Sol: You got back so early last night! Laura: We got back at 4 am...? = Madrid

soooooooo I've been in Madrid for almost 5 days now and I am still alive!! So that's a pretty big feat for me! I'll try to do a "quick" run-down of what I've been up to...

Well Thursday I got here, met Sol, etc. I think I said that? Didn't do much besides unpack, etc, then get to sleep.

FRIDAY

Woke up and got to our orientation thing at our school, Universidad San Pablo CEU at 9:30. Our metro stop is under construction, so we had to use the bus. Sol accompanied us b/c we had no idea where to go, but she didn't really either b/c she had never used the buses before either so that was great...but we got there really early. aka the first people. Orientation was good, kinda long, but made me VERY excited for this semester! The people seem great and our leader people seem awesome too!!

Then came back home to hang out, then at 8 I went out to tapas with Raquel, a girl getting her doctorates at Duke but is here with us for the semester, and 8 other people from the program. Tapas, if you don't know, are tastly little things like toast with stuff on them or olives or bread with cheese or potatoes. etc...but yummy! we went to two tapa bars. The first one was better to be honest. But the second one we drank tinto de verano, this sangria type drink, with red wine mixed with some other stuff, it was pretty good, kinda like watery sangria? but it was fun!

Then we went to Plaza Mayor to find others from the program (A while later...tapas took a long time! oh, and we only spoke in spanish, yay!) at an Irish pub, of all things. Then we went walking around Madrid in literally a group of 20 which was just not good....just too many Enlgish-speaking people..but it was still fun! We went to a few little bar places and such. Then I went to Kapital, this HUGE, 7-floor club. It was a lot of fun! And we got back around 6. in the morning. Which is very normal. Lots of clubs don't open until like 1 ish....

Slept til nearly 1 (not enough sleep) and decided that my stomach still hated me for going to Turkey, so Sol had me only eat rice, etc. She's such a mom! (although no replacement for you, Suzanne of course, don't get jealous...) Ate dinner at the house which was good. Nothing too too Spanish that we've eaten so far, at least I don't think so. But then I'm used to different food anyways (aka not just spaghetti every night, thanks suz!) Excep for the Spanish tortilla, some type of egg potato thing which is good. Then we went around shopping. We live VERY close to some great shopping, which is very very (as Sol would say) fatal. Including el Corte Ingles, THE HUGEST STORE YOU COULD EVER IMAGINE. Picture: Super Walmart, including a massive, huge, super market; Perfumes from a department store; a whole department store; a shoe store; a bed bath and beyond; a purse store; another department store in itself; more kitchet wear; a pharmacy; children's clothes...the lsit goes on. IT IS HUGE. like, GET LOST HUGE. so I bought shampoo and stuff that I of course forgot to pack. Yay! but anyways with the stores...we'll see what will happen...Then we went out again Saturday night to another club, it was fun. We got back at 4 this time, and Sol said 'you got back so early last night!!" haha it was pretty funny.

SUNDAY

Slept in late. like 2. Bascially I'm worthless. Then Laura and I met up with some others and went to el Parque del Buen Retiro, which is basically their Central Park. It was so pretty! and HUGE!! We seriously just walked around for like 3 hours which was fun but very tiring. Then there was this big drum circle thing at some huge statue and it was really interesting. Made me think of Ashville. Also, it's kind of like a mini Disney world...definitely saw Mickey, Mini, Whinney the Poo . Actually lots of Mickeys. I have a really good pic of him, I'll put it up later haha. But it was a fun time :)

Went to bed early...walking, etc, makes one very sleepy. And we had to wake up early for...

MONDAY

"Class." We had to be there at 10 and we got there at 10:15, the VERY last ones, which was not that cool...but oh well. Then we talked about the program's policies and our trip this week to ANDALUCIA! it's a region in southern spain. When you think of it, a lot of things should come to mind (aka i had nothing to say about Andalucia in the slightest and we were supposed to help contribute to a list about Andalucia....so that was a lovely first start. I honestly thought it was a city itself, not an area, if that gives you an idea of what i knew) but especially flamenco, the torros and sol, ole! (torros=bulls, sol=sun of course). So basically it's gunna be super hot. and humid. YESSSSSSSS. But really, I am exciting. Then we got some other stuff done. This was all this morning but I really can't remember. Whoops. OH WAIT i remember it was really hot aka air conditioning didn't work. cool. (but it was eventually fixed....except we have to walk up 4 flights of stairs to our class...no elevator...every. day. AND it's on the 4th floor, but since this is europe, the first floor is 0, so it is literally 4 flights. YAY!)
Then in the afternoon we had "class" a TWO AND A HALF HOUR LECTURE on Andalucia. It was kind of horrible. I mean, informative, but exhausting. And you have to actually PROACTIVELY listen b/c it's in Spanish....so yep. I know a lot now about the area, like what it looks like on a map and stuff. So i'm excited! We're going to Granada and Sevilla with the group. Then I opted to stay the weekend, so I'm going to Cadiz, this really cool looking beach town place. Exciting! But stressful - we have to figure out all of our lodging, etc, for the weekends ourselves. Soooo we'll see if this hotel actually exists??

So I won't be bringing my computer though, so I'll probably have internet cafe type deals....it's just a warning that I won't be updating this until at least Sunday and I didn't want anyone to sit at their computers refreshing this page for more information about my life in Spain. Which I am very, very sure you all do. (understandably)

Also, random note....so i opened my closet and this BAD smell just hit me..it smelled like black licorice (anise seed type stuff EWWWWWW) and i was like WHAT/?? well Sol put these thingys in my closets to make them smell "good." Well, the smell has been stuck in my nose ALL day and i just feel like something crawled up on my clothes and died....So this afternoon I asked her what it was and that I did NOT like it and couldn't have my clothes smell like that for a semester (not in so many words...or so many English words either). It was supposed to be lavender?? Uh maybe flowers smell bad here or something I don't know. But it was bad.

Also, Sol cleans my room...even though I've been keeping it really clean and stuff! She comes in and organizes stuff. She puts my random hair things for example in a little box or puts my rigns in a little can. Which is very nice. The only weird thing is, I made my bed (surprising right??? i NEVER do that....but I figured I'd be polite?) and she RE-MADE it for me. I must have done a very poor job. But she's only done that twice so far, and today I guess she deemed my bed-making decent enough. Ohh Sol. :)

Well like I said, i"m off to the south! miss and love you all!!!!!!!! xoxooxox