Monday, February 27, 2012

"Faster, faster 'til the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death."

I have some down time on my vacation this afternoon, so I figured I fill everybody in, and then go study.
We left Malaga at 9am on Saturday and drove 6 hours to Siguenza, Spain, where we stayed the night. It was a cute little town.
Then on Sunday we left again, at 9, and drove the remaining 4+ hours to Panticosa. As we were driving through a particulary mountainous area, my host dad told me that normally all of what I am seeing is covered in snow. This year for some reason, there is no snow. We arrived in Panticosa, it was 60 degrees and sunny, and only dirty piles of snow here or there clearly left overs from piles made by plows. I looked at the mountain where we were supposedly going skiing, and all I saw was dirt. My heart sank. I wanted snow. I imagined this place like a winter wonderland, or at least an inch of snow and a least a little chilly. But, my host dad assured me that we can still go skiing becuase they have fake snow.

This morning we got up and left to go skiing at guess! 9am, and skiied all day (with an hour lunch break) until 4. The mountains here are absolutlty gorgeous, despite the lack of snow and sort of depressing look the mountain has becuase it is all brown. Only about half of the ski trails were open, but there is practically no one here, so we could go where ever we wanted without having to wait in lines.
At first I figured that most of the older kids in the family would be better than me (oh right, we came here with 4 of my host dad´s brothers and their families, so we got the whole crew. We are a group of 28 people) I figured they´d be better than me becuase they ski here every year for a week since around 2003, so I figured the kids would be well seasoned to skiing, and pick it back up again. However, to my delight (I dont really like it when people are better than me at things) I am still one of the most skilled skiiers of the group. Only a few of my host dad´s brothers can keep up with me. To relate to the quote, I just sorta go straight down the mountain, like usual and my whole host familt is convinced I´m insane. But I can handle that.

We will ski from 9am til 5pm everyday until friday. and after 5 we usually just have down time where I can study. I also think one of these afternoons we are going to go to a spa resort aparently one of the best ones in spain. :)

Well thats all for now. Here are some pictures.

The castle of singuenza

My host dad and my little cousin looking down a well



Me and my cousin Susanna in Singuenza

Our hotel in Panticosa


maria on the mountain



my friend Javi snowboarding

A wierd type of lift, it literally pulls ou up the moutain...



My host brother pablo

pablo again


another type of lift, you stand on the strip, like those
things in airports to help you go fast, but this goes uphill

Monday, February 20, 2012

"You need to have a bad day once in a while, otherwise, you'll never know what a good day feels like."

Today I just had one of those days that could have been better. I came home early from school because the thought of learning in spanish today, or just learning in general just made my head spin. I came home and just watched tv for about 4 hours. But I still went to piano. One of these days I will record myself playing my new songs that I have learned and post them...I just need to get around to it...

Even though today was sort of terrible, my weekend was amazing. On Friday one of my friends from AFS came and visited me for the weekend, Mikeala. We went out on friday night with my friends from school, which actually was kind of a funny situation. Mikeala and I were speaking in english (and spanish here or there), and my friend Mariely (who is french) had her friend who was visiting her from France with her, so they were speaking french, and then the other kids in the group were speaking spanish. So we were quite the multilingual group. While we were out, becuase it was carnaval, many people were dressed up. We were walking down by the port and my friends knew these guys who were all dressed as "firefighters" and once they heard me and mikeala speaking english they surrounded us and wouldn´t let us leave. They asked us a million questions and flirted with us for a good half and hour, all the while my friends were laughing and not doing anything to help us...that was fun.

On Saturday we got up, put on shorts and tshirts and walked to the beach. Granted it was like 60 degrees, and probably more in the sun, that isnt warm for malaga, so we got tons of wierd looks.

On saturday night we first went out with Maria and her friends but left to go out to the center. We saw my friend Mariely and stayed with her for a bit, but later went our own way. We ended up staying out until 4 in the morning...gotta love spain<3

On Sunday we got up at ten to clean my room (which looked like it had exploded...i should have taken a picture...) and get going to get mikeala on the bus by 1. We figured if we left at 11:30 we´d have plenty of time. We were wrong. Aparently there was some sort of protest going on in the center of the city so most of the roads were shut down, and the bus system was all screwed up. Plus, it was sunday, so the bus system already is a little different than normal. It took us an hour to get on bus 32 (my normal one), then get to the center and find bus 24, a bus i have never taken, because the bus id normally take to get from the center to the bus station was messed up due to the protest.

We finally got to the bus station at 12:50, with ten minutes to buy her ticket and hope that they werent all sold out yet. What a morning.

Then I proceeded to do nothing for the rest of the day.

some pictures from my 365 project:






Wednesday, February 15, 2012

"The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase, if you pursue happiness you'll never find it." -CP Snow

So. I know its wednesday, and I wrote not too long ago, but these last three days (today in particular) have just been amazing. I haven´t really done anything out of the ordinary, but finally things are just falling into place. Things that have been building for awhile and getting better gradually. As the quote says, at first, when I first got here I was looking for a certain happiness that I had in mind. But, I was looking to hard. Sometimes you just have to just let it happen, without too many expectations.

I don´t really know how to explain. But I guess, I finally feel like I belong here. The Romero´s have felt like family for a long time, but now I feel even more like a part of the family and I dread the idea of leaving (so I´d rather not even talk about that). Maria and I are getting along great. My host parents and I get along great. They help me out when I need it, and I help them out by cleaning off the table after dinner and all that.

Pablo and I are like siblings, but without the fighting. Pablo and I have a, I help you, you help me sort of relationship. But despite the fact that he is my 11 year old little host brother with a minor language barrier, we just sort of understand each other, if that makes any sense. Today, we made pizza together for dinner (which my host mom enjoyed), plus I helped him with his math. I felt so accomplished after he exclaimed, "I understand! I get it now!" after my aid (mind you terrible spanish math words attempts).
When I first got here he didnt quite know what to do with me. He didn´t know where we stood (nor did I for that matter) because I´m older, but becuase I didnt speak spanish, I was sort of an equal becuase I didn´t know how things worked around here. So, after 5 months of me being here, we finally arent awkward, and we actually talk... :)

Also, today at school I had one of the best days ever. I realized today that my friends arent just my friends becuase I am the "american" and felt bad I knew nobody and all that. They actually enjoy my company. I knew that before, but today it just really showed. I am good enough friends with them that I can steal their sweaters to try it on and they can joke about how big it is. Or good enough friends that we spend the whole class drawing each other pictures that say, "te quiero" with our names. They are good enough friends that they make sure I am alright if I seem a little off. We are good enough friends that they help me to understand no matter how many times I say, "¿quee?" and they actually listen to what I have to say, despite my horrific grammar. They are the best friends an exchange student would ever want :) les quiero.

Anddd in school today I gained the respect of the other half of my class who havent really necesarily been too interested in me. Not that they are mean or anything, they just don´t care that I exist, which I dont really care either. But today, I was sort of forced to spend time with them, and I wasn´t gunna just sit there dumbly. So, now they know alittle more about me, and they know that I can actually speak spanish, and that yes, I do understand what they say. And turns out, hey! they actually like me, who new the american could be so cool? They even invited me to go out with them sometime, go figure.

Well thats all for today. EspaƱa<3 I never want to leave.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

“There is only you and your camera. The limitations in your photography are in yourself, for what we see is what we are.” - Ernst Haas

Photography. Sort of becoming my life here. I lost count of how many of my friends have told me that I take too many pictures. And all my AFS friends joke that "where ever Ally is, so is her camera", or whenever a photo needs to be taken the first person everyone turns to is me, not that I mind :)

So this past week, again has been pretty normal, I guess I am falling into a pattern, finally getting used to things here :)
I had photography and everything. Ran. Had tests in school. The norm.

On Friday I didnt go out. I just stayed home and did work for my Psychology VHS class for my high school back in the US. On Saturday my cousins came over and we had home made paella for lunch. 
Then after that I went for a run (despite basically no motivation) and then went out with Julian who happened to be coming to Malaga for a few hours. We didnt do much, except last night was kick off to the Carnival Celebrations that will continue next weekend. 





Now for some more 365 challenge pics:






and just a couple more pictures I really like:







Tuesday, February 7, 2012

"Expect problems and eat them for breakfast." Alfred A. Montapert

This quote should be the AFS motto, I swear.

So, this past week was pretty boring. I had piano, and my photography class, and stuff. I didn´t go to school Friday becuase I would have had only one class that day, so I was like, I will stay home, no one will miss me. So, I slept in. Got up and ate cereal. Painted Annika a picture (like I promised her I would). Went for a run. Ate lunch. Did my english project. Then went to the beach to take pictures. I had planned on meeting my friend after she had crew, but it didn´t work out. However I did spontaneously meet a guy from Iowa and his friend from England, and we are possibly going out for lunch sometime in the next weeks. :) so that was good.

On Saturday I went to an AFS orientation (in Malaga, so not far for me...a ten minute drive...) For the afternoon we really just played games and talked. One of the activities was to write down a problem you are having and everyone was like...uhh...problems? who has problems? (but...some people do, but only like 5 kids, the rest are happy little foreign exchangers) That is why I love this quote so much. Most of us AFSers just sort of expect things to be a little bumpy, so when we come across a problem we just keep on rolling right over it, even if we need a little push, but no matter what it won´t be the end of the world.
We went out on Saturday night (until 5am...) then got up at 8:30 the next morning. like, whatt?? welcome to Spain. And that is really all I did this weekend. 

Well, many of my teachers are sick (and my math teacher broke her leg, skiing.) So since here they dont have subs, we just dont have class and often times just go home early. Or, like me tomorrow, I am not coming into school until 3rd period because my teachers wont be there. :)

Okay, so now from some of my Project 365 photos.

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