Hey All,
Classes
When in Spain, time flies, the last month was no exception. Classes, we’ll start there. The first week at the University (UPV) was a little crazy. It was Feb. 12th when I went to my first international student meeting for my department where I was told by my international advisor that it didn’t have to have my class schedule together/go to class if I didn’t want to until the 20th of February. Many of my classes had already started the week earlier on the 1st. As I started going around to classes the professors seemed to have a different opinion on the issue. Shortly thereafter, I would come to find out in Spain, everything is “tranquillo,” you need to “relajarte,” and whatever happens “no pasa nada.” I was told to be “tranquillo” more times than any other word in the first week of school.
I am currently enrolled in Water Resources and Management (an English class taught by a Spanish professor), Ingenieria Sismica (a Spanish class taught by a Spanish professor), a Spanish course, Regional and Practical Geology in Spanish, as well as a Geotecnias y Cimientos (Geotechnical and Foundations in Spanish). Some of my Spanish friends have told me that twenty percent of the Spanish students pass the last class I mentioned. The ones in Spanish are fairly difficult, but tranquillo, it’ll work itself out.
In Valencia I’ve been going out for some Spanish “tapas y canas” with some Spanish students every once in a while. Every Monday the study abroad program here, Erasmus, gives out free Paella, which is a Spanish rice-based dish and great for a college kid looking to save some money. I will start adding “tandem” to my schedule as well which is every Tuesday and Wednesday night. You show up at a restaurant, find a Spanish student who wants to learn English, speak Spanish for an hour and English for the next. It’s a good way to meet people as well as learn the language.
Birthday Weekend
February 25th was my 21st birthday, and came a lot faster than I had anticipated. Paolina, our French roommate, made French crepes for my birthday, which were delicious, especially with our peanut butter, which goes great with anything! John and I have pretty much been living off the stuff over here. Lol. Paolina had a French friend over who, like Paolina, thought our peanut-butter substance was revolting. I found out later that she didn’t appreciate us putting it on the crepes and was put off by it. Oops…But Tranquillo, no pasa nada.
We took our first trip from Valencia to Barcelona/Andorra the weekend of my 21st birthday, not a bad birthday present. I can’t complain. In Barcelona we visited la Iglesia de la Segrada Familia, spent a good amount of time on Las Ramblas (one of the most famous streets in Europe), enjoyed Gaudi Park and went to a club at night.
Next we spent two days in Andorra. Andorra is a country between France and Spain and is advertized all around Spain as one big ski resort in the Pyrenees. We got a tour of the Andorran parliament at my buddy Mike’s request, and checked out a lot of the Andorran tax free shops including a few spy shops. At night Sander (a friend from Holland traveling with us), Lucy (from Madrid), and I went to a concert that we thought was jazz. It ended up being a classical guitarist and violinist. I played the same style of guitar for six years, so that was cool to see. Afterward we ended up meeting a really friendly 84 year old guy (yes he told us his age) who had been a journalist in Andorra for 60 years. He ended up introducing us to just about everyone at the concert. He was introducing us to composers, music coaches, and finally the musicians themselves, and later on their families! Sander got to talking with the violinist who apparently is from Holland and is famous there. One of the family members actually asked him if he was her boyfriend! Anyway, we went to a Catalan restaurant afterward for some great regional Spanish cuisine. John, Mike and Heather had been at Europe’s largest spa that night and came back to the hostel loving life. All is good right? ;)
Skiing
The next day was Sunday of skiing, which I’d been looking forward to for the entire weekend. We took a gondola up to the mountain, taught Lucy, John and Heather how to ski, then hit up the rest of the park. It didn’t take us too long to hit some road bumps however. We had gone down one blue square fine, well I was fine. It was a steep hill and everyone else ended up falling. Sander’s fall was the best as he skidded about halfway down the hill and ended up unable to move in some orange fencing. I got to see the whole thing! Great wipe-out buddy. I wanted to take a little harder run next so I took a red circle and everyone else was going to meet me at the bottom after taking another blue square. Mike decided at the last minute to come with me on the harder hill for some reason (I thought to myself this probably isn't a good idea). He ended up making it all the way down fine until it came to stopping, he fell, hit his back off the snow and ended up colliding with a snowboarder with his bad knee.
I have been about ten feet from Mike on a ski hill every time he breaks some thing, so I was a little concerned. I’ve seen this three times previously. So he told me he’d go up to the top of the hill to rest at a bench. He couldn’t find a bench at the top and ended up trying to ski back down and made it about two feet as his knee pretty much fell out from under him. He ended up tearing some ligaments as well as his ACL. For some reason we couldn’t go down to the hospital with him unless we wanted to pay extra, so we kept skiing. John and I got to ski for about an hour after that and bombed many of the hills as usual. It was absolutely amazing with the backdrop of the Pyrenees Mountains. Andorra is definitely on the list of places to go back to.
Coming soon:
Ireland- St. Patty’s Day
Las Fallas
On a side note, just for pure entertainment, John is sitting here looking up random flights as I’m typing out the blog. Rome for New Years came up for next year, then brilliance came over me. New Years in Rome, then get a flight back to the states to catch it in New York! I’m sure my dad will love the idea.
Enjoy,
Kyle
