Wednesday

On Wednesday, I have the same classes as Monday from 9:00am-12:30pm. Afterwards, I sometimes make it to the "bread lady" (I'll explain more later), eat with Elisa, and run to ASPACE for the evening. 

We took some new pictures as a class with our teacher, Elsa. Since this Wednesday was our last week of class, Elsa showed us a few cool places around town.

 And yes, we did finish our Literature class with drinks.

"The Bread Lady"

There is a little town outside of Granada (it's actually the town that Elisa's daughter lives in) that is famous for their bread. Since everyone loves it, they sell it at a few locations around Granada. There is always a line, and it never seizes to hit the spot. This little bread shop/stand is within a 3 minute walk from our school, so it's a great between-class snack.

ASPACE-Asociación Granadina con atención a Personas con Parálisis Cerebral

I spend my Wednesday evenings at ASPACE in the residence home for people with cerebral paralysis. Each evening, they have a different activity: going for a walk, crafts, singing, taking pictures, watching a soccer game, etc. The goal of my time there is to change up the scenery for the residents. ASPACE treats all the residents amazingly... I wish I could bring this back to the United States with me. They have tons of resources, sufficient help, and workers that thoroughly enjoy being at work, all factors that I could tell by just seeing the happiness the residents portray.

Sandra is in charge of the activities in the residence home. She's simply amazing; she knows how to balance work with some fun, while making all the residents feel at home. Not to mention, she was welcoming and hospitable to me while in ASPACE.

 Last night we went walking downtown with the residents to admire the beautiful Christmas decorations. Everyone loved it, except the "see you later" at the end.

Seven of the, I believe, 16 residents that ASPACE has with 3 of us volunteers and Sandra.

Tuesday

Tuesdays start out with Grammar class from 9:00-10:30. I usually come home and take a little siesta before I have to be at the elementary school to volunteer. One day I decided to ask the people at the elementary school across the street from my apartment if they needed any extra help in English classes. Once again, I was welcomed with open arms and started the very next day.

On Tuesdays, I go in from 12:00-2:00. For the first hour I help in Daniel's fourth grade English class and for the second hour, I help out with Maria Gracia's first grade English class. Walking into the classroom brightens up my day, all the kids come running up to me giving hugs. Likewise, they all enjoy speaking English with me, so it's a great learning experience for them. Usually the teacher's have a little something they want me to do with the kids because they love to have the children hear the language from a native speaker.

Daniel

Maria Gracia

Now that it is the Christmas season, I've been helping out with the Christmas program. The program has songs in both English and Spanish, so of course I intend to help with the English songs. Unfortunately, the program is two days after I leave, so I won't be able to see it.

I head home for lunch with Elisa after the school, then have Art History class.

Right after class, I meet up with my intercambio, Marta. I've already described what the intercambio program is, so I won't bore you with that again. However, we've done lots of cool things. Sometimes we meet on weekends and go to a movie, go to a tapas bar, go shopping, find a cool view of Granada, or walk around talking.

Marta, Alex (her brother) and I after seeing the Hunger Games

Some of the cool views we find.

 

I finish up my day again eating dinner with Elisa and watching some Spanish TV.

Monday

I've decided to post about my daily life here in Granada, starting with Monday.

Monday mornings I start class at 9:00am. It's about a fifteen minute walk from my apartment to school. I have two classes in the morning; one from 9-10:30 and the other from 11-12:30. Here is a photo of my first class (I wanted my professor to take a selfie with us in the background and this is what we got). Yes, there are only 6 students in my first class, Oral Spanish. There are I believe 8 in my second class, Spanish Literature, with the same teacher, Elsa.

 I have an hour and a half to get back home and relax for a little, usually chat with Elisa, my host mom, until I meet up with a different Spanish family. At my first day of volunteering at an elementary school (will explain later), the mother of a student came up to me and asked if I would be willing to come to their house once a week to help tutor their child in English. Of course, I agreed, which ended up being the best decision ever. They are such an amazing family, and I'm starting to feel like I am part of their family. Juan Antonio and Raquel are the parents, and María and Raquel are the girls. Each day they greet me with such open arms. I go to their house to eat lunch first, then María and I go work on some English. We practice vocabulary she's learning in school, sing songs, and record our voices in English so she can practice when I'm gone. It's safe to say I will miss them sooo much when I leave.

The first day I went to meet up with them, they introduced me to Raquel's brother, David. David is job searching, and today in Spain, with a high unemployment rate and difficulty with finding a job, English is key. In fact, some jobs here only interview people in English. So after I help María for the day, David comes over and I also help him with his English. We've done practice interview questions, translated his resume to English, and practiced anything else he feels like he needs help on. 

This picture is of Raquel (the mom) and David (the brother). I'm not posting any pictures of the girls, but I do have plenty on my computer for my memory.

Then I always finish up my day by eating dinner with Elisa, which usually is around 9:30. The meals here are much different. Breakfast is small, usually bread and coffee (but I still get my cereal fix). Lunch is around 2:30/3 and dinner is around 9:30/10.

Snowboarding

On Friday, I went snowboarding in the Sierra Nevada mountains with a Spanish friend. It was by far one of my favorite days here in Spain. It was only a 30 minute drive away. The weather was perfect. There was barely anyone on the hills. The view was breathtaking. It was about as peaceful as it gets. It was my first time snowboarding in the mountains (20 minutes from top to bottom makes the day much more fun). I didn't get hurt. Successful day in my book. Here are some pictures, but I have to say that these pictures don't do justice.

 The entire place to myself it seemed like.

 Most of the snow was artificial snow, but it surprisingly wasn't too bad of conditions.

 It was the first time I had ever seen an enclosed lift. To get to the very top of the hill, you had to take three different lifts. However, the very top wasn't open yet, so we only took two to our starting spot.

 I cannot wait to go back next time, there should be more natural snow and nearly all the trails open, yahooooo!

Monachil

 Monachil is a small village outside of Granada with some great hiking trails, accessible by just a 40 minute bus ride. Two friends and I went hiking in Monachil on Saturday morning. Though it was quite chilly, the sun made the hike much more pleasant.

I've always wanted to walk across a bridge like this, like in the movies. Yes, it's pretty scary to be in a bridge that moves with your every step.

A jail-ish looking ruins in the middle of the mountains?

 

Next adventure... Snowboarding in the Sierra Nevada mountains!

Mi familia española

I can officially say that I am now living in Granada after spending two weekends here. My Spanish has perfected and I've done many fun activities with my Spanish friends and family.

I have a friend here named Marta, who I met through a program called Intercambio. The program matches up a local student and a foreign student so they each can practice speaking in a different language. For example, when Marta and I meet, we begin by speaking about an hour in English and finish in Spanish. I think this is a much better way to learn a language than in a classroom. 

Last Saturday, Marta invited me over to her house to eat with her family, which ended up being a super fun day. We started by going to a little market type thing (I'm not sure how to describe it) where they were selling all types of clothing items for verrry cheap. She helped teach me clothing vocabulary, which was very helpful for the quiz I had last week. Afterwards, we went to her house where I met her family, ate lunch with them and soaked in the last bit of warm sun for the year. Her family is so welcoming and hospitable, definitely got a little bit of a family-fix. We ended our day by seeing a movie, of course it was in Spanish, but surprisingly I understood the majority of what they said. Needless to say, I can sum up my day by saying I practiced my Spanish and didn't even get exhausted from speaking so much (which has happened multiple times here).

Friday, I spent the day with my host family, Elisa (host mom), Ela (sister), Antonio and David (nephews). We went to Ela's house for lunch, then went to Antonio's soccer game. Holy guacamole, those six year olds can play... better than me I think. It was a day to remember, Antonio won his first game, and David fell off a retaining wall right onto his arm. We thought at first it was broken, so I babysat Antonio while they took David to the hospital. Fortunately, it wasn't broken, just bruised and stiff. 

Sorry for more text than pictures, didn't take too many this week. Until next time!

Madrid, Spain

 My flight back from Paris landed in Madrid, so I figured I might as well stay there for a night so I could see Madrid. It is a beautiful city, much larger and more modern than Granada, but quite dirty due to the city worker strike. All the city workers, specifically those that clean up the city, happened to be on strike the week I was there, super convenient. As a result, all the streets and plazas were full of trash, quite disgusting, but when ignoring the trash, the city is beautiful!

 This plaza, called Plaza Mayor, is the center point of 6 different streets.

 Madrid is full of street entertainment.

The Royal Palace.

Madrid's Cathedral.

 It wouldn't be a traditional European city without a cathedral.

Plaza de España

 The statues are of Don Quijote and Sancho Pancho, two famous characters in Spanish literature.

 Debod Temple

 My second day in Madrid, I went to a huge park, called Retiro Park. It was amazingly beautiful and relaxing, filled with flowers, grass, trees, fountains, statues, lakes, etc.

 Not to mention the glass palace located in the center.

Thanks for reading!