Second week of school

So now school is actually starting to be, well, school. I have a paper due later today and have to read this difficult story. In addition, I have a presentation in my conversation class on Wednesday. It has been a little hard for me to focus on school while Iḿ here. I really didnt have much of a break from the school year. Hopefully the month off after this between school will be enough to refresh me. Anyway, Spain plays tonight at 8 30 and I will be going back to the Plaza del Torros to watch the game. My conversation class technically goes till nine, but last night we went till 9 15! Since its 15 minutes away and we still have to eat, Iḿ a little worried how much of th egame I will get to see. Anyway it should be fun.We leave for Granada at 5 am Friday so that will be unpleasant. On the flip side, I moved to a single yesterday and slept fantastically. Overall, Spain still going great, just need to start working on the whole school thing

Madrid and Salamanca

Friday morning, I woke up extremely tired because my room mates had a late night and kept me awake. The entire foundation had a day trip to Madrid and I planned to stay the night with Travis and take a train to Salamanca the next day to tour. I was very tired all the way to Madrid but when we went in the royal palace, I woke up. It was very big on top of a hill in the center of Madrid although not as impressive as I imagined. Overall, it was fun though. Then all 100 of us when to a Jamon restaurante and then we decided to walk around. We checked into our hostel and then walked to Indepence Park to take pictures. It was a long distance away and we took lots of pictures. Then we went in the Prado, a famous art museum in Madrid. We saw lots of Greco, Goya, and Valasquez paintings that I saw in high school Spanish. We then proceeded to walk for an hour to the Real Madrid stadium to see Spain play Chile. The place was packed and everyone there was belligerant. I´ve never seen anything like it in my life! Needless to say it was quite the experience. We finally got to get close to the screen around half time when the police let us in to the center. Spain got up 2 0 at half and I think finished 3 1. It poured as we left and we got stuck in the rain. We decided to eat at burgers at an American restaurante with 2 girls to wait it out. We slept in our hostal, then went to Salamanca. Salamanca was a lot like Toledo, just not as popular. The plaza mayor was amazing we tons of shops and people. There were many large churches and the University was very cool as well. We watched the U.S. loss to Ghana in overtime with a group of U.S. students behind us talking loudly about their personal lives.......it was probably the least favorite part of the trip. Then we slept in one large bed in a small room at the hostal and came back in the morning. I spent most of the day just laying around and watching soccer. Germany won 4 1, amid controvery, and Argentina destroyed Mexico 3 1. Next week, Granada.

USA....USA............USA.........

For the Spain game, I ended up running from class to "Plaza del Toros" which is the city bull fighting stadium to watch. Spain won 2 0 although I missed all the scoring. Still exciting though. At least a thousand fans were there, most of whom were wearing red or "La Roja!" in support of their beloved Spain. Then Tuesday night, we played soccer again. I was a captain and picked an excellent team, going 4 and 1 throughout the night before we were kicked out of the gym. Then today, I again had class during the first half of the US game, but showed up shortly into the second half only because me and my friends James stopped to investigate handball prices. 24 Euros, maybe too high. Anyway the US was dominating but failed to score. They needed to win since England had won 1 0. Finally, in the 92nd minute, Landon Donovan kicked in a rebound, and O Brien's, the Irish bar, exploded into America chants and songs. Minutes later, we are through to the second round. We booked a hostal for 36 euros in Salamanca Saturday so my weekend is all planned, just one more class tonight, one more day tomorrow, and then enjoying my 3 day weekend.

The Weekend and First Day of Class

So today marks the first full week of classes, and I managed to start everything off by going to the wrong class. I sat with someone at breakfast who had lunch at the same time and just decided to walk to class with them. I sat down in the room and didnt talk to anyone. The professor was ten minutes late and didnt even mention the title of the class for another ten. Suddenly, 20 minutes into class she mentioned "Linguistics". My class is Phonetics. I decided to stay in class and just pretend that I was there until the end. Since classes are twice a day, I went early to our later one to explain to the Professor. When I told her, she just burst out laughing and didnt seem to care at all. Plus, class got done in a half hour so I went to the gym to play basketball. We have a decent size gym that we played an intense game of soccer on this weekend. I scored many goals but was very sore. Then I went out Saturday and had a great time at this place that was just giving out free food and drinks. I have class till 9 later, but the U.S. plays at 8 30 so I will miss the first half. Hopefully I can finish quick and go to O Brienś to watch the second half.

Toledo

So I have arrived and have been in Toledo Spain for several days now. This town is absolutely amazing. Its extremely old and all the streets are cobble stone and all the buildings are made out of stone. Its surrounded by a wall and has a fortress or alcazar at the top of it. I live in a building that used to be a convent, which is a little weird, however the rooms are very nice and overall the building is nice as well. I have 2 room mates who are from Ohio State and a neighboring room that is clustered to ours. One of them is from Ohio State and the other two are from Notre Dame. Overall most of the kids are from the U of M, Ohio State, or Notre Dame with many people from random places. Since we dont have classes on Fridays, people plan very ambitious trips. This weekend most people didnt plan any, however after this weekend, some people are going as far as Italy or France as well as places all over Spain. I have planned a weekend in Granda and a day trip to Segovia, but so far Iḿ lacking other options. We have a tenative tripped planned to Seville but no concrete plans. Next weekend we go to Madrid on Friday as a group so I might take a train to Salamanca and stay the night with whoever would come with me. Needless to say, Im very busy and dropping money left and right. Im going to play soccer. Bye!

Flying Away

Just spent my last night in my bed, packed all my things up, and am about to go to the airport to fly out. First we fly to Philidelphia and then to Madrid and take a bus to Toledo. I'm super excited and anxious. This should be one hell of an adventure.

World Cup Fever

So today was the first U.S. game in the 2010 World Cup against England. I used to play a lot of soccer and so I enjoy watching games. My dad and I decided to try to go to a Brittish pub in downtown Minneapolis to watch the game. We arrived about an hour and a half early in order to get good seats and the line was out the door. We decided to go to another pub nearby to watch the game. The game turned out to be insane. There were probably about 500 people in this place all screaming and yelling at the game. It completely blew my mind. I had a great time and the U.S. managed to tie 1 to 1. Spain's first game in the World Cup is the day after I arrive and I can only imagine how crazy it will be there.

New Leaf

So, its been awhile since I've last blog but I feel that in the coming weeks I will have much to think about and so I have decided to start it back up. Today is Friday and on Monday afternoon I fly to Spain for a significant portion of my summer. The program is through the University of Minnesota and I will live in an international dorm in Toledo Spain, just south of Madrid. The town is super historic with walls and a castle and is pretty small, only about 50 thousand in the area. I don't know a single person going and I haven't spoken a word of Spanish in a month so we will see how this goes. I've started to become super excited as other students have started emailing and we have started getting lots of information about the program. I expect it to be an experience of a lifetime and I intend to take lots of pictures. Stay tuned....