Madrid (Parte Dos) y Toledo

Yesterday was quite adventurous. We got up pretty early, had a super yummy b’fast at the hotel, and did a walking tour of Madrid. After that, we went to the Reina Sofia, which is a big art gallery/museum. It’s huge and we were only there for a few hours, so we mainly focused on Picasso, Dali, and Miro. We got to see Picasso’s Guernica, which was very cool. After all that, Nick and I decided that we’d find somewhere new for lunch. We walked and walked…and walked some more. And ended up back at the hotel and eating at the McD’s next door. We have a good excuse for giving up though! I could only sleep from 12-2am and I think Nick didn’t get much more than that. So after all that walking, we were just beat! Although, right after lunch, we decided to walk our tour route all over again in search of the ever elusive Telepizza. We never did find it, but we did run into a bunch of ISAers who were going out to watch the Barcelona v. Manchester game. It was quite exciting…it was actually my first time to sit down and watch an entire soccer match. Whoo! The group decided to keep the party going (Barcelona won!) but I went back to my room to see how well I could repack AGAIN. Whoo!

On to Toledo! (Pronounced toLAYdo. Not toLEEdo. ToLEEdo is in Ohio.) We got up early, and worked on getting the entire San Sebastian group (40 of us) and the Sevilla group (about 200 people) onto buses to go to Toledo.  Very exciting.  After the 40ish minute drive, we picked up a tour guide who gave us a quick overview tour of the city. The bus then took us to the top of the hill that the city is on and we got off and took a 2.5 hour walking tour. Very pretty. SOMEONE (ahem, Sarah) told me Toledo was very cold. And since I couldn’t figure out how to get the TV on and the internet was pretty shaky, I decided to wear jeans. Not my finest choice. But it was good! We saw lots of cool things. A lot of cathedrals and castles and swords and famous paintings and such. After the tour, we grabbed some lunch and headed back to hotel which is super pretty. My roomie and I spent our three hour break just chatting in our room. We then had a meeting with the San Sebastian directors just to go over some random details about San Sebastian. We found out some interesting things! Like, my university ID will get me like 2 hour spa dates for like 6 euros, and lots of other interesting things. I also found out that San Sebastian is known as two things: the smiling city and the running city. I like both of those things! Maybe I’ll fit in better than I thought...

Tonight was lots of fun. I’m enjoying getting to know my classmates quite a lot! There was lots of laughs and lots of gelado tonight, which always make for a good night. I’m ready to be in San Sebastaian! So ready. Pray for our team as we make the 7 hour journey north! Vos amo! (That means I love you all! Or at least that what Nick says it is…)

exciting times!

Well! It has been a very interesting time thus far. Here’s a (fairly) quick recap. Nick and I had a 1 hour 50 minute layover in Dulles. However, our flight in K-Town was delayed 1 hour 30 minutes, thus presenting a few problems. By the time we got to Dulles we had exactly 20 minutes to make our connecting flight to Madrid. But, we ended up sitting on the runway for about 10 of those minutes. After exiting the plane and waiting for our checked carry-ons we had about 5-7 minutes to book it from gate C1 to D21…yeah. So, Nick took our rolling checked items, I took our bags and his laptop and we just started sprinting. I will never, ever laugh at people doing that ever again…ever. I was a bit ahead of Nick (I wasn’t carrying like 75 lbs. of luggage…) and when I got about to D1 (halfway point) I noticed the Arrival/Departure board and next to Madrid it said Closed. Well, we kept all out running, and when our gate came into sight, there was no one there except the lady who takes your tickets. She asked me if I was supposed to be on the Madrid flight and after I wheezed out a yes, she went running. She told them “they’re here” and asked them to open the doors back for us! For real. So, we made it. Right about that time, we realized that if we had hardly made it, our luggage definitely hadn’t. No good, but we were just so thankful to be on the plane, we didn’t care much.

All of that running was probably in vain because we sat out on the tarmac for about an hour. For all of that excitement, the flight was very uneventful. We played Who Wants to be a Millionaire and watched some movies, nothing too exciting. When it finally landed and we had made it through the Madrid airport maze, we got to the luggage conveyor belt. We were kind of dreading the whole experience because we could only imagine that trying to explain lost luggage in a foreign country would be no fun. However, our luggage was literally the first two pieces that came out (LIFO? ha, accounting joke). We kind of freaked out. Y’all must have been praying hard because…that’s just awesome! After we excitedly grabbed our luggage, we headed over to the pay phone to see if we could figure out how to call our hotel and get the shuttle to come pick us up. Right then, this sweet airline worker came up, showed us how to use the pay phone (don’t judge, it was confusing), called the hotel for us, AND told us where it would be picking us up. It was fabulous.

Once we got to the hotel, we had to wait around till check-in time. Nick dominated me in Phase 10 and UNO ( I was obviously tired and not on my a-game…and I did beat him in Life and Scrabble on the plane). We got checked in, cleaned up, and decided to head out to waste some time before going to bed. Our goal was to stay awake till 7pm to see if we could start getting our bodies adjusted…but we only made it till 5pm. I then slept til 3am (~10 hrs) and then again from 4am-10am, so I was in pretty good shape. We ended up calling a taxi to take us from our hotel by the airport to the one ISA had booked for us and immediately checked in. That’s when all of the ISAers started flooding in. We not only started meeting people from our group but also from the Salamanca and Sevilla groups. Super fun! The San Sebastian team took a bus tour of the city and then had a quick meeting. After that, Nick and I and our two friends grabbed some dinner (lomo con queso, yum!) and headed to bed.

Sorry for the long post...it’s just been so exciting thus far! Tomorrow is another day in Madrid and then the next day we head to Toledo for one night. From there, we will take a 7 hour bus ride to San Sebastian. I love Madrid, and I’m sure I’ll enjoy Toledo, but I am so ready to be back in San Sebastian!! :) Please continue lifting Nick and I and the other students up. I love you all! :)

and so it begins...

So, I decided that a blog would be the best way to go about chronicling and sharing all about my study abroad trip. That way, if you want to know what's going on, you can come look, and if you don't, well, then, you're not reading this. And that way, I don't bug those people with too many e-mails. :) And, just for your information, 'aventuras' means 'adventures' in Basque, the native language of San Sebastian.

I am so beyond excited! I haven't packed per se, however, I have some very neat and orderly piles of stuff on my floor. It didn't really even hit me until today that I'm leaving for Spain in two days. I actually had a little mini panic attack in Target after explaining to the pharmacist that I needed enough Zyrtec-D to last me until I got back (generally not a great plan...they're a little stingy with their pseudoephedrine), but Mom made me breathe (in and out), and I was on my way.

So...that's where I am spending the next 5 weeks of my life. Probably one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. For those of you that don't know, I will be taking 6 hours of Economics classes at a local university and interning at a local business that teaches the Basque people conversational English. Please keep Nick and I and the other study abroad students in your thoughts and prayers as we travel!