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Móvil Schmóvil

I've pretty much decided by now that I'm not going to bother with a cell phone. It's not incredibly cheap in Europe, and I really just don't want to deal with all those complexities.

So I invested today in $10-worth of skype credit. The rates are really good for calls to landlines.

So! For calls that I need to make, I'll use skype. Or a pay phone if I'm not at home.

If you need to call me, you can use my host family's number, posted here. Don't worry about asking for me. Conchi's pretty much fluent in English, and Concha can probably handle it. Or you can try out your two semesters of Spanish and no one will think less of you. It's admirable, really.

Or, you can just get a microphone and sign up for skype already - it's free!!!

I want to talk to you!

¡Llámamme!

El Rastro

Admission: I'm only writing this post tonight to get that way-to-long Toledo post off the main page.

This morning, I finally went to the local flea market - El Rastro. And I brought my camera!

This goes on every Sunday morning from 9-2, filling several streets. They really do sell everything from clothes to hardware. It's so incredibly crowded, especially later on in the morning. And you really have to keep a close eye on your purse. I didn't get anything this morning. I almost bought a pair of earrings, but they looked like I'd be alergic to them. Anyway, just a couple of photos to give you an idea of the atmosphere.

El Escorial

By popular demand... a photo post!

Yesterday, I went to El Escorial with ISA. El Escorial is the summer home built by (for) Felipe II, as well as housing the burial crypt for the royal family. It was neat to see all the history behind the building. The library houses thousands of ancient books, and the summer residence is home to several fine pieces of art. It was also neat to be reminded that Spain has a king. I know that sounds weird, but it's just so cool to me that such a modern city as Madrid could be the home of a real honest-to-goodness royal family. I'm such a dumb American. The smallest things completely blow my mind.

They don't allow photos inside, but here are some of the outside.

After the tour and some free time to turn our attention to our sack lunches, we headed to Valle de los Caídos. Located some 10 km from El Escorial, this is the gigantic temple of doom where Franco is buried. This gigantic tomb/cathedral is built straight into the granite mountainside. You may not be able to tell from the pictures - you can barely tell standing there - but everything about it is abusolutely huge. It cost a few billion to make, during a time (after the civil war) when many madrileños didn't have the money for food. It's frigid and sparsely decorated interior and morbid iconography remind the visitor of death.

Needless to say, the site of Franco's grave is a controversial subject. But whatever the terrible memories it evokes, the Valle de los Caídos has a certain simplistic beauty to accompany it's slice of Spanish history.

Again, no photos are allowed of the inside, but here's what I've got:

Well, enjoy the photos. I've got a few more that I'll post soon, and I want to get out and take more of Madrid for you.

Until then, I'll keep posting if you keep reading!

Que Dios os bendiga,

-Rebekah

I was just looking at my reflexion in my eye in the mirror when I realized just how many times it was bouncing off stuff.

La Casa

As I've mentioned before, I'm staying with a host family while I'm in Madrid this semester.

I'm really loving my situation here and am so glad that I'm here. We live near Pacífico (most people name their metro stop), pretty near to the center of the city. It's a less-than-ten-minute walk from the metro to the building, then we're up on the second floor (European system), apartment C. It's not incredibly spacious, but it's comfortable. And no one lives in huge houses. We're in a city!

The host family actually lives in two houses. The mom and dad live in their own aparment nearby, with their own students. I'm living with their daughter, who's 22 years old. There are four americans here, two from USD, and one from another university.

It's actually a pretty nice situation. They feed us three meals a day, wash our clothes, and a lady even comes once a week to clean our rooms. And la Señora is an incredible cook!

We all get along really well. Dinners together are so much fun!

And I've got my own room (again - there was another girl here while her own señora was sick). And there's wireless internet.

Yep, it's awesome, and I love it!

Academics

This is all so very complicated. So don't worry if you don't understand. I barely do.

The ISA program that I'm here with is called "Studies With Spaniards". I chose this program because I believed it would offer the most challenging curriculum, as well as the best way to learn Spanish and meet locals. Before the end of last semester, I selected (and had approved) a number of courses from the catalog listed on the host university's (Nebrija's) website. From this list, it appeared to me that the courses listed under "Applied Languages" and "Hispanic Studies" were all taught to Spaniards through the same process. I selected one from the former and four from the latter.

Well, it turns out that the "Hispanic Studies" classes are simply the only ones available to the Fall 2 (not Studies With Spaniards) program. I had thought that the placement test was for placement into the classes with Spaniards, but as it turns out, those are pretty much on a if-you-think-you-can-handle-it basis. But the linguistics class I signed up for turned out to be taught in English anyway. Not what I expected it to be, but it will work.

And the intensive courses, which we all placed into, are in intricate levels that don't in anyway correspond to the levels in the ISA paperwork (which was the basis for getting my papers signed by Engel-Doyle). So I don't really know just how advanced my classes are. Anyway, since I started taking the linguistics class two days a week, I haven't been able to make it to the intensive courses on those days, which means I can't pass them, so I'm not getting credit for them.

AND there's something messed up about how I signed up for the linguistics class, so now it's not showing up on my page of the Nebrija website. I went in today and talked to people, and sent an email, as was suggested by these people. So hopefully that will be resolved quickly, despite the fact that today was the add-drop date.

But today was the final exams for the intensive classes, so the complexity is mostly at bay for now. Today was also my first Friday off. That will continue for the rest of the semester. Yay!

"Hispanic Studies" classes start on Oct 2.

Design Overhaul

Yesterday, instead of writing a blog post, I decided to re-do the blog layout/design. Of course, it's not all as complicated as all that. Blogger's templates make it really easy. But I did go in and edit several of the images in the default. I'll get back to posting content this afternoon. Enjoy!

The first in a series of short, catch-up posts

It's been 22 days since my last real post, and I apologize for that. I keep forgetting that I'm in Spain, and that even the mundane has an innate excitement that you'll all want to hear about.
But in the effort to assimilate myself into Spanish culture, to blend in, to bend so as to not break under the culture shock, I tend to lose a great deal of the wonder I should be relishing in every day. I'm living in Europe! Twice now, I've had to stop, shake myself, and be reminded of that fact. I'm studying in Spain, something I've dreamed of doing for several years now.
Well, at least as of today, I can say that I'm honestly and genuinely enjoying my time here.

Fix Notification

I just realized that the subscription link on the left wasn't working. It should be all better now.

Totally Random Song

But I thought it had to be shared.

Que Dios os bendiga,
-Rebekah

Request

My dear friends and family,

I didn't bring my address book with me to Spain.

I'd love to be able to send you a postcard, but I need your address to do so.

So! Please email me your addresses or box numbers at school. My email address can be found on my blogger profile page.

I look forward to sending you mail!

Toledo en Fotos

Nota: Please, please don't rely on babelfish to understand this entry. Find someone who speaks/takes Spanish, or a good dictionary. Hopefully the pictures will speak a thousand words by themselves. However, if you understand the entry in the original, and want a good laugh, The garden is very tuna.

Hoy, fuimos a Toledo por el día. Saqué 90 fotos. Aquí están unas con descripciones...

Del autobus. Este es el puente, y nuestra primer vista de la ciudad.

La vista panorámica de la ciudad. De aquí se puede ver algunos monumentos.

Una calle estrecha típica de Toledo. La ciudad me recuerda mucho a Asis.

El Barrio de la Juderia. Hace cientos de años, la ciudad fuera dividida en tres partes, para los judios, los musulmanes, y los cristianos.

El claustro de San Juan de los Reyes.

El jardín a San Juan de los Reyes. Estaba lloviendo por la mañana, pero hacía sol desde mediodía, que hizo el jardín muy bonito.

Y arriba, hay un techo arabe muy guay.

Este es el ayuntamiento. El tablado era para una fiesta internacional de jazz la semana pasada.

La catedral. Si podéis ver, hay la última cena arriba de la puerta.

Hubo una boda en la catedral.

Un puente que conecta la catedral y la casa del cardenal.

Esta mezquita anciana pequeña está construido sobre cuatro pilares visigodos, está al lado de un cementerio cristiano, y es llamado "La Mezquita del Cristo de la Luz". Es como la ciudad de Toledo - una mezcla de culturas, arquitecturas, y religiones.

Este es la Plaza de Zocodover. El arco es un ejemplo del estilo arabe.

Los Toledos en españa y en Ohio son ciudades hermanas. ¡Hola a todos mis amigos en Ohio!

Se vende espadas de alta calidad en Toledo. La mayoridad de las espadas en las películas están hechas en Toledo, y se vende también cosas de peliculas como El Señor de los Anillos y Eragon.

¿Recuerdáis esos zapatos de los ceremonios al final de los juegos olimpicos? Pues, Papá, ¡se los vende!

Y cuando empecé a olvidar Asis, encontramos estas esculpturas.

También vimos otras cosas, incluso en cuadro de El Greco, pero no se permite fotos.

So, there's this new web browser out. It's called Google Chrome.

I was very surprised to see it today. I guess I didn't expect Google to do it.

But I downloaded it and am trying it out. So you can see that it at least allows one to blog. :)

It's actually a lot like Firefox. I haven't seen anything that I really don't like yet.

It's still in Beta. Try it out if you like.

-Rebekah

Quick Spanish Observations

...and I just mean about the country, not in the language.

Wow. I just had to consciously fight myself not to write "observaciones". We must be making progress.

I toyed for months with the idea of switching the blog to all-Spanish for the semester and just linking to babelfish. But I hate babelfish.

Yeah! I'm here in Madrid, Spain.

The flights went, all things considered, pretty smoothly. I caught the flu my brother had and got sick twice over the Atlantic. But all three flights were on schedule. That's never happened to me before.

Not feeling well gave me a great excuse to take my time getting used to Spanish food.

The Metro here is immaculate. There's barely even any gum on the floor. Especially compared to the one in Rome... wow. But it's also incredibly complicated, with a dozen lines criss-crossing all over the city.

It seems like all the floors in this city are slippery.

The language barrier is a little lower than I had first thought in the airports. Except for one thing - There's no way to practice using "vosotros" in San Diego.

We had a meeting yesterday evening with ISA about general stuff.

The students in ISA are all pretty nice. There's about 2o of us so far (the compultense students arrive later) but there's only about 3 of us who actively try to speak Spanish while in a group.

We had our examen de nivel this morning. It was nerve-wracking, especially the oral part, but I have hope that I did well.

My host family is really nice. And they force us to speak Spanish at home, which is good.

There was a lady on the bus this morning with a shirt that said "a heart 100% healthful". If you forget, here's the difference. Ha! It's funny because it's cannibalism!

Culture shock so far has been at a deal-with-it-able level. It's too soon to comment on home-sickness. The time difference is 9 hours ahead of Pacific time. Skype me!

I'll be blogging more soon, with some photos.

-Rebekah