Jamón

As I've said in other posts Pig is the main source of food here. Chips are even ham flavored and we almost always eat different products from the pig. A lot of people including my family has a giant dried or cured ham leg in the kitchen. We ran out the other day and Cristina and I went to buy a new one. I felt this is a ritual I had to do...Th buying of the ham leg haha. The one we bought cost around 65€ and weighs 13 lbs! This ham leg also took a year to dry and preserve it to get it ready to eat. I also switched out the old ham for the new one; another important ritual I thought, The changing of the ham. What was left of the old ham leg was basically only bone but Manuel wrapped it in a big and said he was going to bring it to his mom. His mom cuts the bone and uses some in soup for flavor and gives the rest to their dog. Manuel told me they never throw out ham.

Today is exactly 1 month until I come home!

This is such a weird feeling, I've been here 4 months and now only have one month left. Time has flown by, it took a while to become accustomed with so much here and I am finally speaking Spanish well and now all of a sudden it's time to start thinking about home. I actually can't wait, I miss home, I miss people, I miss the food, and I miss some feelings. But when I come back I think I'm going to have major culture shock and realize just how different the two cultures are. Here people live in the streets and live a more relaxing lifestyle. On Fridays when I don't start class until 1 I walk to class and see a lot of people sitting outside bars drinking wine, liquor, or Sidra so early in the day! Then after siesta time at around 6 EVERYONE is out socializing and getting a drink. I think part of it is a result of everyone living in an apartment. I'm so used to living in a house in the States where you can just go sit outside in your front or back yard or where you have enough space in a house to invite people over. Also everything is so far that you have to drive. Here you walk everywhere, even to pick up groceries. The apartments are pretty small so friends hardly ever go over other friends houses and to meet up everyone goes to bars or cafes. Here people cannot simply sit outside in their own yard, this is why you always see groups of old people sitting on all the benches. Us young people never have a place to sit, they take up all the benches haha! Also eating times are going to be hard to get used to. Here I eat lunch at 3:30 and dinner around 11. It took me a good month to get used to that and now I can't even imagine eating lunch at 3 and dinner at 6 or 7. But getting back to my point I can't wait to go home but I know that for all the reasons I just wrote I'm going to have culture shock going home!

Traditional Asturian Feast

On Friday night we all went to this restaurant called Tierra Astur. It serves all traditional food in huge quantities! We ordered a huge tablet and all 6 of us devoured it. They served Chirizo al la Sidra, different Asturian cheeses, fried fish, fried meat, Jam embutidos, eggs, and some fried doe type things with meat on top. We ate it with Sidra and some wine.

Rain Rain Go Away!

Asturias is one of the rainiest places ever! Because it rains so much it is so beautiful and green here but it does get annoying always needing an umbrella and always being wet. When it rains so hard the wind also blows like no other. I get home and even with an umbrella my pants are wet and my jacket is stoked through. Everyday I have to change twice! Here is Oviedo we have had some beautiful days! The month of April is very rainy and it hasn't let up. Since the beginning of spring break it has rained every single day. In the next 10 day forecast there is only one day of partly sun.

Gijon

I finally visited Gijon, its a city on 30 minutes from Oviedo and I haven't been there once in 3 months!  I went with my Spanish friend Nieves, her sister, and her friend.  Of course it was raining, like it always is here in Asturias but we made the best of it.  Gijon is right on the coast so we walked along the water, went down the cliffs some and just looked over the awesome view of ocean and cliffs.  We walked around the city a little bit too.  It reminded me a little bit of Boston with the port, and the boats, and the older style buildings.  after trudging through the rain for a while we went out to get dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  Finally I get to eat Mexican food!  it is different from Mexican I have eaten, we just shared very small, make your own tacos and nachos.  The tacos only had the meat inside with nothing else and we could pick what sauce to put in it, I of course ordered the spiciest there was; and we shared nachos with guacamole, they were amazing!

Touring the City!

I've had a tour of the city when I first arrived in Oviedo but because I live on one far extreme of the city there are a lot of places I never really go to and haven't seen.  I met with my friend Cristina for some tea and coffee on Thursday and after we took a walk around the city taking pictures.  We walked around the cathedral and up around to the park.  Its awesome to have a friend from Spain who is so willing to show you around! Knowing that I only have one month left I have to keep exploring!




 

 

 

                                  

Pompei

Pompei is one of the coolest things I've seen, it's amazing to see a circulation that lived so advanced so long ago. Walking through Pompei was just like walking through a city of ruins. There were so many streets that we had to use a map to get around. Many of the buildings are now only one story but you can tell they used to be two. You can see the different rooms, stairs to go up stairs, and even a kitchen or an oven in some. People back then must have been very short because I was too tall for many of the doors! It amazed me just trying to picture how life was back then. In Pompei there are also court yards, parks, a bath house that used to serve as a sauna, huge columns and statues, and on some of the walls beautiful colorful mosaics. In the cobble stone streets you could still see the marks from the chariots riding over and over again. One thing that amazed me was on some of the floors there were colorful pictures made out of tiny tiny tile, the kind you see in some bathrooms today. I have no idea how back then people were able to make such small colorful tiles into large works of art on the floor. The coolest but also sad part was seeing the perfectly preserved people who does when the volcano exploded. People must have died extremely fast to have stayed in those positions. The people were contorted or looked like they were running and one person was even sitting covering his face with his hands. One some of the people we were able to see up close you could see all of their teeth and the bones in their hands. At the end of Pompei was the amphitheater, nothing like the colosseum haha but still very amazing.

 

After leaving the ancient city of Pompei we went into the actual city looking for food. Dan's friend had tile him about this pizza place called Pompei Pizza and said it was the best around. He wasn't lying! I don't know if I'll ever be able to eat pizza again in the US haha. I ordered a pizza with mozzarella cheese and spicy salami, I loved it! Best pizza I had in Italy. I think what made it so good was the sauce and the freshness of the ingredients, there's nothing like it.

After all this we caught our two trains and four hours later we were back in Rome. There is a restaurant right near our hostel that when we all went before we all agreed that it has the best pasta dishes we've ever eaten. Last time we went there I got lasagna (I already blogged about it) and everyone else had the most amazing dishes. We all always try each others food everywhere we go. We had been looking for to going back to this restaurant to try another dish when we all returned to Rome. I had been looking forward to this meal all day knowing I was going to order the pesto. I hadn't eaten pesto this while trip knowing I was going to order it here. Well when we got to the restaurant it was closed. I've never been so heart broken in my life! I just had to settle for pesto at anther restaurant.

Adios Italy

On Tuesday I had to say goodbye to Italy and head back to Spain. Because something happened with my ticket before Iberia had to rebook my ticket. My flight was from Rome to Madrid, only and hour lay over and then from Madrid to Asturias. Well my Flight from Rome was delayed 30 minutes in the first place and when we got to Madrid there was a lot of traffic and we had to be taxied around for another 25 minutes. When we finally got to the terminal I got up so fast and pushed my way to the front. We parked in terminal HJK near the beginning of the H's. The whole flight I was praying the my connecting flight was leaving from a gate very close to where I was coming in. Of course it wasn't, I had one of the farthest gates, K72. I picked up my bag and ran. I ran past the 30 or so H gates, then the 30 or so J gates, and finally arrived at my gate. The whole time running I saw signs that said K 11 minutes, 9 minutes, 6 minutes. Well I only had 5 minutes to begin with and I was sprinting like never before. I got to my gate sweating and breathing heavy just to see the plane pulling away and hear "the gate is closed". I went to get a new ticket for two hours later and for my troubles they gave me a whole free lunch, not so bad after all! I got a salad, huge chicken thigh, and veggies. That definitely helped the situation.

Sandwiches !!

One really cool thing we have figured out is how to eat on a budget. We do splurge sometimes and go out to eat but many of our meals here have been picnic style. We go to the grocery store and buy a loaf of bread with sandwich meat and cheese. We have also been buys basil, tomatoes, sometimes fruit, and Pringles. When we all split this evenly it comes to about four euros each, much better than 10 or 15 euros at a restaurant. It's not only cheap but if you buy good ingredients the sandwiches are awesome!

Our Hostel

Our hostel is definitely an interesting place. First off we get here and they don't have our reservation anymore but we have our receipt so we know we absolutely paid. They finally put us in a room but said we would have to move the next day.
No one here really speaks English. Whenever we need anything like towels or napkins we have to act everything out. We would ask for something and the people working here would just stare at us with blank faces. Finally we figured out that speaking with them in Spanish works much better.
The next day we were moved into our new room. In our last room we didn't have wifi but in this new room their is a small signal and if you stand in a certain spot in a certain position it will work. Also this new room has about 6 outlets and none of them work! We tried all of our converters and no dice. So if any of us want to charge we have to come use the one plug in the cafe. Now there are four of us, we all have cameras and phones plus two of us have computers. Trying to figure out when we can sit in this cafe and use this one plug to charge all of our devices is a challenge haha. I asked the head guy here why the plugs don't work or if they are different from the one in the cafe and I don't think he understood me. He stared at my for a while and after I made some wired gestures and pointed to the plug a few times he handed me a converter. I tried the converter in all the plugs in our room and none of them were even close to fitting.
On the door of our room is a sign telling us to please close the door behind us thanks. On this sign door is spelled dor and thanks is spelled thank's.
Usually in every hostel you are able to rent or buy towels. We needed two and when we went to ask the lady only had one for our whole hostel. Is this a real hostel?
To top it all off when we woke up Saturday morning a lady was professionally doing the nails of a client in our common area. As soon as I walked in the hostel the first day I could smell nail polish. Well now I know that it is not only a hostel but a nail salon as well. What an adventure.

Easter Sunday

Today Suzanne, Rich, and I woke up to go to Sunday mass. The church was so small and cute. Mass was about an hour long which isn't bad at all for Easter mass. The choir was very good and sang a new song about every two minutes. We got their early so we were able to get a seat because by the time mass started there were a lot of people standing in the back. It was really interesting sitting through a mass in Italian. I can't understand very much but there are words that are very similar to Spanish which I do understand and parts of
                                                   

                                             

I gotta mention the cutest old lady ever in church. She was in the choir wearing a black fur coat and all dressed up and was so tiny singing in choir. She reminded me of an old lady in my church at home that used to dress up so elegant and sing so loud, the only problem is she was toned deaf. Mom I know you know who I'm talking about!
After mass we went to get Dan and went out to lunch. Here I got another pizza, I have to eat it all up while I'm here! No other pizzas in the world like here. The restaurant etiquette is very different here. Once the waiters sit you at your table it is a while before they take your order or give you your bread. Sometimes they will give you your bread and not come back for 5 more minutes with the oil and vinegre. Leaving you waiting is a common theme. But I think here people or more relaxed about it, not looking to just get in and out of a restaurant. Once you've ordered the turn around time for your food to come is extremely fast. It's almost surprising. However once you have finished and your plate is cleared it can be a half an hour until the waiter brings your check. Three times we have had to ask for our check and the waiter has always looked at us funny and just laughed. I know in their heads they're thinking "stupid Americans". I'm not sure how we are supposed to get our check though I'd we don't ask. Today after our meal we waited over 30 min for the check, it was nice because we were all relaxing and chatting but if we never asked I don't know if we would have ever gotten the bill. Maybe there is some gesture or signal, I don't know.

I'm so thankful for being able to travel like this, grow and mature, and experience other cultures. I do miss my family incredibly on this Easter Sunday though.

Rain rain go away

Saturday it poured so unfortunately we didn't get to do much. We hug out downstairs in the cafe using the wifi. Our big excursion for the day was going out to eat dinner. I ordered pasta a la carbonara. So good but once again so filling. It is a pasta with bacon and a creamy sauce made with eggs

                                       Before                                                         After                              =SUCCESS
             

Capri

One of my favorite places that I've ever seen! We took a ferry over to the tiny island off the coast and could just not get enough, I'm so blessed to be able to travel and see these amazing places. We got to the island and first thing we did is find the supermarket and buy food for lunch. It's awesome to do when traveling on a budget. After we bought our sandwich meats and bread we headed over to another boat.
This boat took us on an hour tour around the island. It's an absolutely beautiful place. The island is like a huge chunck of rock with cliffs and caves. On Capri there is a famous cave called the blue grotto, the reflexion of the sunlight through the cave makes everything reflect aqua marine blue. The water was on high tide that day so it was impossible to go inside. We were able to ride right up to the white grottos. The walls are limestone and are an incredible color of white. It's very hard to describe the island so I will put pictures but there are huge beautiful cliffs going down into the water, trees covering much of the cliffs, and caves. Picture Jurassic park. There is also a huge rock in the middle of the water near the island with a natural made arc that we drove through.
Where we went in and out of Capri is a small port with the grocery store, some small restaurants, and tourist shops. After our boat ride we walked to the center of the town on Capri. This walk to the center of town was a 30 minute up hill climb that almost killed me. Once you see the view from the top it is one of the most worth it hikes. From the top you can see all of the island with the houses scattered through out. The town is so cute. The town is all restaurants, hotels, and high end clothes shoppes. We found a restaurant just to order a Caprese salad to split. When on Capri you need to try a Caprese salad! The salad consists of Slices of tomatoes, with fresh mozzarella, oil and vinegar, and basil. We sat on a rooftop restaurant and annoyed the waiters ordering only one salad between 4 people! From the restaurant and headed to a spot where we could sit and make sandwiches with the food we bought. After our luxury style sandwiches we headed back down the island to the beach.
The water surrounding Capri is so clear and bright blue it's amazing. We had to just run and jump in the water because it was so cold but at the same time so amazing to say I've swam in the Mediterranean.
When we came back to Sorento we once again made our famous "we're poor college students on a budget" sandwiches. It was funny because it was Friday and tons of people were on the streets and here we are sitting on a bench in the center cutting tomatoes with a pocket knife and putting slices of salami and cheese on bread.


 




That night was the famous black parade. The night before was the white parade, we missed that one though because it started at 3am. The black parade was a long progression symbolizing the death of Christ. It was a huge procession with hundreds of people dressed in black capes with hoods only showing their eyes. It was very creepy and gave me the chills. There were groups of people signing hyms, some groups of people carrying torches and candles, one man was carrying a crown of thorns, another hold a white cloth, one man holding a cross, and another a statue of Jesus. There was one group of men holding up a large board with a huge statue of Jesus laying down with candles and flowers. To me this symbolized after Jesus had died and people carrying him to the tomb. There was a group of people behind them also carrying a large plank with Mary on top. The procession was about an he long and everyone was crowded onto the sidewalks to watch. What else was cool was the all of the small decks of the apartments lining the streets were lit with candles.

                      


                       

Right before the procession we headed to grandmas gelato place and bought some of the freshest gelato I've ever tried. I got three flavors, chocolate, mint, and peanut butter. It was amazing and the peanut butter flavor even had peanuts in it! She was explains how she makes all of the gelato fresh everyday.

Trip to Sorento

On Thursday we took a train to Sorento. We stopped on the way in Naples, where pizza was invented! I ordered the Margarita pizza which us jus tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, and basil. It was amazing, you can really taste how fresh everything is.
             

When we arrived in Sorento I was amazed at how beautiful it is. It is a small city right on the ocean built on cliffs over looking an amazing view. There are tons of cute touristic shops, high end clothes stores, restaurants, and gelato places.
After we got checked in and settled we took to the city! We walked down to the water, walked around, and took tons of pictures. We walked all around the city looking in all the tourist shops. In Sorento lemons grow about the size of my head, their huge! It's a main symbol of Sorento. The also have a very famous bottle of liquor called Limoncello. We also found a really awesome gelato place were everything was homemade grandma style. We walked around and found a great restaurant. I ordered Gnocci, it's a small potato dumpling stuffed with cheese and covered with fresh tomato sauce. It's absolutely amazing but so filling! After dinner we just headed back to the room to hang out before going to bed.
              

                                                            Small bottles of Limoncello

                                                             

                                                                                   
                                     

                                                            Gnocci before and after