I'm here!!

WOW, I don't even know where to begin! It has certainly been an adventure so far! A lot has happened the past few days!

Wednesday~ I landed in Madrid as the sun was rising! it was beautiful! unfortunately I didnt sleep at all on the plane :/ but the flight didn't seem as long as I thought it would (8 hours) when we arrived in Granada the airline 'lost' about 3/4 of the luggage because it didn't fit on the small plane we took to Granada from Madrid. but luckily both of my bags made it on time! the hostel we stayed in "hostal atenas" was decent considering it's a hostel, but it was nothing special. the first night there we just walked around and i went to my first Tapas bar. they i went to bed REALLY early because i was up all night

Thurdsay~ we had our placement test for our Spanish classes and our academic orientation for school (Cegri). in the evening we had a cultural orientation and someone talk to us about culture shock. I think some people are having a harder time adjusting that I am. One thing she reminded us of is to make distinctions between fact and judgements/opinions. (for example, if we service is slow. we can't assume that it's bad service because that's just how it is in granada, and we can't assume things are the same here as they are in the US). Although it's super different here, it's pretty much what I expected it to be. At night we had a big welcome dinner all together! our entire program went to restaurante sevilla. It was the first time we were all together for a social event. it was nice getting to know more people! everyone's soo nice. After we tried another Tapas bar.

Friday~ we had our housing orientation. they gave all of us a huge map of the city. they marked red dots for every location that someone is living. it's nice to know who lives near by so we can share cabs at night! Afterwards we went on our 'survival tour' we mostly walked around the center of the city. (similar to the 'loop' of chicago.) we saw the cathedral and all the plazas!  after lunch and siesta, we went on a 4 hour 'toursity tour' we walking up big hills and winding streets. we went to two neighborhoods of granada called albayzin and sacramonte. we saw the sunset over the mountains and the alhambra at San Nicolas 'look-out point" it was SOO beautiful. in these neighborhoods is where the arab/muslim people live and where the gitanos (gypsies) live. sacramonte is at the top of the hills and all the houses are built into the hills as caves. its so cool! at night me and few people went to el desea (the wish) for dinner. it was the first time we had a waitress the could speak english. it was also the best service we had (but of course it was the most pricey as well)

Saturday~ I woke up with a cold :/ but i finally moved out of the hostel and into my host family's apartment. it's really cute and it has internet (which is not as common as it is in the US) so I was happy about that! Chari (who is 42) and her mom Rosario live together. They made paella for dinner. I was surprised that I liked it as much as I did. It was rice, and pepper, and chicken, and who knows what else... haha. I've been trying to unpack everything. i brought a lot of stuff, and everything in Spain is smaller! (the rooms, the portions of food, the showers, kitchen appliances, etc) soo its difficult to find a place for my stuff! but i'll figure it out! I'm meeting my friend Andres at 5 for coffee. he's from granada and he will be able to show me around some more :) tomorrow i'm going to visit the Alhambra! I can't wait. I just hope it doesn't rain!!! (still better than the 5 inches of snow in chicago though!)

It feels so good to actually use English! no one really speaks English here, which is probably a blessing in disguise! everyone is so nice, but also very straightforward and honest. If you make a mistake, they don't care if they laugh at you, and often they correct us right away!

At every bar in Granada, they give you a free small plate of food with whatever drink you order. Food and Drink ALWAYS go together in Granada. you don't usually have one without the other. when you get your tapa, you never get to chose. so it's always a mystery of what they will bring. I've already tried so many foods i never would have tried in the US.

Overall, this has felt a lot like first semester of freshman year! going off to a new place and meeting new people! everyone's eager to make friends and we all find ourselves going out in BIG groups and kind of wandering aimlessly at times. :) such amateurs....