Favorites

Hola readers,

My favorite things in Madrid are : tapas, the nightlife, the Retiro Park and the Mercado de San Miguel. Oh and Sol !!!!!

I just love going for a walk to Retiro and rent a boat. Even tan by the lake when it's sunny and warm.
I like walking in Sol and on Gran Vìa. There's a beautiful rooftop on Gran Via that I go to for a drink or just to watch the sunset. It's the Circulo de Bellas Artes rooftop! The Gymage rooftop is also a nice place, very modern and stylish but the view isn't as spectacular.

The Royal Palace is magnificent and there are often parades and shows near it so go there if you have free time!!!

The Mercado de plaza de España has everything if you're looking for souvenirs or accessories.

My favorite clubs are Kapital, Joy and Gabanna. They have good student nights on wednesdays at Gabanna and thursdays are the only day where you can enter for free at kapital but only if you go before 1 am.

Food: yummmm. Go to the San Miguel market the food there is a-ma-zing( a bit expensive though). I found this asian all you can eat restaurant I don't remember the name though. It's located near the Gregorio Marañon station. We ate like crazy and the food was delicious for only 10€!!!!
100 montaditos is awesome for when you're a bit hungry and don't want to spend much.

If you want to run, everwhere is good but try the Santander park!


Hope you enjoy your trip there!

Reflections

Dear readers,

Going to another country for a long period of time is never easy. Understanding a language you learned in high school or college but spoken by native people can be difficult and frustrating. But I noticed that being in total immersion helped me a lot, espacially living with a Spanisb host mom. I improved my Spanish like never before!!

Also, it was the first time that i was truly and totally independent. At home, I live with my parents so there are certain rules to follow, I can't leave the house at 1am and come back at 7 my dad would never let me!!!! I don't have my own car so I depend on my mom a lot to go everywhere. At school, there are rules. We can't drink, have a lot of people over, and public transportation is nearly inexistent. In Madrid, I don't need to rely on anyone for transportation, there is a metro and tons of buses. Cabs aren't really expensive. I can leave my apartment and come back whatever hour suits me. I love having that freedom and independance.

Lastly, traveling around Europe showed me how beautiful our world is and it is now my goal to visit as many places as possible. 

Routines

Hello readers,

I would like to share with you some of the things I do in Madrid and my routine during the week and the week ends.

Well when I first arrived I was very excited and wanted to explore the city. So for the first three weeks, my friends and I walked around Madrid and used the metro when our destination was too far. We visited the main monuments, famous avenues and neighborhoods, tapas places and cafes. We did a lot of shopping and enjoyed the wonderful weather to go tan at the Retiro park. We also went to the school's gym at least once a week. We went out every night since bars and some clubs are open every day.I started planning some week end trips with my friends for the months to come.

After a month and a half or so, we slowed down on the going out 4 nights a week and tried to limit it to twice. We went to the museums when we had nothing to do on the week ends. I probably went to the Reina Sofia Museum at least 5 times. The Retiro park was my favorite place to go on a lazy saturday or sunday but also when I had free afternoons. I would rent a boat and row on the lake, feed the ducks and enjoy the breeze.

Also, every day my roommates and I would nap after class for at least an hour ( sometimes four!!). It's called "la siesta".

Towards the end of the semester, we got very lazy and would spend our free time in our rooms watching tv shows and videos or talking to friends and family on skype and facetime.

However, we always found time to go get a nice meal somewhere in the city, in Sol or Atocha, or our neighborhood Argüelles. I personally love frozen yogurt and "llaollao" was my new favorite place. Also, there is cafe/restaurant chain in Madrid called "100 montaditos" where all their tapas are 1 or 2€!!!! Everytime I was hungry or did not have a lot of money on me, I'd go there and have little sandwiches wich chips and a plate of fries or nachos.

Thanks for reading !

Marbella, Spain

Hola a todos!

Marbella is a little city on the Mediterranean coast. It's in the South, 40 minutes from Malaga. Marbella has a very famous port called "Puerto Banus" where luxury stores and yachts are part of the scenery. I would say that Marbella is like a Beverly Hills or St Tropez. There are a lot of foreigners, from all around Europe and even the US. Because of that, everyone speaks English as it is the common language.

Marbella is a very touristy destination in the summer, but starting late september the city is more peaceful. I loved the diversity of its people but it was a little bit too "bling bling" for me. For someone who wants to go out and party, or has the means to go shopping in expensive stores, Marbella is the perfect spot. A lot of celebrities and important personalities go there on vacation, so don't be surprised if you encounter Paris Hilton in one of the nightclubs!

The weather was perfect, sunny and hot enough to go to the beach. I went there in October and felt like it was August! I carpooled to Marbella on my way there and took the bus on my way back to Madrid.

Check out www.blablacar.com which is a very famous website in Europe for people who want to carpool or sell seats in their car. It can be cheaper than taking the bus, or faster.

For my way back, I took a bus from the compagny "daibus".

The transportation cost me 60E in total.

I didn't book a hostel because one of my friends from home lives there so I just crashed at his place.

I would definitely recommend Marbella to you, its famous nightclubs, Puerto Banus and the Ocean club ( which is a little expensive but so worth it).

Adios!

Classes

Hello again dear readers,


Today I'm going to write about classes in Spain.
Before leaving for Madrid, the international programs office of Fairfield U sent us an email asking us to choose the classes we wanted from a course booklet. There was a lot of classes taught in Spanish but also in English. I wanted to take a business class abroad but the international programs office said it would be complicated so I chose to get rid of my core classes here. I'm taking history of modern philosophy, European history of the 20th century, international current issues from a Spanish perspective, Spanish modern Art and a Spanish class. They're taught by Spaniards who speak English. They're mostly lectures but some require a lot of participation because they're more interactive. We don't have as much homework as in the US but the final is 50% of our final grade !! They use a platform called "Moodle" which is like our Blackboard. You have two weeks in the beginning of September to add/drop a class so don't stress out before your departure.
Finals are in mid December, and papers are due the end of November, early December.
I got really lucky with my schedule since I don't have class on Friday and Monday, which means that I have a mini vacation every week. The professors here don't like it when you skip class, since attendance is part of your grade. People who have a Pass/Fail system don't really care if they miss 2 or 3 classes but Fairfield students must be careful since our grades in Spain will count towards our GPA. The grading system is on a 10-scale and not a 100 like in the US. 9-10 is excellent and difficult to achieve. Most Spaniards have between 7 and 9. I had to buy only one textbook, for my Spanish class, otherwise all the other classes are based on Power Point slides that are posted on "Moodle" so no need to even take notes.

Voila! hope that helps!

Barcelona

Hola readers!!

I went to Barcelona last week end with a group of friends studying abroad with me. Since we are on a student budget, we tried to look whatever was cheaper to go there: bus, plane, train, carpooling, etc. (well I don't see what's left but let's pretend there is)
We opted for the bus. Alsa is the most popular bus company in Spain so we tried to buy our ticket online but our american cards weren't working for some reason. We went to the train/metro/bus station "Avenida de America" and got our tickets using the machines there. 50E roundtrip.

Then, we were looking for cheap hostels and found a decent one in Las Ramblas (very famous neighborhood in Barcelona) and not too far from the beach, a 30 minute walk. So we booked it online and everything was all set!!

The bus ride was very exhausting and not very comfortable. I mean, I really tried every position but nothing worked. I suffered in silence for 8 hours... Once in Barcelona, we took the cab to go to our Hostel, checked in and went to our room. There were 8 beds in total, but we were only 4. The four other people were from Chile, Germany, Algeria and Slovenia. What I liked the most about the hostel was the diversity of its residents and we were all approximately the same age! It wasn't the cleanest place, I give you that. But better than paying 200 bucks a night at a hotel!!!

We walked A LOT, visited Las Ramblas, the beach area, downtown, went to the famous Park Guell. It is a very charming city, with many things to see. The people there understand Spanish and most of them speak it. But everything is written in Catalan and you'll notice the difference when you hear people speaking on the street.

I spent a lot of money on food ( I was always hungry), and the metro is more expensive than the one in Madrid. Overall, I really liked Barcelona although the beach wasn't that impressive.

The Hostel we stayed at is "BeMar" if anyone's interested. Go with a big group of friends and bring snickers if you're planning on walking a lot!






Thanks for reading!

Park Guell

A few pictures of Madrid

Plaza de Toros- Bullring.  tickets are around 20E. This is a beautiful Arab inspired architecture.

 Santiago Bernabeu Stadium- Official Real Madrid team stadium!! This photo was taken at a champion's league game. Real Madrid against Basel. cheapest ticket was 25E !!

 Paella- Traditional Spanish dish. Rice, peppers, calamari, shrimp, etc. SO good please have at least one every two weeks plus it's not expensive!

 Gran Via- Main avenue in Madrid and very touristic. Stores, cafes, restaurants, American food chains, movie theaters,etc.

 Palacio Real- Royal palace. Tourists can visit the inside of the palace, it's 5E for students. Beautiful place and architecture.

 Retiro- This monument is at the Retiro parc, beautiful!

 Retiro- This is still at Retiro. There's a lake and people can rent a bark. 7E. Retiro is very big, it's Madrid's "Central Park" and worth visiting a few times.

 Puerta de Atocha- This is the main train station in Madrid. It's located in Atocha, a very famous and pretty area of Madrid.

Plaza de Cibeles- This is 30 seconds away from Gran Via and not too far from Atocha.