Home....

I miss home like crazy. I am really ready to comehome because I have not been traveling lately. It's really sad, because I know that I will be missing Spain in just a few short weeks. There are lots of things about Spain that I am going to miss. I have decided that I am going to list them, so you will know some of my favorite things about Spain.

-Salad with lettuce, tomatoes, onions, with salt, vinager, and olive oil for dressing
-Walking everywhere-litereally everywhere. I like being able to be productive on the bus
-Being able to be out of phone reach, planning ahead, following through and being patient when waiting for others to arrive instead of calling(not hearing cell phone ringsall the time)
-Being able to go to 3 countries in 3 weeks-for really cheap
-Seeing all my NEW FRIENDS whenever I want
-Watching the Tech games live from 2-6 am.....
-Spaking Spanish all the times (this really includes when I can't think of the English words for things, because all I can do is speak in Spanish)
-My Spanish family (and all that entails, which is a LOT...)
-Not having to express my emotions with everyone, because I don't know how to do that in Spainish-I do however love being able to say what I want, when I want....it's freeing
-Soup for lunch with FRESH warm bread
-Being stared at, since clearly I look good ALL the time. It's the blond hair....
-Talking in English and knowing no one will understand what I am saying...
-Saying Merry Christmas, instead of Happy Holidays
-The fabulous people at the "Casa de los Ancianos" All of them, whom I love!!!
-Tinto Veranos
-Dancing Sevillanas
-Parks and Tapas
-Easy school

There is probably more, but I don't know for now. I think next I will talk about what I miss most about the United States

-FAMILY
-TJ
-FRIENDS
-Mexican food
-Ranch Dressing
-Being able to talk to whom I want, when I want, no questions asked...
-Knowing everything about everyone back home. I just want to be informed, and be able to ease drop with EASE... not have to work to translate it.
-Central heat and air conditoning...
-Being able to throw my clothes in the dryer to shrink them up a little bit
-Chosing who I WANT to hang out with.....(even though I like people here, it would be nice to change it up a bit)
-Fast food American style
-Cheddar cheese, American Cheese, Black olives without pits, pickles
-Swing dancing
-A little responsibility....
-Driving my car

I don't know. There is more, but if I keep talking, I will make myself even more homesick. I will be home soon!

So where to begin???

You probably want to know about Switzerland, huh? Basically I loved Suiza more than anywhere I have been outside of Spain. (Ronda is the place in Spain that is my favorite) It was small mountian town meets Europe with an incredible result. We went to Interlaken, which is the extreme sports capital of the world, in case you didn't know. We had planned on going Bungee Jumping 450 meters, touching the water in the river below, but infortunatly it was closed for the season because it snowed the day that we arrived.... So, we rented 4 wheelers and went up into the mountians and went searching for waterfalls, which we found! It was great! The snow was melting a little, so all the mountians and cliffs had lots of HUGE waterfalls coming off of them. What beauty. People deny that a God created us?

I went to Suiza with a group of 12 people, including myself, which was great! These people are seriously some of my favorite ever!

While we were 4 wheeling, (6 of us) the other half were mountian biking. They were hard core, but we passed them in a matter of minutes, which made us feel really good. Anyways, when we were finished 4 wheeling, we decided that we would push the limits of extreme a little more and go skydiving. Sooooo, we went skydiving. That's right. Skydiving over the Swiss Alps! I went with Amy, Brian and Ryan. My friend Jennifer went with us to take pictures. I don't really feel like I can write much about it, because it was one of the best experiences in my life! I just don't have the words, but don't worry, I got pictures and video... so I will share when I return to the States! Let me say this, though: From 13500 feet, the mountians were breathtaking... It was stellar!

The next day, the whole group and I went and rented motos (that's what they call mopeds) for about 6 hours and we went riding around in the mountians. We had a moped gang! It was hillarious seeing (picture this with me) 12 Americans on 7 motos all bundled up riding through the Swiss Alps, and all these Swiss towns. hahaha! Don't worry. The next day we spent hours shopping around the whole city of Interlaken, where we all bought Swiss Army knives, Swiss chocolate and Swiss cheese.

It was really a trip of a lifetime, because we spended the night in the Mailan airport, on the floor. We also met 3 other girls from our group there. All 15 of us were on the same flight back to Sevilla. One of the things that made this trip so fun, besides the opbious skydiving over the Swiss Alps) was really getting to know our group. We all slept in a hostel room with 12 beds-and it was like a slumberparty with 11 of your best friends every night for 5 days. What a way to get to know people really well, huh?

I feel like I need to take some time to talk about our group. The instructors and staff at TTU Sevilla say that we are the best group they have ever had. There are 28 of us and we ALL GET ALONG! Although there are people that we like more than others, (duh!) we ALL GET ALONG! We love eachother. We don't have spats. We want to know eachother. We love to be together. We share the same intrests BUT we are all VERY different. We would not be this good of friends, if friends at all at Tech. So how will we adjust back into society with out our Spainish friends? Or with our Spainish friends and other friends? How are we going to mesh our two realities? We don't know right now, but we do know that we are having a blast learning, loving and traveling together. :-)

Be jelous! (Oh, and we got repremanded at the hostel for yelling when TECH beat UT and we found out. We also sang the fight song and the kickoff song at kickoff-1 AM....)

Paris for my birthday

So I hate to be cliche, but I will have to agree with the rest of the world on thinking that Paris is the most romantic places in the world. This weekend was everything that I wanted it to be and so much more. Because I dan't have time to go into details, but I will hit the highlights-and let you know everything that we did in 3 days in paris. My friends that went with me are Jennifer, Erica, Maggie and Micah. Then, I had some other of our friends meet us there to participate in other evernts. They are Amy, Cayla, John, Nicole and Sasha.


We saw and explored:
-Cimetiere du Montparnasse
-Palais de Congrés
-Arc d´Triomphe
-La Siene
-Moulin Rouge
-Opéra Garnier-my favoirte building in all of Paris
-Palais du Louvre-WOW!
-Palais du Luxembourg-Sénate
-Jardins du Luxembourg
-The Pantheón
-Notre-Dame
-The Place where Princess Diana died
-Of course, the Tour Eiffel

Some of these places were explored extensivly while others we simply saw from a distance, but none the less, we saw it all. Are you impresed? You should be.

I don't know why the French have such a bad reputation in the states. The French have been the nicest out of anyone from any country that I have been in thus far. They all wanted to help is get around the city easily. When we tried to speak French, they helped us out (by teaching us Frnech) and then clarified in English. It was great! I'm sure it has something to do with the fact that France is run by tourists, but I don't know. They all went above and beyond about being nice. Long story short, I think lots of my friends will be going back again soon. Some for long term, other just to visit.

My new found love has become crépes. Crépes with chocolate, crépes with Nutella, crépes with Jelly, crépes with Cinnamon and sugar, crépes with applebutter and cinnamon. All sorts of delicious crépes. I would highly recommend them from France... ;-) Nedless to say, we tried delicious French food.

All these things + Paris+my birthday+my 22nd birthday+some of my favorite people=a really unforgettable weekend.

Lisbon, Portugal and all it's happenings!

Yes, my second try in Portugal was much more sucessful than the first, although it did rain again. It didn't pour all weekend, though, which was a definate plus.

We saw all sorts of neat things while we were in Lisbon. Lisbon is the capital of Portugal and it is very different than Spain. I have descirbed Lisbon as the San Fransico of Europe. It has a suspension bridge that the one in San Fransico was desinged after. It is right on the water and the city is huge. It has a very efficient metro system and LOTS of history in it. The city is WAY to big to feel like we explored the whole thing in 4 days. I would say we only hit the tip of the iceberg...We went shopping in a shopping center right under a bull ring. That was an adventure. We also got to see the aquarium. When I went out exploring, I happened upon a National Park of Portugal, which was beautiful. We also went to a nearby city called Sintra. This is the place where all the nobles of Lisbon when to build their summer castles. It was really neat to be able to see. Also, Portugal is the number one producer of cork in the world. We got to see all sorts of cork trees and fun things that were made out of cork. It was really neat climbing in the national park because cork trees were everywhere.

The group and I also went to a huge monastary dedicated to one of the great explorers of Portugal. There were so many different parts of this city that I don't feel like I can do it justice by describing it. The architecture of this city was incredible. There weren't two buildings next to eachother that were both the same shape. Everything in Lisbon was different colors and shapes and styles. It was a haven for people that love and can apperciate architecture-needless to say the architects in our group were happy...

Anyways, I leave for Madrid by bus tomorrow. Then Thursday morning I fly out with some friends to Paris. That's right. I will be there Thursday monring through Sunday morning. Awesome trip, huh? I'm excited!

Guess what? I also voted today. I finished my absentee ballott and it will be sent in soon. My second presidental election, and I have now voted from two different countries... cool, huh? I thought so! Love you and miss you all!

Venice

Yes, the rumors you heard are true. I spent the weekend in Venice. My roommate, Maggie and I had a roomies trip. We flew from Sevilla to Milan (the fashion capital of the world) and took a train to Venice from there. The train station was everything I had hoped it would be. The train was great because we got to see lots of the countryside, which was beautiful. Here is a picture of the train station.

We spent Thursday and Friday exploring Venice. We stayed in a cabin/hostel thing. We only had 2 real Italian meals, in a successful effort to save some money. We got lost in Venice, which was planned, because we left our map at the hostel. We met our neighbors, Max and Sarah from Seattle. We also met some Gondola friends, Jess and Ian. That's right! I said Gondola! Not only did we get to ride a gondola, we got to ride it for 1/2 price because we made friends with the drivers! Great job, huh? We thought so. We also saw St. Marcos Plaza and the Grand canal.

We left Venice and it's all Italian autmosphere to view Milan on Saturday morning. We spent the day in Milan. No one there speaks English or Spanish, which made communication quite difficult. Maggie even dared to get her hair cut, although she couldn't speak the language. It turned out great, though. After a long day of shopping (and not buying) we headed to the airport on our first double decker bus! We had the whole top layer to ourselfes.... which is dangerous with a camera.

We spent the night in the cold, cold airport on the ground because our flight left at 6:30 am. We didn't want to get a hotel. Only catch? The airport closed at 10:30 p.m. hahahaha. Fun night overall. We came back into town exhausted, only to find we were locked out of our house and our family wasn't home. They quickly came to our rescue and we slept the day away. All in all a very good weekend.

Culture differences

-smoking is everywhere. Everyone does it

-Everyone here thows thier trash on the ground because the street sweepers come every night and clean the streets

-There is only one trashcan and one clock in the whole house...and no kleenex

-There is no phrase in Spanish for "Can I please have" only "I want" and "I need" Everyone here is very upfront. Oiga!

-You must wear shoes at all times, even walking around the house

-They don't ever drink milk... only EAT CHEESE!!!!

P.S.-My birthday is in 10 days. If you want to mail me something, you better get to it. Here is my address:

Jessica Fowler

44 Recaredo

41003 Sevilla, Spain

I expect lots of packages and mail!

Lagos, Portugal

We went to Lagos, Portugal this weekend. It is just the beach... it was beautiful...

and it rained all weekend. That pretty much sums up the weekend. I had fun.... but it rained... the weekend when I was supposed to get my last tan of the summer.... it rained. SAD....

But, Maggie and I leave for Venice in 2 days, so I still have hope. Be jealous! ;-)

Granada and Toros

I spent the weekend in Granada. We got to see the famous Alambra, which is a castle built by the Muslims and adapted by the Christians. However, most of the Muslim Palace was left in tact. The grounds included a fortress, a castle, summer castle, gardens of Generalife (pronounced herneral-eefe). Although this was very impressive, if was just like what we have already seen but on a much alrger scale. I really liked the city of Granada--It was larger than Sevilla, but used to many tourists. We got to speak English for a little while, which was nice. Many people loved the city of Granada more than any city we have been. I liked it, but I didn´t think it held a candle to Rhonda.

We also got to see La Alambra get lit up at night. We spent a long time climbing the mountianous streets to get to the lookout point. From the lookout, we could see the sun set, and the Alambra light up slowly. It was breathtaking. We spent the night here. Then next morning we went shopping in the local Morrocan market. This was a fun place to find lots of souveniers... but they were all African, and not so much Spanish, so I didn´t buy much....

We returned Saturday evening to a house full of Spaniards. My host mom (Manuela) had her birthday last Thrusday, so they had the whole family over. It was also a good night because after everyone left, our host sister Lola and her fiancé took us dancing. It was a group of us, and about 5 other Americans and about 7 other Spainiards. We had met all the Spainiards before, and I think we are all friends.... which makes me excited...

Sunday though, was my favorite part of the whole weekend. We went to a bull fight. I can´t tell you how incredible it was. We learned all about the bull fight last week. In one fight, there are 3 matadors and each one gets 2 bulls. There are 4 parts to each bull fight.

1) When the bull first comes out, from a dark tunnel into the bright bull ring (they are colorblind and only watch for movement)

2) Picadors (guys on horses) weaken the bull with only 2 stabs with a long stick.

3) Bondaeros (3 sets of 2 each) are but into the neck muscles of the bull to weaken their neck muscles. This will make it more difficult for them to keep their heads up.

4) The final kill, made with one swift sword pass by the matador--only after studying the bulls movements for several passes.

The bull fight was awesome. Many of the guys in the group didn´t like it, but the girls all did.... The fight we went to was with smaller bulls and matadors who were trying to make themselves know. I want to go to a large bull fight now.

That´s all for the weekend....But this weekend, I really felt like I was in SPAIN, which is exciting!