School!!

Good afternoon everybody!!! I have had an extremely lazy day so I thought that I would update my blog and let y'all know about school here in Granada! The University of Granada is so cool! It was founded in 1531 and has 28 buildings spread out over the city! I am taking four classes in two different buildings...the Kenya building and the CLM (Centro de Lenguas Modernas) which are about a 25 minute walk from my apartment! Its a nice little walk that takes me through the beautiful streets of Granada. While its been a tad chilly the whole time I've been here, I still love the walk.

I really like all my classes as well! I am taking two classes in Spanish, Spanish grammar and Spanish oral and writing class. I also have two classes in English as well, History of Spain and History of Art in Spain. I had to take a Spanish placement test the second week I was here which placed me into Level 5 of Spanish. At first I was really excited, but at the same time I was really apprehensive about that level of Spanish. I decided to try out the first couple days in Level 5 before I decided anything. I went to my classes the first 2 days and the grammar class killed me. I literally felt as if I drowning in Spanish and couldn't understand anything that was going on in the class. I ended up switching down to Level 4 and I feel so much better about it. I understand so much more and my teacher is so sweet and patient with all of us. She has already taught us so much in one class! We have a small class so we have all gotten to know each other and I already feel like we are going to all be friends!

I also am a part of an internship program here through CEA where I get to go to an elementary school here for 2 hours twice a week and help teach English to 1st and 2nd graders! I had my first day of school today and I had a blast! I feel like its really going to help my Spanish studies with me talking to these little kids in Spanish and trying to translate it to English for them. I love working with kids too so I feel like this is perfect for me! I am excited to see where it goes!

I am having a blast with this program! CEA is such a blessing and the advisers here are awesome! They literally are always there when you need them and they will help you with anything!! I love them all! I have been so lucky to make awesome friends through this program and can't wait to be a part of this group!

I shall keep you up to date on my school as well as my internship! Until then...adios!
Mackenzy

Cartagena!!!!

So this past weekend I was lucky enough to be reunited with one of my favorite people..Leticia!!!! Leti is from Cartagena, Spain and she lived with my family in the States last year!! She is such a wonderful, rambunctious girl who bonded with our family instantly! It felt like she had been our sister forever!!!! I was so excited to go visit her and her family in Cartagena! I took a bus from Granada to Cartagena on Thursday night and walked around the town with Leti! Cartagena is a town right on the water, a port town where the Spanish Armada also keeps their submarines, war ships, and research vessels.I was lucky enough to get to go inside the base and see some of the ships and submarines with Leti and her father!

I love this girl!!!

A torpedo!!!!

One of the older submarines on the base!

 After a day of shopping and having fun with Leti and some of her friends, Leti and her father (a wonderful wonderful man whom I adore!) took me to their beach house located about 25 minutes form Cartagena in Cabo de Palos! They have a beautiful condo there, filled with such interesting things from the family travels! The beach house was filled with things that Leti had brought back from Texas like a cowboy hat, Texas magnets, some Texas dishes and dish towels, and my favorite...a Texas flag that they hung outside on a flag pole in my honor! I loved walking back to the house and seeing that flag fly!! Made me so proud!

It was really windy that weekend at the beach, which according to Leti is really rare! She said that there are never waves like I saw there, and the water is so warm in the summers! I am going to be spending two weeks with them at the beginning of the summer at the beach, so I can't wait to see and experience that! I love the beach! One of my favorite things to do at the beach is look for cool shells and sea-glass! I know, I'm kinda a nerd, but its like fossil hunting and I feel like every piece of sea-glass that has been shaved down to a smooth exterior and every shell I find has a story! So while Leti sun bathed, I went exploring! It was so beautiful even if it was windy and the water was wavy and cold!

I found some pretty sea-glass and a few shells, but my favorite thing I found on the beaches were pieces of tile that had been smoothed by the sea! I guess when contractors don't use the scraps of tile on the houses and whatnot, they throw them in the ocean which makes them smooth and gorgeous. I kept finding really pretty patterns and colors of this "sea-tile" as I now call it along with the sea glass! My plan is to take a bag of it home and make a stepping stone mosaic from all the pretty sea things I find in Spain! I'll let you know how that turns out!

Well, I will keep you updated on the rest of adventures as soon as I can! God bless!
Mackenzy

The Alhambra

I'm backkk!!!!!!! I have so much to catch y'all up on!! I've been busy traveling and haven't had time to sit down and write! Blogging is actually pretty time-consuming if you didn't know! So I will catch you up as best I can! I took my Spanish placement exam last Monday which placed me into Level 5 of 9 of Spanish! As happy as I am about getting into that high of a level, I am a tad worried it will be harder than I expected to take. I originally told A&M that I would be in Level 4 so hopefully I can work it the transferring of credits soon! Keep your fingers crossed for me! On Tuesday, I had a lazy day of walking around and more orientation business! I got my cell phone here so I am connected to Spain that way! I also went out with some of the girls in my program to an adorable Cantina here in Spain for drinks and fun that night! While they had margaritas and whatnot, I (being the weird girl who doesn't like the taste of alcohol) had a smoothie in a margarita glass! I wanted the full effect of going out without actually drinking haha! It was so much fun to just girl talk and get to know these lovely ladies!

The next day I got to go on a beautiful tour of the Alhambra here in Granada! It is the most visited tourist attraction in Spain and such a beautiful place to see! Take a look at what the Alhambra looks like from a distance at sunset!!

My group got to go on a tour around the Alhambra led by a Spanish man with a British accent..talk about diversity! He led us all around the site and showed us everything there was to see at the Alhambra all the while giving us a thorough history of the Alhambra!

I love this view with the contrast of the palm trees and the snowy mountains!

  

I love this city!!

One of the many views from the top of the Alhambra!

There was so much history in this place! It has witnessed royalty of different nationalities from Sultans to Queen Isabel and King Ferdinand! It was actually here at the Alhambra that Christopher Columbus received permission to sail to the New World!I love standing in the same place as so many important people...it makes me feel like I'm a part of history! Not only was the history so interesting, but it was beautiful around the outside as well! The gardens around the Alhambra (called Generalife) were stunning then, but apparently its even prettier in the spring when everything is blooming around the fountains and around the mazes! I can't wait to go back to see it all in bloom!

When we actually went into the palace areas of the Alhambra, I was blown away by the ornateness of the architecture and designs that were everywhere! What is even more amazing to me is that each of these ornate designs on the walls and ceilings, were at one point painted meticulously in reds, blues, and green like a beautiful Persian rug. I can only imagine how beautiful that must of been!

You can still see some of the red that was once on the trim!

I can just see myself on silk pillows and eating grapes with this view!

Can you imagine painting all of these ornate carvings?! Can you imagine them painted!?!?

It was so beautiful to behold now, but in its heyday it must have been even more spectacular! This is the view from across a pond into the main room that Sultan used to greet visitors and ambassadors! That room across the way is also the same room that was later used by Queen Isabel to give permission to Christopher Columbus who found our wonderful America!

The Sultan's room!

I could hardly take it all in! It was all so beautiful and extravagant! I highly recommend visiting the Alhambra if you are in Spain! If you want to know more about the history of the Alhambra check out its Wiki page here! I am totally a Wikipedia addict even if its not exactly all that accurate all the time it still serves its purpose! Also if you want to look up pictures, tour information, and all around site information, you can check out the official Alhambra site here!
Until next time, have a blessed week!

Mackenzy

4,5,6!!!!!!

My bad, my bad...I've been busy being busy in Granada that I haven't had the opportunity to sit down and write! But here I am!!! So lets start with Day 4: Amigos y Mas!!!!!! Friday was a day of new friends for sure! I had my first orientation on campus which was really fun! I got to meet other kids in my CEA group who had just come in as well! I've met some really cool people and I know I will have great friends by the time I'm done here! That evening after orientation and my siesta (my favorite part of the day), my host sister Ana and her boyfriend Alejandro, took Lizzy and I out on the town with some of her friends! We went to a tetaria (a tea house) and then we walked around the city till we found a cute little restaurant where we got shwarma! If any of you have seen the movie The Avengers, shwarma is a meal that all the superheros eat at the end of the movie. Since I LOVE superheros, I was so excited to try it. It was soooooo delicious!!!!!! By the time we got home it was around 12:30 and Lizzy and I were so exhausted! But we had to wake up early the next morning because CEA was taking us to Ronda!

Which brings me to Day 5: Ronda is the Place to be! We got up at 7 to be at Correos (the local post office where we always meet) by 8. There was about 30 of us CEA-ers and we got on a bus to start the 2 hour drive from Granada to Ronda. The views were amazing! I felt like we were in a different world!!

Lizzy and me on the bus to Ronda!




One of the beautiful views from the bus!

When we got there, we all got off the bus and met up with our tour guides! There was one who gave the tour in English and one who gave it Spanish...I chose the English speaking tour guide because I love tours and wanted to understand everything that we were seeing. It was all so interesting!! Ronda is such an old beautiful town that is divided by a giant gorge! Its so impressive and beautiful!!!! I would've loved to climb down to the bottom of the gorge to look around but we didn't have enough time!


That bridge that you see above is the newest bridge of three that connect the two sides of the city together. Even though it is new, that bridge is still over 250 years old!!! It was so beautiful to see from this angle, but it was even cooler to walk across and look down!

This place was seriously gorgeous! Everywhere you looked had a view of something new and breathtaking! I was in heaven! We also visited an old Arab bath house there in Ronda, where people used to go to clean their bodies in hot steam rooms and cold rooms! We got to see inside them which was so interesting!

This was the view from above the bath houses and one of the hot steam rooms inside!

After we visited this bath house, we went to a museum and an old house with more amazing views of the countryside of Ronda!

I had so much fun in Ronda!!! It was a beautiful city full of history and culture! I would love to back there again someday to spend more time walking around the countryside and the gorge area. It was spectacular! I highly recommend it to anybody visiting Spain, especially southern Spain! You can find more information about the city of Ronda at Turismo de Ronda.

What was even better about the day was that night, Ana and Ale took Lizzy and I to an actual working Arab Bath House in Granada, a few blocks from our house! It was so fun! There were 6 hot pools (different temperatures of hot) and one cold pool! It was silent in there and dark and steamy. The atmosphere was so cool!! Also, we each got to have a 20 minute back or leg massage! It was so nice! I got the back massage and the lady that did it did a great job! They had Arab tea in the rooms so you could drink that and completely unwind! After all the walking around Ronda, this was the perfect end to the day! If you want to check out the bath houses, you can click here.

On Day 6, we visited a neighborhood of Granada called Sacromonte! This was just as pretty as Ronda was and right in my backyard here! We got to visit an old abbey there, and walk around in a cave underneath the abbey! It was a very Catholic place, which was very interesting and historical! My roommate, Lizzy was in heaven because she is a deeply religious Catholic girl (which I adore). I have been so blessed with her as a roommate (or companera de cuarto :D )! So after, we visited the beautiful abbey, we went to a high point of the city named Mirador de San Nicolas where we watched the sunset over Granada. It was sooooooo beautiful!!! Plus we were right next to the Alhambra (old moorish castle) which I will be going to on Wednesday, so be on the lookout for more pics!

I will try to be better about posting every day! There is just so much to see and do all the time!!!! Yes, there are siestas where I have time to relax, but I'd rather sleep and get ready for the second half of my day!!! But I will be better, I promise! Stay tuned!

Kenzy

Day Two and Three!

I'm going to bring these two days together because my day two really consisted of me sleeping all day and trying to get over jet lag which was no fun. I felt like I had sand in my eyes and a weight on top of my brain which subsequently led to me sleeping in till about 3 PM. At first I was bummed that I slept the day away, but I realized I probably wouldn't have had as much fun if I was exhausted. Luckily, one of my friends from Texas A&M who is also studying this semester Granada, invited me to tapas!! I had so much fun walking around the city with her and seeing the nightlife. We went for tapas at a chic little bar that was delicious!! The food sold me on Spain!

I'm going through an adjustment period right now that really makes me mis my family. It feels different than when I went to college...more realistic, I guess. It's just so real that I'm not seven hours from my mommy and daddy and sissy, but I'm actually halfway across the world. It kinda freaked me out the first night, which led to me having a panic attack and Skype-ing my family at 2:30 AM. Thank The Lord above for technology though, because they talked me out of purchasing a ticket back home face-to-face via iPads. Its gotten so much better and the missing home emotions only come in small waves every so often.

Today was such a wonderful day! I finally got to move in to my host house and spend a full day with my new familia! My mama, Amparo, is so sweet and patient with me and my terrible Spanish. Plus she is an excellent cook! Sometimes I don't even know what I'm eating but I love it! My sister, Ana, is also a wonderful girl. She is so funny and loud and energetic! I love talking to her also because she is trying to learn English as well, so we help each other out! I have been so blessed to have a spectacular roommate! Lizzy is from Illinois and she is so good at Spanish! She translates a majority of the conversations for me and helps me reply back correctly. We have so much in common and I already feel like we are best friends!!

Tonight I also got my first shopping experience in the city! There are so many stores and so many different things to look at, its almost overwhelming. But I love shopping so it doesn't phase me! Lizzy wanted a pair of genuine Spanish leather boots because it is SO COLD here, so Mama took us around the various streets! I wasn't planning on buying a pair myself but I caved. They were just so cute and comfortable! Plus, how many people get to say they bought their boots in Spain? Check them out at the bottom of this post!

It is 12:35 AM here right now, and I start my orientation tomorrow morning! I'm excited to meet other students in the group and start learning about the city and university! As always, keep checking back for more of my adventures in ESPANAAAAA!!!

Kenzyy

Day One in ESPANA

So I'm hereeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!! Finally!!!! Yesterday was my first day in Granada and it was, lets just say, full of adventures! We shall start from the top!! I flew from McAllen to Dalllas, from Dallas to New York, from New York CIty to Madrid, then finally Madrid to Granada! At each airport I had a 3-5 hour layover which was really boring but it gave me time to read and walk around the airports and in New York City..eat "authentic" New York pizza!! Not sure if it counts as authentic if its in an airport but it was delicious nonetheless!

One of the best parts of the flights I had was that none of them were full! During each flight I had a seat in between me and the other passenger! It was nice to have at least a little bit of extra leg room! One downer was that on the international flight from NYC to Madrid, I didn't have my own TV like I expected! What the plane lacked in entertainment though, it made up for in food! I had tortellini, a hot bun with butter, crackers with a Swiss cheese spread, and a caramel brownie! Totally delicious!

When I got to Granada the real adventures started. I decided to take the local bus to my hostel instead of a taxi because 1. It was cheaper 2. The guy at the info counter at the airport said it would be easier 3. I had a map and thought it would be easy to find. WRONG!!!! I ended up wandering around the streets of Granada for over an hour. I asked around (in my broken Spanish) in shops, restaurants, hotels, and banks if anybody knew where it was and they kept telling me to go straight then turn left! So I did which would get me even more lost and confused. Not to mention it was coooolllld and rainy, plus I was rolling my 50 pound suitcase behind me and carrying my 15 pound backpack.

Finally, after rolling by these two old men about three times, they stopped and asked me where I was going. When I told them where, they decided to walk me there. I was so nervous at first, especially when they grabbed my suitcase and started walking with it. I kept telling them that I would take it but they insisted on rolling it. I figured that I had pepper spray in my purse if it was necessary, plus I figured I could outrun them. But they led me 45 minutes the opposite way that I had been going, all the while pointing out historical sites and important places to remember in Spanish. They walked me right to the front door of the hostel and each gave me a kiss on each cheek in a typical Spanish farewell. I was so gracious and overwhelmed with thanks but they just nodded and smiled and walked away! My faith in humanity was RESTORED! I know I broke like every rule of what not to do in a foreign county like walking around alone and trusting strangers...especially entrusting them with my baggage, but it was well worth it! Now I have a story to tell the grand kids someday!!!

Stay tuned for more on my adventures in Spain!
God Bless!
Kenzy

Packing up my life!

Today is January 2nd which means I am  20 days away from going to SPAIN!!!! I am soooooo pumped!!! I have already packed and unpacked my suitcase TWICE! Can you tell I'm ready to go!?! Since I have been preparing so diligently for this trip I thought I would share what I'm packing for this excursion! I am allowed one suitcase (up to 50 lbs) to check so take a look and see how I'm doing! :)

So I'll divide all I am taking into parts and show you the finished pack-ness at the end! Starting with winter clothes!!!

I am taking:
1 Peacoat- not the one at the top of the pic..I've replaced it with one I bought at 579 for $16.00-BARGAIN!
1 white button down      
1 denim button down
1 flannel shirt
1 black shrug
4 long sleeve shirts-I took one out of this pic because I decided I didn't need 5
4 scarves (to mix and match with outfits)
3 skinny jeans (2 denim/ 1 black)

I will be in Spain during some of the chilly months so I made sure to pack clothes that are easily layer-able and will also look cute while doing so!

Next up I've got my summer clothes!!!!!

I am taking:
3 T-Shirts (I am using these and Nike shorts as pajamas while  there but also to wear for working out..if I ever do that :p )
5 blouses-I need some nicer blouses since I will be doing an internship while abroad as well as school
5 tank tops-these will be handy to wear in the summer but also I can always layer them for the winter with my button-downs and scarves
2 blue jean shorts
1 khaki short
2 Nike shorts (I live in these at home and at A&M..not even kidding)
2 Bikinis-because I will be on the coast in the summer visiting friends and they happen to own a beach house and enjoy sailing around the coast of Spain...GO ME!
I took out that pair of swim shorts because....

I needed more room for dresses!!! If any of you know me you know that my collection of dresses is expansive...it was hard to pick only a few and leave the rest (same with my shoe collection) but I think I got it down...

4 dresses-2 summer dresses/ 2 night or fancier dresses (not pictures is an adorable black high-to-low skirt dress! What can I say..dresses are my weakness)
1 pair of khaki pants-for the internship
2 denim skirts
1 black skirt
1 khaki skirt

Last but not least is my shoe and miscellaneous stuff I will be taking:

There is the peacoat I mentioned above! Its so cute!
2 hats
1 ear warmer
1 pair of Chacos (one of my better purchases ever made..seriously get a pair!)
1 pair of Sperry's
1 pair of Toms
1 pair of running shoes
1 pair of black flat gladiators
1 pair of brown Oxfords

It was hard to choose from my many shoes as well..but my sister promised me she would take good care of them and my dresses I'm leaving behind!

The finished packing looked like this:

 

Everything fits perfect with room to spare!! I still need to pack undergarments and the gifts for my host family, but even my Bible fits in there as is! When I weighed it on my home scale it was at 29 lbs!! I was so impressed with myself that I went shopping! :)

I rolled up all my tank tops and blouses, folded things down pretty tight, and I will be stuffing my shoes with socks and underwear! This isn't my first rodeo, so I knew that I needed to pick things that  were light and could be rolled up efficiently. I also looked for clothes that can be hung-dried because in Europe that is usually all they do! We dry our clothes on a line here at home so that wasn't hard to do! I also wanted shoes that I could easily walk in (so now high heels) and I picked flats that were comfortable!

I'll keep you updated on what else I will be doing for preparation!!! Stay tuned!!!

Mackenzy