Search results matching tag 'spain'

The S Word...

ChristinaL — Thu, 07 May 2009 04:12:00 GMT

...stands for SENIOR. Also known as what I have officially become as of 5 pm Monday. But let's not say it too much, because the last few days and thinking about how little time I truly have left in college has gotten me even more stressed than finals.

I had no exams, but my finals this year were intense. I had a final paper to write for every class. Normally I like writing, but jamming this much into the end of the year, on top of a whole semester writing articles for my internship at NUVO Newsweekly? No longer fun.

In the end, I wrote about 40 pages (and did LOTS of research & prewriting) within about 9 days:

5 pages in Spanish analyzing the postcolonial/gender theories in the works we read about Hispanic "women on the road"

9 pages about Lolita for my American novel class - the last thing I turned in... I think I may have lost all brain power by that point.

9 pages arguing against a literary critic about The Tin Drum - definitely the most challenging one

18 pages about working women's role in the women's suffrage movement in New York City - definiely the most time consuming one. My room turned into a mini-library, with so many books for research...

I am just SO SO SO glad it's over. I feel like I have grown so much as a writer this year. I'm not sure whether that's coming from having to write in Spanish, or being challenged with new assignments, or the pressure of having to write professionally for my internship, but I have definitely improved... nevertheless, my improvements have made me really obsessive about my writing. I do SO much planning and outlining and I am never happy after one or two drafts. My final products may be better but I am spending a lot more time on them! Stressful. I am ready to take a break from writing...for like a week. Then I am back to work at NUVO.

Anyway, I had kind of a chill day after my papers were all turned in. I had to move myself out (my parents don't always come down to help me anymore... boo for getting older and more independent) which took the better part of Tuesday (but interrupted with breaks to watch the Real Housewives of NYC marathon. perfect for packing, and realizing that your life is NOT that dramatic. I had dinner with a few of the senior girls from Pi Phi (who I will miss ridiculously... there's that s word again! let's not talk about it because I'm in denial.)

Now I am back home in Chicago. My mom and I went out shopping today, but she took a wrong turn and we accidentally ended up having to turn around at O'Hare airport. That was especially weird because I started out this school year at O'Hare, boarding the plane to Spain for my study abroad semester. Now it's the end of the school year and here I am. It truly seems like September 1st was just a few weeks ago, but just thinking about how much my life has changed since then blows my mind.

I've been really nostalgic in general lately, but especially about Spain. The people I met there are so dear to me, and the experiences have shaped me forever. This semester, I feel like I've grown tremendously as a student and through my internship, especially... but I just haven't been happy the way I was in Spain.

I think I've had way too much on my plate and not enough free time to enjoy the things and people I love. I've had good times with so many people I love at Butler... but really, not enough, and I haven't been able to spend the time I wanted to with my family... even the ones just down the street on the east side of Indy. I haven't been healthy to my body... too many almost-all-nighters, too much soda and junky food, not enough exercise. I guess I just want something a little more simple and calm for next year. I don't know if I'm capable of doing that. Butler offers so many opportunities, and I'm just not good at saying no. But, I guess that's my challenge if I want to end out my career with a happy and healthy "s word" experience. I've got one year left. I need to be smart about it.

This summer is my chance to get started... I'll still be around Butler and blogging, so stay tuned and wish me luck!

What I Learned from Studying Abroad

ChristinaL — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 04:58:00 GMT

Although I’ve been back in the States for about two months now, I still find myself thinking about study abroad on almost a daily basis. Almost everything reminds me of something from Spain. I talk about my experience in my classes all the time! It is ridiculous how much you can learn about the world in 4 months.

I am taking a Comparative Lit course this semester, and I think I mention something I learned in Spain at least once per class (three times a week! yeah, my class is sick of me haha). During one class period, I was able to draw on knowledge from three of my four classes in Spain (Spanish History & Civilization, Great Masters of Spanish painting and 19^th Century Spanish Short Stories)… and we are studying India in Comp Lit. Learning about one country in depth makes it so much easier to understand other foreign cultures.

Spain has also been on my mind because last week the three Pi Phis that were in the Alcala study abroad group (me, Rebecca and Chelsea) gave a presentation to our sorority house about our experiences. We told a lot of funny stories, but I tried to make it a little more educational by reading my sisters this list I made on the plane ride home from Spain. I hope this helps to give you a better idea of what studying abroad is all about and why it is so important!

Shooting the arrow (our Pi Phi symbol) at a Templar church in Soria, Spain.

What I have learned from studying abroad:

There is so much out there that I don’t know about! For example, this year I have discovered the European Union, Spanish politics, history, literature, etc. If I lived twenty years without knowing about all these interesting things, just imagine how much there still is to learn about in the world. I’m just getting started.

Being a tourist has helped me realize that there are fascinating things to see everywhere! It’s not just Europe. I will definitely take more advantage of all the cultural opportunities in my hometowns, Chicago and Indy.

I now have a very strong desire to be multilingual. I am definitely on my way to being bilingual in Spanish, but after I met so many people who speak three or more languages and then I fell in love with France (I speak no French), I became anxious to add more languages to my repertoire. They say the third language is easier to learn than the second! Let’s hope it’s true.

I definitely have an increased love of talking to strangers and trying to learn from absolutely anyone I meet. Take the bus. Sit next to a stranger. Say hello… and get ready to meet the coolest people in the world.

Rebecca and me and Jose - a Guatemalan UMass alum with a Boston accent who returned to Spain with the book his Spanish ancestors wrote about their move to Guatemala. Basically one of the coolest people I've EVER met. He taught me all about the corruption in Guatemlan politics and the non-profit he started to help kids on trash heaps. We met him on a bus....Talk to strangers.

I’ve learned how to do what I want - not just what other people tell me is best or what they want from me. I’ve gotten better at listening to myself and my needs. I need to go to sleep at 9:30 pm on a Saturday? Okay. I am sick of art museums and churches and cannot handle looking at every single painting in Paris? No big deal. No guilt. Sometimes you just have to do what will make you happiest and not what seems like the cool or sophisticated thing to do.

I have found my independence. If I don’t take care of me in Europe, who will?! There is nothing like being halfway across the world from your parents to help you grow up.

I am not so uptight! Everything will be okay in the end. We miss buses, we buy the wrong ticket, we get sick…but now I just stay calm and let it be. There are some things I can’t control, and that is okay.

I am not so afraid of looking stupid. My friend Jared really helped me with this one in the beginning when I saw him speak terrible Spanish to anyone with no qualms (we were all pretty much terrible, but I was way more shy!) and even go to an old-woman-aerobics class with me. Everyone looks like an idiot sometimes – especially in a foreign country. That’s okay. You learn from it, you laugh about it, and you move on. If you don’t risk looking stupid every once in a while (or every day, in my case), you will miss out on so much.

My Spanish is SO much better. I couldn’t even remember “DINERO” when I got on my plane to Spain and now I could probably hold a conversation with anyone on the street and more or less read a newspaper or books.

I have a genuine interest in art… and now I actually know something about it! (I was a huge art museum nerd in Madrid – you have to be with three of Europe’s greatest art museums all within 10 minutes of the downtown train station!

I actually like wine now and will try almost anything to eat… seriously! even the slimy-looking clams covered in lemon juice that my friend’s host mom made us. And guess what? They were amazing!

fabada = bean stew with blood sausage - one of my favorite Spanish dishes!

I appreciate hanging out with myself and the beauty of down time. One of the greatest and worst things about college life is that you are always surrounded by your friends… Spain gave me some time to go solo. It was nice to know that I can have so much fun on my own, and to get inside my own head and have time to think. There is also something to be said for not being SUPER busy like I always am at Butler. I found myself just walking around town, enjoying the trees and the buildings and watching the people and smiling at how beautiful the world is when you take the time to slow down and look at it moving by. I think for the rest of my life that will be my gauge of happiness; when you walk around and find yourself smiling all the time for no reason other than you love being alive, then you know you are truly happy!

I think I have a lot more options for my life after college. My Spanish university has a graduate program for foreign students called Teach & Learn where you can come back and get a master’s degree in multicultural education while working as a teacher in a Madrid school… and they pay you for all this! I will definitely consider this and any other option that will take me back to Europe. I know living abroad has to be part of my life in the future.

This was my second time living abroad, and yet I learned so much more in 4 months than I ever expected. Studying abroad is scary, and exciting, and liberating and messy and comical and amazing in ways you will never expect.

When I was trying to plan my study abroad semester during the spring of sophomore year, there were times when I thought I didn’t want to go. The application seemed like too much work, or I was scared to speak another language, or I just couldn’t bear the thought of everything I would leave behind at Butler. But, I remembered what my AP Lit teacher in high school told me: her greatest regret from college was not studying abroad. She said that was the one thing she would urge all of us to do.

Whenever I thought of not going to Spain, I remembered Ms. Hitzeman’s advice, so listen to me now and remember this when you start to make excuse or have doubts:

STUDY ABROAD! It will change your life.

True Life: I was an Undergrad Law student in a Foreign Country

ChristinaL — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:49:00 GMT

Hello from BUTLER! Yes I am finally back at school getting ready for sorority recruitment (and loving it!). However, before I get totally back into the swing of my crazy BU life, I want to hang on to the study abroad memories a little bit longer with a few extra posts I wrote in Spain. I know they’re a little late, but enjoy!

When you tell people that 1) you’re an English major and 2) you don’t know what you want to do with your life, there is a strong chance you will be labeled as one of those artsy hippie types who will probably never have a real job and/or contribute to society. Thankfully, there is always a fallback response for dealing with those who doubt the value of a liberal arts education: just tell them you’re going to law school. This gives you the advantage of feeling creative for having an artsy major and a future with lots of money.

However, in these last few weeks, I involuntarily became a Spanish law student, and let me tell you – law school is definitely not all it’s cracked up to be!

Let me explain. When signing up for my classes, I decided to branch out a little bit from the usual literature classes and take “Spain and the European Union,” which I imagined as a fascinating mix of political science and current events.

This was a bad assumption.

Our EU class was taught by a professor from the Universidad de Alcala law school, who kindly puts up with American students to educate us on the European Union. Unfortunately, that meant that the class was not about debating hot topics; it was essentially a law course.

If you’ve been burning to know what the principle of collegiality in the European Commission is, or if you were just dying of curiosity over what the third type of case heard by the European Court of Justice is, then you are in the right place. And if you didn’t know you were signing up for law school, well, good luck.

Luck was exactly what I needed when I set out to write my ten page paper in Spanish over gender equality in the European Union. The first step was to go to the Law Library. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to a law library, but they are intimidating places. Our library at Butler is a great place to study, sure… but it also has a fountain, and comfy couches, and computers where you can go check Facebook if you get bored.

There is no facebook or fun in the law library. Here is what there is:

1) Silence. Always. Hold that sneeze.

2) Massive books full of directives and recommendations and treaties and theories and jurisprudence and other fascinating topics.

3) Very serious students camped out at rows of study tables for hours with piles of notes colored coded with nine different shades of highlights (You can't tell how crowded it usually from the picture because I took it during their lunch break. I didn't want my non-flash photography to disturb anyone.)

If you have ever wanted to take yourself way too seriously, put on your reading glasses, grab a reference book and head to the law library for a little light reading.

(Some of my research WAS in English (it is one of the three working languages of the EU) but that crimson lightweight is a law theory book entirely in Spanish. You may have seen it on recent bestseller lists.)

However, as much as I complained about sifting through legal jargon, I have to admit that being in that library with my 900 page discrimination law theory book was satisfying: I felt extremely smart and superior to all other students who simply read things that are intelligible.

Okay, I’m being a tool, but in all seriousness, I did realize something valuable in that library. There I was reading Big Boring Book of Law Theory in Spanish, when I realized:

I am sitting here with law students doing research in a foreign language…

I just might be approaching something like bilingual. And that is pretty exciting.

I stopped complaining, wrapped up the paper and turned it in knowing that even if I’ve already forgotten the term length of the EU Commission president, I have come so far in my Spanish, and isn’t that really the core purpose of taking classes in Spanish?

My goals for the semester were to see Europe and grow as a person, and if possible, improve my Spanish. Thankfully, the language was never just a side project – it was my everyday life. Even though I wasn’t thinking about it too much, and my vocab lists and grammar books started collecting dust after about a month, somewhere along the way through all my crazy adventures, I learned a foreign language

I’ve done a lot in college, but when I look back on it, I know that learning Spanish will be one of my most proud accomplishments. I feel like I’m ready to grow up and be a citizen of this new connected world, wherever on the globe it may take me. My world has fewer borders now, and that’s an amazing feeling to have.

Strange Encounters of the Butler Kind

ChristinaL — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 05:53:00 GMT

You might think I’m making this up just to make a good story for my blog, but I SWEAR, this really happened to me, not once but twice in Europe.

Let me explain.

As you may remember, I recently took a trip to London, where obviously, I needed to go on a Harry Potter tour. Our guide designated one of the little boys to be our “Harry,” and after the kid announced that he was from “Indiaaaana” (in a British accent), I went up to talk to his father.

I learned that the Harry had a British accent because he has been raised in London, but the family is originally from Indiana. In London, meeting someone else from Indiana would be coincidence enough. However, when I told Steve that I am a temporary Hoosier attending Butler…

[suspense]

…I learned that Steve was a Butler pharmacy grad from the 80s!

I could not believe it. It was like meeting a long lost cousin or something.

(Here are Steve, his kids, and I with our eclectic Harry Potter tour guide. Please also observe the Harry Potter-style Butler scarf I am wearing.)

We quickly bonded over the Butler connection and spent the whole tour chatting about BU and traveling in Europe. After Butler, Steve went to law school and now works for Rolls Royce in London, where his family has had the opportunity to travel all over Europe, so he had lots of advice for me. I also got to give him an update on life at Butler, since when he went to school, the Mall was still a street, and there was *gasp* no Starbucks. Don’t worry, though, they had C-Club back then. Steve couldn’t believe that the name of our infamous food court and his favorite study spot has stayed the same.

Then, a few weeks ago, my friend Brian and I randomly decided to take a last minute trip to Salamanca, the oldest university in Spain which dates back to the 1200s. Pretty sweet, right? Well, we were exploring the university museum when we stumbled upon this tiny little exhibit about the Civil War. There we are, reading up on the Spanish Civil War when we hear the door open… and in walks Caleb, another Butler student who lived across the hall from Brian in Ross Hall their freshmen year!

Caleb is also studying abroad in Spain, but he’s in a different program in Sevilla, seven hours away from us. What are the chances that we would not only randomly decide to go to Salamanca on the same weekend, but that we would cross paths in such an obscure place?

Only Butler.

I had never met Steve or Caleb before, but I left them both feeling like I was saying goodbye to old friends. Butler is family, and especially when you’re across the Atlantic, there is nothing better than seeing a smiling face that reminds you of home.

How easy is it to study abroad?

ChristinaL — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:15:00 GMT

I got a great question about studying abroad from rme3 the other day and thought I would share the answer with all of you:

How easy was it to study abroad? Do you lose essential classes to graduate or can you complete those abroad?

Studying abroad at Butler is easy to do (and totally worth it!). We have over 110 programs in over 40 countries, so there is something out there to fit your needs.

The process goes like this:

1) Attend a study abroad info session. These are offered several times every semester by the Center for Global Education. They give an overview of the study abroad process, different programs affiliated with Butler, when in your college career is best to go, and most importantly – a list of websites for programs in every part of the world so you can start your own research. You can go to these at any point during your academic career… I went during freshmen year just to get an idea of what options were out there. There are also specific information sessions for Butler programs such as the Semester in Spain (my program), Semester in D.C., and Global Adventures in the Liberal Arts.

2) Start looking at programs and get a idea (even if it is very broad) of what you might be interested in.

3) Sign up for an advising appointment in the Center for Global Education. The advisors will help you refine your plan. They can give you more specific information on many programs, answer many of your questions and give you advice on the program that might be best for you based on your interests and goals for your study abroad experience.

4) Choose a program and fill out the application. This usually involves a short essay and one or two recommendation letters.

5) Go to a pre-departure orientation meeting. This goes over the details of how to transfer financial aid, getting your passport and visa, what to expect about living in a foreign country, adapting to culture shock, etc. For the Butler Spain program, we had our own orientation (where we learned specifics about our program) as well as a get-to-know-each-other gathering at our professor’s house.

So, as you can tell, we get a lot of support from the university. I found the process very easy… when I first arrived in Spain I almost couldn’t believe I was there, because it really didn’t take a lot of pre-planning on my part.

Now for the other part of the question… how does credit transfer? Can I finish my major? Do classes abroad count for anything?

Yes! Studying abroad is, contrary to many beliefs, NOT a wasted semester in your progress towards a degree. The credit that you can get is very much dependent on the program you choose – what classes are available and which classes you sign up for.

However, it is possible for students from every major to study abroad.

For some people with very strict schedules (I’m thinking pharmacy, education and possibly dance majors) it might be necessary to take some summer/online classes or study abroad in the summer, but it is still possible.

For me, studying abroad actually allowed me to pick up a double major in Spanish that I probably would not have made the time for back at Butler. And don't worry... I will graduate on time with a double major, a minor and the Honors Program. I am choosing to count all my classes towards my Spanish major, but other students here are counting classes towards programs like Business, Literature, International Studies, etc.

I would advise finding a program that offers what you need – for example, some programs have science and business classes….some only offer the humanities. Do your research! If you cannot find classes that fit your major requirements, you could always take more general classes towards your core curriculum: ie. your art class, your social science credit, etc. There is even a Butler program called the Global Adventures in Liberal Arts which travels around Europe and gives you four core credits for Butler. Core curriculum is credit that EVERY Butler student needs, so you can definitely fit it into your schedule if you plan ahead. I know even the Honors Program is willing to give you credit for classes you take abroad.

After you sign up for classes in your study abroad program, you email the Department Head for the department from which you want to receive credit with info about the class. They evaluate the information and let you know if you can get Butler credit for it. If not, they will advise you to take a different class. So, the key here is communication! (Oh, and just a sidenote... study abroad classes appear on your Butler transcript, but your grades from that semester do not factor into your overall GPA... BU understands that classes in a foreign country can be totally different and your grades might not be the same as usual.)

I know this can be kind of confusing if you’re not in college and don’t understand our curriculum requirements, so if anyone has specific questions, please comment and I’ll try to be more clear.

But, overall, I cannot emphasize it enough… STUDY ABROAD! When will you have this kind of opportunity again?! It was definitely one of the best decisions I’ve made in college and I recommend it to everyone.

Feel free to ask me more questions, or check out the Center for Global Education website, which includes FAQs and a list of our programs.

America in Spain - Election Day & Halloween

ChristinaL — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:55:00 GMT

Before I left for Spain, I thought of all the things that might make me homesick, and American holidays was near the top of that list. I mean, fall is packed with them - Halloween, Election Day, Thanksgiving... but now that I'm here, I realize that it is even more exciting to see how America's traditions and activities are viewed and interpreted across the Atlantic.

From what I hear, Halloween has not been celebrated in Madrid for very long, but in the last few years, all the tourists, expats and study abroad students have brought the tradition of crazy costumes and big parties to Spain. It is definitely not as popular in the States, though, because I got some strange looks walking from my house to meet my friends in the Plaza.

I dressed up as a flapper, which I soon learned was not an appropriate costume for Spain! Even though Halloween is not a huge holiday here, All Saint’s Day on November 1^st IS a national holiday and everyone goes to the cemeteries to put flowers on their family’s graves. Since Halloween is more closely tied to this tradition, the idea of costumes is to scare away evil spirits… and flappers are not scary, as many Spaniards kindly explained to me.

However, although they knew I wasn’t scary, I was very lucky if anyone was able to figure out my costume. I bought the feathered flapper headband in a Spanish Halloween store so I thought it was a safe choice, but now I realize that flappers are an American icon – not so much in Madrid!

I cannot tell you how many people asked me if I was supposed to be a Native American. Yep, Native Americans typically wear black sequined dresses and silver headbands!

But, even if Spain needs a refresher on America of the 1920s, they are very much in tune with what’s going on in our country right now and the presidential election has been a media obsession here for at least the last month.

We had a mock election at our university, with a vote for American students and a vote for Spanish students. It probably doesn’t surprise you that Barack Obama won both votes… but you might be interested to know that Paris Hilton beat McCain for second place in the Spanish vote.

Silliness aside, though, the mock election was really cool because tons of media came to capture the election and interview all the American students. My friends and I were featured on the evening news that night.

The results of the real election didn’t start until about 11 pm our time, so Democrats Abroad sponsored an all-night party in downtown Madrid. None of my friends wanted to go, so I ended up going with eight other Americans students from my program that I had never met before – but it was so much fun to meet new friends with similar political opinions. Anyway, when we got to the party in Madrid, we realized that it was WAY more popular than we (or the Democrats Abroad) had anticipated. The line was out of control and the event was sold out. However, I was determined to see the election, so a few of us stuck it out and at about 2:30 am we finally found someone to sell us two extra tickets!

Once we got into the party, which was in a fancy museum, we found everyone crowded upstairs where there were big screens projecting the CNN coverage of the election. I got there in time to see Pennsylvania and Ohio which were two very important victories for Obama. Every time positive results came in, the whole place would start jumping and cheering. After more results came in at 4 am, there was nothing for about an hour and we were so tired, my friend Miriam and I fell asleep on the floor!

BUT, at 5 am when the next set of returns came in, everyone woke up and stood up. There was excitement in the air. I don’t even remember which state came in for Obama, but we all started screaming, and before we even quieted down, the screen flashed, “BREAKING NEWS: BARACK OBAMA ELECTED PRESIDENT.” Here you can see the reaction in a quick video I took (there's more on our Youtube Channel):

[YouTube:z5xyfzcUCNA]

Everyone went wild. People were screaming, crying, hugging, and chanting. Of course, the media was there to cover it all – I was even interviewed (in Spanish!) for a newspaper. It was kind of hard to express such strong feelings in another language at 5 am, but I did my best.

Of course, after the initial excitement, we had to stick it out for the speeches. I really liked McCain’s and appreciated how he focused on the historic achievement of this election.

Up to that point, I had been really happy, but the weight of it all hadn’t really hit me. However, when I saw the new President-Elect Obama walk out on the stage in Grant Park, in my home city in front of my home crowd, I knew this was for real.

Just seeing him literally brought tears to my eyes. I am NOT a crying kind of person, but at that moment the significance of that day for our country just hit me, and I was so proud to have been a part of this election and to see the joy and hope in so many faces across America and around the world.

I was even more impressed when I heard his speech. The story about the 106 year old voter really touched me. For those of you who didn’t hear it, Obama spoke about a 106 year old African American women who had voted that day in the election. He talked about how much our country has changed in her one lifetime. I am a feminist and a Gender Studies major, so thinking about the fact that there are women still alive in the United States who were not born with the right to vote really made an impact on me as a woman... and I know African Americans felt this even more. Our country really has come SO far in the last 100 years, and as Obama says, this leaves so many amazing possibilities for the next 100 years. I know it might be political rhetoric, but it is based in truth of our country's history, and it made me so proud to be an American in that moment.

At around 6:30 am, we finally started heading back to Alcala. I was still wearing my Obama button, and everywhere we went, Spanish people told us “Congratulations! We are SO happy that Obama won!”

As Spain was just waking up, we even got to deliver the news to some people in the train station and witness their reactions. It was such a proud feeling for me. It seems like Europeans have become so frustrated with America and the Bush administration in recent years, but this election has given them hope. Someone even said, “Good morning! Welcome to the new world!” because the change seemed that dramatic. Yes, it is a time of lots of political hype, and some of it will certainly disappear when the media calms down. However, if we as citizens can keep this sense of hope and commitment to change alive in the US and the world, then the potential for the future is amazing.

Yes, we can : )

If this election has taught us anything, I hope it is that politics ARE important and our voices count. Please don’t let that idea slip away – no matter what your political views are, stay informed and stay active. Let’s keep this new administration accountable, so Obama and our government can achieve all the success the world wishes them.

I hope you all enjoyed watching the election from the States - I would love to hear about it!

"The President of the World" Election 08, live from Europe!

ChristinaL — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 22:52:00 GMT

When I first realized I would be out of the country during my first presidential election as a voter, I was really disappointed. I mean, how exciting must it be to live on an American college campus now?? Every time I get emails from College Democrats or see announcements about the Election Night viewing parties going on around campus, I get a little jealous. However, since moving to Spain, I realized that being abroad during the election is a really cool opportunity. I feel like Americans always wonder about how other countries perceive us (and our politicians) and now I have the perfect chance to find out.

The thing you probably wouldn’t believe is how much foreigners really do care about American politics – especially now during election season. When I moved to Spain, I couldn’t even tell you the name of the Spanish president (it’s Zapatero, for the record), but I was shocked to see Bush, Obama, McCain and Palin on the news here every single day. People here definitely know a lot more about American politics than we know about Europe – they also love to hear about it first person from Americans.

Whenever people find out I am American, this is inevitably followed by one of two questions.

1) “What do you think of Bush?”

2) “Who is going to win the election?”

To the first question, it is appropriate to tell your new European pal, “Don’t worry, we don’t like Bush either.” This will immediately cement your friendship….ha, but in seriousness, they don’t seem to like Bush or the war in Iraq too much.

When it comes to the second question, you better believe that they want to hear about Barack Obama. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but in a recent poll of Spaniards, something like 70% of them said they want Obama to win.

I don’t know if you’ll even believe how excited people are here about Obama. They talk about him all the time and he is constantly on the news. When I went to Barcelona, I even saw Obama posters in the store fronts.

During our Barcelona trip, we had everyone from drag queens in a bar to museum officials ask us if we were voting for Obama. When I told them that yes, I was an Obama supporter, the women in the museum said, “Thank God!” and went off on a rant about how much Sarah Palin scares them.

Tonight, on Mira Quien Baile – Spain’s version of Dancing with the Stars – one of the judges took a Spanish song with the lyrics “O Mama!” and changed it into an impromptu serenade of “Obama!” Everyone joined in singing and clapping and I swear this lasted for at least three solid minutes of singing Obama’s name over and over. People here already seem to be celebrating Obama as the new president. I really hope that they’re right, but I know that no matter what kind of lead he has, Americans still need to turn out and vote tomorrow before we can say anything.

Tomorrow we are having a mock election at my school – which the Madrid tv and radio stations are coming to cover! There will be one tally of the American student’s votes and another of the Spaniard’s. My friend Nate is pretty sure he will be the only one voting for McCain. I think he may be right – a group of American college students and Spaniards almost guarantees a Barack victory.

My history professor is so excited to get to “vote.” He told me that he thinks the whole world should get to vote in this election, because it affects everyone, not just Americans.

My German friend advocates the same idea… he actually thinks that results of the election are MORE important to the rest of the world than to us. “Either candidate’s domestic policies will be the same for you at home,” he told me. “But the way the Democrats and Republicans handle international policy makes a big difference to us.” I disagree that the parties don’t make a difference at home, but it is interesting that he feels this way.

In any case, no matter what your political opinions are, I hope you take advantage of being around during this historic election. It’s really cool to see our country – and the international community – get so excited about politics.

I will leave you with a thought from my Spanish art history prof:

“The president of the United State is essentially the president of the world. Choose wisely.”

The world is watching you today – exercise your privilege as an American citizen and VOTE!

Why Midterms are Worse than Finals

ChristinaL — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 17:50:00 GMT

Well, friends, it’s that time of year again… midterms! I believe that Butler had them last week (during Homecoming? bad planning) but here in Spain, I have them tomorrow and Thursday.

Midterms always stress me out more than anything else… it is the time of year when I am most likely to stay up late into the night hyped up on Cherry Coke and surrounded by notecards, papers and highlighters. As an English major, I don’t usually even have that many exams, but I always have lots of papers to write.

I have to write papers for my finals, too, so you might be asking, why would midterms be worse? Aren’t those supposed to be less comprehensive? Well, in theory yes. However, finals week is completed devoted to exams – aka no classes and you get a reading day before they begin. They also happen at the end of the semester when all the club activities and campus life is winding down. Finals Week is like vacation! Sure, you have to study a lot, but you don’t have to wake up for your 8 am class and you don’t have club meetings scheduled from 5:30 to 11 pm.

Midterms, on the other hand, come on top of everything else in your normal life – and mine is already full enough. Now, this semester abroad, I only have four classes and I am only in one club. You would think I would have tons of free time and midterms would be a breeze, right? False.

I would have been fine if I had stayed around Alcalá all weekend to study… but when you weigh studying at home with weekend in Barcelona, Barca always wins. My friends and I promised each other we were going to camp out in a park or on the beach in Barcelona to hit the books and cram for our art history exam… but Barcelona is one of the most exciting cities in the world, and we pretty much scheduled every minute with not-so-much room for studying left. However, we did go to the National Museum of Catalan Art and saw five of the paintings that our on our exam…so that counts, right?

I thought, no worries, I’ll just study when I get home… which would probably be easier if I wasn’t so tired from four days in Barcelona. Last night I fell asleep on my nineteenth century short stories at 8:30 pm. After several attempts to wake myself up, I gave in and went to bed at 9 pm. Love it. (Although I did have bad dreams about taking the AP Calculus test, even though I did that three years ago... I certainly hope this midterm isn’t like THAT!)

I woke up at 6 am feeling quite rested and ready to study. I’ve been working on an intense study guide and some art flash cards all day. Hopefully memorizing the names of Spanish paintings from 15,000 BC to the 17^th century won’t be so bad… As we say here, no pase nada! No big deal.

Happy studying! J

I miss you most of all, my darling...

ChristinaL — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:39:00 GMT

Are any of you familiar with the old jazz tune "Autumn Leaves"?

When I was in the Bluecoats colorguard this summer, it was our corps song, so I got to know the words quite well. My favorite is the line "I miss you most of all, my darling, when autumn leaves start to fall."

Well, autumn leaves are starting to fall in Indiana, and here I am at the halfway point of my semester in Spain. I can't believe I've already been here almost two months, and in less than two months I will be packing up and heading home. Anyway, it's about that point in the trip where some of the magic has worn off. We no longer feel like we have all the time in the world here... and with midterms next week, we really don't have all the leisure time we thought we did.

I'm also starting to feel a little homesick for the first time. Not in a big way. I don't want to come home... but I do wish that I could eat at my favorite Mexican restaurant with my parents, or that I could just pick up my cell phone and call my best friends.

Also, to go along with the Autumn Leaves theme, I miss AUTUMN most of all when autumn leaves start to fall in Indiana, and not Spain! For the most part, the weather here is warmer and I love it, but today was cold and rainy and felt like fall... but minus the beautiful yellow trees that we have on campus.

I absolutely love fall and spring on Butler's campus. During the winter, I won't lie, I'm pretty grouchy about having to walk through the snow or wind to get to class (a whole 6 minutes... yeah, my life is rough haha). But during fall and spring I am just in love with campus. I study outside on the mall, and I drink my coffee out on the patio and I take the long route if it means walking through Holcomb Gardens to see all the pretty trees. I miss that. I miss wearing a hoodie and a scarf and walking by the football game. I miss going to the corn maze with the Student Foundation. I miss my best friend Betsy's obession with pumpkins.

I'm also a little sad to be missing out on Homecoming this week. It's one of the times at Butler that is filled with tradition, activities and general college chaos. It is almost midnight here in Spain, which makes me think of Midnight Snack that will be happening in about seven hours Indiana time, when SGA brings in tons of free fast food (Hot Box pizza, Dunkin Donuts, Taco Bell, McD's, oh my)... and now I'm hungry and jealous! ha. I also wish I could be there to see my good friend Jacqui run for Homecoming Queen (best of luck, Q!) and I wish I was there to help out with Pi Phi's lawn decorations (although that did not turn out so well for me last year... haha).

Anyway, Homecoming is SO much fun, but it's also a crazy-busy week to live in a sorority house that is bustling with plywood and paint for the Lawn Decs Workshop and booming with music and clapping as our Yell Like Hell cheerleaders cram in their final practices before the competition.

But, don't you worry... I will find my own chaos in Barcelona this weekend. I hope one of the most culturally-rich cities in the world can rival Butler's Homecoming : )

It's funny... just writing about the things I miss made me feel better. As much as I act like homesickness is for the weak, I'm starting to think it's okay to miss home. If I didn't, it wouldn't really be a good home, would it?? But, the important thing is to know that it will be there when I get back, and for now, I've got a pretty fantastic continent to explore.

I miss you most of all, my Butler darlings! Enjoy fall : )

SURPRISE! Roommates! (aka How to Live with Strangers)

ChristinaL — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 18:50:00 GMT

One question I always get from prospective students is about roommates. This is understandable; most of us have never shared a bedroom with our siblings, much less a perfect stranger.

I have mostly had good experience with my roommates throughout college, but studying abroad seemed a little scary… I mean, I moved into an apartment with two people my grandparent’s age who don’t speak my language! That’s a little different from life at Pi Phi, my sorority house.

That said, it really hasn’t been bad at all. I am actually really enjoying having someone who cooks my meals, does my laundry and gets really excited when I speak Spanish. It is nice to have the feel of a real multi-generation family after living with college students for two years.

However, I was in for another surprise last week when my Spanish mama announced she was going to pick up “las Chinas.” What? You’re going to pick up the Chinese? “Yes, didn’t I tell you? Two Chinese girls are living with us for a month.” Nope… I’m pretty sure I would have remembered that.

So, when I arrived home from a trip that weekend, there were two Chinese girls in my bathroom. Their real names are something along the lines of Jin Xin, but they have been dubbed Lupita and Sonia by my parents (who couldn’t even pronounce “Jared” and definitely have no chance with Chinese.) My padres think the girls don’t speak Spanish very well and so they always ask me to translate or explain things to them… the funny part is that I am pretty sure Lupita and Sonia understand almost all of this dialogue about them not understanding anything. When the padres are not around, the Chinese girls and I have a good laugh about this… the beginning of a fabulous friendship.

This is when I learned that living with strangers is basically the same, whether they’re from China, Spain, or even the same suburb as you.

Here are my tips for getting along:

1) Learn how to share and set up your rules right away.

The Chinese girls shower at night… I shower in the morning. At Pi Phi, we would take turns napping on the couch (and everyone else would nap on the floor pre-school style haha). My Spanish mama reiterates every day: “Turn off the lights and shut the door tightly.” Now that I am the “experienced” one in the study abroad bunch, I am the “Boss of Lights” according to mama. (Yes, she really calls me this.) This means I make sure that all the lights are turned off at night. It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it. So, I turn the lights off, and we all go to sleep happy.

2) Find something you have in common.

My Spanish parents love ballroom dancing, and are huge fans of the show “Mira Quien Baile,” aka Spanish Dancing with the Stars. They even get up and practice their moves during the show! haha. I like dancing too, so we watch this together and have a good laugh.

Sonia and Lupita love American music and talking about boys… so we do it up junior high style and sit on our beds in our pajamas listening to music and having girl talk in Spanglish. (I told them I don’t have a boyfriend and they were like “What!?! We learned in English class that many young Americans have boyfriends. You must be special.” HA! Special… thanks, girls. They crack me up.)

3) Make a peace offering (snacks always do the trick)

My freshman-year roommate and I used to bond over our late night Qdoba queso addiction. My Pi Phi roommates would bring me soup and orange juice when I was sick and we always shared the Cherry Coke when someone’s caffeine supply was running low. I found that this is a cross-cultural phenomenon. The other morning, Sonia came into my room, told me “You are very beautiful,” and handed me an orange and two snacks from China. I think we’re best friends now.

Yeah, living with other people does take some getting used to. But, college is as good a time as any to figure this out. Embrace the late night bonding, be honest about what you need, and please, take your own hair out of the shower. Don’t just survive your roommate experience… open yourself up to meet new friends and love the place you live.