Exams:done Trip in 5 days

Thursday, June 25, 2009

So as of Monday I finished exams, and I am now on vacation. Well I am preparing for my trip that starts next Monday (the date got moved up to the 29th). The exam format here in Spain was quite the surprise so we´ll see how my grades turn out. Basically for all classes, I would enter the exam room and find a stack of blank computer paper, upon which I was given another sheet with the questions and 2 or 2.5 hours to complete. So, now I am super grateful for multiple choice again. Really the whole approach to education here is different and I guess that is kind of the point of a study abroad, but once again without friends in my classes, useful internet resources, and professors who give out syllabuses, I was left asking a lot of questions. I had to ask every professor where the exam was and when and sometimes they didn´t know. I had one tell me that it would be posted on a billboard in the chemistry building and I needed to look for it....

So I take for granted seriously the following:

a)multiple choice

b)syllabuses

c)professors who use the internet to communicate

d)regimented exam schedules determined before the semester starts

e)blackboard (although I hate to say it!)

(blackboard is an online resource for students that has all of the prof´s info and things the professor wants to put up to help students)

f)practice tests 

g)multiple tests/quizzes throughout the semester

h)textbooks (not common here)

i)study guides for tests (especially finals)

So maybe I have it easy at Virginia Tech or maybe I am just not used to the system here but either way I found that I do not like it and I am now a big a fan of the VT education system :)

Probably if I were to look into studying here long term I would have to force myself to go to the professor´s open tutorial hours just so I can practice and ask questions when I need to.

As far as exams my Physics exam was hard, and it was the first so I went in on a completely blank slate not knowing how to study, etc. I tried going to the professor´s office hours the week before but he wasn´t in and I couldn´t get him at any other time... So it wasn´t the material that was hard it was more the  format and actually there were a bunch of words on the test that I did not know which makes me sad after a semester learning spanish. But I justify it as being technical language so no worries. 4 pages of computer paper turned in as my test.

Then I took Population Geography which was long but I dominated it. 4 sheets of computer paper turned in as my test.

Then I turned in my term paper for Modern History of Asturias (modern being 17th and 18th century). 15 sheets of computer paper.

Then I took Organic Chem which was hard still with the language barrier. and long. 6 sheets of computer paper.

Lesson learned do not take sciences while studying abroad because then you actually have to study and it is no fun when you are enjoying your pretty much semester of vacation and tourism.

The term paper was easy although I procrastinated a bit on getting it done. I did learn how to BS pretty well in Spanish but at the same time I thought it was pretty well written for a foreigner (I´m not sure what the professor thinks yet!) haha

So that´s it for exams

Tuesday night at midnight was the beginning of... ANOTHER fiesta here in Spain. This time it was in celebration of San Juan and it was celebrated with a midnight bonfire complete with fireworks in front of the cathedral. It was a real cool event and traditional dancing, etc continued on wednesday which is the actual day. Not as well celebrated as the ascension because it was a wednesday and the spaniards have to work if not just a little on wednesdays. I got photos no worries. 

Here´s a link for a wiki although it´s in Spanish http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festividad_de_San_Juan

For english wiki San Juan festival or Bonfire of San Juan or something like that. The photos I put up have good titles explaining the events.

Afterwards the cafes and bars were filled with people just enjoying the night so that was pretty nice to see. Once again people of all ages out and about at 1AM.

Oh yah I changed apartments again. I now live about 7 minutes from my old apartment. I had to change because the apartment is normally rented out to Med school students in a program called MIR (medicos internos residentes) and they´re moving in now. So I got a real cheap rate on the place because of the fact I had to be out on June 15th. Now I am staying with a guy from Peru named Cesar. He is also renting out another room to a girl from Salamanca, Veronica who brought her beagle, Ary. They´re both real nice and I do enjoy playing with the dog. He´s not very well mannered though and he´ll steal your food without thinking twice. But he stopped trying with me after I denied his first attempts with a smack to the nose :) Dog whisperer training. Photos of the new apartment!

I live real close to old town (about 2 minutes from my favorite bar), but a bit to the southeast so not as centrally located anymore. 

Tomorrow I am doing my souvenir shopping so leave any requests below :)

Also a couple friends and I are doing some Oviedo tourism that we have yet to do until now haha. Pictures to come.

So that´s it for now, possibly 1 more entry before we leave for our big trip on June 29th and then there will be regular entries as I find time/energy to put everything up live from the trip!

Hey it´s June!

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

So this week is the last week of classes. Today was a holiday celebrating, nothing probably but everyone pretty much went out for a picnic with friends and family in the parks. So, like usual, everything closed down. 

Also, I have been sick (again) since last Thursday. Looks to be the same thing, tonsillitis, so I am getting some more free medicine from the doctors (yeah Socialism!) I am not sure how or why I got sick but I have a feeling it's stress related because I got several deadlines coming up for my classes, plus next week begins the month-long exam period. 

Anyway, some cool events did actually happen this week, The first one being last Wednesday night when FC Barcelona won the Champion's League Cup over Manchester United (from England). The Champion's League is a tournament where all the best teams in Europe compete throughout the year, and its considered the best Tournament in Europe. The final match took place in Rome, neutral ground (for soccer at least). So naturally Oviedo went wild at the end of the game, complete with people in the fountains, fireworks, cannon bangs, groups of friends roaming the streets screaming Barcelona fight songs, etc. Barcelona was considered a big time underdog because of how solidly Manchester United played all season, but somehow they managed to lose 3-0. owned

Also recently Oviedo held a fair call la Feria de la Ascencion. I believe it is to commemorate the ascension of Christ into heaven but I have no idea. Oviedo allowed a massive amount of artisans dressed in traditional Asturian-attire to set up shops in front of the Cathedral and other parts nearby. They then also had several parades of bagpiping groups from all over Asturias playing their traditional song from their area. There were maybe 3,000 bagpipers in Oviedo! And you thought one was annoying :) But it was nice to watch and I do have video and photos of that. The vendors sold traditional cheeses, meats, sweets, crafts, honey, art, etc. Right in front of the cathedral there was traditional dancing going on in traditional attire and you could get free carriage rides pulled cows haha. 

Also, this weekend Real Oviedo (the soccer team here) was admitted to the second division soccer league in Spain (from the 3rd). They hadn't lost a single game all year and qualified for the move in points scored. So naturally parties were thrown everywhere this weekend (yet another reason to party). Everyone was in the streets, kids, adults, elderly, etc. They soccer players had several mini parties in different parts of the city just to hype everyone up, kind of like pep-rallies after the fact, and yesterday they held one in front of City Hall. I got some good pictures of that. They chanted their teams fight songs over and over and over and over and everyone on the team got a chance at the mic like 5 times. It was rather ridiculous. But the plaza was packed with supporters and it was a good time.

Finally, since Saturday morning there have been cannon blasts three times a day everyday. 25 blasts, 3 times a day. During the initial blasts, I was still sleeping (it was 10am) and it scared me half to death. I didn't know what to think. I still don't know what to think. It's something to ask my tandem friend because I couldn't find it in the paper or anything.

That's it for now... still sick, so sorry if this post reads a bit funny I'm having a hard time concentrating haha. 

Upcoming events Toulouse June 10th-13th

Big trip through europe: begins June 30th.

Oh and it did get warmer here starting last Thursday or so. Actual summer weather! Today´s high was 80.

New photos here from la Fería and the big Real Oviedo party. 

I don´t have too many from the Oviedo party but I´m going to get some from my friends. 

~2 months left!

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Well not much has happened since the last blog entry... just going to class and planning out my upcoming trips. Barcelona this weekend if we can find good prices (we´re cheapskates!)

3 weeks left of class, and then begins the month-long exam period. I have 4 classes but I am only taking 3 exams. They're all spread out pretty evenly... one a week I believe. I am hoping I can move one up a week so that I can begin traveling sooner!

I have to change apartments next month as well. The deal with this apartment was I could rent it out up until June 15th, and then the normal renters were going to return from vacation or wherever they were. Kind of a sublease deal but it was nice because it afforded me a great apartment for a very good rate (200 euros/month). So I found another apartment I'm going to rent out for the final month here in Spain. It's not too far from my current one. And the rent is almost as good (225 I believe). I'm going to go there probably tomorrow to check everything and make sure it'll work for a month.

Sunday I got up nice and early (3pm) to videochat with Grandma, Grandpa and my parents (who went to W'burg for the weekend). However they had technical difficulties, so it was 2-way audio, 1 way video (no video from them for me). So that was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon... chatting with the family, joking about the Spanish education system, the lack of warm weather, and also picking up some travel tips from some very experienced travelers. 

Right now in my trip planning I'm trying to roughly estimate the total cost on the entire trip to make sure I can afford everything we want to do. I have to change my flight date, so that means a $200 fee maybe. I had some friends change their flight for free and they were flying out via Iberia too so we´ll see. I'm trying to fly out of Madrid without going through Oviedo, so hopefully that'll save me some money... we'll see. Before I change anything however I need to figure out a way to get my luggage to Madrid (the part I don't want to travel with) so that I don't have to return to Oviedo in order to fly out of the country (flying out via Madrid). We´re thinking that instead of taking the train directly to Paris, we´ll bus to Madrid first, and then fly to Paris. This is probably the cheapest option especially if we can find someone in Madrid to hold our luggage for free! If you´ve got any contacts in Madrid let me know! 

If this isn´t possible, I'll take the bus back to Oviedo from Madrid at the end our grand trip and then fly back to Madrid (my flight home goes through Madrid and London). Sounds counterintuitive, but hey, I'm a broke college student haha. The bus ride is 5 hours. The flight back to Madrid is... about 45 minutes? :) I would rather avoid the trouble so hopefully I can get my luggage to Madrid. However, I am very excited for this trip! Overly so probably. 

España va bien

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

So I've been slacking on the blog entries. I blame Spanish cultural influence :) :)

The last 3 weeks have flown by! Usually that's a good thing but during a study abroad I would prefer that they didn't! I wish I could stay a full year but that is not the case. I've got studies to complete at VT, not to mention I'll be returning broke! Nothing much has happened the last weeks... There was a trip scheduled to Llanes, a "beach" town on the northern coast, but it was cancelled due to lack of interest (no one wants to go to the beach when its 60 degrees and overcast...). I've also been working on my essay for my History of Asturias class. It's the paper concerning Commerce between Asturias and the Americas in the 18th century. Pretty exciting huh? It's not too bad and some parts are interesting to me. Some parts. Like piracy and the exportation of wood for the Spanish armada... But as of this week that class no longer meets, and all I have to do is complete the 15 page essay and I'm done. No exam. And what have I learned? Well, let's just say I learned very extensively that, historically speaking, Asturias is possibly one of the most boring parts of Spain. I learned that there was an extreme lack of business incentive, and that the people generally preferred to be left to their own methods of self-sustainable life. Farming enough for one's own, living in small pueblos, very often without roads interconnecting them. Limited interaction with the Spanish court and very little commerce-wise. The port towns typically were composed of fishers who fished enough to feed themselves and sell to neighbors. Much of the class was comprised of comparisons to better parts of spain that were more aggressive commercially, or had developed much farther. Parts such as Galicia, especially La Coruna. Also Santander, Barcelona and the whole Cataluna area, and the Basque country as a whole. However at the same time, I only have to remember about 5 people who were historical figures in Asturian history so that's nice. 

But when you're walking around Oviedo and seeing Asturias on trips, it's not that way at all. Of course it still has all the small pueblos but the cities have modernized to the level of competition with other cities here in Spain. Oviedo is still considered a "small" city but it's got all the parts of a big city. In my population geography class we looked at the population growth in northern Spain compared to that of the South and Barcelona area since 1900 and its quite one-sided. Northern Spain has come quite a ways in 100 years. So yes my report on the commerce in Asturias is rather limited and I'm hoping to squeeze out 15 pages. It's also hard to BS a paper in another language. If it was English, no problem for sure. 

I also have yet to poison myself with my own cooking so that's proof to my mom that I can cook. barely! I have also been learning through the good graces of my friends and the all-knowing internet. In the supermarkets you can buy full pig ears which I thought were only for dogs but I guess I was wrong. Also cow tongue, a family favorite, and full baby pigs. Peanut butter is also hard to come by! My french friends were going through my food and saw my peanut butter and started giving me a hard time. "You know how I know you're American? Look here! Your secret stash of peanut butter!" The Europeans are bigger on Nutella. Ironically, my jar of peanut butter says: Capitan Mani: the original peanut butter (in english). Somehow I don't believe that. However it goes along with a similar theme here. All the t-shirts are that way too. They have some random english written on them to imitate (I guess?) shirts found in the U.S. Many shirts promote random U.S. states, or something that is "American". My favorite so far is a shirt that reads: Indiana Backup Power: America's Original Emergency Energy Source Since 1908. It makes no sense but it's in huge letters on this bright yellow shirt. I also saw a shirt once that said: Seminole Indians: Original Arizona Tribe. Or something to that nature where the tribe and state did not line up at all. But if you're bored in Spain it is definitely worth your while to wander through a clothing store to see all the random atrocities they have for t-shirts. Pretty much all contain the words/things: Authentic, Original, Established, a date, and a U.S. state. But they don't know what it says so it's like Americans who wear shirts with random Japonese/Chinese symbols on them... it's all good!

On a similar note, I forgot to include in my Semana Santa entry this awesome menu translation that we found in a restaurant in Burgos:  "The client who asks for the "Menu of the House" will be forced to the integral payment of he himself, although she resigned to consume some of the components of he himself." Word for word. I took a picture if you don't believe me. At first I had no idea what it said, but I believe it means to say that if you order the House Menu (which includes Appetizer, Main Course, Dessert and drink) you have to pay for the whole thing even if you don't want certain parts. 

Oh also big news (for my dad at least). I was sitting in my History of Asturias class (of 2-4 people, depending on attendance of the Asturians in the class), bored out of my mind, looking at a map of Oviedo when I saw marked: Old city wall! So knowing that my dad would probably be interested, immediately after class I headed to where the city wall was on the map and lo and behold, city wall. Well at least a section that runs about 300 yards or so. I took pictures :) 

As the time to travel through Europe gets closer, my plans are becoming more concrete! However the trip to Barcelona next weekend (May 22nd) may or may not happen. Only 3 people want to go, and the prices aren't as low as we thought they'd be. Alternatively, I have a couple other friends who are backpacking the picos de Europa, a mountain range East of Oviedo which is supposed to be breathtakingly awesome. So... I may ditch Barcelona and go backpacking. We'll see on that one. I do like backpacking...

Speaking of mountains, I started running with my friend Mathieu from Brussels just to be less lazy than normal, and we decided to run to the top of el naranco where the statue of christ is. Twice we've done this and it is absolutely painful and awesome at the same time. You kill yourself on the way up, but then the view is awesome and you get to fly down with relatively no effort whatsoever.

In mid-June I'm going to Toulouse, France with Angelica. Just for a weekend because it's during the exam period. We're going to take the train that runs through Oviedo to Paris. We'll be getting off before Paris, but it's a relatively cheap trip which is always good! Although I've been to Toulouse before, I hardly remember it, and I am a big time fan of southern France after our trip last Summer, so going again in June will be awesome!

Finally, the big trip through Europe has come together! I am not traveling with my European buddies because, well, they live here and have seen most of it and my American friends are going to Andalucia (Southern Spain) and Morocco. However, my Brazilian friends are setting up a trip through Europe because this trip to Europe is pretty much the only opportunity they have to visit the major parts of Europe. 

So we're going to: Paris, Amsterdam, Budapest, Prague, Vienna, London, Rome, Ibiza, possibly Lisboa, and Madrid. Yes I've already been to Paris, London, Rome and Madrid but unless I want to travel alone (which does not sound fun) I have to go again. I'm sure I won't mind.. I'm in Europe after all! I do have the option to leave them at certain points and meet up with other friends, but I would only want to do that to visit my Belgian friends who live in Brussels. Also Danielle (the other Hokie here) wants to go to Denmark to visit a friend of ours, who invited us to visit, so I'll see about that too!

The big trip will last just short of 3 weeks, which I might make shorter because the last couple nights are in Madrid, and I feel that I've covered Madrid pretty well. Although we will be there on a Sunday which means... Bullfight!!! So I might stay for that! 

Pamplona running of the bulls is out of the picture now because of this trip, but that's ok. I feel like I'm spending my time better traveling in this manner.

Naturally we're staying in Hostels all along the way and taking the cheapest form of transportation. I might even make it official and wear a backpack like I'm truly backpacking through Europe! haha. The order above is the order we're going to the cities, starting with Paris finishing with Madrid. It's pretty much trains all the way with flights for the longer trips between cities. But it's very possible that I might skip out on the 3 days in Paris and continue on to Brussels to visit my friends and then meet the Brazilians again in Amsterdam. I'm not about to go up the Eiffel tower for a 3rd time ;). I would classify that as a no-dice situation. I heard Budapest can be a bit rough. But if it's rough on European standards (our tour guide thought Spain was rought), then it's not biggie. We're only spending one day there anyways. And Ibiza is one of the Spanish Islands to the east of Spain. Known for a younger tourist crowd this is not too interested in visiting cathedrals but much rather prefer beaches and sick sunburns.

So it's rather hectic, but we're covering a lot of Europe!

 I'm also looking to get my flight changed to leaving from Madrid instead of Oviedo so I can avoid an unnecessary 4 hour bus ride back to Oviedo. We're still working on how to get our luggage sent to Madrid ahead of us so we can arrive in Madrid, pick up the rest of our luggage and head home. I'm sure there's a way!

I'm still really wanting to visit Switzerland and Germany but I think I'll be back soon enough (skiing in the Alps anyone?). 

The Europe trip is set for June 30th-July 20th(or so). And then I get back to the U.S., and 3-4 weeks later I'm in Blacskburg! 

That's all I've got for now... 

current weather: 65 degrees and overcast. Starting tomorrow it'll be more around 58-60 and rainy. woohoo! One day I might wear shorts. That would be cool.

The new apartment and future trips

Monday, April 20th, 2009

I saw Marcy´s comment and I realized that I put up pictures of my new apartment, but I failed to mention the switch! Yes I switched apartments 2 days before I went on my Spring Break trip with mom and dad. I´m now much much closer to the center of town and getting around has been a million times easier. I am no longer living with a family, instead I am living with 2 Brazilians and 1 Uruguayan. The Brazilians are two girls who are also international students here at Oviedo and the Uruguayan is a woman in her early 30´s who works in Gijón. I also have internet and a desk, which is really handy as a student :) . The desk is pressboard on two sawhorses (you can see it in my photos) but hey it beats doing my work on a twin-sized bed as I was doing. The apartment itself is ridiculously big... in total there are 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, a giant kitchen, giant family room, porch type deal, and like a million closets. And somehow, with such great location, functional equipment, internet, huge room, etc., the rent is only €200 a month! Of course that doesn´t include my food expenses, but considering the rent was €575 a month to live with a host family in a small room, no internet, on the outskirts of the town, I totally scored. The obvious downsides are: I have to cook, clean and do all the chores now. But totally worth it I say. The family was extremely helpful the first month or so as far as getting my bearings, learning Spanish to a functional level and trying the local cuisine (of Ham, Bread, Cheese, Potatoes, and Olive Oil haha). A higher level of independence for sure. My roommates are all extremely nice and the apartment is very well kept! 

Food expenses run maybe €25-30 weekly. Not too sure yet on that because I´ve only been in the apartment a week and a half or so... However there is one supermarket where you can get great deals on pretty much everything and it´s the second closest supermarket to my apartment so I try to go there. 

So yes new apartment, it´s great, I have my own bathroom. Enough said.

I´ve been buying the paper everyday because it´s great language practice, there´s some pretty sweet puzzles and sudokus, and the international section provides an interesting perspective on U.S. issues (as well as other countries). I combine that with cnn.com and I get my daily dose of news, both American and Spanish. Obama is in the paper pretty much everyday, but right now that´s because he was doing the G-20, then he visited some other countries in Europe, and now he´s making the news with his politics during the American countries summit. And there has been an amazing amount of coverage on Bo, the Obama´s dog. Mathieu, another friend of mine from Belgium, put it all in perspective when he said that it´s amazing that the whole world knows the name and story behind the Obama´s dog, I mean, it´s just a dog. It just goes to show how bent on U.S. news the world is. But yeah Bo was on the televisions and in the papers for 2 days.

On a similar note, my fellow Hokie and pro-John McCain friend Bo from South Carolina was rather upset that he now shares his name with Obama´s dog.

Also another interesting note this week, I was visiting my host family on Thursday, and on my way there I was noticing an incredible amount of police standing in the sidewalks. Upon arrival, my host family told me that the King and Queen of Spain were about to pass through Oviedo. They told me (and I remembered Fran had told me this too) that they were on their way to visit an opthamology institute here in Oviedo because apparently the opthamologists there are the best in Spain. Their office is up in the mountains just a little bit right on the outside of town, but long story short, I got to see the King and Queen of Spain´s motorcade as it passed through the street to this institute where apparently all royalty get their eyes checked out. So that was pretty cool.

 I´m working on making more travel plans as we speak. For sure I am going with a bunch of friends to Barcelona to see a home soccer game there (Barça is the best in the Spanish league right now! They are also in the semifinals for the Champions League Cup which is coming to a close here shortly). We wanted to go see them play Real Madrid (translates to Royal Madrid), their rivals in early May, but the game is incredibly expensive, minimum €325 I saw. So I think our choices are... Villareal and Osasuna, two teams that Barça will probably destroy.

On that note, I´ve been watching an immense amount of soccer, considering it´s one of the few sports they broadcast here. It´s soccer, formula 1 (there´s a famous driver from Oviedo, Fernando Alonso, hence the coverage), sometimes tennis, and sometimes european basketball. But usually just soccer because there´s so many games. Also in the papers it´s these sports, PLUS! from the  NBA the Lakers, Grizzlies and Heat, because those three teams have Spanish players. The most famous being Pau Gasol from the Lakers, his brother plays for the Grizzlies and I forget who plays for the heat (I think it´s the Heat at least...). So it´s interesting to get random American sports coverage depending on the consistency of the team.

I am also looking at going to Pamplona for la Fiesta de San Fermin aka Running of the Bulls. We´ll see though because I am still trying to form a group.

Also I am looking into setting up a small trip through some major cities in Europe with some friends. I am looking to do the trains/hostal to keep it on the cheap. 

We´ll see though! It´s a bit early and nothing is definite yet. The hardest part is finding a group of friends that are interested in the same places. Seeing as how the majority of my friends are European they have an agenda of their own, and many aren´t traveling, just going home once the semester is over. My American friends have decided they want to go to Andalucia (southern Spain) and Morocco, but I would rather see the rest of Europe instead so I probably won´t go with them. I know I have at least one friend interested in doing the major cities tour with me, so that will probably happen.

That´s pretty much it... my mom was worried about my lack of cooking skills but so far I am surviving. Proud to say I haven´t yet bought any prepared meals or microwave and go type deals. And proud to say I haven´t gotten sick from my cooking haha. Boy Scout skills at work (aka boiling water). No I do more than that but my skills are still pretty limited. I just make sure to hit all food groups + my daily cup(s) of coffee and bingo good to go. No soda neither. Believe it!!

Culture note for my mom: Check out music artist Melendi. He´s from Oviedo and he has a pretty interesting style I guess. I think it´s boring but you can listen and see if you like it.