I can feel the sand between my toes, and everywhere else!

Wed. 5/25

All five of the Mizzou interns: Me, Alan, Quinten, Kaitlyn, Jack out on the town.

Someone told me to get up and dance on the banister at some bar so I did (for like 10 seconds).  Allan looks half impressed.

I find dancing a great stress relief sometimes!  Especially if it's alone because no one will throw you off your groove ;)  People prolly thought I was schwasted, but I wasn't!

Today was exhausting!  I didn’t get much sleep last night because after going out on the town and then spending some much needed time to stay in touch with people back home (M).  Who knew working at 10 could be such a challenge!  I guess I could’ve gotten there later because it’s such a relaxed environment and they said I could get there whenever (but the boss gets there at 1030 so I needed to beat him).  I stuck with it though and worked my full day with a 2 hr siesta and mini-nap in the middle (I’m getting used to that ;).

The outside of the office.  It's a really nice office, but the street is kinda run down.

The mid-sized studio

The sound guy's (I dk what they are called) station with the window into the studio.

Being my first full day of work I had the chance to really get my hands dirty with the first project.  What exactly that first project was I didn’t really know.  My position and objectives are kind of vague right now so I’m hoping they’ll sharpen as we go along.  Basically I will be analyzing the website (lucentumdigital.com) and competition’s websites in order to make it completely streamlined and user-friendly while still offering the same mass quantity of information about LD.

I was going to spend the day in my single office, but then I got moved into Jose’s office so eventually I could collaborate with him on the website.  It ended up being a great change of scenery because now I had someone I could converse in Spanish with and easily ask questions to across the desk. 

My first "office" (it's really just one of their interchangeable workstations.

I sit at the big Mac that looms over Jose's little Macbook.

Jose is always smiling and is very patient when talking with me.  He talks really fast (like many other people in Spain) so the words all run together into a blob, but he’s been slowing down some for me.  That’s the real problem with talking in Spanish—you can never be sure what you are hearing and what people are saying because the words and sounds aren’t natural to you.  If I could read the words in little speech bubbles as they came out of their mouths, 90% of my problems would be solved!  Jose even invited me to see how they tested the dubbing equipment in their studio for the afternoon.  They dubbed over a 20 second clip of Monster’s Inc. in Spanish with remarkably precise timing after only a couple of tries (first they run through it saying the Spanish over the English, then they turn the English off when they have the timing down).  Even though the people at LD are great and the work isn’t stressful, I was happy when the day ended and I high-tailed it to the BEACH! 

Sadly, I usually can’t get there til like 6:30 (I know! Woe is me, so many troubles!).  The good thing about getting there late is that it’s not too hot, I don’t need sunscreen, and the sand v-ball court is less crowded.  Today I met Olivear and my German friend Steffan to play against these really good locals who are there every day.  You can just tell they are complete kings of the v-ball court, it’s their turf for sure.  Still, playing 3 on 2 we were able to beat them, but definitely not when just Steffan and I played them.  On the way home I feel like I brought the beach with me, the sand is constantly on the bottom of my feet and in my room no matter what I do.  

There's a massive sand castle and a random giant sand horse next to it on the beach.  This guy spent 3 days making this thing and just sits by it all day with a towel out for donations.  I threw him a Euro (they are so easy to part with when 1 and 2 Euro coins are just change in your pocket).

We were almost the last ones when we left the beach just after 9.  After another lovely dinner from mamá I decided to go to the free showing of Grease (Spanish version) in one the Plazas.  Being under 60, I was definitely in the minority crowd.  Afterwards I treated myself to some Teramisú gelato (E) and made the cross-town trek home once again.  We’ll see if I can get a few more winks of sleep tonight.  You can really fill up your day if you want to though (esp. when half of it is walking).  There’s just too much fun to be had and too little time!  

Adios,

Cóle

These are other cool pics I got off Facebook:

A good view of the bull fighting ring at the Plaza de Toros.

Part of Alicante at night.

On the pier there's this gaudy casino that clashes with all the other nice Mediterranean architecture.  It even has these tacky columns plopped in front of it to pay tribute to Mizzou!

The castle at night

View of Alicante through the columns and down the pier.

Those crazy visiting fans from the soccer match on Saturday.  You can see all the whacky stuff they were, but you can't see the crazy songs and dances. 

Long live España.

Hanging with our fearless teacher Armando after a hard day's work of walking around the city.

My room.  My window looks into a courtyard/cavity of sorts.  I messed up the rolly reed blinds the first day and mamá had to fix them so now I just try to change fast and never close the blinds