celebrations

Friday night we had a Christmas dinner gala at the dorm! It was fun and very entertaining. Its kind of a big production here. All the guys had on suits and the girls put on their best dresses! Of course, we didnt want to be maleducado, so we dressed up too! The residence choir sang christmas songs before and then we went to the dinning hall to eat! A few weeks ago we had to sign up for tables. Amanda, Taylor, Astrid, Molly, Rachel and I decided to be a table. I was not aware that you were supposed to name your table (for the sake of place cards) so upon arriving in the dinning room, we discovered we had been given the name "Little Timy". We are not quite sure if it referred to A Christmas Carol or what but we all thought it was pretty funny. The food wasnt great but I wasnt expecting it to be haha. The company was what made it fun. The six of us each told what we are going to miss about each other and reminisced on all of our fun times. At the end of the dinner, they passed out goody bags and champagne. We proceeded to discover party hats, masks, blowers, streamers and a novel in spainsh! (yes, the book was a random surprise, I got "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" in spanish haha). We had a great time toasting and playing with our party favors!

Kimberly's birthday was saturday night so we baked a cake and went out on the town to celebrate! I was so happy i could spend her birthday with her in Spain!

last class

today was the last day of classes.

agridulce is the best word to describe how i'm feeling. bittersweet.

we have two days of finals and then our closing ceremony next week, thats it. its over. a whole semester, gone. it seems like its been so long but also like its gone in the blink of an eye. i know everyone says that, but its because its true. this weekend i am going to make the most of every minute i have with the people here. we are celebrating kimberlys birthday, have our christmas dinner at the residence and our last eramus party tonight!

he aprendido mucho y nunca olvidaré esta experiencia

everything is beautiful

this weekend was our long holiday weekend in spain! i went with amanda astrid and taylor to the Pyrenees! It was incredible. We left Friday en route to Jaca. We had to go through Pamplona again. We had a three hour layover so we decided to go ice-skating. it was amusing to say the least. I'm not the most coordinated person, so i was no Michelle Kwan. I was pretty proud that i didnt have to hold onto the wall the entire time! There was a local news station filming and i even got interviewed. Im pretty sure the guys were laughing on the inside the entire time at my attempt to communicate with them in spanish ha! We got on our bus and headed toward Jaca, a small town in the province of Aragon. The drive there was pretty incredible. We went in and out of the mountains and passed a beautiful lake. i saw so many of the tiny villages i love so much! We finally arrived in Jaca. From Jaca we took a cab to our hotel which was about 20km outside of the city. We stayed at Las Magas. it was a beautiful hotel, very modern and the service was great! the concierge even helped us workout a deal with a taxi driver who agreed to drive us around the whole weekend for a set price!

for our first full day in the Pyrenees we went to a small skiing village

called Panticosa. It was one of the most incredibl

e places ive ever been. on the drive there we steadily climbed higher into the mountains. we began to see more and more snow! leading up to the town were the most beautiful old houses and another lake. the cliffs dropped straight off and there was this jade colored lake! snow was still on

the ground (melting a little) but the town was so cute! astrid and taylor went skiing and amanda

and i explored the town. we got to go into the church, which was built in the 11th century! It never ceases to amaze me when i see these chruches that are hundreds and hundreds of years old still standing. the brains that must have gone into their construction blows my mind. they are completely made of stones but still are beautiful and strong. we meandered through the tiny

streets and looked at all of the stores. one of my favorite things was that they had Christmas music playing throughout the city! amanda and i even came upon a family of kittens. they were so

cute! we couldnt resist, so we bought a can of catfood and fed them. it might not have been the best idea but we couldnt help it!

sunday we decided to explore the town of Jaca. we attempted to go iceskating but the lady who worked there was adamant that we come back at 5 since they were closing soon for lunch/siesta. instead, we walked to the old town. we wandered through the streets, stopping at the occasional store (no buying, just browsing for me). we made our way to the cathedral

(it wasnt a cathedral like notre dame, but it was beautiful on the inside). as we were walking in we realized mass was starting so we decided to go! It was a lovely service, and such a blessing to be able togo to mass in such an old, historic building. after we went to lunch at a restaurant our driver

recommended called La Cadiera. this was probably the highlight of they. We felt so "spanish" because we ordered dishes typical to the region of

Aragon, and they were DELICIOUS! One was called Migas (bread, kindof crumbled but moist with flavoring, and an egg!) it doesnt sound like much but is was sooo good! I also got sopa montanesa (spanish version of french onion soup) which was excellent. taylor and astrid ordered typical meat dishes which were delicious as well! we had such a good time eating and talking. lunch took a while (another reason we felt spanish). after, we walked to "la cuidadela" (the old fortress, similar to the one i saw in Pamplona). all in all, it was a great last weekend trip! it was very relaxing and care free. i will definitely miss the ease of traveling here. i have had some great times with good friends!

winding down

so this was our last full week of class....and its over. we (the dorm kids) also had our first goodbye today. Our neighbor Aida, a Norwegian nursing student, left to go back to norway today. it was weird because it didnt quite exactly feel like she was really leaving. she was the sweetest person ever, always smiling! i will miss her. another sad thing about today was that it was our last class with our teacher Fransisco. He is one of my favorite professors i have ever had. he loves learning the most random things in english and always makes us laugh. he is also a great teacher! he is having surgery tomorrow. we all hope he is well enough to come to our graduation ceremony thing. on a high note, we have a five day weekend/holiday! i am going to the Pyrenees! hopefully there will be snow and many pictures to share with yall!

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!