Las Fallas, Valencia

This is the large Falla in the city hall plaza burning down. The pictures are out of order, but it's easy to get the general idea.

It may have felt like a world war, but it definitely didn't look like one.

This is a photo of a small Falla burning. They literally burned them in between buildings and there were always firefighters spraying water on the buildings surrounding the burning art.

A lot of people were dressed up for the event.

Churros and more delicious food was everywhere.

Bella, Sam and I by the tourist Falla. Very fitting.

We saw a very homemade carousel ride.

Isabella, Sam and I in front of one of the Fallas. Around the city, there are hundreds of large Fallas and smaller ones. On the last day (Friday) of Las Fallas, they always burn all of them down but one. It was pretty sad to see such beautiful pieces of art burn down.

This Falla was in the city hall plaza. They burned this one down at 1am after all the others had been burning since 10PM and had a fireworks show. MILLIONS of people were in this plaza to watch the show.

Chris, Bella and I after the Mesclata in the city hall plaza.

This picture is during the mesclata. Very intense. It almost felt like being in a world war, except no one was running, people were drinking, laughing and clapping.

This is another one of the large Fallas.

Las Fallas, first test and spring break

This past weekend, the group of international students studying in Murcia took a day trip to Valencia to celebrate Las Fallas. We left from Murcia that Friday at 8am and made it back Saturday morning at 6:30. Nonetheless, it was an incredibly long day but well worth it. It was unbelievable the number of people and the amount of noise going on in the city. Writing about it doesn't do the event justice and pictures hardly do it justice either. Because it happened last weekend and there are no words to describe the event, the post after this will be made up of all pictures.

For the past two weeks, two other American girls and I have been studying for our first test/quiz in political history in Latin America. The test was this Monday and we studied from 1:30pm to the last minute before taking our test at 7:30. The test was seven short answer questions and then there was one question the three of us answered differently. I thought it was multiple choice, one girl thought it was answering each letter option and the other girl used those three questions in consideration when answering the main question. Overall, the first test here was fairly similar to what I would take in the states, except that it had to be written in Spanish. The teacher (Ismael Crespo Martinez) has written a few books and I guess is fairly known outside the university. It's nice having teachers who are passionate about what they teach.

Spring break starts on Friday and goes until April 11. On Thursday, I'll be traveling to Marseille with a friend from Murcia. We'll be taking a train from Murcia to Montpellier and then to Marseille. Spend the night in Marseille, visit Marseille the next day and travel to Nice, Monaco, Lyon, spend two hours in Paris and then I'm meeting three other girl friends in Munich. In Munich, we'll be spending two days and then taking a train to Bamberg and couchsurfing with an old lady who lives on a farm with horses. After Bamberg, we'll visit Dresden and then finally spend four days in Berlin. In Berlin, we're going to be staying in a hostel and visiting most of the tourist attractions and finally make our way to a concentration camp if all goes well.

Since I'll be spending a good chunk of time on a train, our political history teacher assigned us the book "La Fiesta del Chivo/The Feast of the Goat" and the week after spring break, we will have to hand in a review of the book.

Overall, it's hard to believe we've already been in Murcia for two months and have only taken one test. As most people know, the US is in the news a lot these days and when I went to my landlord's apartment to pay my rent, she put CNN on to watch the health care news. Since we never watch TV here, it was nice to see what is going on back in the states.

Only stress

After a hectic week of finalizing schedules and credit between the Universidad de Murcia and South Dakota State University, I think things are finally set. On Thursday, I went to the Spanish version of "registering" and signed up for my final four classes: Photo journalism (Tuesdays, 3 hours), Graphic Design (Thursdays, 3 hours), Latin American Literature (Monday (1 hour), Tuesday (1 hour) and Wednesday (2 hours) and Political History of Latin America (Monday (2 hours) and Tuesday (1 hour). Overall, I'm fairly satisfied with the schedule and the classes I chose. Because I'm relieved everything is finally cleared up, I decided to post a popular song that's been playing everywhere here. Most of the exchange students are still stressing because our stipend, that was supposed to come in at the end of February, hasn't come in yet and we've all been living out of our own pockets for the past month.
Tomorrow, I'll write about each one of my classes and the strange university celebration that happened in the Student Union type thing Wednesday night. Let's just say the educational system and rules are very different than those of SDSU or any school in the states.

Buenas Noches

Mazarrón, Spain

Today, we decided to take a day trip to Mazarrón. The bus left this morning at 9:30am and it took about an hour and a half to get to the port city of Mazarrón. On the way there, the radio mentioned something about the earthquake in Chile and then started playing "We are the World." As cheesy as it may sound, at the moment, everyone on the bus went silent and was silent for the whole song. It was amazing to be driving through these little streets and seeing little beach towns and houses, but it was sad to think that in less than 20 minutes it could all be destroyed. Once we were at the port city, it was cloudy outside and because it was in off season, there weren't many people around. Basically, the summer beach town felt very apocalyptic.

 

Some of the streets and houses looked like this.

Some of them looked beautiful. 

A lot of the streets were lined with summer houses that were empty for the season. 

The only people on the beach were young surfers (surfing what, I don't know) and families. 

Overall, Mazarrón is the sort of town that comes alive in the summer from what the postcards and scenery make out. This photo is from google.

This week will be my final week to figure out my classes and credits. Technically, we should get our stipend tomorrow after a month of living out of our own pockets. By the end of the week, a post will be dedicated to classes and the beautiful campus. 

Italian Coffee Maker (Moka Pot)

Highlight of the week: In order to be more economical during this "hora de crisis" or "crisis time", I've learned how to make coffee using the only tool available in the apartment...an Italian coffee maker/Moka Pot. It was nerve wrecking at first, but after the second try, I had very strong espresso ready to drink. 

Cartagena, Spain

This past Monday or Tuesday, my new roommate, Deniz, from Turkey moved in. Both her and the other girl from Turkey, Sinem, are graduate math students. Because they're both in their mid-twenties, it's hard for us to be social with each other; however, because Sinem has been gone for a week and won't be back for a couple more, Deniz and I have been able to build a friendship before the apartment is ruled by Turkish. Before Sinem left, we had started talking more, so I'm thinking things might get more fun once we're all on the same page. The only difficult thing is having to play translator between my landlord and the roommates. Last night, I had to sit in my shower towel translating between my landlord and Deniz. I wonder if I could start charging a fee? On a lighter note, my new roommate has introduced me to a lot of things...

Turkish Candy

Turkish Coffee

From Friday to Sunday, Murcia has been in a full blown carnival celebration. After the first week of classes, it felt like everyone was ready to have a good weekend. On Friday, we had a welcome lunch/wine of honor ceremony with the president of the university. It lasted about 30 minutes and at the end said "Now, let's go drink some beer and wine." Only in Europe would a university president encourage the students to raise a glass to a good semester. The appetizers were delicious and chatting with some of the other students and professors was great fun. 

That night, we went to Badulake for a carnival night. Since during carnival you're supposed to dress up, Megan, Isabella and I dressed up as the 3 Blind Mice (Los Tres Ratoncitos Ciegos). We found mouse ears for 1 euro at a convenience store and thought it would be a great idea. At the bar, they played a lot of Portuguese music since carnival is big in Brazil. It was possibly the best night at that bar because the music was great, there were live Portuguese drummers every once in a while and everyone was dressed up and having a good time...until the next day when we had to wake up at 8am to go to Cartagena at 9am with all the other international students. 

Cartagena started off great because the sun was actually out for the first time in weeks and it was warm enough to wear a light jacket rather than a heavier coat. I have never been so excited to see water in a very long time. When we got off the bus and after roaming around the city, I was shocked at how beautiful Cartagena actually was and how close to Murcia it actually is (45 min.). After visiting the old theater and other buildings, we had lunch right in the center of the main plaza, outside, in the sun, with a checkered table cloth and with a delicious, unhealthy 8 euro meal. It consisted of a glass bottle diet coke with a lime, bread, fresh potato fries, a boiled egg and breaded calamari. The setting and the food was worth those 8 euros. After lunch, we walked around the port, sat in the sun, had some ice cream, visited a museum about a ship from about 2,700 years ago that they are just now excavating under the sea, browsed the shops and people watched. Overall, it's hard to describe Cartagena in words. It felt good to get out of the city of Murcia and into such a different atmosphere. I'm sure once summer starts, we will be taking plenty of bus trips down to the beaches of Cartagena. Since I'm failing miserably at describing Cartagena, I hope the pictures do it justice. 

The old theater in Cartagena. It was so strange to see such an old building with normal apartments all around it. I saw a little boy running around with his soccer ball on the side of the theater like it was an everyday thing. 

Another view of the theater from a look out place. You can see all the normal apartment buildings around it. Imagine waking up every morning to see that. 

The water was so clear, I can't imagine what it's like to swim at the beach on the other side of the mountain during the summer. 

On a more educational note, I started classes last week and because we don't actually pick them until next week, I only went to a few to check them out. For two of my classes (Fotojournalism and Graphic Design), I have to take a 30 minute bus ride to the other campus two times a week. Riding the bus isn't that bad, it's actually nice to have 30 minutes to prepare your brain for class. I also went to a literature of the 19th century class and a journalism law class. Because spanish journalism laws wouldn't help me and the literature class mainly focused on poetry, the other two classes I'm probably going to be taking are literature figures of latin america and another class about Spain that is supposed to be enjoyable for exchange students. Once the weather is nicer, I'll post pictures of both the campus in the city and the larger one outside of the city. In that post, I'll also try to describe the differences between going to class here and in the states because it definitely feels different...a good different. 

Valentines Day

This valentine's day, I went to the movie Valentine's Day with a group of five other girls. The movie theater is at this entertainment center called Zig Zag. When we got there, they were playing a soccer match on the giant screen of the food plaza. Price wise, the tickets for a night show were 6.50 euros which is about $8.80 in the states. There is a small movie theater in the city center where we live but there is only one room and it was showing Wolfman. We ended up walking about 15 minutes to the Zig Zag place. 

Once at the theater, we bought candy at a candy shop outside of the theater and it is surprisingly acceptable to bring in outside food. There were only a couple of differences with movie theaters in the states:

1. The movie theater was very very warm inside. 

2. You get an assigned seat when you purchase your ticket.

3. No one talks during the movies (at least during this one. Except for my Austrian friend who talked to me throughout the whole movie).

4. The movie was in Spanish. Completely in Spanish. Except for the part where they sang I Will Survive. It wasn't the same watching Julia Roberts, Ashton Kutcher, Jamie Foxx, etc, speaking in Spanish...but it was very entertaining nonetheless. 

The first day of class is tomorrow, so it'll be like going to a new school all over again. I've been 

told girls in Murcia don't use backpacks, so I might have to follow the trend to blend in with the other students.