Hola!
Can’t believe it’s been nearly a week since I’ve been gone from the United States. Time has definitely flown by. Since the last post, I moved in with my Spanish host family, traveled to Spain’s northeastern coast to see Barcelona, and started my business classes.
After a second night at Hotel Fernando in Seville, my host mom, Teresa, met me and my roommate at the hotel and we taxied back to her apartment, about a 30 minute walk away from the TTU Center where classes are held. After unpacking, Teresa rode the bus with us so we could get a feel for navigating the routes to and from school. Instead of busing back, we just walked. There are some nice sights along the route, including a huge park, the University of Seville, a casino, a couple fancy restaurants, and a nice fountain. All in all a pretty good walk. The weather has also been perfect at 70-80 degrees. Back in the US, I would definitely drive somewhere if it took 30 minutes to walk, but here a half-hour walk to get somewhere is the norm. Very few people drive cars within the city because parking spaces are so limited and the bus system is pretty efficient.
Teresa’s apartment is small by US standards but mid-size over in Spain. I would guess it’s about 700 square feet in total, and that includes three bedrooms. Her food is incredible though. We eat three home-cooked meals with her a day when we’re in Seville. She is also super nice and even speaks a bit of English when my roommate and I are struggling to communicate a thought.
Since I’ll be studying in Spain for just a month, I am traveling every weekend to get the most out of my time in Europe. The first trip was last weekend to the incredible coastal city of Barcelona. Palm trees dot the coast, mountains line the horizon, history abounds from nearly every corner. All six of us had a blast, and it was definitely one of the prettiest places I have ever seen.
Since I have several friends who have studied abroad in Spain before, I got some recommendations for “must-sees” in Barcelona. These included the giant, as-of-yet-unfinished Sagrada Familia Basilica, the touristy Las Rambles city center, and two incredible parks (one designed mainly by the famous architect Antoni Gaudi). We definitely walked more than 20 miles over the weekend to see everything, so everyone is a bit sore today.
I definitely learned a lot during each step of the trip to Barcelona. The first adventure was navigating the Seville bus route in the wee hours of Saturday morning to get to the airport. Since my Spanish is painstakingly limited, I relied on maps and my IPhone GPS to find the train station, where the entire group decided to meet before heading to the airport. After a friend showed me how to use the Iphone’s real-time location tracker even without cell phone reception or wifi, I have been using it to double-check all my directions. At 6:30 in the morning in a city where you understand 30% of what people say, it’s nice to know that the ghost of Steve Jobs is looking out for you.
All six of us met at the train station about 6:45 and headed to the airport. This was my first experience on RyanAir, and if it wasn’t way cheaper than everything else, I probably would have flown with another airline. RyanAir makes you go through so many unnecessary steps as part of the boarding process. If you forget to print your boarding pass, it costs something like 30 Euros for them to print it for you; if your bag weighs more than 10 kg or is even slightly over their permitted dimensions, it’s a 60 Euro fine; if you don’t get your pre-printed boarding pass stamped by a RyanAir agent before going through airport security, you have to buy another boarding pass from them. Definitely ridiculous. Thankfully none of us had to pay any fines.
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| Sagrada Familia Basilica in Barcelona |
One of my favorite aspects of Barcelona was walking around as a group. Because we walked everywhere we went, we got to see lots of different sights we wouldn’t have otherwise seen. In addition to the main tourist attractions, we went to the Barcelona mall right on the ocean, the main nightlife hub of the city, and all sorts of cool buildings throughout the city. The trip was definitely more about the journey than any sort of concrete destination, and that made it all the better.
View of Barcelona
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for updates about this week’s adventures. Until then, I have homework to finish up because the “study” abroad aspect of the program is finally kicking in. My first class was today.
Adios!
Joseph
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