Sevilla: Where unicorns and dinosaurs do exist...

Waking up is brutal, really brutal. You know how when you were a little kid and you wanted to sleep a few more minutes you could manage to get your mother to drive you to school even though she really didn't want to? Well here, that's not an option. I guess if you want, you could pay for a taxi, but I'm only doing that for an emergency situation. So here, when the final alarm goes off, we're up. Between the two us, I'd say we have 8 alarms. We think this slowly helps us get up... a theory I have been a supporter of for years upon years, but really, its crap. The minute you hit snooze, you are zonked out again and the next alarm sucks just as much as the first.

Yesterday we had to wake up early to go hiking. We expected sunny skies and warm weather like we have had the past 2 weeks. But no, life can't be that good. I was wearing 3 sweatshirts and a northface jacket, leggings and sweat pants, gloves and a hood, and I was freezing my ass off. Some people didn't bring coats. No I'm sorry, just one friend, but a tour guide gave her a big jacket to wear. But honestly, no one was prepared for how cold it really was outside. We all had to stand in a circle for our "warm up." Our guide had a thick accent so when he said the following word... it sounded like: wannnn. Wan? Was that "one" or "when?" We all looked confused. He said everyone turn to your right and say wannnn (while stroking the back of the person you are facing.) So we did. Then turn to the other side. Group: "Wannnn." We were all mocking him. Then he said now turn and say, "Wannnn, two." Oh! One, two. You were saying "one"!? So we stroked each others backs and kept counting, exaggerating how to say the word "one" of course. By the end I think it was to warm each other up. Strange.

Most of the hike was pretty easy, more of a stroll through the mud. We walked through 4 towns total. They were all really quaint and none of our friends could figure out who the hell would live there, but all of the locals looked like normal, happy people. In our first town, there was some big drinking thing with supposedly the best tasting water ever. I tasted it... it didn't even come close to Aquafina's standards. Then, we took a few more steps around a corner and there was a little boy holding a baby Maltese... a baby Opal!! I couldn't control myself. I followed that boy right into the bar and had to get a better look. It seriously was the cutest puppy I have ever seen. There were dogs everywhere on our hike. We would come to an old rusty fence and right behind it would be a beautiful dog tied to a tree. It broke my heart. One of the guys on my trip jumped the fence and immediately the dog starting crying it was so happy. He rolled over and just cried and cried and cried and just wanted to be loved. It was hard leaving that one. Then we came to another dog, same thing. Just wanted to be loved. I think I took more pictures of dogs than of any nature pictures on the trip. Oh well, I really miss my Opal. Every time the guy on my trip would jump over the fence, I could only think about one thing: tetanus, tetanus, tetanus.

We finally got to a harder part of the trail. There were lots of rocks and mud and you really had to watch where you were stepping. In front of me was Catherine and one of our tour guides. His English was pretty good, but he kept having to ask our CIEE rep what certain words meant. He started telling us some story about religion.. and the color white. Me the jokester says, "The KKK?" Clearly a joke. The guy goes, "No, not the KKK!" He kept saying different words and finally he said "Hitaly." A mixture of Hitler and Italy if you didn't catch that one. "Ooooooh, the Pope!" 2 seconds later, I hear the word "otter" come out of his mouth. Seriously, what story includes the Pope and an otter? I turn around to look at the guys behind me. We are all giving each other the, "what the fuck???" face when all of a sudden, I stop looking down, my ankle rolls because of a rock, and I fall down right into this plant that is practically a cactus. FELT WONDERFUL! And wow was this a fall. You know when you fall it feels like you're falling for a good minute? This was like a fall, and then another fall. The worst part is, is that I was wearing gloves so the thorns were still on my glove. This guy on my trip reached out to help me up and I grabbed his hand with the thorn hand. Ughhh, I felt so bad, but he was okay. My hand on another note..... I have 20 prickly black things in my hand. When I got home Pepi went to town with her needle trying to get them out. She didn't do that great of a job so I will be sneaking down tonight for her needle, but she was very motherly. She made sure I had the blanket on my lap to keep warm, grabbed my hand, and went to it. Screaming in agony is universal I guess, but nothing was stopping her. My head was definitely on her shoulder at some point. Today, the palm of my right hand looks like its been through a war or that I have some strange red rash on it. Looks great.

But back to this hike. After I fell, oh and Catherine fell, we continued on  our way. We saw some crazy animals, by the way. We saw donkeys that were insanely big. The face was scary big, and looked fake. Then, we came to these huge bulls. They were so big, that they legitimately could have been dinosaurs. I'm  not exagerating. My camera wasn't really capturing their size too well so I don't have any good pictures, but believe me, monsters were roaming the land of Huelva. Then we came across a unicorn! Okay, fine, not a unicorn but this beautiful white horse in the middle of nowhere. It was a unicorn in my book.

After the dogs, donkeys, dinosaurs, and unicorns, we got to pick our own orange from an orange tree. Everyone was trying to take pictures of themselves jumping in the air. I had a little success thanks to my friends. Unfortunately no one had a napkin so we all had really sticky fingers. I licked one of mine, BIG mistake. Tasted like poison. Mmmm yum.

After leaving the last town we we were on to the last part of a hike. We're standing in this little courtyard, we look up, and there's this big white sculpture thing on the mountain. Great, we were hiking directly up a mountain. I should've peed, I should've had some coffee, but no, I'm not that smart. So we started the hike and everyone's breathing became very heavy very quickly. I thought I was at track practice, sophomore year, all over again. You know when it hurts so bad, your heart is racing so quickly, your breathing is heavy, and you think you can't go on? That was me... and everyone else. Somehow we made it to the top. My thighs and ass were burning from that work out. I can't wait for tomorrow, day 2 sore is always worse than day 1 for me. We took some lame pictures at the top and then got back on the bus and passed out. We hiked for 6 hours total. It was a really, really long day.

This morning Marissa and I both woke up (after the 20 alarms) and were miserable. We both were having weird dreams. Today was our first day at University de Pablo Olavide aka UPO. We took the metro there and it was much shorter of a ride than we expected. We all had to take a placement test for Spanish. In my book, this was stupid. We already took a placement test that took 3 hours, we had a Spanish interview on top of that so we would be placed into the right Spanish class. Then we had our Intensive Session where after the first day you could move up a level if you choose. Then we completed the class and had tests. Why do we need yet another placement exam?? The test wasn't too bad, but of course I screwed up the end. There were 2 open ended questions. The last question said something about 'What would you do if you came home and someone had broken into your house?" The way it was worded, I only knew the word "house." Great, just great. At this point I had to guess so genius me guessed that it was saying something about our house here in Sevilla. So I answered a question about a break-in with "Pepi serves a lot of soup. The house has many floors. It is very cold." These people are going to laugh their asses off when they see my answer. Oh well, it doesn't matter in the end. A lot of people need to move up because they need the credits. For me, whatever Spanish class I take will count for an Arts or Humanities credit. At least I'll give someone a chuckle from my response...

11:00, and we are starving like usual. We had to stop for some montaditos (cute little sandwiches.) But when lunch time came, I was struggling. Nap time is going to be unbelievable right now.

The weather is supposed to be getting much nicer this week, and we have started planning our travel plans. It's amazing having a conversation like this,"Well, let's just go to Paris this week and to Prague next weekend." I really feel so lucky to be here. Europe for 5 months is going to fly by, but I have never been so excited before in my entire life. This place really does feel like home, and I don't know how I'm ever going to leave here. Don't worry, my non refundable ticket will be used on May 21st for sure, but it's going to be hard dragging me to the airport. Well, I'm warm in my bed and Marissa's snoring is making me jealous so I must close my eyes for a bit. Hasta manana!

I also added pictures to all of the other entries so please scroll all the way to the bottom to see them!