La Crema de Las Fallas

"I've got my flippy floppies..."

Ashley, Marissa, Amy, and Natasha at the entrance to the castle!

So this past weekend, 4 friends and I went to Palma de Mallorca, an island in between Spain and Italy. During Fallas, it's supposed to warm up significantly: tshirt and jeans weather. However, the weather decided to be weird and a lot of people are still wearing winter coats and boots. When we booked this trip in the beginning of Feb. we expected to be laying on the beach, getting tan and enjoying life.

While we did enjoy life, it was on the top of a tour bus instead of on top of the sand. The port/dowtown area of Mallorca is really cool and has some really great sites. We did one of those hop on/hop off narrated bus tours which was great! The King and Queen's summer home is in Mallorca so that was cool. Antonio Gaudi (same architect who did all that weird stuff in Barcelona) designed a Cathedral. We got out and explored a castle which was gorgeous. It was on top of a mini-mountain overlooking the harbor.

Our hotel was about 10 minutes by bus away from the port. We heard that Mallorca was a tourist destination for German tourists but we didn't realize how much that affected Mallorca. Most of the signs around our hotel were in German. On Friday night, we went to restaurant down the street from our hotel and were given a menu in German. We had to ask for a menu in Spanish and even then it was the managers hand written copy. All of the street venders spoke to us in German then French then Spanish then English. It was very surreal to be in a Spanish speaking country and not understand the language (German).

Saturday night, we needed a little American fix so we went to the Hard Rock Cafe. I had a burger that was 100% beef (in Spain, you never know if burgers are beef or bull... a little scary so I generally don't order them). It was just like a burger you would get at Sundries (place in Charlotte) or California Dreaming (place at USC). I was very content with my piece of America. We sat and chatted for a while, just enjoying the night, America, and each other.

Mallorca was great, carefree weekend. It was great after Fallas, which is anything but restful, and before the craziness of country-hopping for Spring Break happens.

This is probably going to be my last update before Spring Break but after, expect a LONG update about Athens and Rome!!

Love,

Lizzy

It's Coming Quickly to an End.

Today, the Academic Director sent out the final exam schedule. I can't believe it's almost that time! This is what I'm doing in the meantime.

In 2 hours (3:00 AM) I'm getting on a bus to Madrid to catch a flight to Palma de Mallorca, an island off the coast of Spain for the weekend.

Get back on Sunday.

Have 3 days of class then SPRING BREAK!!!!

April 3 (next Saturday) I'm heading to Athens, Greece for 5 days!!

Then I'm heading straight to Rome, Italy from Athens for 3 days!!

I get back on Sunday April 11.

April 13th I have a Presentation.

April 20th I have a presentation.

The next week is my last week of classes.

Finals.

Hello USA.

SO to recap my weekends: Mallorca, Athens, Rome, Valencia, Valencia, Valencia, Hello Charlotte!

Love,

Lizzy

FALLLASSSS

Lights on a street not too far from my house.

Please notice the Large machine at the bottom and how it is dwarfed by the Falla. Ps. We saw this one burn. It was awesome.

Please notice the people at the bottom. She is gigantic.

Fallas

Observations:

-Old ladies are vicious and use elbows.

-Strollers should be used to carry children, not run over other people.

-Spinning, uncontrollable fireworks should not be given to children. Or drunk boys/men.

-Children shouldn’t have fireworks. Period. Ever.

-People should have more sense than to throw fireworks into a crowd.

So Las Fallas is the big festival in Valencia during the week of the March 14-March 19. However, Fallas starts before that. They have events throughout the year and fireworks at 2 in the main Plaza a week before fallas.

Fallas is fire in some variation of Spanish, Valenciano, and Latin. So everything revolves around fire, which is probably not the smartest of festival themes in an urban area.

Nevertheless, Las Fallas was truly a once in a lifetime cultural experience. There is nothing like Fallas anywhere else in the world.

Description:

*note: falla means about 20 different things during Fallas.

Each neighborhood (not in the sense we think of, its only a couple of streets clumped together) or “falla” has a “falla” or sculpture/art/large piece of artistic building. The fallas (sculptures) are huge- usually the size of an intersection/plaza and 4-6 stories tall. They are HUGE. Each has a message, some are political, many are about the current economic times, others just celebrate Fallas or other cultures. Each falla (neighborhood and sculpture) has a “ninot” or a smaller falla (sculpture)

They start building the fallas the Monday after Fallas ends. So they take about a year to design and build. This is the artists full time job. The most expensive falla this year cost about 600,000 ($900,000 US).

The artist gets help from the falla (neighborhood) and sometimes construction companies to help build the falla (sculpture) in its location. They start building the weekend before Fallas.

Throughout the week, the falleras, like debs but can be any age, offer flowers to a HUGE wooden Mary. In Plaza de la Virgen (Virgin), there are multiple stories tall wooden slat structures to hold flowers as well as the virgin Mary. At the end of the week the Mary has a huge gorgeous dress made of colorful flowers.

On Friday, yesterday, they burned them. Burned them straight to the ground until they are nothing more than a pile of ash. It’s very bittersweet for the artist- he/she worked for a year on a project just to have it burned but it’s also gratifying that their art served its purpose.

Firefighters have to be at each falla when it burns to contain it and make sure it doesn’t burn down the buildings that are about 5 feet away. Firefighters from all over (and not just Spain, we saw firefighters from Andorra) come and help burn the fallas.

Each fire is started by the falla (neigh.) shooting fireworks in the air symbolizing that falla is about to burn. Then they connect fireworks to the falla and start those. The fireworks then catch the falla on fire.

The heat is so intense and the fire so.. fierce. I took a million videos because the fires were so captivating. I felt like I could have stood there all night.

Sorry this took so long to get up, Fallas was intense and I needed some recovery time.

Love,

Lizzy

Video of a Falla Burning. They start the fire with fireworks. Notice on the left side the streaming water. That's a firefighter watering down a building so it won't burn. Also, this is in an intersection of a neighborhood.

Adapting

I knew before I came and am now living it, that in order to survive studying abroad, you need to be able to adapt. You need a "go with the flow/roll with the punches" attitude. When choosing Spain, I expected a slight language barrier. I added "SpanishDict.com" to my taskbar, brushed up on my verb endings, and made a Spanish music playlist. But adapting is more than having a playlist or an instant dictionary- it's eating cornflakes out of a cup because there aren't bowls and haven't a slightly off haircut (its still cute though!) because "inches" is a useless word here.

Usually, I have a pretty good "go with the flow" attitude. I try to blend in with my surroundings- changing my fashion a little, my hair, dressing up for class when I would usually wear a T-shirt. I'm playing pretend Spaniard for 4 months which means changing, adapting parts of myself.

In the U.S. I'm a fairly healthy eater. I eat green vegetables at dinner (the ones I like at least), buy only whole wheat pasta and bread, skim milk, and organic fruits. That doesn't exist here. The health food kick is completely over-run by the Spanish belief that food fixes everything. I have yet to see whole wheat anything and I have no idea what the Spanish word for organic is.

So to compensate for my lack of normal foods, I decided that I should...run. I ran. It was a weird feeling- me deciding that I should run and not being totally disgusted at the idea. I hate running. After playing soccer then field hockey for 15 years, it was hard not to run after something... I had a goal to accomplish, I had someone to beat. Going for a run is more mental for me than physically. It's all about self-motivation. So I'm adapting.

I failed miserably on Thursday night at adapting. In the US, I drink skim milk for every meal, which has enough water in it that I don't get dehydrated. However, skim milk doesn't exist in my house (it's a kind of thick, vanilla-y milk that drinks like cream). So I drank coffee in the morning and nothing else all day, maybe a small glass of water at night at dinner. So I got really dehydrated. REALLY dehydrated. I've been drinking bottles and bottles of water to compensate but in short, Thursday night was interesting.

I think that my "what happens, happens" attitude has helped to overcome any culture shock. The studying abroad program tells us about "Honeymoon, Hostility, Humor, Home" but I truly think I've gotten past the Hostility phase with no Hostility. Things are the way they are and I can't change a culture to suit my needs, so I move on. Eating cornflakes out of a cup was funny. I think having the hairdresser explain back to me what I wanted was funny (no one wants a bad haircut).

It's all about adapting.

Love,

Lizzy

Magic Fountains, Gaudi, and the Right Decision

I traveled to Barcelona last weekend and Madrid the weekend before. I can confidently say, with 100% certainty that I made the right decision to study in Valencia and I chose the right program. While those two cities are incredible in their own rights, Valencia is absolutely the best fit for me. I love the size of Valencia, that I'm constantly exploring new parts of the city but that it still feels small enough to not be overwhelming. I'm glad I don't have to switch trains on the metro or be worried about my safety/my stuff.

Barcelona was an incredible city. I can see how Gaudi and Picasso were inspired by it. The buildings (just regular apartment buildings and hotels) were more ornate than Valencia. It would be incredible to live in the apartments that overlook the Sagrada Familia but you would have to deal with the tourists as well.

I hardly ever spoke Spanish in Barcelona. It is a very tourist friendly city, but as play pretend Spaniard, I want it (the city) to force me to speak Spanish, as Valencia does. I would speak Spanish to the locals and they would speak English back. As I would continue to speak Spanish, they would continue to speak English. It was very frustrating. So if you are thinking about studying abroad and are serious about learning Spanish, Valencia is the way to go.

Some of my favorite things about Barca:

-I found dried apricots!! My favorite snack!

-They had tons of fresh fruit and vegetable stores.

-Gaudi Architecture- You could visit the Sagrada Familia every day and see something new about it every day.

-Ornate buildings with awesome wooden doorways.

-I think my appreciation for ornate wooden doorways comes from our house and church in Charlotte.

I hope everyone has a fantastic week! I know I will (no midterms!!)!

Love,

Lizzy

First Bad Day (Comparatively, pretty awesome)

So today was the first day that could be classified as a "bad day" but comparatively, it's still a good day.

-The hot water heater is a complicated 3 sometimes 4 step process. So today, I didn't have hot water or even warm water for my shower.

-I lost my bus card. I think it fell out of my coat pocket but I don't know for sure. Bummer.

-My teacher was sick today so we talked about the story and answered the questions as a class with no teacher. It was hard because the story was very metaphorical. And we were assigned an essay to do as well because he wasn't there.

-It's midterms week.

-I wrote down the wrong date for my midterm today so I didn't study. I still did okay but I was mad at myself because it would have been easy had I studied.

But some really great things happened. I played soccer (el futbol) with some kids from school, about 20, which was so fun. There was all different types of players from people who play for school to people who have never played before. Generally, soccer is so competitive but it was great to see people so respectful of each other. It was obvious that seasoned players were playing easy against new players while challenging other seasoned players. I felt like everyone was there to have fun and not prove anything. It was SO FUN.

Then it started to rain, and I had my laptop as did most people, so we stopped playing. We went into a building and it stopped raining about 2 minutes later. Unfortunately as soon as we started getting on the field, it started down pouring. It was one of those raining so hard, smelled like rain, rains that you just have to love, no matter if you're carrying a laptop in your backpack that could get ruined.

I finally made it to the bus but my wallet was buried beneath my 5 books, laptop, boots, and clothes. I was carrying my winter coat and a water bottle. So I had to stand at the door of the bus digging through my life in a bag to find my wallet. As I'm doing that the bus driver kindly asks, "So did you take a shower?". I was soaked. I answered "A little". Finally I found my money, but there was no where to sit or stand really on the bus (people who would have walked had it not been raining were on the usually empty bus). So then I just stopped in the middle of the aisle and stuffed my wallet back in my bag, my water bottle in a side pocket.

At this point, I have NO idea if my mascara is halfway down my face. I'm wearing black leggings and a black tshirt and super American tennis shoes. Everyone is looking at me like I'm a drowned American rat, which is exactly what I looked like.

Although that all sounds like the rain would have dampened my good mood from soccer, it didn't. I loved it. I wish I didn't have my backpack and I would have heavily considered walking home in it.

When I got home, Cristina and Madre were cooking dinner. Madre asked me if I got wet. I told her I took a shower in the rain, no problem.

Love,

Lizzy