It’s taken me a while to write another blog because a few of my friends got sick and then it got passed on to more friends and then I got sick. We all ended up sick the past few days but will hopefully be better by Monday, right when the weekend is over, of course. My nose is so raw from blowing and my throat from coughing, but the worst is over. My roommates, who at first [the first month, that is] weren’t too friendly with me [not mean, just not friendly] came in to check on me since I didn’t leave my bed the entire day and one of them even gave me medication. And today the other one came in to see how I was doing because Sanaa told her I was sick. That was very nice of them.

Besides being sick the past couple days, I haven’t done much but stay in bed and do homework or watch YouTube videos so I can talk about last weekend and this past week.

I wanted to talk about my excursion from 2 weekends ago and show pictures. I really do have so many pictures, though, and I want to upload everything but I can’t decide between Flickr and Picasa. Does anyone have any suggestions?? I know Picasa you can edit them.. can you edit them on Flickr, too? And is Picasa online? I could just Facebook em but them there is a limit of 60 pictures or something per album. Argh.

The Geography department of UV [Universitat de Valencià] hosted the 2-day excursion last Saturday and Sunday. It was 60 euros but that included the bus ride, boat ride, food, and one night stay in a hostal. I stayed the night at a friend’s since she lived closer and we had to be there early. The night before we [mostly her] cooked so much food… chicken quesadillas and nachos that we couldn’t even finish it. It was fun, though. We met everyone [~100 people!] and 2 buses the next morning and took off. That day we say 5 different places.

We drove for an hour and then stopped to talk about La Albufera [The Lagoon] and how it formed, etc [geography stuff ;)]. Then we took a little boat ride around in it. We brought a sack lunch because just dinner [Saturday] and breakfast and lunch [Sunday] were paid for. He showed us little restaurants and said just to go sit at the tables and eat our sack lunches but this presented a bit of a problem since we weren’t eating anything at the restaurants. The professor also told us we could use their bathrooms and they weren’t to keen with that either. We ended up compromising and just bought coffees so they would leave us alone.

After that we went to La Playa del Perellonet, the beach. It was very pretty, but still a little chilly. We hung out a while and Priya busted out the huge cookie cake that we had attempted to bake at my house the day before. [Note: Another cultural difference: In Spain people don’t bake the types of things they do in the US. You never see what Americans consider the standard cookie or cake. In turn, the do have multiple bakeries, but with croissants and napolitanas and all sorts of other yummy stuff. But I do miss my cookies and for this reason we attempted to make them, failed, and ended up making a cookie cake.] It turned out alright and we shared it with a bunch of people, making all sorts of friends. Then we took a group picture. We talked about what other cultures say when taking a picture. In English we say “cheeeese” and in Spain they say “patata” and I think in Germany they say “spaghetti.” Lots of other cultures say “cheeeese” as well, though.

After the beach we went to La Montaña de Cullera where we were given a longer talk about the estuary of el río Júcar and La Albufera [the river and beach]. Even with so much traveling, geography has never been my strong point but it was interesting to hear. The view was also very beautiful.

After that we went up into the mountains where it was supppper windy. We hiked up a hill and at the top were a bunch of old dudes flying kites! Not just any kites, though; they were remote control kites in the shape of jets. So cute to see a bunch of old men with their tricked out toys. It reminded me of when my boyfriend and I were in Puerto Rico and the old men would bring chairs and go sit in random places and play dominoes. Totally random.

Way tired, we arrived at the hostel. We were one of the first ones to get a room and we got lucky because we got a room inside a building whereas other people had to stay outside in log cabins [fun.. until you’re in the mountains and the lock on your door doesn’t work nor does your heater work…]. We settled in and then went down to dinner. It was buffet style with beer, wine, coffee and everything.

After dinner was the “Fiesta Multicultural.” The professor went to sleep and they brought out a DJ and let us hang out and dance or just talk if we wanted. Most of us stayed out a little and then went back to go to sleep [long day ahead of us on Sunday] but some stayed out and partied.

Breakfast was at 9 and then the 15 km [9.3 miles] was at 9:30. This was a lot of fun for almost the entire time but at the end, the last hour, it was just horrific. The whole first half was a downward slope and then the last half was walking uphill. We were so tired but it was a great hike.

When we got back they had the paella waiting for us. There were 3 types: vegetarian, chicken, and rabbit & chicken. I had had rabbit twice before, both times in Spain in 2006. When I first tasted it I loved it… and then found out what it was. I was slightly sad but made myself get over it and ate it a second time. I ordered the rabbit & chicken one and was not let down. After a huge lunch, we were taken to the agricultural part of the hostel in the mountains. Apparently they had a bunny farm. So after munching on little bunny rabbits for lunch, I got to hold baby bunnies and then a huge granddaddy bigger-than-your-dog rabbit. Kinda morbid, yes, but it was fun.

We went home after that. It was a 2 hour drive and when we got home I went right to sleep. Good times. I’ll show you pictures if you all help me decide on Flickr or Picasa!

This week wasn’t too adventurous, but Las Fallas did start! Sunday was the Primera Mascletà. It started at 2 and we met a few of our Spanish friends and went to watch it. It was so crowded. It’s funny that everyone always says let’s go ‘watch’ it when there really isn’t anything to watch. It’s mostly just fireworks you hear and can’t really see [except for smoke]. It lasts about 5-10 minutes and then you spend 30 minutes getting out of the crowd. It is SO loud though. I have been told my multiple Spaniards that if you feel it’s getting too loud to NOT plug your ears but to open up your mouth because your ear drums can pop. Crazy. Your entire body starts shaking with the ground; you feel like it’s an earth quake. While Americans are visually stimulated, it must be a Spanish thing to adore super loud noises. We went that Sunday and then Monday as well. I think it’s every day until the Fallas really start: March 14^th- 19^th.

Every Monday a certain restaurant gives away free paella with purchase of a drink. The catch is that the drink is really a pitcher of whatever you order and you get tiny little plates of paella. Locals do not go there because they know that free paella does not mean quality paella but Erasmus students from all over are attracted to this place. We went and almost everyone from the excursion ended up being there. It was a lot of fun.

One of the girls here is pre-med and took an important test before coming here. She was going to find out her results on Wednesday. We went out to celebrate and had a blast. We went to different bars/clubs, including a funk night at one called Black Note.

The rest of the week I was pretty much sick so that concludes it.

I do have a tandem set up for Monday, though! [A tandem is where two people of differing first languages get together to practice their second (or third, etc) language with the other person and then switch back to the other language.] I am very excited and hope to get more tandems set up until I can find a more constant one.