Hola!
Why is it so easy to sleep in this country? Or maybe I should rephrase that; why is it so easy to sleep long in the mornings – ‘cause ‘morning’ is relative no? My morning usually doesn’t start until well after noon. Lunch around 16-17 and then dinner 21-ish. Is that weird? Especially now I’ve come into a period of sleeping almost too long (when you open your eyes and look at the time and realise it is 2 o’clock in the afternoon, or 3 even, then it is a bit excessive even for me…). Sol and I try to force ourselves to fall asleep earlier and wake up earlier but it is difficult when our friendly kebab-guy starts screaming on the street 3 o’clock at night…
Anyway. We are in a period of studying for our dear exams. The literature exam is more fun to study for than the European Integration one (which we have outbursts about at least once a day). We take way too long breaks – well, one got to have that coffee – and even though we realise it will be easier if we in fact would study, neither of us seem to care enough to say “hey, break’s over. Let’s get back to work”.
Today we were supposed to find out whether we passed the English for Scientific and technical purposes or if we have to do the exam. We couldn’t find the paper. Guessing it’s that whole Spanish ‘mañana, mañana’ attitude that is playing with us. On the way back we went to have a coffee outside just by the cathedral and two tables away from us sits a Spanish couple who whistles. They whistled a good half hour and Sol and I tried to give them angry looks. We tried to make them stop, but they just didn’t get it! Who goes to a café to whistle! I mean seriously!
By the way, I want to tell you all what our European Integration teacher is teaching us here about the Nordic countries and other interesting things; Iceland is a big exporter of potatoes and vegetables, Finland is poor and has Finnish mark as their currency and oh, people want to build a canal in the Arctic from England to Japan as the English people then will be able to go to Japan quicker and then the Arctic would be worth more! Is it understandable that we are frustrated with this course? I mean come on, Iceland – potatoes, vegetables? Isn’t the name Iceland a clue to the fact that there aren’t many things growing there? Isn’t it pretty easy to find out that Finland is in the EU, has the Euro and in fact is not so poor anymore? I miss real university studies where you can rely on what the teachers are saying since they look into the latest facts…
Oh well. Let’s continue to play in air bands, enjoy the sun, decide what we're going to be when we grow up, discuss how to make Sol scary and look for mistakes in the stuff we have to read for our exam in European integration.
Hasta Luego!
/k
Wednesday 30 May 2007
Sunday 27 May 2007
It was a happy birthday for me :-)
Hola!
So yet another year in the life of me has passed by leaving me a year older and hopefully a little bit wiser. It was of course celebrated, as being in Spain isn’t a good reason not to party. The celebration started on Thursday night in Dublin Bay in the good company of some of my Valladolid friends. It was beers, chupitos, laughter and later on a bit of dancing in a couple of the clubs we usually go to. It was a late night (or early depending on your perspectives), but lots and lots of fun.
My birthday then continued after some sleep with several phone calls, text messages and e-mails from everyone back home, as well as a couple of visits to cafés for coffee and then a nice birthday dinner in the evening with Sol and Fiona. We even made a cake with candles in the shape of 23. It was a rather calm evening with good food and drinks, good company and good conversations.
So should I get into a philosophical discussion about how it feels so different to have become 23? ;-) Maybe I’ll skip it. Since birthdays rarely imply waking up the next day and being 10 or more years older, one year doesn’t really feel like a big difference. Are there things that I couldn’t do before reaching this age that I can do now?
But anyway, a big thank you to everyone that remembered me. I had a great day(s).
Hasta luego!
/k
So yet another year in the life of me has passed by leaving me a year older and hopefully a little bit wiser. It was of course celebrated, as being in Spain isn’t a good reason not to party. The celebration started on Thursday night in Dublin Bay in the good company of some of my Valladolid friends. It was beers, chupitos, laughter and later on a bit of dancing in a couple of the clubs we usually go to. It was a late night (or early depending on your perspectives), but lots and lots of fun.
My birthday then continued after some sleep with several phone calls, text messages and e-mails from everyone back home, as well as a couple of visits to cafés for coffee and then a nice birthday dinner in the evening with Sol and Fiona. We even made a cake with candles in the shape of 23. It was a rather calm evening with good food and drinks, good company and good conversations.
So should I get into a philosophical discussion about how it feels so different to have become 23? ;-) Maybe I’ll skip it. Since birthdays rarely imply waking up the next day and being 10 or more years older, one year doesn’t really feel like a big difference. Are there things that I couldn’t do before reaching this age that I can do now?
But anyway, a big thank you to everyone that remembered me. I had a great day(s).
Hasta luego!
/k
Wednesday 23 May 2007
Veni, Vidi, Vici - Patetico Madrid-Barcelona 0-6
Hola!
Yesterday I came back from possibly the best weekend ever! A combination of several factors – mainly one though – meant the greatest time in a long time, if not ever. But first thing’s first. Last week, after coming home from abroad, we had a lot of work to catch up on. Our big and final Spanish exam for one, but also other assignments that our teachers told us to do if we wanted to pass our courses (which I guess we want in the end…) Thursday was the final day of Spanish and the exam went okay. I passed it. :-) That of course meant that we had to celebrate and out we went.
The Friday came and that day meant finishing everything that needed to be handed in, packing and preparing in general for a weekend in Spain’s capital with my dear older brother. You see for a while my bro and I had talked about him coming here for a visit and a football game. He found a weekend which worked for him, and a game of interest and booked an airplane ticket. So after checking in to our hostal just off Gran Via, central Madrid, we went to the Vicente Calderon stadium in order to see if the tickets were truly finished or if there was a possibility to still find a couple of seats. After some walking, some pep talk and some talking (in Spanish) to a bartender, we bought ourselves some ridiculously expensive tickets to the game of our choice – Atletico Madrid-Barcelona FC - and went back to the city centre to celebrate. The weather was wonderful, some 30 degrees during the day and around 22 later that evening. Some tapas, mojitos and beers later we were back in our room and made plans for the next day.
We decided that that specific Sunday was to be dedicated to our greatest interest, football, completely. Jocke found that it was possible to take a tour at the other big stadium in the city, Santiago Bernabéu stadium (the home of Real Madrid, which takes about 80 000 spectators), and we decided that while some go to Madrid and go to the Prado museum, we went to Madrid to go to the Santiago Bernabéu stadium. Jocke who had already been to the Prado, said that the stadium was far more interesting. I think I probably would agree (but as I haven’t been to the Prado yet I guess I can’t be all sure about it…). To walk around inside the stadium, to sit in the spectator chairs, on the ‘bench’ and see the museum of Real’s greatness was truly an experience worth our time and money. After a couple of hours of walking around, we went back home to the hostal to change and then have a quick drink with my friends before going to the actual highlight of that day and of the weekend itself.
So to the game. Anyone who hasn’t seen the result yet? Well, it was 6-0 to Barca. And we, the lucky bastards that we were, got seats among the Barcelona supporters. Imagine watching all the great ones, last year’s CL winners and some of the world’s best players play your favourite sport. For me it was complete happiness, and for my brother too. But it was really difficult to grasp that we were there, sitting next to some Icelandic people who only wanted to see Eidur Gudjohnsen play, screaming Barca, and the players’ names. It was truly unbelievable. The last 7 minutes of the first half of the game were filled with 3 beautiful goals and suddenly the rain that had been falling, making me completely wet, didn’t bother me anymore. There were greater things to pay attention to.
The second half came and with it 3 more beautiful goals, and as Deco was to be exchanged and all the Barca supporters and myself chanted his name my brother turned to me and looked at me. I replied by saying “When will we ever get the chance again to chant his name not to the TV or to the radio, but to him at a stadium during a match?”. Needless to say Jocke chanted just as much after that. How many can say that they have screamed ‘Messi, Messi’ to the actual Messi? How many has been clapping and chanting ‘Barca’ to the real Barcelona team? I have. My brother have. And all the other Barcelona supporters have as well. And talking about chanting, while the Barca supporters were ridiculing their derby-oponents Espanyol (even though they were playing against Atletico), we joined them and just changed their Espanyol for Helsingborg. It is important to know where you stand, no matter which game or which opponents.
The best part of the game, apart from the goals was in the beginning of the second half. Barcelona started kicking the ball within the team, and no Atletico players had a chance to even touch the ball for about 10 minutes or so. As more and more Atletico fans left the stadium we didn’t want to stop chanting our great Barcelona team. The funniest end was when the Barcelona supporters started calling their opponents ‘Patetico’ Madrid instead of Atletico. ;-)
After the game we contacted my friends again and met up with them, making the short Dublin-reunion longer and bigger. Naoise, Martin and Pablo were visiting Miguelito this very weekend and it was great seeing all of them again. Some friendships are not complicated at all, just there, now and forever, and that’s what makes them special.
The last full day in Madrid was for shopping, enjoying good food and drinks and realising that we had been there. We were at the crazy game and saw Ronaldhino do a free kick. We saw Messi score, not once, but twice. We saw it all. Jocke said it was the greatest football game he had ever been to, and I could not do anything but agree. Of course it wasn’t as emotional as seeing Malmö play the really important (or any really) matches. But it was Barcelona who completely humiliated Atletico Madrid. And that is something to remember.
To finish off this blog entry I have to say that Jocke is the hero of my blog and ‘Veni, vidi, vici’. Hope to be back soon with more exciting news. Although will anything seem great after this ever again?
/k
Yesterday I came back from possibly the best weekend ever! A combination of several factors – mainly one though – meant the greatest time in a long time, if not ever. But first thing’s first. Last week, after coming home from abroad, we had a lot of work to catch up on. Our big and final Spanish exam for one, but also other assignments that our teachers told us to do if we wanted to pass our courses (which I guess we want in the end…) Thursday was the final day of Spanish and the exam went okay. I passed it. :-) That of course meant that we had to celebrate and out we went.
The Friday came and that day meant finishing everything that needed to be handed in, packing and preparing in general for a weekend in Spain’s capital with my dear older brother. You see for a while my bro and I had talked about him coming here for a visit and a football game. He found a weekend which worked for him, and a game of interest and booked an airplane ticket. So after checking in to our hostal just off Gran Via, central Madrid, we went to the Vicente Calderon stadium in order to see if the tickets were truly finished or if there was a possibility to still find a couple of seats. After some walking, some pep talk and some talking (in Spanish) to a bartender, we bought ourselves some ridiculously expensive tickets to the game of our choice – Atletico Madrid-Barcelona FC - and went back to the city centre to celebrate. The weather was wonderful, some 30 degrees during the day and around 22 later that evening. Some tapas, mojitos and beers later we were back in our room and made plans for the next day.
We decided that that specific Sunday was to be dedicated to our greatest interest, football, completely. Jocke found that it was possible to take a tour at the other big stadium in the city, Santiago Bernabéu stadium (the home of Real Madrid, which takes about 80 000 spectators), and we decided that while some go to Madrid and go to the Prado museum, we went to Madrid to go to the Santiago Bernabéu stadium. Jocke who had already been to the Prado, said that the stadium was far more interesting. I think I probably would agree (but as I haven’t been to the Prado yet I guess I can’t be all sure about it…). To walk around inside the stadium, to sit in the spectator chairs, on the ‘bench’ and see the museum of Real’s greatness was truly an experience worth our time and money. After a couple of hours of walking around, we went back home to the hostal to change and then have a quick drink with my friends before going to the actual highlight of that day and of the weekend itself.
So to the game. Anyone who hasn’t seen the result yet? Well, it was 6-0 to Barca. And we, the lucky bastards that we were, got seats among the Barcelona supporters. Imagine watching all the great ones, last year’s CL winners and some of the world’s best players play your favourite sport. For me it was complete happiness, and for my brother too. But it was really difficult to grasp that we were there, sitting next to some Icelandic people who only wanted to see Eidur Gudjohnsen play, screaming Barca, and the players’ names. It was truly unbelievable. The last 7 minutes of the first half of the game were filled with 3 beautiful goals and suddenly the rain that had been falling, making me completely wet, didn’t bother me anymore. There were greater things to pay attention to.
The second half came and with it 3 more beautiful goals, and as Deco was to be exchanged and all the Barca supporters and myself chanted his name my brother turned to me and looked at me. I replied by saying “When will we ever get the chance again to chant his name not to the TV or to the radio, but to him at a stadium during a match?”. Needless to say Jocke chanted just as much after that. How many can say that they have screamed ‘Messi, Messi’ to the actual Messi? How many has been clapping and chanting ‘Barca’ to the real Barcelona team? I have. My brother have. And all the other Barcelona supporters have as well. And talking about chanting, while the Barca supporters were ridiculing their derby-oponents Espanyol (even though they were playing against Atletico), we joined them and just changed their Espanyol for Helsingborg. It is important to know where you stand, no matter which game or which opponents.
The best part of the game, apart from the goals was in the beginning of the second half. Barcelona started kicking the ball within the team, and no Atletico players had a chance to even touch the ball for about 10 minutes or so. As more and more Atletico fans left the stadium we didn’t want to stop chanting our great Barcelona team. The funniest end was when the Barcelona supporters started calling their opponents ‘Patetico’ Madrid instead of Atletico. ;-)
After the game we contacted my friends again and met up with them, making the short Dublin-reunion longer and bigger. Naoise, Martin and Pablo were visiting Miguelito this very weekend and it was great seeing all of them again. Some friendships are not complicated at all, just there, now and forever, and that’s what makes them special.
The last full day in Madrid was for shopping, enjoying good food and drinks and realising that we had been there. We were at the crazy game and saw Ronaldhino do a free kick. We saw Messi score, not once, but twice. We saw it all. Jocke said it was the greatest football game he had ever been to, and I could not do anything but agree. Of course it wasn’t as emotional as seeing Malmö play the really important (or any really) matches. But it was Barcelona who completely humiliated Atletico Madrid. And that is something to remember.
To finish off this blog entry I have to say that Jocke is the hero of my blog and ‘Veni, vidi, vici’. Hope to be back soon with more exciting news. Although will anything seem great after this ever again?
/k
Thursday 17 May 2007
Lisbon baby!
Hola!
Below is the 4-part story of when miss Sweden, miss Iceland, miss Germany and miss Ireland went on a spontaneous trip to Lisbon, Portugal.
Lisbon, Portugal, part I: We know nothing about Portugal
So last Wednesday Sabine, Sol and I started talking about possibly taking a trip somewhere. We started discussing Portugal and the day after we decided that we were at least going to try to get there. It was one of my goals with this semester here in Spain so you can understand my enthusiasm. At first we thought we’d rent a car, but in the end we thought taking the bus would be better. So Friday morning at 7 o’clock we met at Plaza Mayor, Sabine, Sol, Fiona and I and started walking towards the bus station with hopes of scoring tickets. It proved to be no problem at all so off we were towards Salamanca first where we were to change buses to the one going abroad. But we were left with about 3 hours to kill so we took the Salamanca quick tour which basically lead us to a café which Sol recommended. I must say that I was not incredibly impressed by Salamanca, but who am I to judge I saw almost nothing. (Except for many alternative people and Sol’s favourite café…)
After some confusion we found ourselves on our bus towards Portugal just to find out that we would have to change buses at some point if we didn’t want to end up in Porto instead of Lisbon. The driver had told Sol that we would have to change in a place called something similar to ‘Albuquerque’. We were just generally confused and didn’t really understand all the Portuguese people on the bus – Portuguese is very much different from Spanish, at least in spoken form.
Oh well, we were still in good spirits (although tired), excited about going somewhere and more particularly about the fact that we were on our way, finally, to Lisbon and Portugal.
It was somewhere around here we started doing a mental list of what we knew about Portugal and Lisbon beforehand. That list was rather short. You see in our spur of the moment trying to be spontaneous trip we forgot to look up anything at all about the place we were going to. Our knowledge well was pretty much made up of the following: they speak Portuguese, the capital is Lisbon, they have euros and according to my mother they are more friendly than Spanish people. We spent the rest of the trip asking each other questions that none of us knew the answer to.
We managed to change buses and as we were going south Sabine looks out of the window and suddenly bursts out ‘I can smell the sea! It’s on that side.’ (Whether that was true or not is not something I am able to answer to. I can only smell my way to Irish pubs…) Sol and I spent some time (while the other two were sleeping) having a Nordic language school, trying out how much we could say in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Finnish. Needless to say some languages were easier than others.
We arrived in Lisbon around 22 local time (it turned out that they have different time than in Spain! How silly isn’t that? And Sol and Fiona knew it and told me and Sabine just before we reached our final destination.), about one hour late. Four very giggly and over-tired girls made our way, using the metro, to the hostel Sol’s boyfriend had booked for us earlier that same day. After checking in to a sweet apartment-looking hostel we went out in search for food or drinks (anything really). It took about 5 minutes of walking and then a guy stopped us and asked us if we wanted to buy some weed. He took Fiona’s hand and said: ‘I know you want some’. Fiona took her hand back said ‘No!’ and we walked further.
After a little while we found a small place which was fine for us where Sol and Fiona ordered sandwiches (!) which took forever for the guy to prepare. We kept speaking in Spanish as we figured that would work out fine, but then realised how ignorant we probably seemed. Didn’t we know we weren’t in Spain, that Portugal is a separate country? So we spoke in English instead, which proved to work out just fine. As the place we were sitting at had a clientele consisting of only men and as the preparing of the two sandwiches took forever we were joking about the situation. Sol suggested that we should find a gay bar instead which lead Fiona to say: ‘I’d feel more comfortable in a gay bar than here’. Shortly after that the sandwiches arrived and after they were finished we all went back to the hostel and slept a long nice night. (I had only slept about 2 hours the night before…)
Lisbon, Portugal, part II: The streets go up or down, never sideways (alternatively: Where is Fiona?)
Waking up in the morning after a nice long night we found a surprise in our room. We all thought we were sleeping in a 6-bed female dorm, but it turned out that it wasn’t the case. When we woke up one bed was taken by a hairy guy! We were all equally surprised as we saw it. After getting ready, eating breakfast and collecting all of our things we checked out and went to our next hostel in which we were to spend the rest of our nights (the first one was fully booked the rest of the weekend). We found ourselves staying at a small hostel in which the shower was in a room outside and where they’d prefer it if you didn’t come home after midnight. It was still sweet somehow and we were happy as we got a room completely to ourselves.
The day was spent sightseeing in the city, walking up and down the hills – there were very few streets going sideways, always up or down… We went to the Castelo (castle) and found an art festival going on there with music and clothes and jewellery. It’s the little things that make everything great and this was one of those things. As we sat down in an alternative ‘restaurant’ temporarily there for the festival and listened to the alternative music coming from the DJ (no Spanish music as far as we could hear :-D ) we were all extremely relaxed and happy. We stayed for quite some time just taking it easy and relaxing, but decided to go before we fell asleep.
Then we made our way down the hill and ended up in the middle of a Brazilian samba drum concert on the streets. They were banging their drums and dancing and screaming olé as they lifted the drums above their heads. It was really cool and of course we stayed there for quite some time as well. I thought wow, what a great way to work out and made a mental note to check out if it’s possible to do something similar in Malmö.
We kept on loosing Fiona, or so I felt as I kept on asking ‘where is Fiona?’. (In reality she wasn’t lost at all, I was just not seeing our red-headed miss Ireland at those moments… It was sometime around here that we found Sabine’s future career. She will own a pink hostel in Lisbon where she wouldn’t let Spanish people stay. We even found a pink house for it.
Eventually we made our way back to our hostel to relax and change before going out in the evening. We found a restaurant where they were going to have a buffet and had a seat. The waitress told us that we had to wait with taking food a bit because there was a big party coming and the food wasn’t completely ready. We said all right and ordered some drinks. Sol was extremely hungry and wondered every five minutes when we could start taking some food. The party arrived eventually but they didn’t start taking food until everyone was there (which took forever) so the staff at the restaurant let us take food before. It was great food. Some cold dishes, some warm and a desert (uma sobremesa) consisting of either pineapple (or rather ananas – why is it more or less only in English that it is called pineapple?) or chocolate mousse.
It was during that dinner that we started talking about the many gorgeous guys we had seen during just that day. Sabine, Fiona and I agreed that we had seen more beautiful guys during one day than during three and a half months in Spain. Sol just didn’t get it. She hadn’t seen any pretty guys, but we decided that maybe she hadn’t been looking. So to make her open her eyes we decided upon signs to make her aware of the chicos bonitos. I was to pull her hair, Sabine to get a coughing attack and Fiona get spasms. Then I saw a beautiful guy, turned to Sol to pull her hair but she got it before I finished my sign. Then we all had a long laughing attack.
On the way home we discussed how nice the city was and how most of us could consider living there permanently, and also how the guys are different from Spanish ones. Right then a guy grabbed Sol’s breasts and Sol burst out: ‘I don’t wanna live in Lisbon anymore!’ and gave the guy the ‘fuck-finger’. And so it was settled. Portuguese guys were no different to Spanish ones and the city suddenly looked less attractive to the blonde miss Iceland.
We all concluded during the day that although the city was beautiful it didn’t feel like a big city or a capital. It felt more like a small holiday city, to which you go to stay for a week or so, like cities on the Canary Islands or other holiday spots. It also looked like a poor city, houses were quite run down and sure there were areas which were modernised and cleaned up, but most of the streets that we walked down or up were filled with houses which needed substantial remodelling. The Portuguese people came across as extremely friendly and nice (except maybe for the guy that molested Sol…) and so we could agree with my mother’s opinion, they are nicer than Spanish people, at least the ones that we met, and they speak English!
Lisbon, Portugal, part III: I hate sand.
We decided that we were to visit a beach on this day, our last day in Portugal, a beach that was about 30 minutes outside central Lisbon. On the way we were to stop and look at some monuments and stuff in Belem (which was also recommended to us by the tourist office). As we sat on the train relaxing we suddenly saw the train leaving the station that we were supposed to get off at. Ooops! We went off the train at the next station and jumped on the next train going back. The only thing was that the train we were on didn’t stop in Belem so it was just to get off that train as well and go back one more time. Then we came to the right station and could finally see the things we wanted to see.
We saw a couple of monuments situated by the ocean and walked along the coastline. We sat down and rested our flip flop bearing feet and Sabine got a sunglass salesman to sell her a pair of sunglasses, that he originally wanted 15 euros for, for 5 euros. We saw loads and loads of Americans (mainly old ones) who wore funny clothes. In particular one guy who was so mismatched that it was hilarious. And he wasn’t old. He bought a scarf from a scarf-selling lady which made his outfit even worse. Let’s see if I can describe it; he wore grey surf shorts with white flowers on them, to that he had a shirt with a lot of patterns on it mainly in a reddish scale of colours. From the lady he bought a blue scarf. Talk about loving colours…
After resting and feeding my new-found coca cola addiction we walked to the next train station and took the train to the beach. We arrived in a really small town where they had McDonalds (of course we had to go…) and nice and friendly people. We found the beach and laid ourselves down to enjoy the sun (the water was not very warm according to Sabine and Fiona – and as you know I don’t bathe unless the water is at least 25 degrees warm…). It was windy and the sand found its way through everything and I realised once again how much I dislike sand. We got to lie there for a little while, but then the clouds started turning grey and so we left to go back to Lisbon.
It really was amazing to us that more or less everyone spoke English there, even the bum helping us with our train tickets. A nice contrast to Spain.
We bought Subway sandwiches (yes, McDonalds and Subway in the same day. No we are not extremely Americanised… you just have to understand that these kinds of fast food restaurants don’t exist in Valladolid!) to have for dinner and a bottle of wine. The next day would be starting very early and so we decided to relax at the hostel’s roof terrace. The way home led us through the red light district of Lisbon (ooops!), but I guess it’s something you really should see and know where it is so you won’t end up lost there when it is dark and the middle of the night…
We relaxed on our roof terrace and played a few games of Uno (the card game) and I became the two-time winner while Sabine learnt the word sink and that it is not equivalent to binch. We sat and relaxed and talked and decided it was a pity to have to go back to Spain and Valladolid, Portugal in general and Lisbon in particular had proved to be such a nice place to stay at.
Lisbon, Portugal, part IV: The long way home
The day started approximately 4.30 Portuguese time, our train to the bus station was to leave at 5.36. Arriving at the train station we found no information as to where the train would leave from. We asked some people and found our train. At the bus station we had the same trouble as there was no information whatsoever. A bus driver told us where to wait and eventually the bus arrived.
We had to change buses again in the city which has a name similar to ‘Albuquerque’ and as we went on the bus the bus driver told me ‘no comida en el autobus’, I answered ‘pero solo es agua’. In reality I had both crisps and cookies in my bag but that is not food in my opinion. Those are only snacks, no matter what Fiona says.
As I saw the Portuguese landscape passing by outside the bus window, listening to my I-pod music, I thought about the differences between Spain and Portugal. There are truly many differences. One is about the people’s general behaviour. Most of the Portuguese seemed to speak and understand English, while here in Spain you’ll have to search more or learn Spanish. They seem to eat more proper food, not only tapas (which I don’t think I will ever become properly used to). Everything seemed also cheaper than in Spain – anything from metro tickets to food and drinks. The landscape looks somewhat different to what I have seen of Spain and the language written is possible to understand, while spoken is quite different from Spanish. Someone said it reminded her of eastern European languages.
I quite enjoyed Lisbon, I think we all did, but wouldn’t like to live there. I’d love to come back though for a visit, either back to Lisbon or to other places (maybe both).
As we reached Salamanca we were all hungry and just wanted to get home already. We went to a small snack bar where we immediately got reminded of the Spanish people’s way of being. We came back to Valladolid and home to our apartments around 8 p.m. The best thing was to have a proper toilet not only those disgusting smelly toilets on bus stations or gas stations… Also the last hostel had the worst beds (hard, too short and not wide enough – I had to balance not to fall off), so coming home to my noisy, but comfortable bed was great.
It was so nice to get away for a few days. Now we all just have to study for our Spanish exams and finish our other assignments. Well, hopefully the energy from being somewhere else will make it all easier…
I realise this story of our adventures ‘abroad from abroad’ was rather long, so if you’ve read all the way through you’re worth an award! ;-)
Besos
/k
Below is the 4-part story of when miss Sweden, miss Iceland, miss Germany and miss Ireland went on a spontaneous trip to Lisbon, Portugal.
Lisbon, Portugal, part I: We know nothing about Portugal
So last Wednesday Sabine, Sol and I started talking about possibly taking a trip somewhere. We started discussing Portugal and the day after we decided that we were at least going to try to get there. It was one of my goals with this semester here in Spain so you can understand my enthusiasm. At first we thought we’d rent a car, but in the end we thought taking the bus would be better. So Friday morning at 7 o’clock we met at Plaza Mayor, Sabine, Sol, Fiona and I and started walking towards the bus station with hopes of scoring tickets. It proved to be no problem at all so off we were towards Salamanca first where we were to change buses to the one going abroad. But we were left with about 3 hours to kill so we took the Salamanca quick tour which basically lead us to a café which Sol recommended. I must say that I was not incredibly impressed by Salamanca, but who am I to judge I saw almost nothing. (Except for many alternative people and Sol’s favourite café…)
After some confusion we found ourselves on our bus towards Portugal just to find out that we would have to change buses at some point if we didn’t want to end up in Porto instead of Lisbon. The driver had told Sol that we would have to change in a place called something similar to ‘Albuquerque’. We were just generally confused and didn’t really understand all the Portuguese people on the bus – Portuguese is very much different from Spanish, at least in spoken form.
Oh well, we were still in good spirits (although tired), excited about going somewhere and more particularly about the fact that we were on our way, finally, to Lisbon and Portugal.
It was somewhere around here we started doing a mental list of what we knew about Portugal and Lisbon beforehand. That list was rather short. You see in our spur of the moment trying to be spontaneous trip we forgot to look up anything at all about the place we were going to. Our knowledge well was pretty much made up of the following: they speak Portuguese, the capital is Lisbon, they have euros and according to my mother they are more friendly than Spanish people. We spent the rest of the trip asking each other questions that none of us knew the answer to.
We managed to change buses and as we were going south Sabine looks out of the window and suddenly bursts out ‘I can smell the sea! It’s on that side.’ (Whether that was true or not is not something I am able to answer to. I can only smell my way to Irish pubs…) Sol and I spent some time (while the other two were sleeping) having a Nordic language school, trying out how much we could say in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic and Finnish. Needless to say some languages were easier than others.
We arrived in Lisbon around 22 local time (it turned out that they have different time than in Spain! How silly isn’t that? And Sol and Fiona knew it and told me and Sabine just before we reached our final destination.), about one hour late. Four very giggly and over-tired girls made our way, using the metro, to the hostel Sol’s boyfriend had booked for us earlier that same day. After checking in to a sweet apartment-looking hostel we went out in search for food or drinks (anything really). It took about 5 minutes of walking and then a guy stopped us and asked us if we wanted to buy some weed. He took Fiona’s hand and said: ‘I know you want some’. Fiona took her hand back said ‘No!’ and we walked further.
After a little while we found a small place which was fine for us where Sol and Fiona ordered sandwiches (!) which took forever for the guy to prepare. We kept speaking in Spanish as we figured that would work out fine, but then realised how ignorant we probably seemed. Didn’t we know we weren’t in Spain, that Portugal is a separate country? So we spoke in English instead, which proved to work out just fine. As the place we were sitting at had a clientele consisting of only men and as the preparing of the two sandwiches took forever we were joking about the situation. Sol suggested that we should find a gay bar instead which lead Fiona to say: ‘I’d feel more comfortable in a gay bar than here’. Shortly after that the sandwiches arrived and after they were finished we all went back to the hostel and slept a long nice night. (I had only slept about 2 hours the night before…)
Lisbon, Portugal, part II: The streets go up or down, never sideways (alternatively: Where is Fiona?)
Waking up in the morning after a nice long night we found a surprise in our room. We all thought we were sleeping in a 6-bed female dorm, but it turned out that it wasn’t the case. When we woke up one bed was taken by a hairy guy! We were all equally surprised as we saw it. After getting ready, eating breakfast and collecting all of our things we checked out and went to our next hostel in which we were to spend the rest of our nights (the first one was fully booked the rest of the weekend). We found ourselves staying at a small hostel in which the shower was in a room outside and where they’d prefer it if you didn’t come home after midnight. It was still sweet somehow and we were happy as we got a room completely to ourselves.
The day was spent sightseeing in the city, walking up and down the hills – there were very few streets going sideways, always up or down… We went to the Castelo (castle) and found an art festival going on there with music and clothes and jewellery. It’s the little things that make everything great and this was one of those things. As we sat down in an alternative ‘restaurant’ temporarily there for the festival and listened to the alternative music coming from the DJ (no Spanish music as far as we could hear :-D ) we were all extremely relaxed and happy. We stayed for quite some time just taking it easy and relaxing, but decided to go before we fell asleep.
Then we made our way down the hill and ended up in the middle of a Brazilian samba drum concert on the streets. They were banging their drums and dancing and screaming olé as they lifted the drums above their heads. It was really cool and of course we stayed there for quite some time as well. I thought wow, what a great way to work out and made a mental note to check out if it’s possible to do something similar in Malmö.
We kept on loosing Fiona, or so I felt as I kept on asking ‘where is Fiona?’. (In reality she wasn’t lost at all, I was just not seeing our red-headed miss Ireland at those moments… It was sometime around here that we found Sabine’s future career. She will own a pink hostel in Lisbon where she wouldn’t let Spanish people stay. We even found a pink house for it.
Eventually we made our way back to our hostel to relax and change before going out in the evening. We found a restaurant where they were going to have a buffet and had a seat. The waitress told us that we had to wait with taking food a bit because there was a big party coming and the food wasn’t completely ready. We said all right and ordered some drinks. Sol was extremely hungry and wondered every five minutes when we could start taking some food. The party arrived eventually but they didn’t start taking food until everyone was there (which took forever) so the staff at the restaurant let us take food before. It was great food. Some cold dishes, some warm and a desert (uma sobremesa) consisting of either pineapple (or rather ananas – why is it more or less only in English that it is called pineapple?) or chocolate mousse.
It was during that dinner that we started talking about the many gorgeous guys we had seen during just that day. Sabine, Fiona and I agreed that we had seen more beautiful guys during one day than during three and a half months in Spain. Sol just didn’t get it. She hadn’t seen any pretty guys, but we decided that maybe she hadn’t been looking. So to make her open her eyes we decided upon signs to make her aware of the chicos bonitos. I was to pull her hair, Sabine to get a coughing attack and Fiona get spasms. Then I saw a beautiful guy, turned to Sol to pull her hair but she got it before I finished my sign. Then we all had a long laughing attack.
On the way home we discussed how nice the city was and how most of us could consider living there permanently, and also how the guys are different from Spanish ones. Right then a guy grabbed Sol’s breasts and Sol burst out: ‘I don’t wanna live in Lisbon anymore!’ and gave the guy the ‘fuck-finger’. And so it was settled. Portuguese guys were no different to Spanish ones and the city suddenly looked less attractive to the blonde miss Iceland.
We all concluded during the day that although the city was beautiful it didn’t feel like a big city or a capital. It felt more like a small holiday city, to which you go to stay for a week or so, like cities on the Canary Islands or other holiday spots. It also looked like a poor city, houses were quite run down and sure there were areas which were modernised and cleaned up, but most of the streets that we walked down or up were filled with houses which needed substantial remodelling. The Portuguese people came across as extremely friendly and nice (except maybe for the guy that molested Sol…) and so we could agree with my mother’s opinion, they are nicer than Spanish people, at least the ones that we met, and they speak English!
Lisbon, Portugal, part III: I hate sand.
We decided that we were to visit a beach on this day, our last day in Portugal, a beach that was about 30 minutes outside central Lisbon. On the way we were to stop and look at some monuments and stuff in Belem (which was also recommended to us by the tourist office). As we sat on the train relaxing we suddenly saw the train leaving the station that we were supposed to get off at. Ooops! We went off the train at the next station and jumped on the next train going back. The only thing was that the train we were on didn’t stop in Belem so it was just to get off that train as well and go back one more time. Then we came to the right station and could finally see the things we wanted to see.
We saw a couple of monuments situated by the ocean and walked along the coastline. We sat down and rested our flip flop bearing feet and Sabine got a sunglass salesman to sell her a pair of sunglasses, that he originally wanted 15 euros for, for 5 euros. We saw loads and loads of Americans (mainly old ones) who wore funny clothes. In particular one guy who was so mismatched that it was hilarious. And he wasn’t old. He bought a scarf from a scarf-selling lady which made his outfit even worse. Let’s see if I can describe it; he wore grey surf shorts with white flowers on them, to that he had a shirt with a lot of patterns on it mainly in a reddish scale of colours. From the lady he bought a blue scarf. Talk about loving colours…
After resting and feeding my new-found coca cola addiction we walked to the next train station and took the train to the beach. We arrived in a really small town where they had McDonalds (of course we had to go…) and nice and friendly people. We found the beach and laid ourselves down to enjoy the sun (the water was not very warm according to Sabine and Fiona – and as you know I don’t bathe unless the water is at least 25 degrees warm…). It was windy and the sand found its way through everything and I realised once again how much I dislike sand. We got to lie there for a little while, but then the clouds started turning grey and so we left to go back to Lisbon.
It really was amazing to us that more or less everyone spoke English there, even the bum helping us with our train tickets. A nice contrast to Spain.
We bought Subway sandwiches (yes, McDonalds and Subway in the same day. No we are not extremely Americanised… you just have to understand that these kinds of fast food restaurants don’t exist in Valladolid!) to have for dinner and a bottle of wine. The next day would be starting very early and so we decided to relax at the hostel’s roof terrace. The way home led us through the red light district of Lisbon (ooops!), but I guess it’s something you really should see and know where it is so you won’t end up lost there when it is dark and the middle of the night…
We relaxed on our roof terrace and played a few games of Uno (the card game) and I became the two-time winner while Sabine learnt the word sink and that it is not equivalent to binch. We sat and relaxed and talked and decided it was a pity to have to go back to Spain and Valladolid, Portugal in general and Lisbon in particular had proved to be such a nice place to stay at.
Lisbon, Portugal, part IV: The long way home
The day started approximately 4.30 Portuguese time, our train to the bus station was to leave at 5.36. Arriving at the train station we found no information as to where the train would leave from. We asked some people and found our train. At the bus station we had the same trouble as there was no information whatsoever. A bus driver told us where to wait and eventually the bus arrived.
We had to change buses again in the city which has a name similar to ‘Albuquerque’ and as we went on the bus the bus driver told me ‘no comida en el autobus’, I answered ‘pero solo es agua’. In reality I had both crisps and cookies in my bag but that is not food in my opinion. Those are only snacks, no matter what Fiona says.
As I saw the Portuguese landscape passing by outside the bus window, listening to my I-pod music, I thought about the differences between Spain and Portugal. There are truly many differences. One is about the people’s general behaviour. Most of the Portuguese seemed to speak and understand English, while here in Spain you’ll have to search more or learn Spanish. They seem to eat more proper food, not only tapas (which I don’t think I will ever become properly used to). Everything seemed also cheaper than in Spain – anything from metro tickets to food and drinks. The landscape looks somewhat different to what I have seen of Spain and the language written is possible to understand, while spoken is quite different from Spanish. Someone said it reminded her of eastern European languages.
I quite enjoyed Lisbon, I think we all did, but wouldn’t like to live there. I’d love to come back though for a visit, either back to Lisbon or to other places (maybe both).
As we reached Salamanca we were all hungry and just wanted to get home already. We went to a small snack bar where we immediately got reminded of the Spanish people’s way of being. We came back to Valladolid and home to our apartments around 8 p.m. The best thing was to have a proper toilet not only those disgusting smelly toilets on bus stations or gas stations… Also the last hostel had the worst beds (hard, too short and not wide enough – I had to balance not to fall off), so coming home to my noisy, but comfortable bed was great.
It was so nice to get away for a few days. Now we all just have to study for our Spanish exams and finish our other assignments. Well, hopefully the energy from being somewhere else will make it all easier…
I realise this story of our adventures ‘abroad from abroad’ was rather long, so if you’ve read all the way through you’re worth an award! ;-)
Besos
/k
Monday 7 May 2007
I am not studying at a university
Hola!
So today I got the ultimate proof of what I so long have believed – Spanish university studies equals Swedish secondary/high school education! Here’s what happened, Sol and I were sitting in our Cinema class (yes, the classes seem to continue even though we’ve already handed in the final project…) minding our own businesses and being frustrated with the fact that once again the film was dubbed into Spanish. Suddenly a girl faints and the teacher and some nearby students try to help her and eventually leaves the class room in order to get the girl to feel better. As the door closes behind them everyone except me and Sol starts speaking loudly. I mean really loud! Anyone who has ever been in Spain understands what I mean. The talking continued until the teacher opens the door again, being back, then everyone shuts up as if there had been a sign or something. Does that happen in a Swedish university during a cinema course when there is a film on? I don’t think so.
Otherwise it was a rather interesting weekend with new friendships being made, parties and a lot of laughing. I am now looking forward to tomorrow’s game (or rather to listen to it on the webradio… :-(
Adíos for now! Hasta luego!
/k
So today I got the ultimate proof of what I so long have believed – Spanish university studies equals Swedish secondary/high school education! Here’s what happened, Sol and I were sitting in our Cinema class (yes, the classes seem to continue even though we’ve already handed in the final project…) minding our own businesses and being frustrated with the fact that once again the film was dubbed into Spanish. Suddenly a girl faints and the teacher and some nearby students try to help her and eventually leaves the class room in order to get the girl to feel better. As the door closes behind them everyone except me and Sol starts speaking loudly. I mean really loud! Anyone who has ever been in Spain understands what I mean. The talking continued until the teacher opens the door again, being back, then everyone shuts up as if there had been a sign or something. Does that happen in a Swedish university during a cinema course when there is a film on? I don’t think so.
Otherwise it was a rather interesting weekend with new friendships being made, parties and a lot of laughing. I am now looking forward to tomorrow’s game (or rather to listen to it on the webradio… :-(
Adíos for now! Hasta luego!
/k
Thursday 3 May 2007
Finally...
Finally hell is over (for now) and the essay is ready to be handed in. It's not my best work ever, rather the opposite, but at this moment I don't think I could have handled it better. Erasmus students should get a break.
/k
/k
Tuesday 1 May 2007
reunions
Hola!
Another rather exciting weekend has passed and my extra days of holidays are coming increasingly close to an end. So what has been going on? First of all Sol and I got IPES visitors in the form of Pernille and Fred. Pernille kept on saying Fred with a French accent, while Fred has been giving us treats from her future stand-up show.
But I left the reunion Saturday morning to go to Madrid and have my own little reunion. Sabine joined me and we spent the day shopping, looking, walking, eating ice cream, eating at KFC (only because it was a fast food restaurant and they don’t exist at all in Valladolid, of course one must take the chance…) and finishing of the day with eating tapas at a place in the area La Latina in central Madrid. Those tapas were funny, ‘cause our waiter chose them for us and thus we had no idea what was coming or what the bill would end up at. It all turned out rather well and apart from having a nice dinner we got a free round of drinks.
After the dinner Sabine and I said goodbye and as she went to the bus station to catch her bus back to Valladolid, I went on to the airport in order to be the welcoming committee for Ainita who was just coming back to Spain after moving to her and Klas new apartment back home in Malmö. As we made our way back to central Madrid and tried our best to find the hostel we finally got a room in, we met a lot of weird people. But we found it after some wandering around the Madrid streets…
We rested a bit and then went out to meet some of Aino’s Sevilla-friends to go dancing. We eventually found ourselves in a small club where they played mixed music, a crazy girl with a huge behind danced for attention and guys just didn’t get it when you said ‘no comprendo’ and turned away. It was anyway fun, but after a whole day of walking my old pains in my right foot started coming back and so we left and began walking back to the hostel.
As Aino convinced me to stay at least until later that Sunday evening we walked around, relaxing and spontaneously shopping at the few shops open. (You would think that in a big city like Madrid the shops would be open also on Sundays but no, so don’t go there leaving your shopping ‘til the last day…) We ended up sitting in one Irish bar after another, watching football games and discussing everything between heaven and earth (or maybe rather between the first game of the season to the last… ;-) In between we had some tapas in what I called ‘fattigast i kvarteret”, but that was of course not the correct Spanish name…
In the end we ran to the bus station and I went back to Valladolid, while Aino made her way back to her other friends.
I got some great news from back home during that Saturday afternoon, Malmö beat AIK 4-0 at home and seeing as I had people there I of course got live score results. It was really complete happiness, now if we could only beat all the other teams in the same way that would be great. Aino, who had seen the game on television, described every one of them 4 goals and it seems like we put up a show worth watching. :-D As I write we are playing the Swedish cup and are leading 5-0 a bit in on the second half of the game. I dare guess that we will win the match. :-)
Another week awaits, or maybe rather a few days. On Thursday my cinema course paper is due and we’ll see how I manage in my writing.
Besos and hasta luego!
/k
Another rather exciting weekend has passed and my extra days of holidays are coming increasingly close to an end. So what has been going on? First of all Sol and I got IPES visitors in the form of Pernille and Fred. Pernille kept on saying Fred with a French accent, while Fred has been giving us treats from her future stand-up show.
But I left the reunion Saturday morning to go to Madrid and have my own little reunion. Sabine joined me and we spent the day shopping, looking, walking, eating ice cream, eating at KFC (only because it was a fast food restaurant and they don’t exist at all in Valladolid, of course one must take the chance…) and finishing of the day with eating tapas at a place in the area La Latina in central Madrid. Those tapas were funny, ‘cause our waiter chose them for us and thus we had no idea what was coming or what the bill would end up at. It all turned out rather well and apart from having a nice dinner we got a free round of drinks.
After the dinner Sabine and I said goodbye and as she went to the bus station to catch her bus back to Valladolid, I went on to the airport in order to be the welcoming committee for Ainita who was just coming back to Spain after moving to her and Klas new apartment back home in Malmö. As we made our way back to central Madrid and tried our best to find the hostel we finally got a room in, we met a lot of weird people. But we found it after some wandering around the Madrid streets…
We rested a bit and then went out to meet some of Aino’s Sevilla-friends to go dancing. We eventually found ourselves in a small club where they played mixed music, a crazy girl with a huge behind danced for attention and guys just didn’t get it when you said ‘no comprendo’ and turned away. It was anyway fun, but after a whole day of walking my old pains in my right foot started coming back and so we left and began walking back to the hostel.
As Aino convinced me to stay at least until later that Sunday evening we walked around, relaxing and spontaneously shopping at the few shops open. (You would think that in a big city like Madrid the shops would be open also on Sundays but no, so don’t go there leaving your shopping ‘til the last day…) We ended up sitting in one Irish bar after another, watching football games and discussing everything between heaven and earth (or maybe rather between the first game of the season to the last… ;-) In between we had some tapas in what I called ‘fattigast i kvarteret”, but that was of course not the correct Spanish name…
In the end we ran to the bus station and I went back to Valladolid, while Aino made her way back to her other friends.
I got some great news from back home during that Saturday afternoon, Malmö beat AIK 4-0 at home and seeing as I had people there I of course got live score results. It was really complete happiness, now if we could only beat all the other teams in the same way that would be great. Aino, who had seen the game on television, described every one of them 4 goals and it seems like we put up a show worth watching. :-D As I write we are playing the Swedish cup and are leading 5-0 a bit in on the second half of the game. I dare guess that we will win the match. :-)
Another week awaits, or maybe rather a few days. On Thursday my cinema course paper is due and we’ll see how I manage in my writing.
Besos and hasta luego!
/k
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