I AM SO DRUNK BUT NONETHElESS GLAD THAT LAURA WILL BE IN BUDAPEST WITH US!!!

as the title states, drunk. Yes, i am. but Lut is more drunk and throwing up in the bathroom now. I feel bad because I know she has a lower tolerance than me but I played card drinking games with her anyways until this point of vomiting.

IM SORRY LUT! But in good news, Laura will be joining me and Max and Emmy in Budapest (provided we find a train to get there from Zurich) and it will be a blast! I can´t wait until the navidad break....after my anthropology of religion presentation where I have to speak in front of a class of many Spanish speaking students in Spanish. Oh I am so nervous. But thank god today was my last day of work so I have many more hours (24 per week to be exact) to work on academia and make me not get deported for failing classes. No worries to all of you reading this, I promise I´ll pull off at least passing grades (if not better, for you padres mios) and wow i can´t write more because it´s nonsensical and its amazing that I can still speak in one language. Porque hablar en español es demasiado difícil para mi ahora mismo y prefiero comunicar todo lo que me ha pasado en una lengua que tiene razon. Espe, eres la unica persona que conozco que es española y que lee mi bl0g, entonces perdona mi estado de estar emborrachado y disfruta el blog como si no fuera tan emborrachado! jajajaja, bueno, ahora me acuesto porque este blog se convierte en..... basura. No tengo ni pies ni cabeza ahora mismo. Hasta mañana cuando no estoy borracho!

matt

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Exciting piece of news number 1. Tomorrow is my last day of my receptionist job. Its been only a month at Hostal AB and at first I thought my intense desire to flee from that job was a sign of patheticness, but it turns out, no one really likes the boss. I hope he doesn´t facebookstalk me and find out I have a blog and read this, but you guys should know. He´s a creeper. I think a large part of me having no ganas de staying there was him. Right from the get go he made me kind of uncomfortable. Oh well, that short short chapter of my life is reaching its proverbial final period.

Also, my plans are solidifying for this navidad break coming up. Here´s an outline so if any of you are in the same place at the same time we can meet up and find somehow to not freeze to death (average predicted temperature for this trip is about 3 degrees celcius). In any case, *December 23rd- I catch my .01 cent flight to Barcelona Girona and then make my way into the city from the tiny airport in the middle of nowhere known as Girona. Hopefully rendezvous-ing with Max will happen since we are staying in the same hostel, Sant Jordi Diagonal. Then at some point Emmy and her family step into the picture and there is joy and merriment as Christmas passes.
*December 26th- I fly out of the MAIN airport of Barcelona (eff you ryanair!) and arrive a few hours later in Zurich, Switzerland where the temperature is sure to be close to freezing with a RealFeel temperature of -5 degrees. FANTASTIC! But thank you to Max´s uncle who is letting us stay at his place for a few days while we wander through the Swiss winter wonderland.
*December 30th- Although this is still in the planning stages, hopefully it will solidify later today when Emmy and I have a planning party... We catch an overnight train, with beds and everything! so exciting!, to Budapest, Hungary where we check into the hostel with an unpronounceable name where we will reside until New Years. Hopefully there will be awesome parties and things to go to. Emmy´s cousin recommended a really fun bar that occasionally puts on drag shows, which would make great photo opps for facebook albums. I can imagine now, ¨Me and Minnie Coffee in Budapest on New Years. We later took shots of absinthe.¨ How bad ass will that be? Well, painful too, you ever had a shot of absinthe? It burns.
*January 2nd- I have to go to class soon so I´ll wrap this up. We will take a train to Vienna, Austria for four days (hostel yet to be reserved) and have much much Viennese fun until we return home by ryanair....*sigh* to Granada on the 7th... or 6th. I cant remember. Good thing we´re having a planning party today.

Off to anthropology! Hasta la hora!

stupid granada weather...

So here in Andalucia it doesn't rain much. However when it does, it RAINS if only for 10 minutes. Today I was at work and as 830 rolls around and its time for me to make the 20 minute treck home, it begins to pour, naturally. So I decide to take the bus home and walk down to Camino de Ronda and lucky for me there is no bus stop to be found. So I keep walking until I get all the way to the end of the street (soaked, of course) and I decide screw it. Im buying an umbrella. So I walk into a.... I hate using this word....chino, and buy an umbrella and literally the second I step outside it has stopped raining. So not only am I soaked already, I have an extra umbrella. THe rest of the way back home I walked under the rain gutters that spilled water into the street just so I'd have an excuse to use my new, excessive umbrella.

Now for an anecdote about how I'm a total nerd. Locale - Anthro of Religion class. People - Rachel, Lauren, Ben, me. Topic - Spanish, as usual. Ben comments that its interesting that when Spaniards say things like ski or spanish, they actually say "esqui" and "espanish". However, with words liek super, it just comes out "supe" not "esuper". He then said, "I wonder why that is." Now you all know I am a sucker for linguistics and it just so happens that in my Structure of Romance Language class back in SC we cover exactly this topic. I was so excited that I was actually fidgeting waiting for him to finish his sentence so I could chime in and explain this. When it was my turn to talk, I thought to myself, speak slowly and clearly and not too stupidly excited so they dont think you are bizarre and possibly asthmatic. I then overcorrected by having the excitement stress my voice and I started talking like I was panting or something. My moment of linguisticy glory had corroded into embarrassed wheezing, basically. Entertaining, right? I thought it was blog worthy..

Que mas... oh, I'm 21 now for those of you who werent in the facebook birthday notification loop. Yes, I got cards and presents (mostly alcohol, but the good stuff) and a email from my dad that said at one part "we're going to go out for cocktails once you get back." and I imagined to myself that scenario. I would walk into a bar or restaurant or wherever and order somethign deliciously sophisticated and of course, alcoholic, and then they'd ask me for my ID. I can understand how on your 21st birthday you actually WANT to get carded but I feel like after a year in Spain where the drinking age is .... well, its not all that clear if there is one actually. But my point is, I think I'm going to feel insulted if I'm carded. I mean, I'll not only have been a year into drinking in anyestablishment and buyingn alcohol whenever I want, but I'll already be 7 or 8 months into being 21. Anywho, I made a really dlicious veggie over rice dish with homemade peanut sauce and I really want to eat it. So hasta luego everyone~

Guest post - Wine, Scrabble (as in Scramble) and Cominos

Shalom!
Ali here. You may or may not know me. I am a friend of Mateo's. He's a super nice guy. And I'm a generally nice girl. We get along well.
I am in Mateo's cocina. Ben and Emmy just left to buy more vino. Mateo wonders if we should chip in. "Girlfriend" by Avril Lavigne is playing. He says this is the better version. He is taking out the trash. He just said "berb" as in to signify "brb".
Anywhos. This is Ali, still. We just created a bizarre form of food. Digression: we just took a shot. It tasted like scope. Normally I don't use scope. It really hurts my mouth. Germs don't go easy. Mateo is drinking milk now. And he added this bizarre scope business. Green milk.
Hokay. So. About our dinner.
Setting: Mateo's kitchen, Albaicin, Granada, Andalucia, Spain, Iberian Peninsula, Europe, Eurasia, Western Hemisphere, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way, Universe.
Time: Right now? About 23.27
Peoples: Mateo, Emmy, Benjamín, and yours truly
Food: Turkey Pancake Scrabble. Yep, it's as good as it sounds. It has turkey, potatoes, eggs, milk, butter, salt, pepper, cominos (lots of), and romero. You should try it.
Drink: Vino and scope

What else to say? Very little. Over and out.
Pace,
Ali

Visitors!

Unfortunately, I couldn't get Julia to make a guest post here but we will cross paths again so look forward to an entry by the lovely Miss Bergen.

Today was indeed a sad day in Granada. Max and Julia both left this lovely little city in southern Spain to continue on their journeys. Max is flying to the UK and Julia is off to Barcelona before her return to London. I miss them already and the excuse they gave me to not go to all of my classes... but I guess now I'll get back to the real world. What of my travel plans, you ask? I'm still here in Granada until Christmas time when I'll be heading to Barcelona, France?, Switzerland and Hungary! I'm very excited although I'm still not sure how I'm getting to all those places. All I know is I have a reservation in Budapest and a place to stay in Zurich. Oh well, as the number one couch surfer host of Amsterdam Larry Greweldinger says, "There's not really any point in making plans. The more plans you make, the more you can mess them up. No plans = no mess ups ;)" Yes, he even put the winking face.

In other news, my mom is here in Granada also. I took her to the Albaicin and to a shawarma place and I think they enjoyed it, but I also think the Granadina culture is a little different from them, but they'll either adjust or just keep on getting strange looks from everyone. No pasa nada.

ALSO, this was pretty exciting in a funny way... let me explain. So I live next to the "bohemian" street of town and naturally that attracts the transients and wanna be transients who have decided to make their meager living selling drugs. Now, on this street it is not at all uncommon for people to approach you and ask you if you want to buy drugs from them. Mostly there are offers for hash but the other day I got offered coke. TWICE. Ok well, it wasnt in the same day so that last sentence wasnt written very well but im too lazy to go back and change it. Deal with it. BUT COKE! How cool must I be for people to look at me on the street and think, "he wants to buy coke"..... oh.... wait.... that must mean i look like a coke head. Damnit. I guess I still don't have the Spanish style down yet.

Ya esta.

<3

Hola Espana!

Hello and welcome to guest post numero (that's "number" as they say here in Spain!) 2. Me llamo Max, but being as Spaniards seem to be a little unwilling to accept the name so as often as not it turns temporarily into "Matt" . . . whatevs. So today marks my 4th night in Granada and I, as I discovered earlier today when perusing my good pal Matt's blog, am expected to impart wisdom upon all yalls (I don't know who actually reads this but shop GAP (they told me they'd give me $5 to plug their new shade of taupe)). So tonight we smoked hash that we bought from a Spanish gypsy who pulled it out of her sock, but she insured us that it was quality and I now believe her. She introduced us to her party in order to gain our trust, which included her girlfriend (who I thought was a man) and three dogs that took a minute from eating the trash that was out behind a falafel stand to give us ominous glances. One of their names was "animal" which is actually Spanish but spelled the same way which is why you will read it incorrectly . . . unless you speak mainly Spanish, thus understanding that when she told us this dog's name it sounded like "aun-ee-mal." Tonight we ate at a restaurant that had its menu in several languages which gave us great pleasure in discovering that the Spaniards spelled "ham" "jam." Well done Spain, five points. Although I really am not one to talk being as I only know how to order red wine, espresso and point to things on a menu. Luckily the folk here in Granada seem quite used to putting up with shit from people like myself so they just smile and nod their heads. Went to a gay bar tonight but had to leave once I realised that perhaps having men hitting on me and not being able to explain the fact that I am not actually gay but prefer the welcoming and friendly environment as well as the superior drink prices and music perhaps wasn't the best for my first week in Spanish culture. Perhaps we'll have another go after I have properly assimilated. Ok, I am being told that the party is leaving Matt's room so I should sine off (oh, math joke SNAP). I look forward to speaking Spanish to you soon!

p.s. Have a LOLkat