Top Ten Things I Like/Dislike about Spain (Thus Far)

Part Two in my attempt to make up for my terrible neglect of this blog comes to you in the form of a list. Two lists, if you want to get technical.

Top 10 Things I Like About Spain:

1) The Sun: After five months of living in cloudy Paris, my skin was starting to look almost Anglo. The constant presence of El Sol has gotten me to the shade that normally takes me a week of serious tanning at the beach. I suspect that my race will be questionable (from Hindu to African American) by the end of the summer.

2) The Spaniards: Let's face it. Latin Americans had to have gotten their charm from somewhere. That somewhere is our Spanish roots. I feel like I'm in Peru with a funny accent.

3) Sangria: Really, do I need to explain this? A pitcher is only 17 euros, so if you get 6 people together it comes out to less than 3 euro a person.

4) Seafood: I fall under the category of "foodie," which means that I love food. Eating it, making it, talking about it, fantasizing over it, etc. I'm in seafood heaven (see pictures from previous post).

5) No Strikes: I'm all for everyone fighting for their rights, but the Spirit of the Greve has worn me down. Spaniards are way more laid back about this thing.

6) Bar culture: This is on par with Cafe culture in France. Starting around 9, you'll see people of all ages each night enjoying their drinks while conversing and people watching.

7) My Host Family: They're pretty awesome people.

8) The Accent: It sounds just so gosh darn classy. I also like that they emphasize the difference between the c, s, and z sounds, something we lack in Latin America. The 's' is a defined 'sssss' sound, while the 'z' is a hard 'th'. The 'c' is is just in between.

9) Fully understanding the language: I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty gosh darn good at French. However, how I felt surrounded by French is completely different from how I feel surrounded by Spanish. It gives me a sense of comfort and home that French lacks, being my third language and all.

10) Little towns/cities: Much like France and all of Europe, Spain has some great places to visit. The cities are much smaller than Paris, which is really nice. It's your basic layout: cathedral, castle, and the neighborhoods that surround them. I'm also having a lot of fun looking at the architecture.


Top 10 Things I Don't Like About Spain:

1) The Sun: It gets up to 44 degrees (110 Fahrenheit) daily. That plus the sun beating down until 10:30 at night can make the days unbearable, especially on my round trip 3 mile walk between home and university. Spain also has dry heat, so I'm in a perpetual state of thirst.

2) Mullets: Spanish guys my age thinks this is a cool hairstyle. *barfs*

3) Man-pris: What are man-pris? It's the capri pants for a man. They're called "piratas" here (translation: pirate pants). Combine that with a mullet and you've got Spanish college fashion. Basically, if I were to ever consider dating a Spanish guy, he'd have to be of the late 20s/early 30s range.

4) The bread: It just pales in comparison to Parisian bakeries. I've been spoiled rotten.

5) The diet: As much as I love Spanish dishes, the basic diet here is meat and potatoes. This gets graphic, but I've been in a perpetual state of constipation since I've arrived.

6) Voice overs: I hate them anyway in any language, unless it's a cartoon, but Spaniard voice overs on TV shows are just creepy. Just look at the Miley Cyrus clip from my previous post. And yes, this voice over is different from what Latin America gets. VERY. DIFFERENT.

7) Everyone smokes: Not as much as the Frenchies, but still enough to get to me.

8) Siesta: I have a love/hate relationship with siesta. From 2-5 pm everyday the entire town shuts down. After lunch, you're supposed to nap for several hours. As someone who HATES napping (it makes me feel ill afterwards) this is quite the problem. See, I planned on getting things done during siesta. Unfortunately, it's just too hot to do anything but just lay there in bed. I think I'm going to start swimming laps in the pool to combat this.

9) No air conditioning: I know, it's very American of me to complain about this. Normally, I have no problem with not having air in a dry climate. But when it hits over 100 degrees, a little air would be fine.Unfortunately, you can't open the blinds and windows up until 10, because the sun cancels out any breeze that might cool a room.

10) Eating hours: Breakfast and lunch are fine. I have no problem eating at 8 am and then 4 pm. Cool. But dinner's not until 10:30. You're supposed to sleep right afterward, which I can't do until I fully digest. When I'm in Peru I'll eat this late occasionally, but that's followed up with a night of going out. This is getting a lot better, though.

Let's talk my first weekend in Spain...

My first weekend in Spain was…exhausting, but still a lot of fun. I touched down at the Barajas airport after a somewhat rushed morning in Paris and a hectic incident at the counter. By “hectic” I mean “I had to pay a lot of money in over-weight charges because they lowered the weight limit.”

Let’s not talk about that.

My two cousins (really, they’re uncles, but so close to me in age that we just call each other cousins), Gonzalo and Claudio, were waiting for me at arrivals. I hadn’t seen them in about 8 years, so you could say I was super happy to see them. Claudio took us to his house, which is a little outside of Madrid, so that I could greet Katty, his wife, and meet his three kids.

I already knew the eldest, Kira (9), but the last time I saw her was when she was a baby. Man, I felt so old when I saw her. She has two younger siblings, Fernanda (6) and Claudito (4). They’re all quite energetic and talking a mile a minute once I walked through the front door. Super cute =). I’ll need to get pics of them once I go back to visit.

We went out to eat and then for a brief tour of Madrid. We hit the main sights: The Royal Palace, Cathedral, Plaza Mayor, and such. Look at the pictures that I took on my other trip to Madrid and pretend that I took them that day =). Claudio also took some pics, but he still has to e-mail them to me.






Unfortunately, it started to rain so we headed back home. I spent the night repacking my summer clothes into one suitcase while watching Hannah Montana in Español with Kira and Fernanda. Hannah Montana dubbed sounds CREEPY. Click the link below to get a look.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNDZQfXurhU

Later that night we took a tour of Alcalá and ate a tapas dinner at this really fancy restaurant. Check out some of the delicious seafood!

Anyway, we ended up having a midnight dinner, which seemed odd to me but is actually pretty normal in Spain. Nice.

Sunday, I got up really early to go to the Barajas airport and meet up with the rest of UA in Spain. Stephanie Bailey and Trevvor are on this trip, so I was super happy to see some Bama friends. I also met some new ones: Brooke, John, Alex, and Trey. More on them later.

We headed out to meet our families in Alcalá de Henares. It’s about 30 minutes outside of Madrid, but we can take trains and buses at any time to go into the city.

My family is really Spanish and crazy, which is awesome! They even have my last name, but it’s actually pretty common in Spain. Here’s a briefing on them. I really want to do a post just dedicated to them soon.

Javier (Javi): My host dad. He’s really cool and has a black belt in Karate.

Mari: My super talkative and lovely host mom. This woman never fails to keep me entertained.

Cristina: My eldest host sister. She’s 16, really nice, and has a crush on Hayden Christensen.

Sandra: My 15 year old host sister. We watch Desperate Housewives together.

Marta: My adorable 5 year old host sister. She’s convinced I’m lying to her about being American, because I speak Spanish so well.

We also have three dogs: Chispi (a Westie who is my constant companion), Benji (grey terrier of some sort), and Guafa (a 5 month old lab mix puppy).

I also met my roommate, Danielle. She goes to Bama, too, but with having 24,000 students at our school I’d never met her. She’s really nice, and we get along really well. I don’t think we’ll have any major roommate issues this summer =).

Later that night we took a tour of Alcalá and ate a tapas dinner at this really fancy restaurant. Check out some of the delicious seafood!