First Week

A cathedral very close to where I live in Triana

I'm pretty sure I'm just going to move here and become a gypsy.  Sorry mom and dad. Really, I'm sure you were half expecting said news anyway.  I love it here in Seville. The people are gorgeous, the food is delicious, the architecture is mind boggling, and the lifestyle is relaxed, family oriented, and healthy.  What more could you want?
So I've been here a week now.  I've gone through orientation, I've moved into la apartamento de mi familia española and tomorrow begins my intensive session of Spanish Grammar. We're talking three hours of Spanish Grammar a day. It may or may not kick my butt. My spanish family is very agradable, nice, and for the most part they just leave me be.  There is a señora y un señor with there son who is 29 years old.  It's actually very normal for young adults to live with their families until they are in their late twenties, early thirties.  Here big families live together forever and sometimes they keep the same apartment or house for generations to come.  The living space is very small though, my bedroom is extremely tiny with a desk, bed, wardrobe and dresser crammed inside.  Not a problem though because I spend most of my time outside. Below are shots of mi habitación.

Speaking of outside-- bloody hot. Actually, that doesn't even apply to just outside, my home isn't air conditioned so it is also hot inside. I have a fan in my room though, so that helps.  It's also very cool in the evenings so I leave my window open. Spain is extremely conscious of the energy they use.  It's practically a crime to leave the lights on in a room that you aren't using, and they charge .05 euros for a bag at the grocery store.  I think it's good! Saving the environment one grocery bag at a time.

We walk everywhere to get to where we are going.  I love it. I walk probably ten miles a day when I add it all up, and it feels great.  The first few days my body was sore the next day, but I'm finally getting used to it.  The city is so beautiful that I don't even realize how long it takes to get to different places.  It's wonderful.  Everything about this place promotes a healthy lifestyle.  There is a bike system here called sevici where you can buy a card that costs 20 euros for a year, about 26-27 USD, and then you get to rent bikes from all the kiosks in town.  Each bike is free for the first 30 minutes and after that it's extremely cheap to keep biking. What a lot of the spaniards do is they rent a bike for thirty minutes, drop it off at the next kiosk, and then grab another for thirty minutes. It's genius!

People here don't use gyms or things because there lifestyle is just naturally active.  The meal schedule is also very different.  Here you eat something very small for breakfast like a piece of toast and cafe con leche.  Then you don't eat lunch until 2:30 or 3:00 pm.  All of the stores close during lunch, and everyone goes home to eat.  After lunch everyone takes a siesta, possibly one of my favorite cultural differences.  After that you don't eat again until 9:30-10:30 in the evening. Also snacking here is nonexistent.  Apparently snacking is just an american thing! The spaniards will only eat at their allotted eating hours! It's very cool, but man has it left me starving sometimes!
Sometimes between breakfast and lunch people will go out and get a tostado and a cafe or orange juice.  A tostado is like two pieces of hard bread with tomatoes, olive oil, smoked ham and queso.  Depends on what you want! Below is a picture of my friend Chris eating at a bar (they call breakfast places bars) this morning.

And yes. The food here is amazing.  Lots of fresh fruits and veggies.  The fruit here is so much better than in the states.  Peaches are the sizes of melons, and melons are the sizes of american footballs!

Today Chris and I went to Paseo del Arte where a bunch of local artists were selling their art for really great prices.  Chris bought three beautiful paintings from a local artist who gave him 3 for the price of 2 which ended up being 100 euros.  For good art, that's a deal.  The guys who ran the place were very nice and told us to come back next week because they give art classes to niños.  I asked him if he needed volunteers and he said absolutely! I might have found something to do every sunday now :) Mom, you would love the art.

My favorite are the four on the top left.

Vale! I will write again soon :) This is a very spastic blog entry.  Lots has happened this week.  I didn't even cover the flamenco or the sevillano dances! Hasta la proxima vez!