Sue in Seville: Mrs. Berger comes to visit

So, in the last post I said I would post a little more about Paris, although there really isn't much more to tell, so here are some pictures from the trip. It kind of stinks travelling by yourself because you can never get anyone to take your picture for you:

Notre Dame across the Seine

The Louvre


Me trying to get the Eiffel Tower in the background

So this past week, my mom came to visit Seville. Her hotel was quite a ways from the center of the city, but working with that and around my class schedule, we still managed to do quite a bit. We visited the Cathedral, the Royal Gardens, several streets, stores, plazas, etc. It was great to see her after being here for 3 months. It was also great because she brought me some more sweaters, since it it getting colder here. Down into the 50's. Ahh!!!

It was interesting that she noticed a lot of the cultural things that I've just gotten used to over my time here. For example, I guess I forgot how strange it was that most restaurants here just have ham hocks hanging in the windows. Even just the little habits that people have.

We also had lunch at Loli's while we were here. My 2 mothers, however, did not speak a word of each others' languages, so I had a lot of fast translating to do, especially since Loli didn't seem to slow down at all or pause between sentences.

Here are my 2 mothers, my real mom, Sue, on the left, and host mother, Loli, on the right (and me in the center, in case you couldn't tell):

So, less than a month left. And getting down into the paper and exam time. I will still try to update this when I can and let you know how stressed I am ;)

Till next time, besos!

Belgium and Paris

Wow, I'm horrible at updating this.

So this past weekend, I decided to make an extended weekend and go to Brussels and Paris.

The original plan was to meet Guillaume, another foreign exchange student from high school, in Brussels on Thursday, but he was in the United States right before that. So, I met a friend of his, Florianne.




So a couple of her friends came over and we made spaghetti. We then went out for a night out:



So after a night out with this motley crew, I spent the night at Florianne's apartment. I was really tired from a long day of travelling and a night out. So I slept in till about 12:30 the next morning. Florianne had an exam that morning...not sure why she went out the night before. Welcome to Belgium????

Guillaume came at about 2, and we went out and did a speed tour of Belgium in about 3 hours. This included the "big arc-y thing" (-Guillaume), the Church of San Michelle, the Grand Plaza, and just walking down some cool streets.










The reason we had to hurry: Because Guillaume had a Boy Scout trip that weekend!


So, I went as a leader on this Boy Scout trip. The problem was, I speak English, which is the 4th most common language in Belgium. All of the other leaders (all between 18-23, because that's how they do in Belgium) spoke English at varying degrees, some extremely well. Of the kids (all between 8-12), the one who had lived in Ohio for 2 years knew English, but he was the only one. About the only English the other kids knew was the song "American Boy" by Estelle.

So the other leaders would translate for me. Most of the kids didn't know my name and I became "le amerikan". To the leaders I became "American dude".

So, some pictures from that:












So, after this fun weekend with the Belgian Scouts, I left for Paris by train. My hostal in Paris was pretty cool, except that I was on the eighth floor with no elevator and had to climb a steep and narrow staircase to get there.



Since I was only there for one day, so I really had to book it to all the sights. It took me about an hour to find the Seine, but once I did, it was easy, since most of the attractions are right along it. Notre Dame was amazing!!! I didn't go into the Louvre, but I saw the outside of it. I didn't quite make it to the Eiffel Tower, but I got some pictures from far away from it.



So I've already spent 2 days writing this blog entry, so I will continue with Paris in the next entry.



Also next entry: SUE IN SEVILLE! Mrs. Berger comes to visit!


Besos!

Halloween and Africa

So, I apologize to all that I don't have many pictures of this weekend. It was raining a lot and was not quite conducive to picture taking.

So Halloween does exist in Spain. There are a decent amount of people that dressed up. But, unlike the US, teenagers dress somewhat conservatively, mainly as scary things. In fact, a lot of girls dressed up in the same costumes as their friends, so there were sometimes 3-4 people wearing the exact same costume. Scandalous!

Also, trick-or-treating. Kind of exists, but in a very different form. Either that or I encountered an exception. But anyways, it was about 11:oo pm and I was walking down the street, when from around the corner comes this mob of about 20 children between the ages of 6-10. Once they see me, they rush up around me and start screeching "Roberto! Roberto! Un caramelo! Un caramelo! Por favor! Un Caramelo!" I think this may be how they trick or treat, although I'm not sure how my name became Roberto...

So once they figured out that I didn't have any candy, they mobbed another guy about my age who was carrying a skateboard. But he was terrified of them, and rushed across 4 lanes of moving traffic to get away from them. When the mob left my sight, they were pounding on the windows of a bus at a stoplight, still screeching.

The next morning, I left for Tarifa, a city on the Spanish side of the Straights of Gibraltar. It's kind of a surf town, famous for its windsurfing. It's also kind of like every other Spanish city, in that it's old and has some old ruins:

An old fortress:

An old catapult:

A cool frog fountain:

The ferry to Morocco was a little more than a half hour over the Straits of Gibraltar. On the way we met some cool Canadians, who said they were just going to Africa for 3 weeks without any real plans. That seems to be a common attitude here in Europe.

Once we got off the ferry, about 10 people rushed into the crowd offering to be guides. They are very forceful, but after telling several of them no, we made it off the port. Tangiers (the city we went to) is a very market driven city, with lots of little shops filled with knick-knacks. It also has very specific shops. We passed one that sold nothing but thread, another that sold nothing but eggs. I guess it is the 5th largest city in Morocco. That's saying something! (?)

We meant to make it up to the Kasbah (an old famous fortress) but it was far away and we didn't want to get lost, so we stopped for some Moroccan tea instead (which was very good).

So, some pictures from Morocco (again, not many, because it rained the whole time):

The city of Tangiers:

A cool archway in the old town:

Chickens, and other meat beyond it:

Tea wares:

The tea place we stopped at:

This coming weekend: Brussels, Paris

Besos!