finally

(#1-5 Cueva de sésamo; #6-9 Club; #8 Cal students w our new Spanish friends; #9 Pablo & Daniel)

So thanks to the" intercambio" program at the university, students have an amazing opportunity to interact with Spaniards who want to learn English. In turn, we as students studying abroad can not only improve our Spanish, but also learn about the people of the country we're studying in & their culture & customs as well. Mad props to whoever thought of & executed the program :) I finally have Spanish friends!!!

I met Daniel through Evan, who's from UC Irvine. They came & sat at the table in the school cafeteria & we all est.a friendship. Daniel's an engineer & here, in Spain, its takes about 10 yrs to become one. Yes, you read right. A decade. And I though engineers at Cal had it bad, lol. The program works really well because it's totally but choice & very relaxed. I've been able to learn common Spanish phrasing from Daniel like "guiri" is a word to describe any foreigner in Spain but its connotation is neither good nor bad. Also, he's learned English slang like "hella". Besides the espanol coloquial class, our daily conversations are the only thing I feel make the hour-long trip to the university worth it.

Last night we met up w Daniel & his fellow engineering friend, Pablo at Sol. We ended up at Cueva de sésamo, the same sangria spot that I had gone to the night before. I adore this place! It's cozy, adorable & has random, thought-provoking quotations painted everywhere. Not to mention the sangria! It's so sweet it tastes like juice, lol. I hate alcohol but this is one of the very few drinks I don't make a thizz-face to. Afterwards we grabbed pizza & went to a club- all places on the same street.

Good times!


P.S. "ibiza part II" post coming up ASAP

español coloquial

(in the best class E V E R )

I need to get up at 08:00 twice a week for this but I don't give a mierda! Just look at the foto. Need I say more? 

OBSESSED

(taken 7 Sep 2010; taken 9 Sep 2010)

Tell me why I can never remember the names of the one materialistic thing I love most in the world: food? Ugh. I have a pet peeve about myself. Is that even possible? UPDATE: they're called Palmeras con chocolate

So I discovered these desserts at the university's cafeteria that will be the death of me. They're these delicious pastries that are covered on one side with chocolate. & To make it even more perfect, it's in the shape of a heart. Right? I know. I die everytime I hold one in my hands. It's like it was meant just for me. & To make it even mooore ideal, its only 0.75 euros! That's like $1 for pure bliss!

My goal for the next 3 months: stay away!!! Or else I'll go back to the states #1 unrecognizable and #2 sad since I won't be able to have one whenever I want anymore. Therefore, I'll be a depressed blob. Not cute.

mucho gusto, carlos

1. The very first part of my walk to school looks like this every morning. I know, I know- don't hate :)

2. Mi piso!

3. Bus stop

4. Train ride w my two BBs (Berkeley Boys). Sidenote: BART needs to get on the spain's train level because theyre all nice & clean.

5. Coolest part of campus is @ one of their libraries. Makes me wanna get my study on.

6. Everyone in my row passed out about 30 min into the professor's presentations on their classes.

7. Everyone wide awake a few min before the end of the presentations lol