Getting the swing of things

“Conejo, conejo, conejo!”—That’s “Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit!” for those of you interested in getting a little extra Spanish luck on the first day of February! I told my Senora Julia about this tradition at lunch today and she said rabbit feet are good luck in Spain too! We’re getting to a point of merging cultures now.

I just sat for a second thinking, “How do I say ‘Getting the swing of things’ in Spanish?” before remembering I’m writing my blog in English! The past week or so when I’ve been talking with friends or family from home, I think first in Spanish! Yesss! I’m getting somewhere! Little by little (poco a poco) this culture is starting to sink in and become natural to me. I’m making fewer mistakes in both speaking and manners. I’m starting to recognize the patterns on the blankets covering me when I first wake up in the morning. I’ve been going to more local Spanish restaurants and bars. I’ve even joined a gym. I figure I’m going to be in Europe for four more months, so I might as well get comfortable!

Still, I feel like I don’t really know what the semester has in store for me quite yet. I start regular semester classes next week, so I haven’t even begun the somewhat terrifying adventure of trying to understand a professor discuss the history of mass communication in Spain entirely in Spanish. Yikes. Last week and this week we’ve been taking an intensive two-week Spanish course to remind ourselves of the past seven or eight years of Spanish we’ve taken. As daunting as that sounds, it’s been pretty easy. My professor Carmen is very patient and we spend much of the class chatting about cool things to do around Sevilla. Last week she suggested her favorite tapas restaurant and my friends Abby, Kayla and I went there on Friday. Carmen was so right! Best tapas I’ve ever had- and really cheap! I love the feel of dining here. You just order however much you want at a time, and you can sit around and have a long meal and order more as you go. No rushing away of the plates. No slamming of a check on the table. Yes, I can get used to the Spanish way of life.

I want to explore the ways of life while visiting other Spanish cities as well. My program, CIEE, organizes four free trips for us. Last week we went to Italica, which is basically a much smaller Roman forum and Colosseum left over from the era of Roman rule over 2000 years ago. Very cool. (Oh and cool=guay) And Saturday we took a day trip to Cordoba, which many people describe as a smaller Sevilla because it is also situated along Rio Guadalquivir and reveals the influences of Catholicism, Islam and Judaism. We toured the castle where Ferdinand and Isabella lived for eight years and where Christopher Columbus (Cristobal Colon) knocked on the door asking for a few ships for a tiny insignificant voyage to India that opened the entire New World to Spanish/European colonization. No big deal. The castle was fascinating, but the gardens behind it were stunning! I’m always the one lagging behind the tour with my camera, so after a little while, Abby, Kayla and I decided to just hang back and do our own little tour! It’s so much better when you can just wander and figure things out on your own than walking with a tour guide, stopping to listen to rapid Spanish, walking to a new spot, listening again, walking, listening…get the picture? It’s so much more fun to explore…and maybe even get a little lost like Cristobal Colon!

So Cordoba was tons of fun, and then the rest of my time here I’ve just been getting to know the city. My friend and I explored el Mercado de Triana (Triana is my neighborhood, mi barrio), checked out the various stands for fruit, meat, fish, bread, sweets, etc. and only got slightly freaked out by the massive buckets of still-moving sea creatures amidst fish heads and octopus tentacles (pulpos). Quite fragrant. Yesterday I took a long walk on my own around neighborhoods farther from el centro and sauntered down the Rio Guadalquivir. You just get to see how varied the neighborhoods (barrios) in one city can be and that not every European city is all castles with turrets and ramparts but that people live there and it’s not a tourist attraction for them. I feel like the more I get to know these parts of the city, the more I’ll feel like a Sevillana. And that’s another one of my goals for the semester. Feel (speak/act/dress/be mistaken for) a Sevillana. I’ll let you know how that’s going next time!

Muchos besos!!
Lyss

P.S. If anyone wants to suggest wonderful places to visit in Europe, my friends and I are planning our trips soon, so I’d love some advice! Gracias!

P.P.S. Some pics!
Here we have my friend Zenith and me at the Colosseum in Italica, el Mercado de Triana and my room!