The last five weeks... of this trip at least ;)

               And so starts the reality check of the 5 week mark. I’ve made it through 34 weeks already, which in all honesty feels like it happened in a day. At this point in time, while I still have some time left here, I’m going to do a little reflecting that I’ll let you guys in on. To think what I’ve done in these past 34 weeks is a little overwhelming. I keep thinking ‘I did all that?’ it’s quite extraordinary, actually, the things you can accomplish by studying abroad and the unexpected things that happened.

                Here’s a little summary of some of the most memorable things that happened or things that stuck out in my mind:

So far I have:

• -    Traveled to 10 different countries and to 2 continents

All the red dots are the places that I've been lucky enough to have traveled to!

• -        Played charades due to language barriers (sometimes better than other times) in 10 different countries and 2 continents

• -        Opened my 1^st bank account in Spain

• -    Had to use 4 different types of money

• -        Become a temporary student resident of Spain

• -        Had to actually pay taxes in Spain

• -        Moved into my 1^st apartment ever to live with españoles

• -        Haven’t taken any English classes since last April

UGR Centro de Lenguas Modernas --- The Center of Modern Language aka my school :)

• -        Made Granada a third home

So much love for this place

• -        Eaten enough Kebab for a lifetime (what up, Kebab King. Anyone that has ever been to Granada will understand)

• -        Watched the sunrise at 8am after dancing all night long

• -        Watched the sunset over Florence at the Michelangelo lookout with great friends

• -        Been able to go to the Cologne/Koln Christmas markets

• -        Made best friends that, at the moment, I cannot imagine living without (shout out, Rachel and Hannah)

True love

• -        Become a regular at a few tapas restaurants (and consequently, sometimes get some free goodies from the waiter-friends!)

• -        Taught social and natural science in Spanish to 7 and 8 year old kids at Colegio Caja Granada

• -        Realized that I will be returning to Spain in 2013 to hopefully continue teaching somewhere in Andalucía upon my graduation from Pitt

• -       I’ve been able to improve my Spanish skills immensely by studying and living here for an incredible, wonderful, eye-opening, everything 8 months

• -        Grown as a person in ways that are simply indescribable and incredible to me
  

What’s even more incredible is that this isn’t even half of it. I cannot wait to aprovechar –take advantage of- the rest of this experience and the 5 weeks I have left :)

Hasta pronto, queridos <3

Until soon, loved ones <3

Semana Santa

                About two weeks ago, España had a 10 day break of school to celebrate Semana Santa, known in English as Holy Week. Holy Week here should be on everybody’s bucket list in my opinion. It was nothing like I’d ever seen before. It started Saturday, April 1^st. Holy Week here is filled with processions throughout the city of floats, first with a depiction of Jesus followed by a float of the Virgin Mary. The whole procession has an order that every procession follows. (keep in mind, this is a rough description) It always starts with someone carrying a cross in the front, then a lot of people dressed up in pointy face covers (more about that later) then some depiction of Jesus, then women dressed in black with big black veils on carrying a rosary, and followed by the Virgin Mary.

                For any American, the sight of the uniforms for the persons of these processions is a bit unsettling at first. Why you ask? Well, the sight of these uniforms is linked to a horrible time in our history and quite an awful group, the Ku Klux Klan. The uniforms are a large cloak with one of the pointy head pieces where you can only see the eyes. Each procession has a designated color ranging from blue to deep purple to brown to white (where it really reminds you of the KKK) 

The uniforms from the first procession we saw

The paso of Jesus on a donkey

The women in black veils with a rosary that always precede the Virgin Mary float

The Virgin Mary paso

Each procession also has a name. Some of the ones that I saw included Jesus’ sentencing, the Last Supper, and the Penetencia. The floats or ‘pasos’ are extremely large and very heavy. This gets interesting with the streets of Granada because some of the streets are very narrow. The people who carry the pasos are called ‘costaleros. And yes, you did read that correctly, people carry these giant things. There are, on average, 30-60 costaleros for each paso. Well, logically the question comes up of ‘Why would they have people carry this extremely heavy float when, well, they know the wheel exists’ (Seinfeld reference? I’ll put a little refresher in: I'll tell you what I like about Chinese people. They're hanging in there with the chopsticks,aren't they? You know they've seen the fork. They're staying with the sticks. I don't know how they missed it. Chinese farmer gets up, works in the field with a shovel all day. Shovel. Spoon. Come on. You're not plowing 40 acres with a couple of pool cues!) I was curious about this as well so, while I was learning in my Flamenco class about Semana Santa, I asked this question to my professor. It turns out the people feel extremely honored when they get to carry the paso. The crowd also loves the illusion of movement that happens when people carry it. The costaleros are hidden underneath and the movements from them walking makes the figures of Jesus, Mary, the disciples, etc. look like they’re actually moving too and are real. The crowds go crazy for this life like-ness. 

The feet of the costaleros underneath the paso

More of the outfits from the processions

A paso of Jesus in Plaza Trinidad

This is the outfit that the costaleros wear while underneath the paso

The Virgin Mary squeezing between some of the narrow streets in Plaza Trinidad

Some of the white outfits at night

Yeah, real freaky for anyone who has studied American history

One of the larger Jesus paso's

                I saw a total of 5 processions in the one day I was in Granada for Semana Santa before heading out to Mallorca. One of my friends, Maria Angeles and her sister, Eva, love going around seeing all of them so they took me along with them! It was a lot of fun and nice to have people who were knowledgeable as to where everything was, the names, etc.

                In the middle of Semana Santa, I left a rainy and chilly Granada for the island of Mallorca (which, actually was rainy and chill for the second day we were there but I digress). The rest of the days in Mallorca were sunny, beautiful and a bit windy. The beach and beachy atmosphere of the city were very nice and appropriate for a little beach vacay :)

Beautiful Mallorca

:)

A lovely day at the beach watching all the windsurfers in the background

Our view from coffee at one of Kristen's favorite places

                That sums up my Semana Santa. It was much different than anything I had ever experience in the US. Holy Week is a huge deal here and I wasn’t accustomed to that from the states. It was such a cool sight to see!

Catching up

So about the whole being better at blogging thing… I’m reeeeally sorry about that. It’s already April 10^th, (HOW?!) and now I’ve realized that I haven’t posted anything since February 23^rd which seems like just yesterday. Since then, I’ve made it over to Morocco (incredible), Rome (with API. So awesome), London & Ireland (with my wonderful brother), and I just got back from Palma de Mallorca where I went for spring break with one of my best friends, Rachel. Whew, I cannot believe I’ve done that much just in these few short weeks that I haven’t spoken to you guys. Dios mio.

                I’ll have to do blogs later on about all those trips (I have to admit, I have not yet written any of them. I swear though that they will be written and read by you wonderful people who are following this creation of mine) Long travels short, Morocco was simply exquisite. It was so different but there were many traces of Granada in there as well. Chefchaouen aka the blue painted city was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. Rome was very cool as well. Our hotel was by Vatican City so that is where I spent a lot of time. We got blessed by the Pope at Sunday mass, saw the Vatican museum & the Sistene Chapel, the Colosseum, and the Trevi Fountain. Rome is definitely too big of a city for my liking if I were to live there or stay there for an extended period of time but it was just insane seeing all the old stuff there. It was a huge history trip (and for those fellow readers of Dan Brown’s Angels and Demons, yes I was in heaven walking around seeing all the things from the book).

                After our API trip to Rome, Italy, my brother came to visit shortly thereafter! He came at the end of March for about 2 weeks. We were in Granada for the first bit which was just lovely so he could see and experience Granada. After a few days in Granada and my midterms (yuck), we left for our 6 day trip to London and Ireland! We went to London for 2 nights where we were definitely tourists, which was totally okay with me for this trip. We saw a The Comedy of Errors at the National Theatre our first night there. The next day we were alllll over the place seeing Churchill’s War Rooms, Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London, doing the Thames River Cruise and seeing Big Ben, the parliament, and the London Eye as well. Then we moved over to Ireland going to Dublin, Galway, and Cork. Ireland was beautiful and I miss it terribly. I loved it there. In Cork, we went to Blarney Castle which was so much cooler than I ever expected. We got to climb in, around, and underneath the castle and walk around the breathtaking gardens that surrounded it. Galway was a little quaint town that was a lot of what I pictured a little Irish town to be. Dublin was a bigger city but I loved it all the same. I’m definitely going to be trying to go back there in the future.

                And then we’re at Semana Santa! Otherwise known as Holy Week in Spain. I was in Granada until Wednesday of Semana Santa so I was able to see some of the spectacular processions before I left for the island life. And the processions were just that, nothing short of spectacular. I have pictures that will be up soon. So happy that I got to see them in Granada because we stumbled upon one while we were in Palma and didn’t have anything on Granada’s.  I then left a rainy Granada (yeah, first time it rained in a looooong while) for a sunny Palma de Mallorca. Rachel and I went to visit our friend Kristen from last semester who is studying in Palma right now and also to meet up with her aunt and uncle who were in Palma for a bike camp. We had such a fantastic, relaxing week. We strolled around Palma and spent our last 2 days at the beach.

                Now I’m back in Granada for a good bit. I have not further trips planned except for our last excursion with API to Cadiz in May. I might take some day trips here and there but I’m going to enjoy being in Granada for these last 6 weeks too. Time has FLOWN and I am not liking it one bit. I’m grateful for these past 7 months I’ve been given but am terribly sad that I only have a month and a half left here. I can’t quite fathom leaving yet.

                I’m off to hit the sack before my second day of class back after break tomorrow.

Besos y abrazos a todos

Katie