regrettable

Hey Everyone,

As you can tell I'm not doing very well at keeping up with my blogging.  I have two full weeks worth of adventures to chronicle for you all!  Unfortunately I have been under a huge time crunch lately and cannot do my blogs justice at this point.  At the moment, I'm busy with writing final papers and exams for my class and preparing for my trip to Italy which starts when I leave Spain tomorrow evening! I won't take my computer.

The point is I will not have time to blog until I return home, but I still plan on getting everything in here.  I will try to let you know when I finish posting everything so you can read up if you're interested.

Hasta Luego,
Cóle

First week of classes... + mucho más

My new 'do!

Monday 7/11 – Thursday 7/14

Monday

We had our first day of classes today!  I missed my mom being there to coerce us into posing for those first-day-of-school pictures ;).  I did wear a special outfit.  Quinten and I donned our Pamplona gear (white clothes and red bandana and sash).  It was mostly for fun, partly for a conversation-starter, and a bit to show off that we had been running with the bulls that weekend, haha.  It definitely worked because I was telling people about our adventure in Pamplona throughout the day and one girl remarked that she prolly won’t be able to remember me tomorrow when I don’t have my white outfit anymore. 

I got up a bit early to have breakfast.  It’s nothing special hear at the Villa.  There’s always a choice of peach, pineapple, or orange juice, bread with meat and cheese you can turn into a sandwich, and then a choice of a pastry: croissant w/ jelly, chocolate-filled roll if you are lucky, and chocolate doughnut if you are really lucky.  They also had cereal (which I love) but it was only one flavor at a time (usually crappy corn flakes) and the milk was hotter than room temp.  After b-fast we met especially early at 8:30 am in the lobby to walk over to classes together in the middle of the campus.  I was really looking forward to seeing what classes were like and meeting all the Spanish students we would be studying with.

We kicked-off the program with a joint welcome session where they introduced us to the program, the building, and the way things would work.  I purposely sat next to no American students and quickly met some cool Spanish students.  I found out there are a lot of other international students from France, Austria, Italy, Scotland, Sweden, and Canada.  From there I went to the first class I would have from 9-11 Monday through Thursday: Managing in a Digital World with Mizzou professor Antoni Stam (one of three options from 3 Mizzou professors).  He’s a genial character whose defining characteristic is the incredible amount of sweat he manages to impart to his shirt throughout the day.  Before class he emailed all of us welcoming us to the class and asking us to respond with a joke.  Here was mine:

            Why is six afraid of seven? ……. Because seven eight a bucket of worms.

Don’t think to hard on that one.  Stam asked me my reasoning and I said I wanted to throw a curve ball at people who were expecting the old classic.  He said, “I think you are going to do well in my class.”  Next we had a 30-minute break where we had chocolate donettes (M), wafer cookies, and coffee before heading into our other two our class.  Second I had International Marketing with Professor Mayo from Alicante University.  We have group projects in both classes, so we had to decide our groups already.  I ended up being stuck in a random group because everybody split off to fast and left my several new friends and me alone to be divided among the other groups in order to make sure they had a mix of all nationalities.  Mayo told us that she always observed that the Spanish students were always to shy and didn’t take initiative, so that’s why so many of them ended up group-less (I couldn’t be with them because we needed a mix).  Also, in both classes, especially Mayo’s, I found some Spanish friends to get to know.  We’ll switch off between English and Spanish now and then and help each other with some words.  All the international students speak English really well (except for the Scottish guy, haha) because they have to in order to survive the class.  

I prolly took a siesta this afternoon.  It’s hard remembering details now that I’m writing these things 1.5 weeks later (exactly what I didn’t want to happen.  In the evening after class we had a rigorous soccer match outside the dorm.  I’m really glad I bought my soccer ball here because it will be perfect to play with at the dorms since no one else has one.  It hasn’t got to roughed up on the hard court so far, so hopefully it will endure.  The only thing is the ball rolls at lightning speed and the shots are like rockets on the hard surface. 

That night we went to the water-themed bar across the street with water cascading down the windows.  It was a low-key place and we basically made up the whole crowd.  I had fun playing pool and they also had foosball and darts.  I didn’t spend any money except for what the pool games, so that was good, and I went home fairly early.

Rebecca, Me and Stephanie posing after one of my pool victories no doubt.  At least one game we had was ridiculously sloppy.  I think each team lost twice before we got all the balls cleared (we just pretended it didn't happen).

Cole, Zach (SM), Mohsen (SM), and Stephanie at the water bar right across from our dorm.  It's so much more convenient and relaxed than going down to the barrio.  Also, I love the bar games that I can stay busy with if necessary.

Tuesday

After breakfast we found out that our classroom building had been changed to one that had air conditioning (Prof. Stam was very thankful).  The coffee snack break between classes is quickly becoming the best part of the morning.  In the heat of the afternoon we played soccer because that night we left for a class trip to the neighboring towns of Guadalest and Altea at 4:30 that afternoon.  In the coach bus I tried to read some articles to keep up with my homework.  It was weird having assignments I had to think about to muddle up my free time now!  Unfortunately, lots of Mizzou girls playing an entertaining, but distracting game of Would You Rather squelched my concentration.  I’m also pretty sure the whole bus could hear the disturbing questions with how loud they talked.  We have a lot of fun characters in our program.  That’s really not sarcastic.  I like everyone in our group a lot.  Almost all are very friendly and really know how to have a good time.  It’s been even easier getting to know the people in our group than I expected.  I was afraid I might be on the outside of some of the cliques, but everyone has been pretty open and sociable so far.  It helps that we are a fairly concentrated group and are always doing one thing or another with each other.

After climbing through the mountains to arrive at Guadalest I immediately fell in love with the beautiful mountain town.  We were told it was the most visited “town” in Spain and I could see why.  We climbed this perfect little castle perched above the town and surrounded by cliffs on 3 sides.  The view of the valley below was astounding with its vibrant blue lake and surrounding mountains.  I would’ve loved jumping in that lake or climbing through those mountains!  Unfortunately, we had to leave after only like 40 minutes because we had to move on to Altea.

Sitting on the wall of the Castle at Guadalest.  I'm really bummed I can't load on my pictures I took of the beautiful scenery right now.  Check back after the next post and hopefully they'll be up.  The beauty of the countryside was breathtaking! 

Bros.

The castle ramparts.

I wish I would’ve known that we were taking a class trip to Altea because then Quinten and wouldn’t have needed to go on that Sunday trip there.  However, the class definitely didn’t get the full experience of Altea, because we only had about an hour to spend there.  I enjoyed seeing the beautiful artsy city again.  Quinten and I looked for our friends from the art studio, but they were not home.  Then we joined some of our Spanish friends for dinner and we got to know a couple new classmates as well.  The table split a pitcher of Sangria and Quinten and I split a kebap pizza. 

Back in San Vicente I decided to skip the Tuesday night ritual for the first time.  I went to the store to pick up some shower gel and then spent a relaxing night in the dorm chilling, chatting, and laughing with a couple friends.

Wednesday

Today was the same old routine in the morning.  I was finally able to meet with David and Pepi again.  It’s always good to be able to go over to their place and have a nice conversation.  They were very interested to hear about Pamplona and all the changes of the past week.  We looked up clips of the running-of-the-bulls online.  If you wanna check it out here’s the link: http://www.rtve.es/noticias/san-fermin/ . Go down to Sanfermines 2011: los encierros día a día and choose Sábado 9 de Julio (this was the one I ran in).  Unfortunately, I missed out on soccer that night visiting D & P.  I think a lot of my friends thought it was cool that I was still in connection with some friends I had met from before the program.

When I was bored in class once I drew the network of friends I met during my internship.  I might be missing some connections, but I tried to limit it to only the people I talked with and hung out with. 

I finished my book, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, today.  It was very interesting and I recommend it as long as you aren’t looking for a happy-go-lucky feel-good book.

We have been having a bit of trouble with the lunch staff at the cafeteria lately.  I think it all started when one of our guys “cussed out” one of the lunch ladies because she wouldn’t let him get any food at b-fast and he was tired and hungry.  This kind of gave our group a bad rep w/ the staff and ever since then they started being incredibly stingy with our food.  We have always had strange restrictions on what sorts of plates we can get on our tray.  We are allowed a 1^st plate (a salad or something like paella, pasta, meatballs, soup, cannelloni, chicken, fish with bones, beans and potatoes, Spanish tortilla, ham croquets, arroz cubano etc.) and then a second plate (with very similar options), and a side serving of carrots, zuchinni, onion rings, potatoes, etc. (people say all the meals are just a bunch of carbs).  We can never switch the 1^st and 2^nd plate options.  Now that we are on bad terms though, the staff is constantly pestering us to bring our lunch cards and trying to refuse us service.  They won’t let us get a water without going through the whole food line.  We can only have one water (our only drink option) and one item of fruit/desert.  They watch us like hawks and if we try to get two they either yell at us or take it out of our hands.  At one point they also tried to take away our olive oil and then said we could only use it for salads and not the bread rolls that are the one thing that are always abundant.  Thus, eating and getting your fill has become much more stressful and requires more stealth cunning than it should.  I’m always looking for an opening when the staff is distracted or in the back to sneak an extra water (especially after an exhausting soccer game).

Even though they told us July was the hottest time, it hasn’t really gotten much above 90 at the peak and it’s very comfortable at night.  Time really seems to fly by here.  I always am busy and I always am tired.  My first weeks at the Villa have been much more jam-packed with stuff than I expected.  You can prolly realize this just by how bad I’ve been about blogging.  Catching up on sleep often wins over catching up on blogging when I happen to have a bit of free time.  It prolly has less to do with the fact that there’s so much to do here and more to do with the fact that I will fill my days to the brim with activities, tasks, and adventures no matter where I am.  I could prolly find a lot of free time if I didn’t already feel guilty for staying in my room and working on my computer or sleeping as much as I do (which isn’t a lot, but when people are always doing things around you it feels like a lot).  Typically, the afternoons disappear after class and before you know it you are eating dinner and deciding whether you want to go out or do something like stay in and watch a movie.  This particular night I was able to practice slacklining some more after it was nice and cool.

Thursday

I had a big scare this morning when I found there were no cookie tables set up during our break.  Luckily they wheeled them out halfway through the break and I pounced on my prey.  I have even become a fan of the coffee, much less for its taste than it’s stimulating qualities.  The cups are quite small and I still fill half of them with milk and then dump in a whole pack of sugar to make the coffee drinkable.  We had our first test today in one of my classes (after 3 classes).  As I was saying good-bye to my Spanish friends for the weekend Amaia asked me what I was going to do special for Monday since this Monday I came in my Pamplona outfit and she told me that she had high expectations.  It’s funny how I always manage to get this reputation for dressing in quite interesting manners and have heard many times that I have the “best” or “coolest” wardrobe (including once on this trip, even though my closet is very limited).  Maybe people should just be a little more creative and wild with their own wardrobe and then I won’t stand out as much.  I didn’t tell Amaia, but I knew I was going to surpass her expectations when I saw her next Monday.

By the end of class I’m always looking forward to lunch.  After lunch I asked Quinten to lend his stylish expertise and give me a poppin new haircut with his guardless razor in my bathroom.  I figured I don’t really need a professional looking haircut for anything in the near future so why not get a convenient free haircut and have some fun.  That afternoon I went to San Juan (which is double far now that we are at the Villa outside Alicante) with Quinten and Lauren to meet a larger group there.  After the group got over the initial surprise of my haircut and complimented the bold choice I played some paddleball and had some nice deep talks with some friends among the waves.

We left the beach just in time for me to catch the last half of soccer back at the Villa.  Then after dinner I went out to slackline and invited Julie who had been very enthusiastic to try the odd sport.  Her spirit has not dampened at all by the initial difficulty of even standing on the line and by the end of the 2ish hours we were out there she had gotten a good grasp on her first couple steps.  I was doing particularly well that night as well and was walking the line fairly easily myself and getting about halfway going backwards.  It was extra fun when some of the passing friends stopped by and we hung out and they tried the line and chilled before a crazy weekend in Barcelona.  That night I got very little sleep after packing and tying up different loose ends before the weekend (and prolly trying to blog a lot).  It’s all good cuz I’ve got a 5-hour train ride to sleep tomorrow!  


Hasta Luego,
Cóle


FYI, the next post will prolly won't be up til Mon. afternoon since I'm getting back from Morocco/Madrid Monday early morning.  Maybe someday I'll be less than a week in the hole!

A TWO-FACE weekend

 I hiked up to an overlook of Barcelona.  On my way up I was interested in this homeless couple who had set up a permanent bed (mattress and all) in the shadows of the staircase.

Thursday 7/7 – Sunday 7/10

I began my four-day weekend with my overnight bus ride to Barcelona.  It was decently comfortable in all respects but the legroom, and I managed to get a couple hours of sleep.  When I arrived around 10 I had to check the Internet café in the bus station to see if my friend in Brussels had given me any updates on his plans for the weekend and whether I could stay with him or he would be leaving.  He still didn’t know, so I was still flying by faith. 

I grabbed a map of Barcelona, mapped out a route for the more atypical sights that I figured our group would not bother going to see the next weekend (so I wouldn’t be revisiting a bunch of the city when I returned to Barcelona with my friends), and spent the morning walking through various monuments and museums.  I had the feeling that there was a beautiful monument worth a snapshot on every corner.  Even when there weren’t monuments around, the huge buildings had such fascinating old-fashioned architecture and incredibly majestic designs that you could never get tired of looking at them.  I did ton of walking today and feel like I was able to pack a lot into the 8 hours I had to kill between my bus arrival and my flight to Brussels. Again, I will let my pictures and captions do most of the talking.

even the bus station looks cool.

the massive Arc de Triomf

I admired the sweet light fixtures that flanked the whole walkway down to the arc along with the palm trees

This giant thing was in the middle of this park.  There were cool winged lions spewing water, a nice waterfall within the flowers and a sculpture of golden horses on the top!

Government building

Chocolate sculpture!

The arc in chocolate!

More chocolate!

St. Mary's Basilica

This isn't even the famous church in Barcelona

Outside the Cathedral where I ate my Kebap lunch and imagined how a dirty thief might want to sneak up behind me and steal my backpack while I eat.

Sweet monument in the middle of a roundabout

Poble Espanyol was this place I went into where there were shops, artisans, and restaurants from all the regions of Spain.  The bus driver I caught a ride up the hill with really recommended it along with some website.  I like some old-fashioned stuff, but frankly this place was pretty boring.  It might be nicer if I was a 60-year-old lady.  I still tried my best to appreciate it though and went to every shop.  There were some interesting places, but it wasn't really up my alley.  Luckily the ticket, like many others, was discounted because I was a student.

two more columns and I would be at Mizzou!  Sadly the place called Magic Fountain I'm in front of was not turned on.  It woulda been so cool!

I climbed up a ton of stairs to the entrance of this national Catalan art museum.  I didn't go in.  Instead I flipped through some souvenir book with pictures of all the art at a gift stand.  I think I got the gist.  The grand staircases and view was well worth it. 

I walked by this huge "Harley Days" festival.

Plaza de Espanya.  Their bullring is on the left.

Barcelona was certainly a wonderful city with a lot of character.  I feel like most cities in the U.S. are so blah compared to all the cities in Europe (Spain specifically).  I suppose they do have several hundred years head start.  Nowadays it seems the craftsmanship and artistry of urban architecture has devolved into plain modern buildings that use unique designs as a façade to cover their lack of detail and cheap-as-possible construction.  To clarify, I mostly observed the “casco antiguo” (old neighborhood) of Barcelona where all the great buildings and monuments are concentrated, so it definitely wasn’t a representative sample of the whole city.

Around 6:00 I caught the express bus from the beautiful Plaza Espanya to the airport to ensure I had plenty of time to catch my flight at 8:25.  I got to Brussels just in time to help my friend celebrate her birthday that night.  I spent the last 3 days of the weekend hanging with my Mizzou friends, sharing stories of our adventures abroad, meeting more friends in the Mizzou program, visiting the beautiful sights in the capital city of Belgium, and chowing down on all the waffles and chocolate I could handle.

Some town square

Grand Palace?

definitely a waffle

At least that’s how I wished the weekend could’ve turned out.  Instead I realized 2 minutes in to my bus ride that I was on the bus to the wrong airport.  Not only that, but my airport (Reus) was an hour outside of Barcelona and the airport I was speeding towards (El Prat) was outside Barcelona in the other direction.  Both had been under the title of Barcelona on my airline’s website and   I got that sickening panicky feeling in my stomach as I frantically scrambled to think up ways to get out of my pickle.  The lady next to me was very sweet and gave me some advice on what to do.  She even asked the bus driver who said I could not make it to my airport in time.  The next thing I tried was asking a taxi how much the fare to Reus would be; 150 Euros made that a no-go.  I am pretty sure if I had either taken the regular non-express bus that I could’ve gotten off right when I realized I was wrong or just had 15 more minutes I could have taken the buses all the way to Reus in time, but such is life.  When I had resigned myself to the fact that I would not catch my flight I talked to the RyanAir ticket office and they told me I could book another flight to Brussels or pay a 100 Euro missed flight fee to be put on the next flight at 10:15.  Neither of those sounded very appealing.  I checked the fares on other airlines and my luck was no better.  By then I was seriously considering scrapping the whole trip so as I was online at some Internet café checking online fares I was talking to my friend who was the birthday girl in Brussels.  She told me the guy I was staying with did decide to go out of town and admitted there would not be enough sights to see in Brussels to fill up three days if I was just going to be there by myself.  That was the nail in the coffin that made my decision to cut my losses and head back to Alicante. 

I was not in a good mood to say the least as I drug myself on the bus to head back into Barcelona.  I felt defeated and my spirit was broken in a sense.  I was over taking chances,  I was over being independent, I was done going out of my way to see people, and I was definitely done traveling alone. 

Luckily the return time on my bus ticket was open, but when I went to authorize it at the ticket office I saw that the next bus didn’t leave for Alicante until 7 am.  It was 10:30 pm.  I felt like a homeless bum as I sought out a dormant massage chair to curl up in and try to find a couple hours of sleep.  To my dismay I woke up to police patrolling through the bus station with a police dog kicking everyone out.  I then joined a handful of people as we meandered outside and took up spots on the concrete benches near the platforms.  I really felt like a bum then as I laid down and got as comfortable as I could on a concrete bench and tried to sleep some more.  Twice during the night I woke up in a panic.  The first time I patted my chest and felt my heart sink as I realized my grandpa’s travel pouch with my wallet and passport was not there underneath my shirt.  After several seconds I realized it had merely swung around to my back.  Then I woke up searching in a frantic haze for my backpack, which I soon realized I had been using as a pillow.  I think I was so on edge because of all the horror stories I had heard about Barcelona being the pick pocketing capital of the world.  I had been paranoid the whole day, and trying to sleep out in the open around all these shady characters was not helping matters.  The whole night was really a surreal experience.  It was like I was caught in limbo between being asleep and awake and I never really knew what to do with myself.  On the bus ride back I was finally able to get a bit of cramped, but peaceful sleep. 

Friday

I was very relieved to get back to Alicante to my own room and my provided meals even though I felt like I had wasted the weekend.  Thankfully Quinten and his suitemate Ryan were also in the dorm that weekend (the only two of 43 who had not left to travel).  For some reason, as glad as I was to be home, when back at my room I had the urge to start looking up bus tickets to Pamplona where the running of bulls was going on.  Quinten, Allan and I had contemplated taking a trip to Madrid and Pamplona this weekend before we decided to go our separate ways.  To my surprise tickets there and back were only 67 Euros and left in 3 hours.  I posed this impromptu adventure to Quinten and Ryan who quickly agreed and within an hour we were off to Pamplona.  This time it was a 10-hour bus ride in a smaller bus with zero legroom, but it was still an overnighter.  On the bus we did run into my two Deltasig friends from Wash U., so that was a crazy coincidence.  They just happened to be going to Pamplona for the day on their way out of Spain and we decided to join forces. 

Saturday

We got to Pamplona at 5:30 am and immediately witnessed the chaos that engulfed the city during the 9-day running-of-the-bulls festival they call “San Fermín.”  Side note: it’s actually only English speakers who call it running-of-the-bulls.  This makes sense that the Spanish don’t use this term because they call a standard bullfight “corrida de los toros” or “bull run” (which definitely confused me when I went to a bull fight).  For the 9-day festival the cities population explodes to 5 times it’s normal 200,000, the streets are full of people 24/7, alcohol is cleared off the shelves as people drink continuously all day, garbage crews work overtime in vain to clear the litter of broken glass and beer cans and mitigate the stench of puke and urine, and the city receives the spotlight of the world. 

We went up through the packed bus station where there were 20X the amount of sleeping people in Barcelona and came out from underground to see a huge grassy field covered with litter and smattered with sleeping (passed out?) bodies.  It was unlike anything I had ever experienced with the unrelenting mass of people and the wild nonstop partying and the climax of cheating death each morning as you run through the blocked-off narrow cobblestone streets with a pack of bulls.  Since there were people everywhere going every direction, we had a tough time making our way through the crowd and even determining where the running of the bulls (which they called the “encierra”) was going to take place.  Along our way we found one of the many people selling the red San Fermín bandanas and sashes and used those to accessorize our uniform of white and feel like legit San Ferminers. Eventually we found a place for Kathyrn, Caitlyn, and Ryan to watch the encierra (and hold our backpacks) as Quinten and I slipped through the opening in the fence and in to the alley where the bulls would soon run.  Even though anyone could run who wanted to I felt honored and “special” to be in front of the crowd down in the alley with all the other crazies. 

The packed bus station.

The packed streets

The packed grassy field 

more people and trash. Fascinating!  These people who stay for multiple days really do live in complete squalor.  They get their white clothes brown from the bullring dirt and red from the wine they quirt on their faces, sleep (or pass out) outside in the trash, and wake up in their same clothes to do it all again.

If I had to guess I would say the bull run from the pen to the plaza de toros (bullring) was only .75-1.0 miles long.  We weren’t at the very front, but we definitely had the majority of the run ahead of us including the sharp Dead Man’s Curve (you need to hug the insides of the turns because the bulls have a tendency to slip when turning and pile up on the outside wall) and the most dangerous entrance to the plaza de toros where the street becomes a funnel.  I was getting more anxious as we waited for the start.  Police officers were moving through the runners kicking out people with backpacks and cameras.  I was really worried they were going to make me leave for wearing my Chacos and not close-toed shoes.  I quickly found it was a dumb decision to only bring those shoes not because I couldn’t run in them (I could run great), but because of all the glass on the streets.  Luckily this never came back to bite me.

My feet after the encierra and playing with the bulls.  When I was standing on the fence looking for my friends two girls actually took a picture with my FEET!  Then they offered me a band-aid for my toenail whil the guy they were with tried to pull it off (I slapped his hand, haha).

7:49 and we were talking to fellow rookies from DC to calm the nerves. 7:50 they got thrown out for taking a picture and revealing their camera. 7:58 and the tension was peaking.   I jumped around and stretched in anticipation.  8:00 and the rocket exploded to signal the start of the encierra.  Some people waited to see the bulls, but Quinten and I started weaving our way through the runners along with several others.  At first we were jogging along (I preferred to watch my footing on the recently cleaned slick rocks and ensure that I didn’t create a pileup with the other runners).  Then I looked back to see the crowd behind us starting to surge, and my pulse quickened.  I shouted to Quinten, “They’re going faster!”  He thought I meant the bulls were coming faster so he took off sprinting and we got separated.  As the people around me thickened I kept my eyes on the bulls gaining ground on me.  I weaved faster and kept my arms up to guard myself against the other runners.  All of the sudden I could tell the bulls were behind me and I quickly stepped over to the wall of the alley and watched as 10 or so bulls blazed past with hoof beats like thunder.  I was amazed at how quickly they had caught us!  Right after they past I started running again and soon made it to the plaza de toros.  I quickly ran through the entrance into the ring because there were still two bulls who were separated and running behind me.  I joined all the other triumphant runners jumping around with enthusiastic cheers and celebrations. 

The pen where the bulls started.

Pretty soon, they started the next less-known phase of the running-of-the-bulls.  They let out the first of 5 adolescent bulls with padding on their horns into the ring to play with the runners.  When I had read about this I imagined the bulls would jump around and we would get to pet them and play with them like oversized dogs.  This was definitely NOT the case!  The bulls burst out of their gate into the ring where they charged at the more gutsy people in the crowd who would run at them and try to sneak behind them to slap their rump or even more boldly grab their horns.  The whole aim was to antagonize the bull and you got extra balls points if you could touch it.  Some people were nuts.  During playtime with the very first bull this streaker appeared out of the crowd (prolly totally wasted) and promptly got caught somewhere in his bare groin region flipped by the bulls horns and then trampled a bit.  There were also people in Superman costumes, funky wigs, and with cameras on their helmets.  Lots of people got taken down by the bull, driven into the ground, and flipped around.  Each time someone got smoked or was making the bull particularly frustrated by holding on to its horns or whatnot the crowd that packed the stand would ooh and ahh like it was Sesame Street on Ice.  Only one got seriously hurt to my knowledge and his unconscious body was quickly dragged away from danger.  There was kinda a weird sense of camaraderie, because each time the bull caught someone too close and started going to town on him the crowd would rush in to distract the bull and get the guy out of trouble.  It was really a spectacle.  Some of those people were nuts!  It prolly didn’t help that a good portion must have been drunk.  Really though, if you wanted to play it safe it was very easy to stay on the opposite side of the large ring as the bull and avoid the bubble of space that ebbed and flowed as the bull ran around the ring.  But this wasn’t nearly as fun. 

I never put myself very close to harms way, but I did enjoy a good view from time to time as I shuffled around running backwards and forwards.  Once I felt this hairy thing brush my shoulder and I looked around to see it was one of the adult bulls walking by me being corralled over to its gate by a trainer.  After each baby bull had had 10ish minutes of play they brought it’s coinciding big bull into the ring to accompany it to the gate.  I found out sometimes the bells on these big bulls don’t really work and they end up sneaking up on you while you are watching the baby!  During playtime with the last bull I finally had worked up the courage and developed a strategy to go in for my first bull slap.  Basically, I waited until the bull was rushing away from me, got on the inside of the bubble and ran up to give it a nice love tap as it was busy pounding some other guy into the ground.

One of the craziest parts of this ridiculous event was when the baby bull entered the ring.  I noticed everybody would huddle up behind the gate where it was about to come out.  It wasn’t until the third bull that I realized people where crouching down in a group so that when the bull charged out of its pen into the ring it would jump over them.  Unfortunately for these gutsy guys only one bull jumped that day and the rest just plowed through the huddled bunch. 

Although this was prolly my favorite part of the morning I was not sad when they opened the gates and allowed all the runners to exit the ring.  Quinten had not made it into the ring, so I eventually was able to meet up with all the others and we started to explore the town. 

It's like a giant "Where's Waldo" with everyone in red and white!

Without  San Fermín Pamplona would definitely just be a mediocre place to visit.  It had the standard old-fashioned buildings and cute little streets, but the quaint effect was definitely diminished by the raucous partying in every street.  After the encierra was over people were back in the bars and clubs by 8:50 am to continue the party.  At one point we bought ingredients to make the traditional San Fermín drink of Coke and red wine and sipped on that during our picnic.  It was ok.  I enjoyed my purchases of unbelievably rich oozing chocolate-filled mini croissants, chocolate chip muffin, and chocolate-coated orange gummies much more.  If you didn’t already discern this from my visit to the Chocolate Museum in Barcelona I love chocolate.

I'm eyeing my heavenly chocolate croissant from the hole-in-the-wall Beatriz cafe recommended by one of the Wash U. girls' friends who studied here.

By the time we left to catch our bus around 9 the streets were packed again, the street performers were out in full force, the concerts were starting, and everyone was getting ready for another night of raging.

Unfortunately I had to get ready for another night of bus riding.  I spent all 4 nights of the 4-day weekend on a bus or in a bus station without a bed.  This 10-hour bus ride back to Alicante was literally the most uncomfortable ride of my life.  We got stuck in the last row which doesn’t recline so when the people in front of me reclined I physically could not fit my knees out in front of me.  For the first time in my life I felt a little claustrophobic as I was trapped in the corner of that bus.  When were finally delivered from that wretched bus and made our way back home to pass out in a real bed it seemed like we had been gone much longer than 36 hours. 

San Fermín was worth every minute.  I always thought it would be really cool to run with the bulls, but I never thought I would actually do it.  It was a true once-in-a-lifetime experience that I will never forget. 

Sunday

Today was quite the recuperation day.  I slept late, did laundry, walked around town, and did who knows what else.  In the end my weekend turned out to be a great success despite its abysmal start.  My only regret is that I didn’t plan to go to Pamplona from the beginning.  Tomorrow I finally start classes at the University.  I’m looking forward to pumping some knowledge into this noggin, but mostly I’m excited to meet all the international students and start using my Spanish again.

A random parade of huge wooden royalty figures

This is the same field we saw in the morning... where did all the trash go?

There it is!  We found you.

A nice view of the city outskirts

We ran into this cool competition of strongest-man type events.  Here the guy had to yank this weight to the top of this tripod as many times as possible in a certain amount of time.

most intense tug-o-war I've ever seen.  They also had log cutting races with two-person saws

dinner for the fam

a cool drawbridge entrance to the city.

I'm glad I finally got this monster post off my chest.  I'm only backed up by 3 days now!  This has kept me up way too late though, so you better have enjoyed it!

Hasta Luego,
Cóle

Islands, beaches, 4th of July; where's the studying come in?

Monday 7/4 - Wednesday 7/6

The group waiting to board the boat.  So many people got burnt on this trip to the island it was like Red Lobster's  Lobster-fest at dinner that night.

Our cruiser

the group on the deck

Monday

Today we were scheduled to go on a trip to Tabarca Island to snorkel.  In the morning we all hopped on board a nice ferry that took us to the nearby island that was only about 3 miles in circumference maybe.  I love riding on those ferry boats and going to the bow, feeling the wind in your hair, watching the boat cut through the waves, and taking it all in with your friends.  It reminds me a lot of Guatemala (M).  Only 6 people live there all-year-around, but in the summer there is a modest little town of restaurants and gift shops that subsists on tourism dollars.  We were divided into groups to go snorkel and since I volunteered for the last group I went with some people to a smaller neighboring island just a hundred yards or so away through shallow water.  This heap of rocks was particularly fun to climb around because you could see how the crashing waves had carved it into all sorts of fun shapes.  At the highest cliff of the island a bunch of people were wondering whether the water was safe enough to jump.  I decided I could climb down and check it out since my trusty Chacos were far superior to anyone’s flimsy flip-flops.  After making certain the water in the whole area was several feet over our heads I climbed back up (which was harder than I expected and the razor sharp rock gave me a bit of a scrape).  Still people were hesitant, so I said I would jump first.  I always love a good cliff-jump!  I looked over the ledge, spotted my entry point and leaped out waving my arms like wild.  After I got down safely there were a handful of others who made the 2-3 story jump.  I climbed back up and did it 3 more times!

The leap into the blue.  One of our student managers was definitely not pleased that we did this, and another one yelled at us to stop then gave in and the third one joined us to "supervise."

The little island we swam to.  The dots on top are people.

After that exhilarating adventure I went with a couple people to walk around the perimeter of the island.  There really was nothing there besides the measly town in one corner a cemetery in the other and an old prison in the middle.  The water at the small beach there was incredibly full of plant junk, but we got out of it by swimming out through the big rolling waves to the buoys.  Later on the beach, the girls forced us to have a girls and guys “photo shoot” much to our chagrin. 

We we courageous explorers on our expedition around the island.

The city across the bay where we swam and hung at the beach.

Finally it was our turn to snorkel.  I was really surprised that taking groups was a legitimate business on the island because all we did was go out to the middle of this cove and watch the same type of gray fish swim around.  I think over 30 minutes I saw 3 types of fish and they didn’t even come to the boat unless the boat guy threw out bread to make them swarm around us.  Real natural, haha!  There was no coral or anything, just a bottom of thick sea grass 15 feet below us.  Still I had fun swimming around with my snorkel gear, but I feel like I could have easily managed that myself.  Once we were back in the boat our guide gave us a glass of sangria, he made sexual jokes with all the girls, we got our limbo on, and we had a dance contest.  Somehow everyone voted that I won the dance-off so apparently I got the prize of “spending a night” with the guide.  Since we were the last group we got to ride back to Alicante in the small speedboat.  It was a ton of fun because he swerved back and forth over the waves and we would hop off our seats as the small boat bobbed up and down.  Back at the dorm we played an energetic game of soccer (our student manager, Mohsen, gets so excited for our pickup games!) within our group and got ready to go out for the 4^th of July!

Our lively snorkel crew complete with our guide Antonio.

Tonight everyone wore a white t-shirt and blue jeans or some other form of red white and blue and some were even lucky enough to carry one of the mini US flags that I had brought from home and had been passing around all day.  For one night we were unabashedly and obnoxiously American.  First, we went to Austin’s to have a relaxing drink and watch guys run around dressed in American flag clothes squirting tequila from a super soaker into people’s mouths.  Our next stop was our favorite dilapidated dance club, Carpe Diem.  Even though it was a Monday night it was packed for the fourth of July and they were playing the most American songs possible.  I had the most fun I had ever had there dancing with all our friends.  Next we migrated to Mulligans where our girls enjoyed dancing on the bar and our French friend really acted his age. 

Celebrating the 4th of July!

Our Iwo Jima reenactment. 

I left with these two girls who said they wanted two walk the 2 hours uphill it would take to get to our dorm from downtown.  I knew it was an awful idea, but I stuck with them humored them for a little while until I convinced them to flag down a taxi.  We definitely celebrated the Fourth in style!

Tuesday

We left early this morning (9:15) for our daytrip to the neighboring city of Elche.  We were supposed to go to two different company visits today, but both canceled just a couple days ago so we are going to a different company and visiting a museum.  The museum was pretty cool and set within the castle of the city.  A lot of people were just too tired to enjoy it.  We did see Elche’s famous palm tree oasis.  They said there are something like 200,000 natural palm trees in the town and it’s really rare to find such an abundance in an arid desert-like climate like Elche’s.  Then we visited a shoe company called Panama Jack’s (Havana Joe’s in the US).  It was quite interesting to see all there operations.  We learned that Elche is the 2^nd largest city for shoe manufacturing in the world.  A company called Pikolinos is another shoe company across the street (this is one that canceled on us).

A nice building in the park we walked through to get to the castle in Elche.

The castle tower

Panama Jack makes mostly work-type practical boots.  This is there staple shoe.  The advertisement behind was created in-house (like all their advertising) and shows Adam and Eve wearing these boots because "they get you where you need to go" (out of Eden).  I appreciated it.

The warehouse full of leather.  It reminded me of our basement when we had that pile of leather for years.  I went along the shelves and tried to name all the animals represented.

That night most of our group took a tour of the castle in Alicante and since I had already done that I got in some major slacklining outside the dorm.  It’s kinda fun how most of the people walking by will stop and gawk for a while at this weird tight rope act I’m attempting.  By the end I was able to walk across the line about half the time, so that was a great accomplishment.  Now I need to practice walking backwards! 

Tonight we introduced the Mizzou students to their first BP tournament at Havana.  It was a pretty full field, but Quinten and I got to the 4^th round, which was farther than ever before, until we were beat by some of our friends.  I ran into my friends Kathryn and Caitlin who I discovered are some of my Delta Sigma Pi (business frat.) brothers from Wash U. in StL. 

The only Mizzou Deltasigs on our trip with the two Wash U. Deltasigs.  We just made up that hand sign and I'm excited to bring it back to Mizzou.

Wednesday

This morning we got up early to head to the huge tourist city of Benidorm to the north of Alicante.  It should have been a 1 hr. tram ride, but by the time we took the tram backwards to the start of the tram-line where the tram company wanted to take a picture of us which made us miss our tram it turned into a 2.5 hour mess of a journey.  We were all under the impression that the tram company was going to give us a presentation and explain their operation, but they definitely just wanted our picture in their station for publicity purposes.  It wasn’t even a good picture because the lady took it as we were still getting settled and only half the people were smiling!

When we finally got to Benidorm we walked deep into the city until we reached some government building where we received a presentation on tourism in Benidorm.  Benidorm’s economy is based off of the 4-million tourists who visit each year for it’s pristine beaches and numerous water parks, zoos, aquariums, golf course, etc.  It would have been cool to learn about the internal operations of the division of tourism but instead we were fed a bunch of inconsequential, irrelevant statistics about stuff like how many beds are in all the 4-star hotels of Benidorm.  Half the group was put to sleep by the end of the 30-minute presentation.  After this lackluster start the day picked up because we were free to roam around Benidorm for the rest of the afternoon. 

The pristine beach at Benidorm was more beautiful than any I had seen yet.

I went with a small group to eat at an Italian place and then visit the beach.  The water was ridiculously clear and the sand was incredibly hot.  I had a great time body surfing on the sizeable waves and playing crack the egg with myself (you curl up in a ball in the shallows and let the waves buffet you down the coast).  We leisurely strolled through the town stopping at various shops (I bought a Spain flag!) on our way to the tram and got to the station just in time to catch the last tram they would have to Alicante for a couple hours.  We were incredibly lucky!

My tortellini pasta.

Couples come up to this nice plaza that overlooks the city and has beaches below on either side and they attach a lock to this structure and then throw the key into the sea.  It symbolizes their everlasting love (our interminable bondage ;) )

On the plaza overlooking the city.  Benidorm actually has a decent amount of skyscrapers unlike Alicante.  The funny thing is that Benidorm is only bigger than Alicante for 2 months of the year (July and August when the tourism is at its peak).

When I got back to Alicante I realized I had to really hustle in order to buy my bus tickets to Barcelona for that weekend, eat, pack, and make travel preparations for my trip to Brussels that weekend.  I got out of the dorm just in time to catch the last bus to Alicante for the night and was relieved to be through with the hectic preparations and by 2 am I was on my 8-hour bus to Barcelona.  I am really looking forward to seeing my friends in Brussels Thur. night (after I fly there from Barcelona), but a lot of them said they might be leaving to travel Europe for the weekend, so that would be real crappy.  Especially since I’m traveling solo because no one else would care to go to Brussels with me to see my friends.  I’m just planning to go with the flow and trust that everything will work out.       

Hasta Luego,

Cóle