taking the bull by the horns

I spent a wonderful day in Pamplona today! Pamplona is a city in Spain most known for being the Roman city in Spain, the Running of the Bulls and Ernest Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises." I had been wanting to visit because I almost studied abroad there! It was a little chilly when we arrived but I was so excited. The bus station was right next to the old city fort so we decided to go there first. It was so neat to see the old walls that used to surround/protect the city. Taylor and I enjoyed blowing dandelions at each other! Michael, a friend from Ole Miss who is studying in Pamplona met us at the fort and graciously took on the job of being our tour guide for the day! We made our way to Casco Vieojo where we walked along the street that the bulls run down on the festival of San Fermin (first picture on the left). We saw the outside of the bull-ring, but apparently it is only open the week of the Running of the Bulls. It was interesting because you could see the covered holesthat are removed each year to block the street off for the bulls. We decided to eat chinese for lunch and let me tell you, we feasted. After we walked to the Cathedral but as we got there a priest was closing the gate! We walked to the oldest part of Pamplona and then walked along more of the ancient walls. We came to a cool look-out that you could almost see France from! The walls were built up in levels for protection. We also got to see the original entrance gateway. We also saw the ayuntameinto (town hall). The city was quiet because it was siesta so we decided to have coffee and dessert at the famous Cafe Iruna! We strolled around a little more and wandered into Corte Ingles for a few items. As we were pulling out on the bus back to Bilbao I also saw the first lit Christmas lights of the season!!! It was a short but sweet visit. Definitely good to see familiar faces and Michael was so great to show us around all day!

We couldnt leave without posing with bulls!

A Spanish Thanksgiving

so yesterday was Thanksgiving in the U.S. for most of the day it didnt quite feel like Thanksgiving because 1.) I had school and 2.) i had a test. While i was sad not to be with my family i was excited because our professors and program directors had a Thanksgiving dinner for us! I really was so grateful that they did it for us. In Spain the last Thursday of November holds no significant value. To them it is just another Thursday. Our professors know that it is an important day for us and were gracious enough to celebrate it with us! The dinner was very nice. We had pumpkin soup, turkey, mashed potatoes and a type of pumpkin bread for desert! I even brought the decorations my mom sent me to put on our tables! The professors liked them so much they asked if they could keep them for next year! I really enjoyed Thanksgiving with my spanish family and even got to skype my family back home! I'm proud to say that they won the 4th annual Shmucker bowl once again! Yay Romig/Tucker clan! After dinner a bunch of went to the last Erasmus party. All in all it was a good Thanksgiving, given the fact that technically it wasnt (i did miss bread pudding though :( o well...ill have some in a few weeks!)!

recipe

so a phenomenon recently swept through spain in the form of a drink and it started here in the north! The drink called a "kalimotxo" (pronounced kal-e-mo-cho...its a Basque word). I kind of think we should bring it to the US. here is the recipe:

• Equal parts coca-cola and red wine

yes it sounds strange, i know. i was skeptical the first time i tried it, and im not even a huge coke person, but its actually pretty good. i have a few friends here who LOVE it, but i know it probably wont be for everyone. i dont know why i waited so long to share it. Enjoy!

futbol

i went to my first Athletic game last night!!! (Bilbao Athletic is the name of the team) it was the most fun i have had in a long time!!! i spent the day with amanda, astrid, and taylor. we went to a market in Algorta and then went to Areeta and looked at shops and had lunch. I had a nice siesta when i got back and then we got ready for the game! We all wore red, black, and white (team colors) and even found face paint! We realized that face painting is nonexistent here when we started to get funny looks because of ours. i personally think the spaniards were jealous they didnt think of it first. we actually got approached by people wondering who painted our faces and they

wanted theirs painted. too bad they were for Barcelona! before the game we grabbed bocadillos and drinks at a restaurant and then made our way to the stadium. we sat with some more friends from our program. im not an expert on soccer but i loved the atmosphere. people are very passionate about their teams here (which is kind of an understatement if youve heard about the whole ireland vs france saga that happened last week). the game ended in a tie 1-1. Bilbaoians were pretty excited about this because Barcelona is the #1 team, and if Madrid won then they would get knocked out of the number one spot (or something like that)!

also, im not sure if i previoulsy mentioned the tricked out strollers here in spain but i finally snapped a couple of shots of some i saw. yes, one even has an umbrella attachment!

teaching twins

so i forgot to mention that about a week ago i met a lady who wanted two people to teach her children and her sisters children a little english through conversation and games. today was my first day! I am teaching two twin girls who live in the Deusto area. the girls and their parents are really sweet and im excited about the next few weeks. im sad that i only get to meet with them five times. i would have loved to have had something like this to do all semester. a girl in my program is going to take over next semester when i leave. sometimes i feel like im not a great teacher but im trying and i hope the girls will take something away from our classes! today we did the alphabet and clothes. im going to try and really plan in advance so that they have fun and are not bored.

why im here

Today was one of those days that reminded me that i'm where i'm supposed to be. amanda, taylor, astrid, and i decided to take

a day trip to San Sebastian, a city located on the northern coast of spain. it is very popular in the summer and an international film festival is held there every year (Brad Pitt was there this year!). it is only an hour away and buses leave Bilbao every hour, so it was not difficult to get there. it was on the bus ride, of all places, that i had my moment of realization. i fell even more in love with the countryside and the little pueblos that surround the city. the mountains are beautiful and lush and i absolutely love the houses dotting their hillsides. i just want to be tucked away in one overlooking everything. it made realize that there are so many places i want to see and still so much i want to do!

once we arrived in san sebastian we made our way toward the aquarium. parts of san sebastian remind me of paris in a way. the architecture is beautiful and the apartments are so cute. the beach and harbor are gorgeous as well. the aquarium was a lot fun. at first i was starting to doubt its coolness because an entire floor was just displays - no animals! but then we finally found the fishies!!! it wasnt a huge aquarium so we took our time at each exhibit. i got to pet a star-fish and a sea cucumber!

we also saw the craziest thing ive seen in quite some time. im going to try and explain it to the best of my abilities. it was a tank of tiny sharks. at first i just thought it was sharks but then we realized it was tank that displayed the breeding habits of this particular shark. so the shark lays an egg. from that egg develops a hard corn-husk like sac that anchors to coral or algae so it wont get carried away by the current. inside the sac is everything the shark needs to develop. it takes about 9 months!

as it gets closer to being born the sac becomes more translucent and you can actually see the baby shark inside moving around. You are also able to see the nourishment sac and how its connected to it! it really was incredible. a few of the sacs looked like they were almost ready for the shark to be born. the babies were moving around quite a bit and it looked like they might break out! the pictures arent the best but you can kind of see what im talking about! Lunch was AMAZING compared to the dorm food! we ate at a restaurant called la vaca. I got a delicious sandwhich with grilled chicken and bbq sauce (the real kind) and onion rings. afterwards we got gelato! the town was pretty quite because it was siesta time. we walked around the deserted streets and made our way back to the bus stop to catch a bus back to bilbao. it was a great day.

I love how when you least expect it you are given those moments that remind you how truly blessed you are. I am so thankful for this experience and i love how life reminds me of that in the little things!

i'll pass thanks...

two posts in one day, i know its big, but this couldnt wait. i had to share with the world what we had for dinner tonight! enjoy!!!

jobros

yes, i did it. i went to the Jonas Brothers concert in Bilbao last night! ill admit that they are my guilty pleasure and it was worth every penny!! i went with kimberly and emily and we had a BLAST!!! one of my personal highlights was when big rob came out and rapped with them in burin' up! ok, enough said. i dont want yall to think im too insane. enjoy the pics!

historic sites and hail

so the most bizarre thing about this week/weekend has been the weather. it has been rainy all week which is a bummer, but i can deal with that. yesterday there was a huge hail storm when we were in Guernica, which for a few minutes, turned the street white like snow, (more about that later) and then this morning we opened our shutters to yet another hail storm. it wasnt like any hail storm i have ever seen. at first glance it looked like rain, it was coming down so fast. when you looked off into the distance you realized it was extremely dense and made it hard to see in front of you. it was intensified because it would come barreling around the sides of tall buildings adding to the noises and visuals. when the hail subsided and huge lightning bolt struck (at first i thought it was Amanda taking a picture on her camera), but when the ground shaking thunder rumbled i knew otherwise. i was expecting a terenchal downpour, but one never came, and now its sunny! but it is supposed to rain for like the next week so im not going to get too excited about the brief sunshine! i shot a video of a little bit of the hail storm but im not sure if it really does it justice.

yesterday we had our final excursion of the semester to Guernica. Guernica is the city where the parliament of Biscay is located; it is also where the Lenhendakari (president of the

Basque country) takes his oath. It is most famous for the painting that Picasso did of it after it was bombed by German planes in 1937 by the order of Franco. It was a monday, market day, when the city was full of people buying and selling goods. Almost 2,000 civilians were killed and the entire city was destroyed, but the Biscayan assembly and the Oak of Guernica survived the attack, making the Oak tree a symbol for the town. The original oak tree is now preserved under a gazebo like structure. I fall more in love with the countryside around this area. I love all of the traditional Basque houses that are built into the mountains. they look so peaceful and secluded. We got to see a lot scenery on the bus ride as well as some coastal views.

dorm delicacies

yay this week i was able to check a 6page group paper off my list! its not as easy to write a paper in a group as you would think. other than that school was pretty uneventful. next week is a low-key week and then from there it gets super busy. i bought tickets to the jonas brothers concert for next week! im not going to lie, im excited. im going with kimberly and emily and i cannot wait!!! so i am mainly writing to share a picture of some of the delicious food we are served here at the dorm. rachel has been documenting our meals and this picture wins hands down for the grossest of the week. enjoy!