Hello all!

It’s been a while!  I’ve been thinking lately a lot about the little things in life.  Instead of giving you all a long run down of everything that’s happened, I’ll leave you with a list of some of the little things that bring joy and irony to my daily life in Spain.

It’s the little moments during the day that really matter…imagine yourself in my place.  It’s like when:

Ø      Your 80 year old art professor decides to repeatedly act out “erección” in the Dali museum.  Yeah, that word means what you think it does.

Ø      Barca kills the opposing team in an 8 to 0 victory, and everyone in the bar celebrates by happily swearing at the other team. 

Ø      Your host mom gives you the sex talk, European-style.

Ø      You get tipsy at 1:30pm in a museum…of Bacardi products.

Ø      A man decides to catcall you in the street, and a 90-year-old woman on the other side of the street yells “Shut up you son of a bitch!”

Ø      You ask a prostitute for a kleenex and she gives it to you.

Ø      A waiter asks you out in front of 4 of your friends.

Ø      You decide you have officially become an okupa of peeing due to lack of public bathrooms.

Ø      In grammar class, you are all bored while talking about words ending in –ia, and then your dear friend Natalia jumps in with an enthusiastic “Sangria!”

Ø      Your grammar teacher counters “Sangria” with “Alegria” (Happiness).

Ø      While at a football game at Camp Nou, YOU SEE MESSI!

Ø      Messi scores a goal.  While you are watching live!

Ø      The 5 year old boy that you are teaching English drops a toy and immediately goes, “JODER!” (FUCK!).  Four seconds later, he asks you how to say it in English, because he wants to tell his mom he learned something cool.

Ø      You get the pleasure of hearing two drunk girls sing “Tonight’s gonna be a good night” for 11 metro stops at 4:30 am.

Ø      You have made public your distaste for bodily hair on men.

Ø      Your school building reminds you a little bit of Harry Potter every time you enter.

Ø      Watching the fashion on the metro every morning is one of your main sources of entertainment every day.

Ø      Finally you find one person in the entirety of Europe that understands and is respectful of your decision to be vegetarian.

Ø      Your art professor compares Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo with gladiators…and each other.

Ø      Pasapalabra.  It’s a game show that is all about words and guessing what word the announcer is describing.  It’s like my favorite thing about this country.

Ø      A man on the Ramblas has told you “I luffff you”.

Ø      Every time you look around, it’s obvious that Spanish men are a lot more open to femininity than American men.

Ø      You ask your intercambio if he’s gay.  He says no.  You continue to think and treat him like he’s gay, because gaydar does not work in Spain.

Ø      You get any type of written communication in your mailbox.  It’s usually a note from the school or from the program director, but all mail is awesome.

Ø      Someone has attempted to entice you to a bar by offering Xupitos and novios.  (Shots and boyfriends.)

Ø     You go to the Ramblas after Barca wins "el clasico," the huge rivalry between Barcelona and Madrid.  You stay there singing "Ese portugues, hijo puta es" (referencing Cristiano Ronaldo as a son of a bitch) and "Villa Maravilla" until 1am.  Oh yeah, and you have a final you didn't study for in 9 hours. 

That's all for now lovlies!  Tomorrow I leave for a two week trip around Spain.  There will be pictures and stories I'm sure...

<3 Besitos, Mandy

HayBeahOoo, maldita Francia, and a bowl full of pasta.

Hello friends!

It’s been a while!  Don’t worry; I’m still alive (despite the crazy drivers…right Natalia?).  Now for a quick update:  last “weekend” (really 5 days) I went to Sort, a smallish town in a valley in the north of Spain surrounded by mountains.  It was a lot of fun…and pretty action-packed.  We explored the town, learned some history… “learned”, hiked 9 miles up and down a mountain, and rode horses!  We also went to a castle and a salt cave.  It was fun to hang out in the hotel that looked an awful lot like a castle to me, though maybe I have just been reading too much Don Quijote!  My brain has been addled by reading too many libros de caballerias. 

So, to address the first part of my title – HayBeahOoo.  I joined a Christian group here in Spain called GBU, but in Spanish we say it like HayBeahOoo.  It’s been a lot of fun so far, and I’ve made some friends!!  FINALLY!!!  Hopefully it continues to be wonderful J

Secondly, maldita sea Francia.  Yes, I am hating on France.  Before coming to Europe, I held the stereotype that the people in France are slightly ruder than in most other countries.  Coming to Europe has not changed my mind.  A friend of mine went to France and had some not so great experiences with the French public.  All of my Spanish friends have told me that the French are not the most polite.  And just when I wanted to travel to/through France the whole darn country goes on strike!  How inconsiderate is that!?!  Ruined my travel plans.  Fine France, have it your way.  I won’t travel to/through you.  Which brings me to my third point…

Pasta.  Being rudely rejected by France and thus not being able to make it to Germany, Natalia and I are being forced to travel to…ROMA!  It’s a burden we’ll just have to bear.  So, from the 27^th to November 1^st, we’ll be strolling the streets of Roma.  Be on the lookout for some fantastic pictures on Facebook in the next couple weeks! 

Noticitas (Small news):

Ø      Still no novio…(boyfriend) but it’s not for lack of looking!

Ø      Barca is second in La Liga and very close to first!  Yeahhhhh David Villa!

Ø      My art history teacher still hasn’t taught us art.

Ø      We found out that clubs here really start around 1:30am…we went at 12/12:30…too early.

Ø      I’ve concluded that European money is much more fun than American money.  I think it’s the colors. 

Ø      I am the proud owner of bandana-esque parachute pants.  Pictures to come.

Ø      I am almost to the point where I can look at 19:37 and know what time it is…I am almost integrated into the European way!

Ø      I miss psychology classes.  I think this means it must be my destined career.

Ø      According to my palm, I will be faithful to my future husband, am most likely born in June, and come from a family with considerable wealth.

Ø      I miss hearing from you all!  Write me!

 Besitos!  <3 Mandita

I do my little turn on the catwalk...

Some would argue that Spain has an easier workload than Knox.  I would agree in terms of homework, but I think in terms of learning new things, my brain has been on overload since I got here.  I didn’t really think about having to relearn how everything works in a house for example, but in every household there are systematic ways of doing things.  Some families watch TV during dinner, some families ask their kids to run errands/do chores, and some families like to have family outings once a week.  Other families don’t.  Imagine relearning the way a household works…and at the same time relearning how everything in the entire country works.  The government, the transportation system, restaurants, school…everything here has been a learning experience, right down to the public restrooms.  And when you think you get the basics figured out, you still have to learn and deal with the cultural differences… which brings me to my point – European fashion. 

Ah, European fashion.  Known worldwide for being trendsetters in the fashion industry, Barcelona loves to keep up with the quickly changing pace of the fashion world…and I use quickly changing here in the sense that sometimes I see the fashion here and hope it will change quickly, because quite frankly sometimes “the look” here is just ridiculous.  Overalls are in.  Mullets and rattails are thriving among young men (and women!?) in Barcelona.  A combination of flipflops and boots are the popular footwear.  The worse two patterns clash, the more fashionable the look seems to be.  And then we have parachute pants with the crotch down near your knees or lower. 

Does this stop me from wanting parachute pants?  Absolutely not!  I just think they look a little absurd and ridiculous…but oh so comfortable!  However, the fashion here is taking me a little bit longer to get used to than the rest of the cultural aspects.

Disclaimer: I know I was a little sarcastic (really?) in this post...I don’t think that all Europeans follow awful trends or that all European fashion trends are awful or anything like that.  But in all seriousness, mullets will never ever ever be okay with me.  Ever.

Quick updates:

*I had a lot of fun this weekend at La Merced, a weekend-long festival celebrating the patron saint of Barcelona. (See pictures on Facebook)

*Still no Spanish boo

*David Villa got red carded on Saturday night for hitting someone in the face.  The man he hit deserved it.

*Lionel Messi will be back soon!  (He was injured in a very dirty game on the part of Athletic Madrid)

*I went to my first ever futbol game in Barcelona and learned quite a few useful words lol. 

*I finally uploaded some pictures to Facebook from the first few weeks in Barcelona!

Lots of love,

Mandita

Sex, Barça, and the Spanish way

Hola queridos,

After a few kind words of harassment from the audience at home and much ado about nothing, I am finally able to say that I find myself in this moment in the country of Spain, at the University of Barcelona, with access to a computer that has internet, and more than 3 minutes of free time.  Enbuenahora! (Finally!)  So here goes nothing.

First, the update I know you all are dying to hear about, and obviously the most important:  No I have not found the love of my life yet.  I've definitely seen some contenders though. ;)  I do want to state for the record that I am not going to do anything *too* crazy, and as Natalia tells me almost everyday, Europe means more choices, not lower standards.  However, my philosophy is more similar to window shopping, if you know what I mean...look, but don't touch!

My classes here in the University are unique to say the least.  This was my first week of real class, and I feel like I've learned so much about the people in Spain, and so little about the actual subject of the class.  For example, my favorite class is art history.  Those of you who are my better acquaintances will be shocked to hear this due to my long standing dislike for art history in general, but let me explain why.  Our profe (professor) has managed to turn a lecture on Dali into a history of his personal sex life and instead teaches us "important" words to know in Spanish...that are also sexual.  I've learned in my brief time here, that Españoles in general adore telling dirty jokes.  I, of course, love this about their culture.  This profe also loves to invent things about his own life, like in the movie Big Fish, and has some fantastic one liners.  So class is thoroughly more enjoyable here than in the US, and well as being 10 times easier.

During free time in Spain (which is pretty much all the time), I love to explore.  My host mom, Ámparo, took me on a tour of the neighborhood the very first day, and since that moment she tells me at least once a day that you can't know a city without walking in it everyday.  So needless to say, I go out a lot.  We've only been in Spain two and a half weeks, but there have been adventures every single day.  I won't go into them all now, but a few of my favorite things that we've done have been: 1)discovering carajillo (coffee and coñac) and then going to a movie 2)hanging out in Sugar, a fabulously sketchy bar 3)helping tourists on the metro 4)going to a concert in Catalán, so we couln't understand a word of what was happening 5)ranking boys in terms of attractiveness at the University.

You all know me, and know how...shall we say fanatical I am in terms of my sports.  Fútbol has quickly become my absolute obsession.  FC Barcelona (lovingly known as Barça) is the local fútbol team.  I am a huge fan of the team, and my host mom and I always watch the games with her at home.  We scream, we cheer, we cry, we are pretty much crazy.  Also, added bonus, I live literally two blocks away from the stadium, Camp Nou.  My favorite part is that my beloved (as my host mom calls him, my "enamorado") David Villa plays there.  Just a side note, he won the game for Barça yesterday :)

I'll be updating more often now that I have access to computers with internet at the University...I promise!!!

That's all for now...
Cuidense! (Take care!)
Mandita

Adios a los Estados!

Hey everyone!

As I'm hoping most of you know, I'm about to begin my journey to Spain, a country full of history, culture, and...well, really attractive guys.  It's not difficult to figure out that I'm excited to go :) 

This blog will chronicle the various adventures that I (with the help of a few friends like Natalia and Charli) have in Spain and the surrounding European area.  There will be excitement, laughter, romance (we're hoping...), and maybe even some deep, profound insights into the meaning of life.  Oh yeah, and maybe a little studying...if there's time left over. 

Hope you all enjoy reading our little adventures as narrated by Mandy!  I'm sure there will be some airplane/airport stories coming up soon, perhaps a European bucket list, and some first impressions of Barcelona....but none of those could be any weirder than walking into walgreens wearing makeshift foam flipflops and those things that separate your toes after getting a pedicure...right Natalia?

With a warm welcome to everyone as my blog begins, and a fond farewell as I leave the country,

Mandita