Valencia

We´re nearly done the second phase of the masters and decided that we should take advantage of the Santiago de Compostela long weekend. After some research, we decided to go to Valencia, one of Spain´s larger cities, located on the mediterranean coast.

 Some interesting buildings near the central market

 The entrance to the central market

 Meat vendor in the marker

 Fruit vendor in the market- here we ate fresh figs!

 The cathedral of Valencia

 The science and arts park- the aquarium portion

 The dolphin show!

 DNA

 Adriana and I out for a drink.

 The whole gang- out for tapas. Adriana, me, Kathryn, Paige, Lorena and Steven

 After a day at the beach! My hair was a little crazy!

Pescaito Frito...not my favourite, but worth trying.

Excursión y las tunas

This Sunday we had our last excursion. We went to Ciudad Rodrigo and to Almeida in Portugal.
I am glad the excursions are done and we have a long weekend to organise our own trip. Also on this entry are two videos of las tunas and a picture of la Plaza Mayor.

 This is a picture of a model of a fortress that we were unable to visit. Not really the most interesting part of the trip, but the explanation of the fortress from the guide was ok. In the background (from right to left) you see my classmates Luz, Joy & Teresa.

 The bus that takes us on our trips, with a decal of the façade of the University of Salamanca.

 This is a picture of the fortress ruins in Almeida. The fortress surrounds the city and was interesting to view.

 This is a picture of my friend Myrian, I think she may have been a little annoyed with me. :)

 La catedral de Ciudad Rodrigo.

An image of the Virgin in the patio of the cathedral. 

Videorecording skills are the not the greatest. I apologise. 

These are videos of the tunas in the town square. They are groups of friends from the University of Salamanca who play in the main square on Sunday nights. 

Lastly a picture of the Plaza Mayor de Salamanca. It is probably the nicest in all of Spain.

La Fiesta de San Fermín

This past weekend I had the chance to go to the San Fermín festival, or the running of the bulls. I went with my friends from the program, Adriana, Lorena, Paige, and Steve.
We had a really great time together, as we often do, and were lucky enough to meet up with Paula & Gerardo, Paula will be teaching at RTA for me next year, and Gerardo is her husband.
Paula and her family were more than welcoming and we had such a great time. Because of them I will remember San Fermín for the rest of my life.

This is a picture of the Muralla or city wall around the older part of Pamplona. We walked along it to get to the festivities.

 This is the view of the Calle Principal or mainstreet that the bulls run down. Viewing from a balcony is quite a treat, as most people would watch from behind a fence. Thanks to Paula, we had an excellent view of the Encierro.

 After the Encierro, we went to a dance. We learnt some traditional (and not so traditional dances...Paco el Chocolatero) dances AND it turned out that we ended up appearing on TV afterwards! Someone from one of the tv stations was there to record things.

 San Fermín - the patron of Pamplona

 Dancing worked up quite an appetite, so we went to Paula´s dad´s sociedad, or society. It was a sort of private restaurant in which the members take turns preparing meals for each other. We ate a delicious meal prepared by a friend of Paula´s dad Ángel. In this picture you can see the men of the sociedad playing instruments and singing traditional songs. This was another amazing experience. Thanks Paula!

 This is a picture of all of us after our meal before we left to see the Cabezudos y Gigantes wandering around the city. Paula is in the front at the left, and her husband Gerardo is standing on the left side.

This is a picture of Paula and I before we all left to drive back to Salamanca. Notice we´re wearing the traditional white clothing with red kerchief.

El Convento de San Esteban

Our first excursion with Jesús, our beloved guide here in Salamanca, was to the St. Stephen Monastery, shown here below. The entrance resembles an altar or retablo. It was actually quite interesting to learn the meaning of all the sculptures.

This is a picture from inside the monastery, where you see the courtyard and the cloisters around it. We were only able to go into part of the monastery, but the parts we saw were quite interesting.

 This is taken from the Convent next door. The nuns here have quite a nice view, but again, we were not allowed to see the entire convent, which is too bad, I was hoping to see a nun.

La primera semana

So I am in Spain again completing the second phase of my MA in Spanish language and culture.
I thought it would be neat to start a blog as a record for myself and for my friends back home to know what I have been up to.
I also am hoping to add some pictures, but since I haven´t used my camera yet, that will have to wait.
This year the courses we are taking are
Gramática
Arte Español
Historia, Sociedad y Política
Lingüística
Literatura Hispana
Cultura popular

In addition we also have excursions to locations near Salamanca as well as a film class and tours of various locations of interest in the city.

The first week was full of fun, meeting up with old friends, taking in the sites of Salamanca (Plaza Mayor, La Catedral, los bares y mucho más). We also had some sad news, that Adriana, la mexicana, would not be in our group this time. However, our posse of 4 have a number of adventures planned already.

I´ll try to add some photos in the next little while to make this more interesting. But I would love to read your comments and give this blogging thing a try!