Cheers!

Hey friends! For the last two days I've been enjoying the sights and sounds of one of my favorite cities in the entire world...London! I don't have much time to update now (because the hostel I'm staying at only gives me 15 minutes for 50 pence, ugh) but it has been AWESOME to come back to a city that I love! On Saturday we went to Madame Toussant's wax museum and took a lot of funny pictures...I will be sure to post them. :)

Tonight we leave for our last time at the London Gatwick airport, and I will arrive in Madrid tomorrow morning at about 11am. I am VERY MUCH looking forward to being back in a familiar city (and not spending so much money!) I will give everyone a full run down of my past week when I get home- I have a lot to talk about!

all my love--

Praha!

I made it to Prague! We got in this morning around noon, and by the time we got to our hostel and settled it was around 2pm. The 7 of us met up with another group from SLU Madrid that is staying at our same hostel and we all headed out to lunch.

We quickly discovered that we were about to make bank anywhere we went to buy anything...the Czech Republic's currency are called "crowns" (not spelled like that but it sounds just the same) and 20 crowns equal about 1 American dollar. When we went to lunch, I got 2 drinks and a full meal for about $5, which is crazy cheap and NEVER would have happened in Greece or Spain! So we lucked out on this one :) Afterwards, we walked around the city of Prague. It is a beautiful, beautiful city. Prague was one of the few European cities that wasn't completely obliterated by WWII and its aftermath, so all of the old architecture is still in place. Supposedly it was Hitler's favorite city so he never bombed it. But seriously, the architecture here is SO COOL. I know I keep saying that about everything I say, but its true :) It has a lot of old world charm- all of the streets are still paved by cobblestone and there are hardly any street lights or cross walks. I wish I could put up pictures and show you all! It is honestly so gorgeous.

Tonight we are all pretty wiped, and we're heading out tomorrow to see the Castle in Prague and part of the old Jewish corridor that still exists here (that's for you, Mags) :) We leave Friday for London (again, but this time to actually stay for more than 10 hours) and then I fly home to Madrid on Monday. I can't believe I've already been on break for a week! Time has gone so quickly...I've traveled to 4 different cities in the course of 6 days, none of which are located near each other....only in Europe :)

I also neglected to mention yesterday that it was my sister's 24th birthday, and that deserves a special shout out. Happy birthday my love! Maggie was also so lucky as to recieve the only international phone call I've made on my cell phone since I've been here...lucky, lucky girl :)

all my love--

Quick update

Hey friends! I'm sitting in the London Luton airport right now, getting ready to (try to) sleep before my flight to Prague tomorrow. This has to be quick, because I just looked up at my internet clock thing and realized that I only have 4 minutes and 30 seconds left before I have to pay again for my time :)

Athens was AWESOME. Yesterday we went down to the Acropolis and saw everything that makes Athens famous- the Parthenon, Athena's Temple, the Ampitheater, etc. It was so incredible to be around things that have been around longer than almost anything in the world. Today we went to see Zeus' Temple and the 2004 Olympic stadium. It's a shame I can't show you all pictures, because both were really cool as well. I'll post some once I get back to my computer in Madrid.

Like I said, I leave for Prague tomorrow and then for London (again) on Friday. I'm super excited to go back to London, and I'm looking forward to seeing some of my friends from school in Madrid in Prague! I don't know about the internet situation at my next two hostels, but if I can update you all I will! OK my time is up but I will talk to you all later!

all my love=--

How Lucky You Are!

Hello from ATHENS!! It just so happens that my hostel here in Greece has free internet with free computer usage, so I can update you a little bit over my adventures from the past few days! :)

I left Madrid Thursday night and we arrived in the London Gatwick airport around 11ish. Since our flight to Athens did not leave until 6:30 the next morning, we spent the night in the airport. Sleeping on the ground is never easy for me, and this was no exception. But, my senora had given me Spain's version of Tylenol PM, so I got about 2-3 hours worth of sleep. Not great, but I at least was able to function until we got to our hostel the next day.

We arrived in Athens and quickly discovered that getting around would be a bit more difficult than we imagined...in Spain we all had a basic understanding of the native language, but being here has given everyone a whole new meaning to the phrase "it's all Greek to me!"...literally. Thankfully people at the airport were able to help us get directions to our hostel, and we all promptly proceeded to crash and nap for about 3 hours after arriving. After we woke up, we left to go get lunch/dinner (which ended up being a trip to the grocery store and the 7 of us splitting a loaf of break and sandwich meat, meaning we only had to pay about 3 euro.) :) We came back and hung out in the bar downstairs for awhile and then went to bed. We had to wake up at 5am the next morning to catch a ferry to Mykonos.

So, we woke up the next morning, walked to the metro stop and bought tickets for our ferry. I LOVED the ferry ride, mostly because I love being on big boats and it was about 5 hours long. :) When we finally got to the island, we were greeted by Maria, who owned the hostel we were staying at, Villa Viscilis. She might be one of the most adorable women I have ever met. Seriously. She gave us anything we wanted, and told us all the best restaurants to eat at and places to take pictures. She even offered to hire us if we wanted to come back for the summer and give us free rooming, food, and "a very nice Greek boy!" :)

Mykonos was beautiful...absolutely gorgeous. For those of you who have seen the movie The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Mykonos looks just like the island where they filmed in Greece. Adorable white houses with blue roofs and windows everywhere. I took a bunch of pictures, but can't upload them onto this computer now so I'll put them up once I get back to Madrid. We hung out around the island yesterday, ate dinner, and just relaxed. It was so nice. I would love to return there some day.

We left Mykonos this morning, and got back to Athens at around 9:30 tonight and have just been hanging out in the bar downstairs again. Tomorrow we will be seeing all of the things that make Athens famous: the Parthenon, Acropolis, Olympic Stadium, etc. I am super excited and will be sure to take a lot of pictures for you all to see :)

love to all--

"OPA!"

This will be my last post for awhile...I'm off for Spring Break! I'll be traveling to Athens, Prague, and London. I am SUPER SUPER excited for Athens, and from what I hear Prague is really neat too. I went to London six years ago with People to People, but I'm really excited to go back. I really enjoyed it when I went and I know I'll love it again. Plus, it will be nice to be in a country where my native language is spoken fluently and by the majority of the people there :)

This Sunday (the 8th) also officially marks the half way point of my time here in Madrid...I've been here for 8 weeks, and I have 8 more weeks to go. Man, how time flies :)

I'll update you all when I get back! Have a wonderful week until then!

Out of Africa

I went to Africa this weekend. It is so weird for me to hear myself say that...just non-nonchalantly, no big deal, very casual manner. Its times like these that I realize what amazing opportunities I'm having living here in Spain for the semester.

SO Morocco. Africa, in one word is, well....different. Going to Morocco was probably the biggest culture shock I've experienced to date. Everything about it is so different from anything I've ever seen, both in the US and Europe. A little white Christian girl is definitely out numbered in a male-dominated Islamic nation. That being said, I am so glad I went. Even though I was in Africa for less than 48 hours, I feel like I learned so much in such a short period of time.

Thursday night my friends and I took a night bus from Madrid to Malaga, a city in Southern Spain. We met at the bus station and took a 7-hour bus down there, and I have never prayed for my life more than during that 7-hour time span. Seriously, I thought our driver was going to drive us off the road. He drove probably close to 80 mph on winding roads that were on the edge of a mountain. Thankfully we all arrived in one peace. We slept a little bit at the bus station, and then moved to a cafe across the street for breakfast. We spent the rest of the day seeing the city (we weren't leaving for the ferry for Morocco until 3:30). Malaga has a beautiful beach and we had fun seeing different parts of the city.

This is me in front of the beach, with some of my friends walking towards the water.

The beach also had this really cool sign that said the name of the city, Malaga. We played here for several minutes.

After we ate lunch, we walked around this park that is in the middle of the city for awhile and then made our way over to the Cathedral to get on the bus to Morocco! Our guide's name was Vito, and he works for Study-Travel Spain, the group that sponsored this trip. He was really funny :) He was also the one who was responsible for us getting across the boarder to and from Spain, as he took our passports to get stamped each time. We had to learn to trust him very quickly.

We boarded the bus in Malaga and then had a 2 hour ride to get to the ferry, where we would take an hour ferry ride to what is technically Spain in Africa. On the way, we saw the Straight of Gibralter and took some pictures in front of it.

The rock! The actual Straight of Gibralter.
My friends Maria, Emily and I with Gibralter in the background.

After we got off the ferry, we had about another hour wait to get through customs and such. It was kind of a weird experience, because you end up in this "no-man" zone that neither Spain nor Morocco owns, and there are all these people just randomly milling around, but we couldn't take any pictures or else we would be arrested. After Vito came back with our passports, a Moroccan police officer came onto our bus to check that everything was stamped. Again, kind of a weird, intimidating, oh-my-god-we-are-definitely-not-in-Europe-or-America-anymore experience. We then finally got to our hotel, ate dinner, and gratefully went to bed.

The next morning we ate breakfast and left for our first city to tour (sadly enough I forget the name. I wrote it down somewhere, I'll try to find it later). It was here that I experienced the biggest culture shock of my entire weekend. It's even hard to explain. Being around such extreme poverty in some cases next to extreme wealth is a very strange sight. Plus, everything is sold in open-air markets. You have vegetables and spices right next to dead chickens for sale. Very weird. So while you're trying to see and take everything in, you still have to be careful and on high alert of where all your belongings are at all times. The entire weekend we had 5 men walking around with our group: Vito, our weekend coordinator; Abdel, the guy who runs Study-Travel Spain; Abdul, our tour guide of the city; and 2 under cover Moroccan policemen who made sure that our group stayed together. It was intense. We ate lunch at a typical Moroccan restaurant and then got on the bus to to to Tangier. Tangier is a bigger, more tourist-y city and I felt a little less culture-shocked when I arrived there. It was also on our way to Tangier where I rode a camel! (note: The change in the above picture is at the request of my mother. I though you'd appreciate that, mom) :) Abdul then took us to see the point where the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea meet.
Beautiful, yes? I think so :)

We then got on our bus again and headed back to the hotel, ate dinner and went to bed. I was pretty wiped from our entire day.

Sunday took us to the city of ChefChauen, located literally in the middle of the mountains. We had another tour guide and other Moroccan police men following us around again. This city was beautiful, too. Every house was "chalk-washed" in this blue chalk-paint that made the city gorgeous. Unfortunately our tour guide spoke really softly so I don't remember a whole lot of what he said. But here are pictures to show
The city of Chef-Chauen! You can see the blue chalk-wash through the trees.
This picture is just for fun, Coca-Cola written in Arabic :)

After Chef-Chauen, we boarded our bus and headed back to the ferry. After we got back into Spain, we headed to the bus station and started the long 7-hour ride back to Madrid (although we had a much smoother trip this time around, thankfully). I didn't get back to my señora's house until 7am! All in all, it was a great trip, but I'm definitely glad to be "home" :)

Taking the plunge

Alright, folks! This is it! This weekend will be my first weekend since arriving that I will travel internationally...to MOROCCO of all places! Tomorrow night I'll take a night bus down to Malaga with some friends, and then our tour group will pick us up there and take us via ferry to Morocco. I'm pretty excited. My friend/co-leader Allison went to there with this same tour group when she studied in Granada last semester, so I have faith that my experience will be just as wonderful :) I will be sure to update everyone when I get back. In the mean time, enjoy your weekend...I will be in Africa! :)