Vlogs, Strikes, and Nuts

Without further ado I give you my first video blog.  There were some technical errors that lead to a late posting, but it should all be running smoothly now.  I will be posting a vlog every Thursday from now until the end of my exchange starting with this one.  If you have any questions about my exchange or suggestions on how to make my vlogs better please let me know in the comments down below.  Thanks for watching!!

Jaen Part 2: Quiero estar aqui siempre

I gave up on the catchy three things in a title, cant do it with this.  Anyway chicos, fasten your seeatbelts and don't close this tab because the second half of my great weekend starts right now.

My day(like the day before it) started with what has become a fabulous rarity while here in Spain, I did not hit my head on anything when I got up.  My bed here is something that must be smaller than a twin, and a bunk bed with an unfortunately placed ladder, which means that every morning I probably wake the whole house with a bang.  After another delicious breakfast and some packing up we ventured to out to the countryside.  Which, in this part of Spain means one of my absolute favorite things, the mountains.  As we were climbing up the mountain my aunt pointed to one of the little purple flowers I had been secretly admiring and said, "Do you know these are?"

I had to say no, but the first thing that popped into my head was, a flower, not sure if that's because of my limited vocabulary or if even in Spain my natural powers of stating the obvious occasionally come through.

Its saffron, I never knew spices could be so pretty.  Everything about this day was beautiful, and nothing I can tell you would do it justice.  We continued our march up the mountain, and once we had all settled in and were enjoying the view my aunt asked if I liked mountains, my Dad who loves to use really obvious sarcasm in situations like this replied, "Noooo, she hates them," we all had a really good laugh.  After I turned to my mom and said, "Yeah this is horrible, because its so wonderful here I am never going to want to go home."

My uncle, emulating the
spirit of the Corps of discovery 

After our hike down we enjoyed a picnic lunch on the ruins of castle, then went to a nearby town to enjoy a cup of coffee, and headed home back to the land of school and civilization.





Jaen Part 1: La Ciudad, Historia, y mas de mi familia excelente

My mom and Carlos in the Palace/Church

On our valiant quest to visit all 13 of my parents brothers and sisters, we travelled this past weekend to see Maria Jesus and Pepe, my mother's sister and brother-in-law(he did his post doc at MIT no big deal.) They, along with there two sons, live in Jaen, the capital city of another province in Andalucia with the same name. 

On Saturday we travelled around the city of Jaen, and got to know a little of its history.  There are a lot of really obvious Moorish influences in this part of Spain, and the architecture of Jaen is no exception, an Arabic bath, palace repurposed as a church, and countless other things were constant reminders that for hundreds of years this was part of a totally different world.  Sightseeing here in Spain is a little different than typical US sightseeing though so before I go any further let me give you a blow by blow of my day.



The inside of the Cathedral
(I think pics werent allowed but I didn't
understand the receptionist sooo)

Since we arrived on Friday night and stayed up until one, we all slept in till 10ish, after I managed to stumble through the shower and into the kitchen my wonderful Aunt laid before me churros with chocolate(side note: here in Spain churros are not rolled in sugar or filled, and are instead served for breakfast with a mug of some kind of thick chocolaty goodness, which is for dipping/drinking/eating with a spoon), fresh pressed orange juice, and coffee. 

After we leisurely finished getting ready we left the house promptly at noon, or 12:30.  First we saw a church that was once an Arabic palace, the courtyard was really beautiful.  We walked around the city a little and then toured the Cathedral, which was gorgeous, they were doing some kind of restoration as well, which we got to see. 

Then as all good Spaniards must do we took a break at 2:30 for lunch which was among other things, Paella(for those of you who have not ever experienced this gift God gave to man it is seafood and/ or beef, chicken, etc. with jasmine rice which makes indescribable goodness), then a couple of hours later we finished lunch with a cup of coffee and went to watch Alvaro's soccer game, which his team won. 

Upon returning to the house we looked at pictures of when my uncle and aunt lived in Boston and when my mom and dad came to visit them while we ate fruit for Merienda (afternoon snack).
Sometime around 8 we traveled up the mountain that Jaen resides on to the huge Moorish castle to watch the sun set.

We were starving after having gone almost 4 hours without eating and so for dinner at the request of my cousin Pepe we went to an eerily authentic 50s diner and my father was appropriately shocked when I did not have a cheeseburger(I could figure out why he gave me the look he did when I ordered, until later when I was talking with my sister)

Because we knew we had to get up early the next morning we crawled into bed early as well, around 1 am.

More on Jaen later right now I have to partake of more Spanish traditions, the Madrid/ Barc. soccer match.