Valencia, Ghandia y Calpe

The week of exams and fallas turned out to be an amazing week. After the pressure of exams was over, we all felt so much better. I know I did at least. I had three exams, one on monday, one on tuesday, and one on wednesday. After the exams on Wednesday, most of us explored the city of Denia in search of different fallas, which are huge sculptures made out of plaster designed to satirize or criticize different (usually political) public figures. Thursday we went to Valencia to see the mascleta and the fallas there. I haven't been in a crowd that big since new year's in NYC at the end of 2008. The mascleta was a huge fireworks display during the afternoon. The Valencianos really love their fireworks; they were so powerful that we could feel them, not just hear them. It was really impressive. The fireworks were about 50 yards away and the show lasted 10 minutes; ten minutes during which you couldn't hear yourself even if you were yelling. The biggest falla in Valencia was 27 meters tall, according to what the newspapers said. I believe it. Absolutely crazy how much money they spent on it too, about 600,000 euros! The winning falla only cost half that. After we got back from Valencia at five in the morning on the bus, I slept for about four hours and then got up to go to Ghandia to hike with some people from the Iglesia Bautista and three other Calvin students. The hike was great; we saw some rural shepherds herding goats in the mountains and saw some great waterfalls. We met lots of nice people; mostly Ecuadorians and Colombians. One lady, Elva, invited us to eat with her in two days, on Sunday. We all were pumped about our new connection. On saturday a group of Calvin students and the boyfriend and brother of Mieke, one of our group, drove down to Calpe from Denia. Calpe is an enormous rock (332 meters tall and 1 km long) that juts out of the ocean and overlooks the town. It was an amazing view from the top, and the wildlife and flowers that grow up there were beautiful. I would go again for sure. So that was all day saturday. Sunday after church Clara, Kaylee, Courtney and I went to eat with Elva and her friends. I felt like I was in South America, not Spain; all of the people were Ecuadorians and Columbians. We all met at an abandoned house, which sounds weird. They had a few huge pots with this soup (chicken, bananas, yams, potatoes and rice) that they were preparing for everyone. We got to know the people and learned how to play dominoes. Great times. I had no idea how long we were taking until I realized it was 4:30 and we got out of church at 1:00. Then we went to have "coffee" at Elva's house, which turned out to be a code word for "Johnny Walker" (whisky) and learning how to dance salsa. By 7:30 I was all danced out and needed to go home to do homework. I don't think I slept at all this weekend, but it was a really great one. One more week until spring break; I'm really excited for that as well!

Exams and Fallas

This week we have been studying all week, every week. Art history is going to be a tough exam for most of us. 60 works of art to memorize, and dozens of new spanish words we need to describe the works of art. We also have to know when the work of art was created, where it is, and who did it, if the information is available. On top of that this coming week is the week of Las Fallas, the biggest festival in La Comunidad Valenciana. It will be quite a distraction for us. Fortunately, we are done with exams by wednesday, and thursday we are heading to Valencia to see more fallas and a bullfight, which should be pretty great. We just have to make it through this coming week.

Benimaurell

This weekend we heading off on our Esteve bus to the small mountain village of Benimaurell, about an hour inland from Denia. We stayed in an old hostel that, along with the rest of the village, was old and quaint; far from the noise of the city. From our hostel we could see the castle of Denia and the mountain Montgo that towers over the city of Denia. On saturday we went hiking through the canyons to the north of the town and ended up at a fantastic waterfall. Sunday we went to what was the first Catholic mass for many of us; Catholics don't do long services apparently. We were out in half an hour. Then some of us climbed the "horse's saddle", which are two mountains that overlook the entire valley and the dozen or so villages that are spread throughout it. It was more of a serious climb than Saturday; we had to climb through a crevice that went through the entire mountain and we also had to use climbing rope left there to get up a particularly steep part of the mountain. The view was worth it though. The whole area around Benimaurell is covered in terraces which have almond trees planted everywhere, and they only blossom for about a week, which is when we happened to be there. It was a good weekend to get away from it all. This wednesday we head out for Andalucia; we are going to La Alhambra and La Mezquita de Cordoba. It will be amazing for sure.

Rain and Marruecos

As it turns out, the rain in Spain falls mainly on Denia, not the plain. We have seen rain every for about a week. I might be exaggerating but that's what it feels like. In class this week it's Roman architecture and Las Rimas de Becquer. The classes are much better than what my first impression had led me to believe. The city council of Pego, a nearby town which happens to be the place to celebrate Carnaval, canceled the celebration that was supposed to take place this last weekend. This weekend five of us Calvin students are off to Morocco, which will be a really great time and hopefully more sunny. We are going to see Fez and Marrakesh, which are two really interesting and old cities.

London

London is a big city. I traveled there with three other Calvin friends this last weekend. We had to take a train to Alicante from Denia, then in Alicante we took a bus to the airport, then we took a plane to Gatwick airport, a train to central London, and finally a cab to our hostel. The city itself is amazing; we walked all the way from Hyde Park to the London Bridge the second day. We did all of the essential London sightseeing: fish and chips, phone booths, double-decker buses, et cetera. The hostel was not the nicest place ever, and it seemed like everyone in the hostel had a keycard that opened our door...I really like the fact that people from all over the world coexist in London; we met people from Sweden, Zambia, South Africa, Italy, Austria, and even Chicago. The Austrian man gave us his card and said that since he traveled as a student in the US, he knew how nice it is to have a place to stay when passing through a country. I'm quite sure that we saw most of the major London landmarks: Big Ben, the Parliament Building, the London Tower, the Globe Theatre, the London Bridge, the London Eye, Buckingham Palace, Trafalgal Square, Hyde Park, the Soho District, Piccadilly Circus, the National Museum, Westminster Abbey, and more. What a busy weekend. This coming weekend most of our Calvin group is going to Pego, a city close to Denia, to celebrate Carnaval. Still on my list of things to do: climb Montgo next weekend if we have time. Some of the group already climbed it last weekend, but most of them want to go again because they enjoyed it so much.

Barcelona and Tarragona

This last Wednesday after class our Calvin group met up with a high school group from a Denia high school called Chavas for our trip to Barcelona and Tarragona. After eight hours on a bus with 30 high school students, I started to realize how far I have come after being out of high school for three or four years. Also, I would say that high school kids are not that different whether they are in Spain or in the U.S. That stage of life has lots of common traits. Barcelona is an amazing city; we visited most of the well-known attractions. Gaudi is the most famous architect in Barcelona, and we saw the Pedrera, Parque Guell, and La Sagrada Familia. The cathedral was by far the most impressive part of Barcelona. The main pedestrian street is called Las Ramblas, and it is by far the busiest part of the Gothic District of Barcelona, which is also the oldest part. We stayed at an albergue, (hostel) which used to be a seminary and now serves as a conference center and school for nurses. One student from Chavas, Vicente, hung out with the Calvin group the whole weekend, and we have hung out since then here in Denia. Later this semester, we have more trips coming up: Granada, Madrid, London, and Marrakesh. The last two are independent trips that we are planning for February.

Montgo

Today a group of us Calvin kids tried to climb Montgo. We met at the university that we study at, the UNED (universidad de educaciOn a distancia), and then we started the hike. We knew that the forecast said something about rain and clouds, but we didn't pay much attention. We hiked up the mountain to about one third of the height of the whole thing, and stopped at a cave that had been used for a source of freshwater in the distant past. There were a bunch of Roman numerals and Latin words etched into the side of the cave at one point. Pretty interesting, but I have no idea what it said. After the cave, we decided to head back down because it looked pretty angry and dark outside, and we didn't want to be stuck on a mountain during a raging rainstorm. We headed back down and stopped at a hermitage of the patron saint of Denia (I think), la virgen de los desamparados. (virgin of the helpless). It turns out that it didn't rain at all today, but we wouldn't have been able to see very well from the top anyways. We probably got up about 250 or 300 of the 700 meter climb...Maybe the next weekend that we have free. In a week we are going to Barcelona and Tarragona, and professor Bierling has been telling us scary stories of how she and her husband have been mugged and robbed. I'm excited to see how that weekend will be; Barcelona is a great city from what we have read and studied in class. Exams for our January class are this wednesday, so we have to study vosotros forms, spanish political and physical geography, and spanish literature...We are all looking forward to Barcelona as a good break before the new classes start.

In the news today...and language differences

Today in class Marielena brought in the local newspaper and we found a little piece about our group. Here's the link for that:

http://www.lasprovincias.es/20100120/marina/universitarios-americanos-visitan-centre-20100120.html

That was pretty funny to read, especially since we aren't "Calvin College" anymore, we are now "Collin College" to any local Denia amigos who read their newspaper this morning. So many things get lost in translation. The most difficult part of not speaking English is that whatever sense of humor that I had (or thought I had) in English just got killed by my inability to understand Spanish jokes and sarcasm. It's so weird because I will understand the words people are saying, but it won't make sense because of the context within which they are saying it. I guess the point is that I need to learn some Spanish jokes or something...

Today I had the opportunity to meet with Jaime Jr, a 17-year-old Spanish amigo whose parents think that he needs to improve his english. It was pretty fun to work with him and his little brother Federico, or Fede for short. It turns out that their english is pretty limited, but we can still find fun things to do. They are nice guys. The family lives in a two-floor apartment next to the store that their dad works at. It was really hard to know how to prepare because I had no idea how much English the guys would be able to speak. Now I know. 16 euros is not a bad bonus. I might have done that for free anyways...

This weekend our group of Calvin kids went to Javea and Valencia, a quaint earthy village and beautiful big city, respectively. Javea is on the other side of Montgo, which is a mountain that sits behind Denia. Denia is between Montgo and the ocean. The local "Javean" city council had a few representatives that met our group at the town hall and gave us all bags with all of their turist propaganda. They did let us climb up to the roof of their local 14th-century church and explore the place. What a great view; from their you can see miles of Mediterranean coast, the entire village of Javea, and the clouds of mist created by waves crashing against the rocky shore in the distance... Montgo is about 2300 feet above level, and this coming weekend a few of us are planning on climbing it. We'll see how that goes. Valencia was amazing; we saw all the major sites, including a baptism at the cathedral. It was an odd mix of reverent catholic liturgical tradition and turists taking photos of everything. I personally found it really awkward to take photos while I was in the cathedral but I sneaked a few, especially of the ceiling, which had an amazing painting the spanned the whole interior of the dome. Later on in Valencia we went to the Oceanografico, which, I was told, is the largest "Shedd Aquarium" type of site in Europe. (Shedd Aquarium is bigger)

Cell Phones and Tutoring

Eighteen of the twenty-five Calvin students managed to get cellphones today, which will be a huge help for us with respect for planning and coordinating meetings and such. I have this tiny little LG phone now with limited minutes, but it won't be a problem because I'm only using the phone to call people in our group. Professor Bierling told us in class today that our travel agent wanted someone to tutor his two kids in english, and since I was the first volunteer she brought me to the travel agency to meet the man and his wife and his two kids. Most mondays I will be meeting with Jaime Jr. and his little brother, and I am supposed to speak in english with them. I'm not sure what level they are at, but hopefully we can get past hand gestures and have some conversations. Two hours is a long time if no communication is taking place other than hand motions...

My first Monday in Spain and I came late to class because I was looking at the wrong schedule...Not a problem though after I explained everything to Marielena. (that's professor Bierling back in Michigan) It turns out that I will probably get to know most of the older ladies in Denia through the many acquaintances of my mama here in Denia. I spent all of yesterday shopping with Pepita and my mama at a mall close to our house. There were some good rebajas (sales) going on and I took advantage of them. I have 150 euros to spend that will be reimbursed by Iberian airlines because they pay 50 euros per day to passengers whose maletas (suitcases) don't arrive on time. My little suitcase was three days in arriving, and I was pretty happy to be able to drop some euros on sweaters and shoes and pants and socks and...yeah I bought a lot. The mama does a pretty good job making me at home. She is a funny lady, and has an interesting habit of finishing my sentences for me before I am done talking. I'm really great at starting a sentence, but I rarely have the chance to finish before she jumps on it. We'll have to figure that one out. She cooks really well also; for example for lunch I had salmon, mussels, red wine and some kind of soup with valencia oranges. Her little apartment is right at the base of the castle in Denia. The walls by us are part man-made and part natural cliff; I would say that they are about 120 or so feet tall by us, but less in other parts.
On saturday a bunch of us Calvin students met a the bus station and began our little expedition to La Torre de Gerro, which is this 50-foot-tall tower about 5 miles south of Denia that overlooks "really tall" cliffs and gives a great view of the Mediterranean. Seth Kuiper and I climbed to the third "floor" of the tower, but realized when we got there that the rope that we had been using was worn thin at the top, whereas it had looked quite strong with intermittent knots at the bottom. So we didn't get to the top, but the view was still amazing. I am not a huge fan of spending long amounts of time at dangerous heights with 30 mph wind blasting me in the face, so I didn't last long in the tower. Next weekend we are going to Valencia, so that will be an interesting time...