bus was only goin 60 mph so it was slow. There were tons of wind turbines cause it is so mountaneous and not much else. The country side was kind of like a desert-which is typical of Spain. Out bus left at 10 so it was the perfect time and I was wide awake to see the country side.

We got in Zaragoza which is pronounced as the title above at this huge bus train station. All of the foreigners went on this trip so it was weird getting off the bus. We all have met so many people but little groups of friends are present. I got off and met up with Emanual, Teff, and Kath again and others were there but I usually am with this people. We had to wait forever to get a stupid map of the city but we finally got one nad walked for all eternity to the center of the city.

This city is much much larger than mine and there were tons of people. There was a parade going on which was of people. All of the people in the parade wore old old maybe medieval clothes and held flowers. They had some traditional dancing too but mainly it was just dressed up people in gowns and weird hair dos. They would carry the flowers all the way to the cathedral and would offer them to the saint for which this holiday was made. We made it the the cathedral but it wasn´t easy. There were tons of people and some were rude. This one man told us to not f off which was really weird. We didn´t know why he swore at us but we laughed cause it gramatically makes no sense.

We got to the cathedral and it was amazing. It was a massive catherdral but fairly new. NExt to it was a plaza with a huge pile of flowers. It looked like a layer cake but made of mainly white flowers. All the flowers were offerings and it looked beautiful. It was the size of a house I would say. We took some pics and then went to eat cause all this walking calls for lots of calories.

Smart people brought food but we had to go out to eat. We ate at some place that served really americanized food but not really. I had some chicken and fries. They had this mustard sauce but it was discusting. I think honey mustard has too much flavor for Spaniards. My meal was 8 € so it was fine.

I have an allowance of 10 € a day which is from working all summer. I usually dont spend any money all week so that I can do these trips in the weekend. I am pretty stingy about things but i would rather travel than go out to eat.

We then walked thru town and they had all the nice tourist crap on sale as well as tons of creepy old men selling balloons. I think it is required to look creepy here to sell balloons. They had some nice pictures of whoopie golberg though i should have bought one for my friends ´kind of an inside joke´. We were told by MO from austrailia that were was like a beer tasting festival somewhere in town. We walked for 2 hours and rested in the park before finding this "huge festival. It was a let down and half of us ditched out and took the bus back into town.

It was 5 ish and we got some coffee and went walking around. They had old roman ruins which interests me the most of all the things here. We also toured the cathedral where they were having a mass at the time but it was huge so pft. We had to push thru crowds to get there, and some of the elderly here are really pushy. I found it ironic that they were being rude so that they could go to a cathedral.

It was a really nice cathedral and they had tons of stuff. I like cathedrals but they are way over the top a lot and they are not necessary. They had a huge cross with a lifesize Jesus on it and they would kiss his feet and go on. We didn´t partake on this, but it was so cool to see. I am a christian but I wasn´t brought up with these things so it is incredible to see.

We then went to this plaza to see fireworks. I should explain that I was with the usual group but we were also with a few portugese people all day. We kept saying " they are really nice¨ all day long. Portugese is a weird language and I don´t know if I like it. The fireworks were really cool and we sat on someones car and watched them. We were under them and it was cool because of that. We even got hit with the debris so it was risky.

We went to the main road in the town where a huge concert was with breakdancers but we left. We had to get a snack cause we never ate dinner are I got a kit kat mcflurry and it was amazing. They didn´t have any other flavors I knew. We then went to some discos. We all had backpacks so it was quite funny. We would put all of our stuff in a pile and kind of dance around it. The french people made us play ring around the rosie with it. They are really into playing disco songs from the 70´s. People got mad about our little circle party, and one man stepped on my foot and then yelled at me. I don´t believe in fighting so i just laughed, but wow.

We came there on friday at 10 am and wer eleaving saturday at 7 am so we didnt sleep again, which is typical. We walked the huge distance to the bus station and saw a churo stand. Churos are kind of like mini donuts and they are delicious. I ate other peoples cause they can never finish their food. We got to the station and there were so many dead looking people everywhere but I felt good cause i always have energy. I got on my bus and slept instantely and woke up in Pamplona. I walked back to my piso, had some lunch and slept. It was only saturday but I didn´t do anything exciting that day.

I did do something amazing on Sunday though. I went on the camino de santiago before but i never climbed the mountain. So on sunday I called my friend Tristan from Germany and we walked up the mountain. I love stuff like that and it was a 2 hour walk to the top but it was totally wortth it. Once u leave this city it is all fields and tractors. We went to the top and it is line with wind turbines which are really cool to see up close and on top of a mountain. We could see the surrounding valleys and it was amazing. The wind was so refreshing and we could see everything. We took some sweet pics but Tristan doesn´t have a comp here so we will have to wait to see.

We got back really late and my feet were real tired. I got a candy bar at an asian shop cause others aren´t open and rested all night.

This weekend prolly my favorite here because I have good friends and did really cool stuff. The weather is beautiful and sunny. I even got sunburned yesterday. Tonight I am gonna explore the gym here and see what sports I can play. They have a bball team that icould join but i don´t know. They aren´t good so it would be easy but meh.

I hope Minnesota is going great and everyone is getting ready for halloween. I will have to see if they sell candy corn here.

Adios!

Photos

So there was a bombing on tuesday in Bilbao. No one was injured but we were just there. There is a group called ETA which is doing it all, they also graffitied all over the buildings here. It is a nasty situation.

I am kind of tired today, but i only have one class so not to busy. We are buying bus tickets for Zaragoza today cause there is a huge fesitival there this weekend. We will be staying up all night again.

It is really nice out lately and i have been running a lot in the park. My classes are really really easy so i am not being pushed to hard with my Spanish. One of my roomates asks me to explain some english words are it is quite difficult to do in Spanish.

It is almost 4 am there and i bet my dad is snoring with the tv and radio blaring loudly.

I am looking up ticket prices to go around eurpoe and i can´t believe how inexpensive it is. I found a round trip flight to brussels for 35 €. I will stop buying junk food and just go around.

Trip to Bilbao

This Friday I went with 6 friends to the town of Bilboa. It was a two hour bus ride to the North in the heart of basque country. The Gugenheim museum is in this town and that´s about it.

I went to Teff from Ecuador, Emanuel from Germany, Aliah from Canada, Kath from New York, Fernanda from Bolivia, and Vanessa who is another german girl - Emanuels friend. It was a diverse group of people and we only wanted to get a Hostel for friday night. THis means we had to stay up all night on Saturday and take the 8 30am bus home on Sunday. It was a nice plan, but difficult.

We got there around 6 on Friday and walked forever to the museum. The Guggenheim museum has amazing architecture and is all silver and it is nuts. The creator also made the Wisemen art center in the cities near the u of m. The museum was closed but we went in for a tour of the building. We saw no art but the video about the guy was cool. THe creator is nuts but what artists aren´t.

After leaving we got some grub and tried to find out hostel. This city. Bilbao, has about 400,000 people so it is quite large. There are mountains around it and it is very green cause it rains a lot. It is very close to the coast. While walking to our hostel we had to go thru the town and the stores seemed much nicer there and they had really cool clothes styles. THe people looked very different because basque people inhanbit this town. THey are very dark and have the dark hair.

We made it to our hostel and settled in. Our hostel was really nice and my friends said it wasn´t like the typical hostel. I wouldn´t know. It had a shared bath and way to many blankets on the bed. I heard about bed bugs but i survived. The girls room was harrassed during the night but they were fine. It was on the 5th floor and it smelled aweful climbing these stairs but the place was nice and we paid 16 € each for the night.

AFter getting beautiful we went out on the town... not really though. We walked around and it was only 12 so no one really is out yet. They go out around 2 am and we arent that cool. We ate some pinchos and I had these weird ones. One had anchovies and i ate it but it was nasty. I make myself integrate these cultural differences in my life. After eating that weird meal i was full. We went to some bars but we were all kind of boring and went to bed around 2ish. Since we were in the old part I think we missed out on the nice clubs and bars. It was a nice experience though. All of our area was in Basque so we couldnt read anything and the people have a distinct look of them.

The next day we slept till 11 cause we knew we didnt have a room to sleep in the next night. We all showered and said goodbye to shelter and got lunch. We all ate huge sandwiches, but teff from ecuador decided that she needs to get something more Spanish. They were good and only 6 € for a sandwich and coffee. The coffee tastes better here. We then got some candy at the store like little kids and walked around. It was almost siesta time and we went to a museum which had works from Picasso, Monet, Goya, Dali and Greco. There were tons of other artists but Randolph doesn´t place much emphasis on art lol. My friends knew a lot so I get some nice tours.

We left there are all got huge bottles of water and relaxed for a long time maybe 3 hrs in the park. Kath and I - the fat americans as we call it- went to the market and got these massive pastries with creme inside. Picture a swiss cake roll times 10. It was only 1 € so we ate them. The non americans made fun of us but 5 minutes later they were eating one.. talk about hipocrits. The parks are always full of old people and dogs so we get looked at all day. Especially while scarfing down these massive pastries.

We then walked to our hostel and got our stuff and checked out. We had other friends from school staying in town and they let us put our bags in the place until later. The owner of the hostel got really bad, which is understandable, but we are young so hey. We then ate at burger kind... not my choice and walked around and went out that night.

We walked around the old city again but it was scary. We got to this plaza and there were tons of police wearing masks and holding shields. They all got scared but teff is from ecuador which makes her immune to this stuff and I didn´t care. There wasa protest i guess cause the basques are fighting for independence or just violence in my opinion. We left right away cause it was a scary thing to see all these armed police with masques on. While leaving the plaza the police stuck this old guy and his wife, but we didn´t know why. I am glad we don´t have these separations. This country is so divided it is terrible.

We got over the little riot and hung out in the park and played weird games. We then went to a club- which is not my choice cause clubs are expensive and evil.

On our way back from this club we were harrassed by people from Spain and they kept following us. It was 3 in the morning so it is hard to meet nice caring people. They kept following us and we finally ditched them. We walked a lot then and got to the bus station aroubnd 5 ish and relaxed and had some nice 5 in the morning talks. I didn´t know a lot about some of the people we traveld with but traveling brings out the best of us haha. We got on the bus then at 8 30. We looked really good. We got back in pamplona at 10 and all walked together thru the park and back to our pisos.

It was a nice trip, but expensive to do it all. The bus tickets were only 22€ but everything else adds up quickly. I just have to save more money this week because we are traveling to Zaragoza for this huge festival. We don´t have class friday so it will be nice.

Food, Weather

People wanted to know about the food I am eating. Spaniards eat tons of meat and everday I eat some sort of red meat. I have never eaten so much red meat in my entire life. I guess I am just building my cholesterol for my lifetime this year. Some central american friends said they eat bull penis here so they really are into the meat...

For breakfast Spaniards hardly eat anything. I have cookies-which are more like graham crackers with whole milk. I also sometimes eat yogur. They have cereal but it isn´t typical. There are pastre shops with good stuff but most people just get coffee.

After waiting all day until about 2 I eat lunch which is the biggest meal of the day. Lunch will be some meat- usually pork or hamburger. I haven´t had chicken yet except for eggs. Lunch we usually have some pasta and bread. They use tomato sauce on their pasta so it tastes different. I usually make some toast with jam because i need sugar and they dont eat much of it at all. I am very full after a plate of all meat and pasta. They don´t really season anything and most restaurants dont have pepper. My meals have been very similar except one dish is like a cooked cheese with this fishy taste, it was terrible. They grow peppers here so we have cooked peppers on occasion and they are delicious. It is typical to eat a lot of fish in parts of Spain but here it isn´t as prevelant. No one really has acne so all the protein they eat must be helping. I haven´t had too many vegetables and it may just be the lady who cooks for me or I don´t really know.

The meals I have had are (pizza, spagetti and meatballs, pork, tortilla de potata, eggs, sausages, peppers, roast beef, beef stir fry stuff, pastres, cresants, bread, nasty fish thing, Salami sandwiches, pudding- but it is warm. I am sure i am forgetting some but you get the point. Meat Meat Meat.

Dinner is really late and I eat at 8 oclock which is super early. My roomates dont eat until 10 at least. Dinner is usually more meat, with sausages and sometimes pizza. They always use ham on their pizza. After dinner people will then go out for a drink.

One typical cocktail here is called Sangria and it is red wine with some sort of juice. The name comes from the word blood so it is red obviously. There are other Spanish drinks but in the north here we don´t have a lot of them. Everyone drinks wine and beer. They have really cheap beer that people buy in liter bottles. In the bars it is typical to drink beer with limon. Everyone always makes fun of american beers cause they are so thin but i wouldn´t know much.

Weather

Today it is in the 70´s and kind of cloudy and sunny. It is rare for it to be completely sunny but it can be. There is usually an overcast and sometimes rain. It hasn´t rain a lot but I guess it will soon. Last night it rained and I used the "nice umbrella i got from my dad" it broke after about 6 seconds but it still sort of works. It has gotten down to almost freezing but only one night. It is usually 60´s or 50´s during the night. It will snow some here, but they are babies about it. They never wear shorts in the fall so I am always sweating while walking my 25 minutes to class.

I haven´t really gone out a lot to eat the food cause it is very expensive usually 10 -12 euros. They have little appetizers at bars that are really good. They vary greatly and can be seafood or sausage things. Their markets are cheap so it would be cheap to make food but I never need to worry.

Walks thru the city

Oh am I tired today. In this area of Spain there is a pilgramge road that is thousands of years old. It goes thru my university so I went for a long long long walk on it up the mountain near here. There was an old town with a church and an amazing view of the city. I didn´t bring my camera with but it was cool. Thousand of people walk this road every year and you can stay in these little hotels for cheap or free. I think I will walk it but probably not until the Spring.

I had to buy a book today for class and it was super cheap only 11 € but everday on CNN they talk about the record lows our US dollar keeps reaching. I only have to buy two books so I think you can assume how difficult my classes are. I wish I could take a real class, because i am only taking Spanish learning. It would help my Spanish a lot more. We are learning about the Spanish culture now and it is getting interesting.

This weekend was fun. We went out as usual, but it wasn´t as amazing. We went to the old part of town which is really cool and saw some hippie dancing around the street. apparently they are usually American so I had to laugh. One american friend of mine rooms with a SPaniard but he is from the south and they are very different from the norther people.

I always meet people and talk with them for a long time. I spoke to a french girl for 2 hours about everything and it was really cool. She was very conservative and was complaing about the 35 hour work week. It is weird how we all live the same "life" but view it so differently. I did happen to get lost very late in the evening and was a half hour in the wrong direction. I guess it is a funny story but i kind of had a cold from it.

I am healthy now and I haven´t had the initial sickness that most have here. I want to plan a trip to see some more of Spain but I haven´t been to active about it. One of my roomates is from Bilboa where the cool art museum is so maybe i will plan that.

I now am getting the whole culture shock thing. The initial excitement really does fade because nothing is the same. I have decided I wont watch any more english TV (even though all we have is CNN international in English). THey have weird TV Though and they get all of our old shows. EVeryone knows Minnesota from the 90210 show.

I have i think 10 minutes of homework today and I don´t know what else I will be doing with my free time. I want to get a bank account here so I can fight off our terrible exhange rate. I will try to get some photos online soon but I don´t know. I haven´t taken to many of scenery so I better get on that before it rains everday.

I don´t know if you guys hear about Spanish news but there was abombing in Madrid and it was really graphic. The ETA is who did it and they are a Basque terrorits group. ALl over the city people have posters and I guess it is really starting to heat up around here. I am safe though because this is basque area and they wont bomb themselves. I am glad we don´t have these particular separation issues cause we were advised not to ever ask anyone on the streets about it.

I am tired of rambiling if you have any questions please ask. There is a lot I am not saying