La Ciudad de Amor

Paris= amazing!

 So I am super tired and getting sick right before finals which start tomorrow! I have had so much going on in school (yes I have actually been going to school while I have been here) that I have had no time to blog! So I am going to try to update everything now! Sorry for the wait!!
So we went to Paris a few weeks ago! And it was so much fun! We spent the night in the Barcelona airport two more times on the way there and on the way back and I never want to see that airport ever again!! Terrible!! We tried to find our hotel when we got to Paris but apparently there are 2 Belfort hotels in Paris so yaaaaa we were wandering around for a good hour but we finally found it! Menu for the weekend was crepes, pastries, macaroons, and cheese. Perfect! Versailles was beautiful and we went to Montmartre at sunset where you can see the whole city! Awesome! We were wandering around looking for the Moulin Rouge and we couldnt find it until we heard this French tour guide say Moulin Rouge so we decided to follow him and 70 other old French people for 20 minutes and we found it! Ha it was so random but so fun! The next day we went to the Louvre, Notre Dame, the American Church (where ashleys parents got married....precious!) and we had a picnic in front of the eiffel tower with wine and cheese watching the sun set and then we watched it light up! What a great end to a fabulous trip!

The weekend after Paris, Ross came to visit!!!!! We had SO much fun and I missed him so much! We wandered around Madrid for a bit and then came to Granada! It was so cool being able to show him all of the stuff I have been doing while I have been here! The weekend that he was here happened to be a holiday called Dia de la Cruz (day of the cross) and people wear Flamenco dresses and dance in the streets and ride around on horses! So now Ross thinks that everyone in Granada dresses like that haha! But we had tons of fun seeing the Alhambra and all of the cool places in Granada! He also got the chance to come eat dinner with Carmen and she got her hair done that day! It was hilarious watching her talk to him like 3 inches from his face because he had no idea what she was saying! And he got to experience all of the food she forces us to eat! Very fun! It was hard to let him leave but I know I will be home soon so it was okay!

The weekend after Ross came we went to the beach for the day and had lots of fun just hanging out! I got very sunburned (as usual)! I think Carmen is trying to make sure that we don't miss her that much because she is being, well, not the nicest person ever.  Me and Alaina named her alter-ego evil twin Charmen. Charmen has been here alot lately haha but I only have 1 week left in Granada! Soooo bittersweet! I am definitely ready to get home but I am going to miss this place and these people so much! Oh and if you want to see ALLLLL of my pictures go to my shutterfly!  http://ryannsmith.shutterfly.com/

Maestra Carmen

So Carmen drives me absolutely crazy but I absolutely love her at the same time.  She has tried to teach me so much wisdom that I thought I would share it with all of you :)

Carmen's Nutritional Information:
1. Potato chips are not food, so you can eat as many as you want
2. I have been told more times than I can count to stop drinking so much water at dinner because it fills up my stomach and that is why I am full (not because i have 7 courses at every meal)
3. Pasta does not make you fat, it is what the athletes eat and they are not fat
4. Lentil soup is way to heavy for dinner. But a hamburger, a giant plate of french fries, and a loaf of bread is perfect
5. You can't gain weight in Spain, only in America
6. Eggs is not a breakfast food, but chocolate cake is
7. Callete y come. (translation: shut up and eat)

This is the difference in the size of our plates and Carmens...

These entire table of plates was for ONLY ME! Alaina wasn't there and Carmen didn't eat!!!!!

This is paella! Sooo yummy!! Soooo much food!

I was studying and asked for Cola Cau (hot chocolate) and this is what I got... and I was told to eat all of it.... There wasn't even room for my notes on the table!

AMAZING strawberries we get for dessert everyday with whipped cream! And yes, she cuts them up for us...

Fried eggplant fries=awesome

Other good Carmenisms
1. Every soft drink is Pesi Cola. Not Pepsi, Pesi. And coke is Pesi too
2. I taught Carmen how to use the remote yesterday.  She can now get to double digits. She was so baffled as to how I got to channel 18 because "it didn't exist". However she can now go above channel 9! so proud!
3. There is ALWAYS "mas in la cocina" (more in the kitchen)
4. All Americans are the same and all they do is sleep.
5. Me and Alaina are incapable of ordering our own food at restaurants when we go out every Sunday.  She always orders for us and orders the wrong thing. I do not know how we have ordered our own food without her :)

This is where Carmen is 75% of the time... if you can't find her here, she is either in the kitchen, cooking, or leaning out her bedroom window smoking (she thinks we don't know)

There are so many more crazy things that she does but these are some of the best! Love her to death! She is probably the thing I will miss the most about Spain.... still trying to figure out a way to bring her home in my suitcase.

Las Alpujarras

Alright so alot has been going on lately and I have had no time to blog as usual! Lo siento!
Last weekend we went to Las Alpujarras which is about an hour and forty five minutes from the city of Granada but it felt like wayyyy longer on the way there!  It is in the mountains and there are a few tiny little villages there.  I have never had a problem with getting motion sickness before this but WOW! We were literally winding through the mountains for an hour and a half in a big bus with no air conditioning.  Almost everyone on the bus was about to hurl! It was horrible! I stared at this blue speck on the seat in front of me the whole time trying to keep my mind off of it! So we finally got there and while we were all so nauseous, they said we had ten minutes to put our stuff in our rooms before our first 5 hour hike! This hike was supposedly an intermediate hike but in my mind it was pretty hardcore! It was absolutely gorgeous but i spent most of the time staring at the rocks under my feet trying not to cause a landslide! It ended up being fun still even though I was close to death by the end!  We went back to the hotel, had dinner, and watched the Real Madrid vs. Barcelona futbol game which apparently is a BIG DEAL!  It was so fun watching it with real Spaniards because they are so passionate about everything! The next morning we got up early and went on another four hour hike that was supposed to be "girly".  It was probably harder than the first one! But still fun! I had blisters all over my feet and a really cute farmers sunburn but it was worth it! We got back on the windy bus (with motion sickness medicine that didn't help all that much) and went back home! Very fun!  We had absolutely awesome weather for this trip but it was really sad because it was the last trip with our program! All of these trips were awesome and so stress free and it just brings back the realization that this is all going to be over very soon!

In the past few weeks I have discovered alot more about Granada which is so sad because I have lived here for three months but thats ok! Four nights ago we discovered a teteria which is the best place ever and we have already been there four times and the owner knows us! It is a cool Indian like place where it is dimly lit with incense and you sit on pillows and you drink all sorts of tea! My favorite is the Pakistani tea with milk and sugar and cinnamon and vanilla! Soooo good! And to add to the awesomeness that is a teteria, they bring you free chocolate crepes (sort of like a tapa)! I am in love with them! 
My grammar class went and saw a movie in theaters last week which was very interesting.  It was one of the two actual Spanish movies and it was very depressing and the movie ended with the father committing suicide! So sad! They said that it was a typical Spanish movie! Spaniards are un poco loco.  I also found the show Fear Factor in Spanish on tv haha that is hilarious! Today some of us went up to the Albacyn area which is where they have TONNNNNS of little stores selling everything! I went crazy shopping and bargaining! It was so fun except for it was RAINING!!! And it is supposed to rain for the rest of the week.... thank you, sunny Spain.  Everyone needs to pray that this volcano in Iceland goes away before next weekend because that's when we are supposed to go to Paris!!

Me Encanta Italia

11 days
10 cities
4 planes
6 metros
11 trains
5 busses
2 shuttles
6 boats
4 hostals
10 friends
1 backpack
countless amounts of fun

So I got back from Italy early this morning and I have so much to write about! Sorry that this is going to be so long! It was such an amazing trip! Italy has been my favorite country since I visited it with my grandparents a few years ago and I am still in love with it! I am going to split this post into the cities we went to so it will be easier! Sorry for the A.D.D. style that I write in. I have never been  writer and never will be haha so enjoy

Rome

So on Thursday I packed eleven days worth of clothes and necessities into ONE BACKPACK! I am the overpacker of the century so this was definitely a learning experience but I did it! The airline we take called Ryan air is really cheap but checking a bag is about 45 dollars and you can only have one small carryon and no purse soooo it was tough but somehow we all did it. However I did have so many things in the pockets of my jackets and hiding everywhere because if they see you and they think your bag is too big they make you check it so it is a challenge every time we get on the plane! My curly hair products got taken up the second time we went through security so that would be why my hair looked atrocious for the rest of the trip!  When we were on the plane they were selling smokeless cigarettes! Spanish people can't last an hour without nicotine! its ridiculous! So we got on a plane after class on Thursday afternoon and flew to Barcelona. We then spent the night in the airport because we are cheap college students and we had an early flight to Rome the next day.  Everyone pretty much slept most of the night except for me and my stupid insomnia so I did not even lay my head down haha it was an experience.  The next morning we flew to Rome and checked into our hostel.  It was called the Pop in hostel and it was precious! Four of us had a private room so that was nice too! When we got there we met a guy from Australia who had been in Rome for two weeks and he showed us around. We walked around and saw just about every main thing there is to see in Rome from the outside and by the time we got back to the hostel to go to sleep I had been awake for 38 hours.  Lets just say I could barely walk straight! The next day I slept in while the other 3 went to the Vatican (I had already been before and I needed sleep) and then I met them at the Colosseum.  We went into all of the cool stuff and saw the Trevi Fountain at night while we ate gelato. Wonderful. The next day we did a little more sightseeing and hopped on a train to Florence.

(Side note: me and Alaina got Carmen rosary beads from the Vatican because she said one time how special they are.  They are so nice and pretty and they have a cool leather carrying case! So we gave them to her last night and she FREAKED out! It was the cutest thing I had ever seen! she kept on kissing us on the cheeks and saying that she will think of us every time she prays and how precious they are to her…. adorable!)

Florence
Ahhhh Florence.  This city was my favorite when I first went and I only grew to love it even more the second time.  Florence has the most character of any city in Italy and it doesn't even need a huge attraction like the ruins in Rome or the whole being built on water thing in Venice. (Not to bash Venice which is also amazing) I am just obsessed with Florence.  We spent 3 nights here in an awesome hotel in the center of the city and we woke up staring at the Duomo every morning from our balcony.  So awesome and so cheap! When we first arrived in Florence we checked in and walked around and decided to go to my favorite restaurant in the world that I have been talking about since last time I went to Florence.  It was every bit as good as I remembered and everyone else fell in love with it too! It was awesome!! The next day we went to an awesome market where I probably could have spent my life savings if I had any life savings.  They also had an indoor food market where we had sandwiches that were freshly sliced and awesome! We also had dried strawberries that were soooo good! We met up with 3 girls from the study abroad group in Sevilla and a girl that studies in Florence, Claire, who is absolutely precious.  We went up to a lookout over all of Florence and it was a breathtaking view.  After that we went to Claire's apartment and we all made dinner and laughed a ton. The next day we all wanted to do different things.  Ashley and Devin waited in line for 3 hours to see David.  Some others went to an art museum and me and one of the Sevilla girls (Allison) decided to wander around the city and go into anything that was free.  This was sooooo funnnnn!  We found a bizarre museum with paintings of Marilyn Monroe mixed with classical paintings! We found these big glass bottles of water there that were free (we think) so we carried them around with us for the next day or so but they died in pisa haha.   We also went to a perfume museum and tried on awful perfume that we smelled like for the rest of the day. 

Italian men are waaaayyyy worse than Spanish men about cat calls.  It is so funny what they think they should say to you in English.  Some good ones were "Your eye is beautiful", "Can I take your eyes from you?", and my personal favorite "I realize that you are the most famous person". Hahahah who taught them English??  After a long day we walked for what seemed like forever to a family owned restaurant outside of the city center that was soooo good.  We got a pizza called "secret" and it didn't tell you what the ingredients were but it seriously had everything in it and it was amazing!  After we could not eat another bite we went and got gelato and it was wonderful!

Pisa
Early the next morning we hopped on a train to Pisa. We all got separated 3 minutes before the train left and we literally ran to the train and barely made it before it left.  We stopped in Pisa for about an hour because there is absolutely nothing in Pisa except the tower.  We took the cliché pictures and laughed at all the other people taking them haha it was so weird.  After that we hopped back on a train to Cinque Terre!

Cinque Terre
This was probably the most beautiful place I have ever been. We were sitting on the train going through a tunnel and all the sudden the tunnel opened up and all you could see was ocean.  All of us gasped and started freaking out because it was awesome!  Cinque Terre is five small cities on the coast and there are trails from one to the other that are in the mountains overlooking the ocean.  We stayed in the bottom city called Riomaggiore in a hostel but it ended up being our own apartment because they had 7 person rooms with a kitchen and bathroom and we had six people in our group so we got the whole thing to ourselves and it was so fun!  After we checked in and put all our stuff in the apartment we went out to this port and just sat on a wall overlooking the crashing waves and we just stared for over an hour.  It was awesome!

We then explored the city that we were staying in and it was adorable! All the buildings are different colors! So cute! We went to a grocery store and bought wayyyyyy too much pasta and we all cooked a yummy pasta dinner! It was so much fun!  We went to bed early and woke up at 6 AM and took a train to the city that was farthest away.  We hiked from that city to the next one and it was supposed to be the hardest part of the hike and they weren't joking! I do not think I have ever walked up that many stairs! But it was totally worth it because every view was breathtaking!  We made it to the next city in about two hours and explored that city and got fresh focaccia bread because it originated in Cinque Terre and it was so good!  Sadly it started to rain but we needed to get back anyways to go to Venice so we took a train back to our city and took a train to Venice. 

Venice
The cheapest train from Cinque Terre to Venice meant that you had to change trains twice.  Our first train was late so when we got to the first train switch the nice train man told us what platform it was on and told us we had to run.  So there we are with our big backpacks sprinting through the train station and we barely made it.  The doors closed on Devin's backpack and we had to pull her in while the train was moving! On this train we met an Italian girl who was adorable and we talked to her the whole way and she called her friend to figure out stuff for us to do in Venice! She was precious! When we finally arrived in Venice, it was around 9 pm and we had no earthly idea where our hotel was.  All we had was the address and we showed it to countless amounts of people who kept on telling us to go to a different person. 

Somehow we ended up at the bus station and the guy told us to take the Padova bus so while we were waiting for it we had to call the hotel and see what stop we were supposed to get off at.  After talking to the hotel 3 times we finally figured out that we were supposed to get off at Oriaggo.  So the bus came and by this time it was raining and the windows were fogged so we couldn't see the names of the stops. I had to walk up to the front of the bus and I started talking to this lady who looked nice and she spoke no English, she only spoke French (random).  So I kept on saying "Oriaggo?" and she would spout off a long answer in French and I would have no clue what she was saying so I would just say "Ummmm, Oriaggo?" This went on for about 5 minutes until she somehow conveyed to me with hand signals that she would tell me when we got there but I wasn't exactly sure if that is what she meant.  So at every top I would point and say "Oriaggo?" and she would say nooooooo.  This lasted forever because it was a 45 minute bus ride to Oriaggo but she was so nice!  So we finally got to our stop and the hotel said to turn left at the stop sign and it would be right down the road.  So apparently right down the road means 20 minutes down a deserted road.  It was really creepy and we had to ask random people walking there dogs where we were going.  The hotel was supposed to be number 213 but 213 was a house.  So somehow we made it!  It was actually a decent hotel and thankfully there was a shuttle for the rest of the trip.  There were four of us staying in a room and when we got to the room there were only three beds (two twins and a couch bed) and we were like ummmmm what? The man came in and pushed something on the couch bed and it popped up into bunkbeds! So weird! The next morning we took the shuttle into Venice! We had to buy a pass for the water bus which was pricey so we got our moneys worth out of it!

We kept on calling it our "boat tour"  We sat on the back of the boat and just road it all around and saw all of Venice it was so cool!  We then got of and went to St. Marks square and then just got lost in the city on purpose.  It was so cool to just wander around! We were all so exhausted from traveling so we were ready to take it easy!  Right after sunset we took a gondola ride and our gondolier had been doing that for 35 years! he told us all about the sights and he sang to us (because we told him he had to).  He sang Backstreet Boys, Billy Joel, and some Italian songs.  Ha so cool. It was an awesome and realizing end to an awesome trip! We got up early the next morning and took a train to Milan and flew back to Barcelona to spend another looooong night in the airport!

Granada
When we got back to Granada early Sunday morning I had never been so relieved for my bed and for hearing people speak a language I could somewhat understand! I never thought I would be relieved to hear Spanish!!  I went straight to sleep until Carmen woke me up to go out to lunch with her and her friend at a Chinese buffet. Ha wow so weird. Carmen hated it and every time her friend got up she would look at me and say how much she didn't like it haha love her!  I then came home, went BACK to sleep, Carmen woke me up at 11 pm to eat a small dinner and then I went right back to sleep and didn't wake up until school the next day! Crazy!

This was seriously an amazing trip! We had so many more stories and adventures but this is already way too long!! God was really with us on this trip because we had no clue what we were doing, where we were staying, where we were going, etc. and everything worked out perfectly! We had so many helpful people that we randomly met!  I have mastered the art of any sort of public transportation that you can imagine and I can play charades with people who don't speak English really well now too.  This whole experience is teaching me so much in such a short amount of time and I am trying to soak up as much as I can! Hope everyone had a great Easter!

Chau!!!