Being the Token Southern Girl

Over the course of the past few weeks, it has been brought to my attention that I might be the only true-blooded southerner on this Sweet Briar program in Spain. What defines one as a true-blooded southerner other than the frequent use of the word yall? Well, for one, a southerner who chooses not to leave the south to receive a fine education. (Grey and Liz might be from the south...but they bailed for a northern education!) And who also might have a cute little southern accent occasionally. And, this story explains more...

Spencer: My middle name is Earl. It's a family name.
Me: 'Caus Earl had to die...
5 seconds of awkwardness in a group of 8 people...
Joan: I got it Sarah.

For those of you who haven't caught on, that was a reference to a dixie chick's song that every southerner knows/should know. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw7gNf_9njs

See this youtube video for enlightenment if need be.

In any case, in a southern situation, at least 3/4 of the group would have either a) laughed at my joke or b) thought of it before me. But no, I'm in a very northern situation, and so everyone gets to make fun of me (with love in their hearts, i know) for being a small town southern girl. :)

On another note, I went to the beach this weekend! We took a group trip to Chiclana, but went first to Jerez, where we did a sherry tasting. I hate sherry. It. Is. So. Gross.

Chiclana was lovely! We stayed in a really nice 4 star hotel with an incredible buffet for dinner, breakfast, and lunch. Why is a buffet so impressive? Well, for 3 weeks (and for the next 3 months), none of us get a say in what we eat. We eat what our host families prepare, which might be delicious or might be a plate full of asparagus (true life, that was my dinner Thursday night...with little bitty shrimps and onions in a plateful of asparagus). So having so many delicious choices in front of you really rocked our worlds. They also had absolutely delicious french fries...like the thick cut kind they have at steak houses. If the ketchup hadn't tasted like non-American ketchup, I might've felt completely American. And they had omelets made-to-order (I miss commons!).

In addition to eating like a pig, I went to the beach, took some sun (a direct english translation from a great spanish phrase), and finished reading the first Harry Potter book in spanish.  It was lovely! Harry beat Voldemort! Who would have guessed? Kate bought the second, and Maria bought the third, so Kate is bringing me the second tomorrow. I'm pumped.

Tomorrow is the first day of university classes! Ah! I have five hours of class in a row: 2 hours of The Projection of the 3 Cultures: Muslims, Jews, and Christians in Spain; 2 hours of The Arabic Influence on Spanish Literature; 1 hour of Artistic Techniques...a course directly in the university with a bunch of spaniards and a professor who won't slow down for foreigners. In any case, it'll be a long 5 hours of classes, but it'll be nice that I'm completely done with class at 2! I'll stick some magdalenas in my purse (muffins) to snack on between classes...since apparently it's a faux pas to munch in classes in Spain. Not that I ever munch during classes at Davidson, but the option is always there...

Replaced by a Spanish/Scottish Baby.

Any older siblings out there? Remember that feeling of utter rejection when your younger sibling was born and no one cared about you anymore? Well, let's be real; I'm that cute little younger sibling, and I'm sure Jay had a terrible time of being rejected for my preciousness as a wee child. But I've got a problem now! My host sister (who lives en casa con her boyfriend from Scotland) just had a baby. And when I say just, I mean just. She brought that baby home from the hospital on Sunday.  Baby Esperanza! She's so precious! I'm not sure of cultural norms with babies, so when I sit next to them, I always wonder, "could I poke that baby's belly and talk about how cute it is, or would that be crossing a line that might not exist in the US of A?" So I sit there awkwardly and say things like "Que preciosa!"

In any case, the baby really is adorable! But what's gotten less adorable is dinner time. The whole fam is enamored by Esperanza (and who can blame them?)...that well...the older children (who also happen to be 20 year old Americans) have been rejected a bit. Lots of sandwiches...which, well, can be strange in Spain. Example: Last night's dinner: white bread, hot dogs cut in half, mayonnaise, lettuce, white bread, cheese, butter, white bread. I wasn't quite feeling it. Another sandwich tonight, but it was much better. Still not fantastic. We're supposed to tell our fam's when we don't like something, but my southern upbringing is making that difficult. Every day, when she asks, "Os gusta?!" how can I really say no?!  Well, i tried it out tonight. It was difficult, but I said, well, I don't really like sausages alot.... (hoping that saying that about the sausage in my bocadillo tonight would also encompass the "sausages" aka hotdogs from last night).

But I don't blame them, really! I mean, they have tons of family coming over all the time (hide yourself in your room so as not to interrupt family time? what's appropriate?) to see this precious new baby, and they don't wanna make me a good dinner! I just like good dinner....

Haha but all is well!! It really doesn't matter, because I do love the family, the baby, la vida sevillana! In fact, I've been trying to find more ways to immerse myself in la lengua espanola. I just googled popular Spanish songs to add to my "canciones espanolas" playlist on itunes!  Most of the songs I found were in English, but I added a few, including some Shakira excellence.  I'm also reading the first Harry Potter in Spanish. Harry's about to try on the Sorting Hat! Ah! Don't pick Slytherin!

Writing this blog doesn't exactly help my Spanish immersion, but lucky for all of my faithful readers, I will continue to update you on my life every now and then! :)

Last weekend, I went to Italica, a city about 30 min from Sevilla with a whole bunch of Roman ruins! It was cool, but not superguay. Guay means cool. Add super in front of it, and you have superguay!  Then on Sunday, we went on a hike aka senderismo.  It ended up not being a hike through any mountains but more of a 18 km walk on a pathway next to the mountains. At the end, we swam in this beautiful litter waterfall that was also FREEZING, like knock the breath out of you cold. On the bus back from rando town to Sevilla, well, we were stranded when the bus broke down. Got on another one, and eventually made it home.

This weekend, well, I don't quite yet know what's in store! I do know I'll be going to a futbol game! There are 2 Sevilla teams: Betis y Sevilla. Neither is something to write home about (although I guess you could say I'm writing home about both right now...), but Sevilla is slightly better. I don't yet have allegiance to one or the other, but we're watching Sevilla play on Saturday!

We're almost done with week 2 of orientation classes! I also plan on taking my first ballet class (in Spanish? with French words? Crazy) tomorrow.  I'm ready to get my regular schedule going with University courses!  We still have one more week of orientation classes, and then on to the cool classes!

Sevilla! Sevilla! La Mejor Ciudad en el Mundo!

Sevilla!! Prepare yourselves for a relatively long post, because I’ve got lots o stuff to talk about!

I’m here!  On Wednesday, Jay arrived back home after 3 months in South America.  We overlapped only about 2 hours at our lovely home in Oxford, GA before I left for the airport, but in that 2 hour period of time, he unpacked his backpack so that I could pack it up with a bunch of my stuff. We shared a delicious family meal—the perfect burger (I had to have a super-American meal before leaving for 3.5 months!), and I was on my way!  I flew from Atlanta to JFK to meet with my group, then from JFK to Madrid, then from Madrid to Sevilla. A longgggg day of flying, but I was sitting between my new friend Kate who is on this program and a girl who was headed to study in Valencia with UVA.  All in all, the long flight was enjoyable with fun people on either side of me!  Kate was the first person I met on my program when I arrived at JFK. I was rather flustered trying to meet up with the group, and the Iberia terminal was a madhouse. A random security woman threw me in the middle of the line with another person with a Sweetbriar College Junior Year in Spain (JYS) tag. And that person was Kate!

When we arrived in Sevilla, I learned that my roommate would be Meital Caplan from Northwestern.  About half of the people on the program are from Northwestern, but it’s funny because very few of them know each other particularly well! So Meital and I live with a really awesome family in a really awesome barrio (neighborhood): Los Remedios.  Actually, as I write this, I’m sitting on the balcony of our homestay looking at some sort of café on the street below. It’s a beautiful day, in a beautiful area!  We live on Calle Asunción, which is a medium sized-pedestrian friendly-shopping street.  It only takes about 15 minutes to walk to the center of town, where the JYS office and Universidad de Sevilla are.  Our apartment is soooo much bigger than I expected! Meital and I actually have our own rooms, which I was not expecting at all.  In general, the apartment is much bigger than most in Europe. And it has wifi, so it’s easy for me to post my blog for all my fans! 

My family is so nice! My host mom is Esperanza, but she prefers to go by Pechi, a nickname she’s had since birth (shout out to my mama Buncie, who has a similar situation!).  Her daughter, Pechi 2, is probably in her late 20s, and lives at home in the room next to mine with her husband(?) or boyfriend from Scotland. She is very pregnant, so we’re going to have a baby in the house by the end of September!  She met her husband/boyfriend in Scotland when she studied English there for 2 years. He barely speaks any Spanish, which is cute with the whole family.  Pechi 2 has 3 brothers, but none of them live at home right now. 

I love my family! And my roommate! Her Spanish is better than mine (both parents are Argentinian, so she gets to practice with them. Too bad my parents aren’t so cool. Just kidding!) But in no way does she try to speak for me when I get tongue-tied.  In fact, today she was saying that she thinks roommate pairs were done by level, which means that I’m in the highest level! Yay!!!  I should hope some of this travelling would pay off.  Also, I didn’t even realize this, but apparently I have to take a class directly in the university because I’m in the higher level…which is cool, because I wanted to do it anyways.  Yay immersion!  Really, my whole home life here is an awesome situation. And since I have earplugs, I don’t think it’ll be too bad having a baby next door either. J

So! That’s the lay of the land in Sevilla! Now a bit about what I’ve been doing since arriving!  I won’t go into detail about everything, so have no fear. 

Throughout Sevilla, they have these bikes. Similar to community bikes at Davidson? Well, they’re all throughout the community, but that’s about it.  You pay 10 € to rent them for 30 minute periods of time for one week. So Meital and I rented some for the week! It’s been so nice! There are parking stations all around the city, and I’m looking down at one right next to our apartment.  You just type in your number, choose a bike, and ride! It’s a fun way to explore, enjoy the sun, and get some exercise.  We rode all around yesterday, and it was lovely!

Last night, Meital and I went out for a night on the town with Kate and her roommate Maria.  It was a hilarious night, largely because of this one incident con los tejanos.  Seriously, they embarrassed Texans everywhere!  So here’s the story:

As a group, we really try to speak a lot in Spanish. Everyone wants to improve, so we try to as much as possible. It’s really easy to fall into the English trap, and we do occasionally, but we definitely speak a lot of Spanish.  In fact, this blog is totally messing with my Spanish flow, so my loyal readers, be grateful that I write it. J Anyways, the 4 of us only spoke Spanish for the 5 hours that we were out and about (yes, we were out from midnight to about 5 am, which is pretty typical for Spain).  At one point we saw a bunch of Americans.  Assuming that they might know some Spanish, and trying to keep with the language flow, we asked them their names and where they were from (in Spanish).  They responded with slightly confused faces in English, but for whatever reason, Meital y yo continuabamos hablar en español.  When they asked where we were from, I said Atlanta, but 10 minutes later, they asked if I spoke any English.  I responded, “solo un poquito.”  So you can imagine how the next hour went.  Meital and I were both Sevillanas who only spoke a bit of English, and Kate and Maria became our translators when we were “confused” by the English the Texans spoke or when they were legitimately confused by the Spanish we spoke.  We began referring to them as los idiotas, because truly, they were. We’ve got good Spanish, but we will always have an accent. And they literally had no idea. They said they were here to study Spanish and had taken a few classes but hadn’t learned anything. Again, an embarrassment to Texans everywhere. 

So today is Sunday, and I had planned to go to mass at the giant awesome Cathedral with some friends, but for whatever reason, my alarm didn’t go off. The alarm on my phone doesn’t seem to have an option of am or pm, so maybe it’ll go off tonight at 11:20? Yo no sé. In any case, I woke up at 12:30 this afternoon and began reading some Harry Potter in Spanish. We had some delicious gazpacho and pasta, and who knows what the day has in store for me now! We begin orientation classes tomorrow, but until then, I’m just chillin in Sevilla, la major ciudad en todo el mundo!

Oh, and a disclaimer about my blog for anyone who cares:

This will not be a work of art. In fact, I will probably write quite spazztically often!  Please excuse the lack of poetry here.  I frankly don’t want to spend that kinda time on this blog! Really, I just want people to know what’s going on in my exciting Spanish life, so I’m gonna write it, and I’m gonna write it fast. J