Yes, I know its been a while, sorry, therefore i´ll take the lazy route and just show you my diary.
and then there are the photos etc.
last night was fun, walked for ages and met up with our usac group people (some of them) and drank kalimotxo (wine and cocacola), beer, wine, anyting we could get our hands on. good times. very cold tho.
monday - thursday has been a very busy and stressfull week. test after test and not being able to sleep much. 2 cups of coffee a day has helped :) i´m a coffee drinker now by the way :)
learning how to surf today, and then off to my first rugby practice...
sorry about the email neglecting, at least you know i´m alive tho right?
will get on top of it all soon.
One of My Favourite Photos So Far
Sunday 18th: went to a medieval festival in a neighbouring neighbourhood which had EVERYTHING medieval, it was really cool. even archery lessons, hawks, hangings, and swordfights. ok, the hanging happened in a play so it wasn´t real. but the swords were... and their choreography good. hmm. my spelling has gone to the crapper. so has my vocabulary, i think all the spanish i´m learning is pushing out the english....!
on monday i met my intercambio, who is my exchange partner. we converse 1 hour in spanish then 1 hour in english. now, every student gets a partner, who is more or less thier age so they can go to parties etc with thier new spanish friend. my intercambio is Eduardo, a 39 year old economics teacher at the university! but he´s really cool, and his speciality is development economics, which is the area i want to go into - so what we talk about is all beneficial! not that we talk about economics all the time, nooooo! lots of different topics, but his english is nearly perfect anyway so thats good.
actually the past few days has been quite tame, getting into the rhythm (you don´t know how many times i spelt that to get it right... i´m still not sure if its spelt like that) of studying and things. had a test today which i did very well in for managerial finance, and now i have to go home and write an essay for spanish on food. mmmmm i´m hungry.
oh yeah, i may not get to post until monday or tuesday because this weekend i´m going to Barcelona!!!! wihooooo! i´m going with katherine, alisha, beth, ivan and jaron. this is going to be a kick ass weekend!!!
on monday i met my intercambio, who is my exchange partner. we converse 1 hour in spanish then 1 hour in english. now, every student gets a partner, who is more or less thier age so they can go to parties etc with thier new spanish friend. my intercambio is Eduardo, a 39 year old economics teacher at the university! but he´s really cool, and his speciality is development economics, which is the area i want to go into - so what we talk about is all beneficial! not that we talk about economics all the time, nooooo! lots of different topics, but his english is nearly perfect anyway so thats good.
actually the past few days has been quite tame, getting into the rhythm (you don´t know how many times i spelt that to get it right... i´m still not sure if its spelt like that) of studying and things. had a test today which i did very well in for managerial finance, and now i have to go home and write an essay for spanish on food. mmmmm i´m hungry.
oh yeah, i may not get to post until monday or tuesday because this weekend i´m going to Barcelona!!!! wihooooo! i´m going with katherine, alisha, beth, ivan and jaron. this is going to be a kick ass weekend!!!
El Momo Loco
Me encanta Momo!
This was the friday night i had just written about. very cool.
anyway, so that saturday i went to a juanes concert, who is very very popular in spain and latin america, you can see the photos on my photo page etc. that was really fun, he´s pop, and its fun pop, not candy pop type music. anyway. la camisa negra is the name of his hit song at the moment.
sunday i didn´t do too much, in fact it was so long ago and i don´t have my diary with me that, well, what did i do? coffee with ivan and alisha. um yeah.
monday classes etc..... tuesday classes etc..... wednesday had a mini study group thing with katherine and alisha which we got hyped up on caffine and sugar. that was cool.
thursday i went rollerblading, had a good meal by giuseppe (As you can see in photos (yeah i say that a lot)) and then a good relaxing night.
friday i ahhh, ummm oh yeah, hangover and stuff. relaxed.
saturday more of the same, lounged around at home, awaiting election results etc, called a lot of people. (and no, i didn´t vote, too much hassle - i would have either had to travel to madrid, or post in a form. both are expensive!) oh yeah and then photos and stuff of drinking games with ivan, ivan and alisha. very cool night. didn´t go out, but drank at ivans house and my place. time flew out the window, and it was 4 when we realised what the time was!
not much of a hang over this morning which was nice.
AND I´D JUST LIKE TO ADD A VERY HAPPY 24th BIRTHDAY TO CAMERON, AND ALSO A HAPPY 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY FOR US BOTH.
Te quiero mi amor.
This was the friday night i had just written about. very cool.
anyway, so that saturday i went to a juanes concert, who is very very popular in spain and latin america, you can see the photos on my photo page etc. that was really fun, he´s pop, and its fun pop, not candy pop type music. anyway. la camisa negra is the name of his hit song at the moment.
sunday i didn´t do too much, in fact it was so long ago and i don´t have my diary with me that, well, what did i do? coffee with ivan and alisha. um yeah.
monday classes etc..... tuesday classes etc..... wednesday had a mini study group thing with katherine and alisha which we got hyped up on caffine and sugar. that was cool.
thursday i went rollerblading, had a good meal by giuseppe (As you can see in photos (yeah i say that a lot)) and then a good relaxing night.
friday i ahhh, ummm oh yeah, hangover and stuff. relaxed.
saturday more of the same, lounged around at home, awaiting election results etc, called a lot of people. (and no, i didn´t vote, too much hassle - i would have either had to travel to madrid, or post in a form. both are expensive!) oh yeah and then photos and stuff of drinking games with ivan, ivan and alisha. very cool night. didn´t go out, but drank at ivans house and my place. time flew out the window, and it was 4 when we realised what the time was!
not much of a hang over this morning which was nice.
AND I´D JUST LIKE TO ADD A VERY HAPPY 24th BIRTHDAY TO CAMERON, AND ALSO A HAPPY 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY FOR US BOTH.
Te quiero mi amor.
Sorry For The Wait
Problems, problems and then more problems. Problems with time management, problems with the blog site (it deleted my last long post which I wrote 2 days ago), and problems with my student loan not being paid.
But now I think I have a little time to fill you in.
Wow, I really haven´t said much about where I am what i´m doing etc etc.
Um. Ok.
Thursday 1st September: Arrived in Getxo, moved into my apartment, crashed, slept, welcomed in Ashley who is from San Diego.
Friday 2nd: We had our university orientation which was us sitting in a room listening to the rules etc, and then we had a written test, and a vocal test. I did pretty good, I got into track 3 (out of 4 tracks). Welcomed Giuseppe from Italy (who loves kiwis because he lived on a farm near Tokoroa for 5 months a few years ago).
Wasn´t feeling very well, but hung out during the afternoon with Andréa and Lindsay, two friends of Ashley (but not friends from america, they met in madrid). Then later on at night I hung out with Beth and Sara, we went for a walk to the port.
Saturday 3rd: Full blown sickness, I wasn´t able to go on the tour of Bilbao and Getxo - but it turns out I didn´t miss much because it was quite lame. Sleep, sleep and more sleep, achey joints, hot and cold etc - and there was a huge party at our apartment. Seriously, it was loud. I felt so lousy. At one stage i think i was hallucinating, i´m not sure, but i remember something about giraffes. Weird.
Sunday 4: Relaxed during the day, didn´t want to ruin my recovery, tho the worst had passed.
Monday 5: Went shopping with Beth and Nate - you see the highway picture in my photo page? yeah, read the blurb about that one also. maddness. running across highways. we hung out in the evening as well, went to a reallllly nice bar thing near the old port of Getxo.
Tuesday 6: First day of uni! (or school as the americans call it - noone knew what i was saying apart from Alisha, who studied in waikato uni in 2003 for a semester!)
Classes are as follows:
Mondays to Thursdays spanish from 845 until 1125. (yes, that means getting up at 730 to catch an 820 bus. its not fun adjusting!)
I have global economics on tuesdays and thursdays from 1125-1255 which is a good class - it would help if i could read the book we´re meant to be following - mines still being shipped from amazon. mondays and wednesdays are my busyiest days with managerial finance 1125-1255, and then european union from 1255-225. All three classes are quite interesting, and all have a large workload(e.g reading), but it looks easy to me as i´ve done similar classes. one thing freaked me out here, a D is actually a pass, what we´d call a C - so I really don´t want to come back with D marks because noone in nz will know that its a pass! they´ll think i failed!!!
Wednesday 6th: classes... and then went shopping!!! i bought rollerblades - and they are SUPER cool. can´t remember what i did for the night time.
Thursday: 7th: classes, then went rollerblading! and man it was fun. i went so far and with such ease!!! most of the picutres in the last post are from my rollerblading, it was beautiful weather!!! then seeing as we don´t have classes on fridays, it was time to hit the town!! we went to an irish pub in bilbao where a LOT of students were, and it was kinda hot and crowded so we floated a bit (and took poo photos, a VERY funny time we all had) (we=jeron (who looks like christian bale who played batman), Alisha and I, and then later joined by Sara and Ivan) (can´t remember where Jeron is from, alisha Idaho, sara Northern California, and ivan Idaho).
That was a great night. Got to bed at 330.
Friday: Ummmm... can´t remember... oh wait, yes i do, hungover, took it slow, talked on the webcam with a few people (friday evening for all you kiwis is a good time to catch me, its looking to be my time on the net). had a coffee (yes, i´ve started drinking coffee here, its really good) with Iñigo, a very hot spanish guy who lives in our building (and by the way this is social coffee, nothing else) at a very cool bar called Momo and then for the nighttime i hung out with Iñigo, Giuseppe, Ashley, Lindsay, Andréa, and some of Giuseppes crazy italian friends. it was cool, got home at 3ish again. This bar is just around the corner (well, 3 corners) from our place, and its truley funky.
Saturday: Well, I went to a .... crap. I have to go, the library here is closing (normal university hasn´t started yet, it starts in october, so ther eare reduced hours.)
I´ll post soon, and will tackle my large inbox of mail when I can also!!!
But now I think I have a little time to fill you in.
Wow, I really haven´t said much about where I am what i´m doing etc etc.
Um. Ok.
Thursday 1st September: Arrived in Getxo, moved into my apartment, crashed, slept, welcomed in Ashley who is from San Diego.
Friday 2nd: We had our university orientation which was us sitting in a room listening to the rules etc, and then we had a written test, and a vocal test. I did pretty good, I got into track 3 (out of 4 tracks). Welcomed Giuseppe from Italy (who loves kiwis because he lived on a farm near Tokoroa for 5 months a few years ago).
Wasn´t feeling very well, but hung out during the afternoon with Andréa and Lindsay, two friends of Ashley (but not friends from america, they met in madrid). Then later on at night I hung out with Beth and Sara, we went for a walk to the port.
Saturday 3rd: Full blown sickness, I wasn´t able to go on the tour of Bilbao and Getxo - but it turns out I didn´t miss much because it was quite lame. Sleep, sleep and more sleep, achey joints, hot and cold etc - and there was a huge party at our apartment. Seriously, it was loud. I felt so lousy. At one stage i think i was hallucinating, i´m not sure, but i remember something about giraffes. Weird.
Sunday 4: Relaxed during the day, didn´t want to ruin my recovery, tho the worst had passed.
Monday 5: Went shopping with Beth and Nate - you see the highway picture in my photo page? yeah, read the blurb about that one also. maddness. running across highways. we hung out in the evening as well, went to a reallllly nice bar thing near the old port of Getxo.
Tuesday 6: First day of uni! (or school as the americans call it - noone knew what i was saying apart from Alisha, who studied in waikato uni in 2003 for a semester!)
Classes are as follows:
Mondays to Thursdays spanish from 845 until 1125. (yes, that means getting up at 730 to catch an 820 bus. its not fun adjusting!)
I have global economics on tuesdays and thursdays from 1125-1255 which is a good class - it would help if i could read the book we´re meant to be following - mines still being shipped from amazon. mondays and wednesdays are my busyiest days with managerial finance 1125-1255, and then european union from 1255-225. All three classes are quite interesting, and all have a large workload(e.g reading), but it looks easy to me as i´ve done similar classes. one thing freaked me out here, a D is actually a pass, what we´d call a C - so I really don´t want to come back with D marks because noone in nz will know that its a pass! they´ll think i failed!!!
Wednesday 6th: classes... and then went shopping!!! i bought rollerblades - and they are SUPER cool. can´t remember what i did for the night time.
Thursday: 7th: classes, then went rollerblading! and man it was fun. i went so far and with such ease!!! most of the picutres in the last post are from my rollerblading, it was beautiful weather!!! then seeing as we don´t have classes on fridays, it was time to hit the town!! we went to an irish pub in bilbao where a LOT of students were, and it was kinda hot and crowded so we floated a bit (and took poo photos, a VERY funny time we all had) (we=jeron (who looks like christian bale who played batman), Alisha and I, and then later joined by Sara and Ivan) (can´t remember where Jeron is from, alisha Idaho, sara Northern California, and ivan Idaho).
That was a great night. Got to bed at 330.
Friday: Ummmm... can´t remember... oh wait, yes i do, hungover, took it slow, talked on the webcam with a few people (friday evening for all you kiwis is a good time to catch me, its looking to be my time on the net). had a coffee (yes, i´ve started drinking coffee here, its really good) with Iñigo, a very hot spanish guy who lives in our building (and by the way this is social coffee, nothing else) at a very cool bar called Momo and then for the nighttime i hung out with Iñigo, Giuseppe, Ashley, Lindsay, Andréa, and some of Giuseppes crazy italian friends. it was cool, got home at 3ish again. This bar is just around the corner (well, 3 corners) from our place, and its truley funky.
Saturday: Well, I went to a .... crap. I have to go, the library here is closing (normal university hasn´t started yet, it starts in october, so ther eare reduced hours.)
I´ll post soon, and will tackle my large inbox of mail when I can also!!!
Home in Getxo!!
Well. After a disasturous night on the night train, I have arrived to my final destination, Getxo (pronounced Getcho).
This is home now for me until christmas!! (after christmas i´ll be homestayed with a family)
I had my first day at uni, and moved in yesterday, and i am currently sick with the flu.
Therefore this post will unfortunately have to wait, however i´ve made some good friends already, i have a wicked apartment with a great view (See photos), am flatting with an american Ashley, an italian Giuseppe, and someone else who hasn´t moved in yet.
Its been great, but i need some rest now (la tomatina was a very large blog to type out!)
Adiós for now.
If you want to know my address and cellphone number, just drop me an email :)
This is home now for me until christmas!! (after christmas i´ll be homestayed with a family)
I had my first day at uni, and moved in yesterday, and i am currently sick with the flu.
Therefore this post will unfortunately have to wait, however i´ve made some good friends already, i have a wicked apartment with a great view (See photos), am flatting with an american Ashley, an italian Giuseppe, and someone else who hasn´t moved in yet.
Its been great, but i need some rest now (la tomatina was a very large blog to type out!)
Adiós for now.
If you want to know my address and cellphone number, just drop me an email :)
La Tomatina
Ok, so i´ll cut to the chase.
Arrived at 10 to buñol and already a very large amount of people trying to get to the main square, large amount is incalculable, i´d say already a few thousand??
Pushing and shoving got easier as I got more and more saturated in sweat (mine and others), beer (cups thrown around), water (sprayed around from roof tops), and sangria (so I became red early).
Then started the ´camiseta´ chants. A group gather around someone (willing or unwilling, usually males vs male) and rip their shirt off. About 70% of people got their shirts ripped off, not me thankfully!
After about 45 mins – 1 hour of this it was getting tiring, it was like a never ending mosh pit with no apparent rules. The streets were running thick with water and beer, and my shoes were sodden.
Through all this time there´d be frequent ´ole ole ole ole´ chants, and a large round of applause and cheer when someone climbed or got quite high on the traditional greased pole to get the ham at the top, which starts the tomato throwing.
All around us on the balconies and roof tops surrounding us were tv cameras, and photographers happily snapping away, with the crowd often playing to them and vying for attention. Also on the roof tops were locals who had buckets of water, hoses, and tomatoes lined up waiting to be thrown.
At 11 there was a huge bang and the roof top dwellers immediately swung into action, with the crowd expecting to be pelted, but before they crowd got hit, the rooftops had a war! They also aimed at the tv cameras. The bang signalled the arrival of the 7 dump trucks FULL to the brim with tomatoes which made its way slowly through the streets unleashing its red fury!!
If there was a squeeze in the streets beforehand, then squeezing the lorries through created madness! They took up half the street! We were treated to a barrage of tomatoes from them, and then as the tomatoes became more populous, we threw tomatoes back at them.
Occasionally a truck would stop and dump a whole heap and this is what EVERYONE was looking forward to.
FQ$•%%& AWESOME FUN.
After 15 mins my goggles had become useless as they were fogged up, so I went without. It was hard to bend down and pick up the tomatoes due to the throng of people, so I just went with the flow of people!
I got hit heeeeeaaappppsss including many in the back of my head and quite a few in the face too. I had well lost anyone from the hostel, but everyone at la tomatina was now ´every man for himself´ anyway, but having said that, everyone around you became your friend!
Lots of English/uk people, ozzies and kiwis were there, with many annoying pushy guys around, but they slid right past most of the time.
One popular and painful pastime was getting the ripped tshirts from the ground, soaking them in more liquid tomato, and knotting them, then letting them loose. There were tons in the air at any given time, I copped a few but lobbed them on to share the joy!
Wiping your eyes constantly was a must.
At one point in the street, the tomatoes came up halfway to my shins, and it was all chunky pureed fun!!! Many (Well, basically all in jandals) lost their jandals, so there were lots of scooping tools floating around.
Anyone who was on top of someones shoulders, wearing something silly, or some sort of inflatable hat was more fair game than everyone else, and there was lots of aiming at people on balconies.
Near the main square there were large water cannons which made the throwing a little tough because it was mostly tomato juice!
And when I did wee people I knew, you know that a tomato was going their way for sure! Of course that worked both ways tho….
I didn´t eat any, but could tasted the tomatoes like there was no other taste. Actually in the beginning with the roof top wars, I smelt the tomatoes before I was hit by one!
Jumping up and down to splash everyone was a favourite, by my favourite move was scooping with my hands and throwing it straight up.
At one stage I couldn´t hear anything in one ear, I scooped out a large amount of tomato and then I was fine!
Being on constant alert was exhausting, but that doesn´t mean it wasn´t fun!
CONSTANT F”•$•&%%$• FUN
At 12 another bang went off, and everyone paused and cheered. Note that I said paused, coz it basically continued after, tho not as intense. I stopped to take stock of how I was doing – feet in tomato swimming pool like shoes, sodden clothes, pulled and disfigured top, hair completely covered in paste, goggles filled with chunks hung around my neck, and something in my left eye. Inside I felt fantastic!
People slowly made their way back in the direction that they came from, and I say slowly because there were A LOT of people. Estimates are 30-40 thousand.
The smell was really really thick, it was of old tomatoes. Inescapable! More chants of ´camiseta´ as people were determined that we should be shirtless! A lot of stomping and splashing, tshirt throwing, and of course, puree slinging still happening – but it was all good!
I went past one side street which was angling downwards, and there was a river of red flowing down. Naturally I stopped to take a photo, and I got splattered completely over the left side of my face, which I promptly took a photo of! Actually I wonder if you can see the guy lining me up in his sights on my photo!
It took around half an hour to go about 80-100 meters – not many wanted to give up the fight!
Broke free from the crowd finally, and dawdled over to the bus which was about 10 mins away. The walk took about 40 mins coz I stopped at every opportunity to get hosed off, but it wasn´t enough. My legs started to sting a little from the tomato stuck to it. Luckily it was a particularly cloudy day and the sun didn´t burn the tomatoes to us, it only baked them on
Everyone who was white was now various shades of pink, and everyone carried a sickly sweaty beery tomato smell to them!! The river/stream turned red as bathers washed themselves, and beer sales raised significantly with the out pouring of the masses.
No bus, so took off my sodden and cold wet top, shoes and goggles, and left them with some hostellers looking for the bus. Noone was going to steal them, in fact, many people were simply throwing their clothes away!
Went back into the main area (which smelt worse than before) and bought a tshirt (of course), and the major clean up had already begun, which hoses, brooms, and shovels.
Back to the bus (which had arrived), changed into fresh clothes after scooping tomatoes out of my bra, then took digital camera into town. Rivers of utterly disgusting mush flowing everywhere, and tshirts, shoes and beer cups everywhere! It has made me rethink about eating tomatoes!!
Met up with more hostel people (one of whom breast stroked in the liquid tomato area) and even saw a guy in a tomato costume – classic!
Ate some food, but couldn´t stand the smell anymore, so went back to the bus where everyone was raving about the festival.
IT WAS JUST F$”%$•&•$ BRILLIANT
Some poor kiwis were sitting by a nice rental car… unfortunately they´d lost their keys in the madness!
Lots of girls walking around in bikinis, and guys just in shorts – it was like a day at the beach, except tomato seeds replaced sand and tomato juice replaces the salty feeling after a swim!
I will NEVER forget this day.
EVER.
So here I am on the train to Madrid, and i´m sure I still smell, even tho I had a quick shower at the hostel. My hair is still matted, I have tomatoes caded under my nails, my eyes are a little blurry, and my left eye keeps expelling some sort of gunk, and I just took off my headphones which have remnants of tomato on the ear buds! Ah, its going to be a long night to Bilbao!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)