Aventuras de España: Learning the ropes

Hey everyone! It's so crazy that already another week has passed; time goes by SO quickly here! This week was the last week of "firsts" when it comes to my everyday schedule, which is a good and bad thing. I'm really happy to finally have a set schedule, but I also love trying/experiencing new things! But there are always new things to experience here!

The first new event of the week was on Monday, when we had our first flamenco class. I had been looking forward to this day for a long time! Whenever I watched people dance, it never looked to difficult, but I would be lying if I told you I'm a natural, hahaha! The steps aren't too difficult, but as soon as you add the hand motions, it gets so hard! Needless to say, there were a lot of laughs during the lesson, and a lot of awkward attempts to get the hands right!

On Tuesday night my group that went on a tour of Sevilla together during the first week reunited with our 2 tour guides for tapas and helado (dinner and ice cream). This was my first night going out for tapas, and it was so good! We each got 2 tapas, and then the entire group shared a few big plates. It was so weird looking at the menu when I had no idea what half the foods were, but I ended up getting some things that I really liked! And the ice cream afterwords was delicious as well! Probably the best chocolate ice cream I have ever tasted in my life, actually! There are SO MANY ice cream stores here though, and they're all good... I'm hoping to try a good portion of them while I'm here, hahaha!

On Friday I had a very exciting afternoon. First, I had my first meeting with my intercambio! Intercambio is when you get paired with a Sevillan who is learning English, and you spend time with them once a week speaking Spanish and English, helping each other learn the language. Most people have intercambios who are around our age, but mine is a 42 year old woman. We met for coffee right across from my apartment and talked for almost 2 hours! I was nervous going into it because I had no idea how much English she knew, and we have a bit of an age gap, but I had a really great time! We helped each other out a lot, and had a lot of laughs along the way! I'm really excited to see her every week!

After my meeting with my intercambio, some friends and I decided to go to a free show that my tour guide had told me about. The show was a little over 2 miles away, but it was free so we decided to go and find it. We left the familiar old side of Sevilla and started going into the more modern/ugly side of the city. Well, after 1.5 hours of walking we finally made it to the park (if you can call it that) where the concert was supposed to be... and all there was was a fenced in area with some abandoned-looking structures, a few dogs, and a women shadily sitting in the back corner....Needless to say, there was no concert, and it was to the point where all we could do was laugh! 2.5 hours after we left home, we finally made it to a tapas bar where we had dinner (a much deserved and extremely delicious dinner, mind you).

On Saturday morning, my roommate Chelsea and I decided to check out the Archivo General de Indias, and had a great time! The building was built around the 1500's I believe, and is absolutely beautiful. Inside is where they store all of the maps, letters, books, etc. that pertain to the explorations of the Americas. After learning about this time in history in my college classes at home, it was SO cool to be in the place where they keep all the primary sources that we have talked about. I mean, these are documents about the discovery of our country! Unfortunately, the vast majority of documents can only be seen by researchers, but we still had a great time! In the evening I met with a group of people to swing dance in the park. There was also a blues concert going on, so we got to dance to live music which was awesome! On the way home, the street by my house was blocked off and there were a ton of people on the corner. I could hear a marching band and saw something strange in the distance, so I decided to check it out. What is was, from my understanding, was a parade-like event where the statues of saints are moved from one church to another. The statue of the saint was on a float-like thing covered in flowers, candles, and burning incense, and a full marching band followed it. I didn't really understand what was going on, but it was still really cool to watch this extremely cultural event, right on my street!

A few random side notes that show I'm slowly becoming a Sevillan... First, the other day for lunch our Señora made us crema de calabacín (cream of zucchini) which is like soup, and SO delicious, but forgot to give us bread. I'm not sure if I mentioned this earlier, but we eat bread at every single meal, and it's wonderful! Anyways, she forgot to give us bread, and Chelsea and I kept looking at each other, trying not to laugh, because all we could think about was how much better our soup would taste with bread! It was to the point where were trying not to eat too much soup until our Señora left, just so we could sneak some bread! Thankfully, she noticed before we had to sneak some, but it turns out she was out of bread, and so we had crackers instead :/ Also, here in Sevilla I have a card to use the public bike system, Sevici. The system is really great, but not all the bikes are perfect. When I first started using it I would always take bikes with issues: the seat couldn't be raised, it would only stay in gear if I held it in gear, it was missing a bell..... Well after several instances of riding with my knees to the handlebars, unable to signal to pedestrians that they were in my way, I have finally learned how to spot a good bike relatively quickly.

Anyways, thank you everyone for your continued prayers and support! I'm really having the time of my life here, and I'm so glad I have this way to share a bit of it with you! As I go into this next week, I could really use prayer as I have exams in 3 of my 4 classes on Monday and Tuesday! Also, continued prayer for wisdom in my time management and safety as I travel would be great too (I'm taking a weekend trip to Portugal this upcoming weekend!). Love you all!
Hasta luego!
Rachel :)