FALLAS

PAELLA!

ME BALANCINA A BEER AND CUP ON MY HEAD FOR LIKE 10 MIN

SO MANY PEEPS

PARADE FINALE

BEACH, I'VE OFFICIALLY BEEN IN THE MEDITERRANEAN--IT WAS COLD

YO <3>Hey guys I had an exciting week!

Wednesday was St. Patty's day, so I went to Orange, a bar in Arguelles, with the gang. It was 5 to get in with free drinks for an hour (if you were wearing green) and one free shot after that. It was a fun time except that the bartender tried to skeet Laura out of her free drink cup and by the time it was figured out free drinks were over! That night I spent the night at Laura's so I wouldn't have to take the night bus home which really isn't working out well for me..

Last Thursday, I went to a mexican restaurant with some american friends and it was awesome! Free chips and salsa and guac (no queso or tortillas) None of us, however, knew what mole was, so all of us ordered the enchiladas with mole on top. We then discovered that mole is a nasty sauce made from chiles and chocolate. but the chalupa I had was delish! After that Laura and I went to Jano's basketball game. They lost, but its ok! After that we went to Burger King with his team where I ordered a BK Fusion, chocolate cake flavored. Then I went to Janos house and later home to pack for Valencia!

Friday I had to be at Plaza de Espana at 9 to get the buses to Valencia! woooo Of course, the whole thing was completely unorganized, but still fun. We stopped halfway at this rest stop where literally EVERY bus going to Valencia stops. There must have been 1000 people there. Then, when we got to Valencia, we went to the beach! We had sandwiches and tinto de verano that the ESN provided! Then we decided it would be a great idea to walk downtown from the beach to meet up with our other friends. 2 hours and a bottle of sangria later, we found them! Laura bought us chocolate covered churros which ranks very very very high on the goodness of foods that I've eaten lately scale. Then, we walked around downtown for a bit and looked at some of the statues. Again, there were people everywhere. Every street was like walking through a mosh pit. Then at 7 the parade started. It pretty much consisted of music, dancers, girls in fancy dresses (falleras) and at the end fireworks! The fireworks were really cool because it wasnt like in the US where there usually far away; it was right up the close and the whole sky was smoke and everyone smelled like fire. Then we went to the bar where we were supposed to meet the coordinators and had agua de valencia (orange juice, brandy, champagne and other shiz) and beers of course. We got really mad at ourselves that we didnt think ahead and buy stuff to drink outside. Laura and I had dinner at the restaurant next door to the bar. Later we went to watch the burning and that was when we had the most fun probably. Afterwards we went to a discoteca with everyone from the erasmus trip and were reallly tired by that time and some biatch stole Laura's sweater...hmmm I also realized that every single song they played was the same song. They would play 5 seconds of the beginning so I would get excited and then go right back in to the techno beat. We left at around 6 and got to the hotel around 7 which was of course super organized and we could go straight to bed...not. I ended up sleeping from around 8 to 12:30 and then got up to have Paella!

Saturday was a chill day for most normal people, but, as I discovered, Italians either snort coke or have extra batteries somewhere because they were drinking, having water fights, stripping, fighting with table legs all day. (straight out of Jersey Shore) We left at 6 and got back to Madrid around 12:30. No comment about the night bus...

Sunday I went to see Shutter Island with Jano which was reallllly weird but it was pretty cool.

Today I found out I won one of the MLLL scholarships! I don't know how much it's for yet but I'm still pumped!

St. Patrick's Day!

Hey!

Last Friday Jano had a basketball game on Friday and I went to that with Laura and Laura. It ended up that the other team didn't show (they were afraid) so we just watched them play around, but it was still fun. Later that night, we went over to Laura Hill's apartment. It was Jano and I, Laura, her roommate Terez, her other roommate Heleen and Heleen's boyfriend Yurun (im guessing), Billy, and Jano's friends Juan and Jesus (ketchup). We played my new game Party! It was so much fun and interesting because the game is in Spanish but we had Heleen who speaks English and Dutch and her boyfriend who only speaks Dutch, so someone had to translate the questions from Spanish to English than she had to from English to Dutch. hehe Apparently 2 liters is a lot more than I thought because I always buy two liters of beer and am like, this is not enough, so I bought a budweiser to go with my 2 liters of Mahou. A few hours later I was throwing up in the parking lot on my new boots (just a little).

Then on Saturday, I was pretty much wiped out, obviously. I was sleeping on and off with some attempts at eating and taking medicine and throwing up mixed in there until 5 pm. Then, after I finally got some medicine down, I was fine! We ordered pizza and watched some movie that right now I can't remember.

Sunday I hung out at Jano's most of the day and he made yummy pasta for lunch!

Monday, nothing really exciting happened. I went to class and bought myself a fresh orange juice which is ALWAYS delish but costs 1.40 for a small glass. Oh! I also booked a hotel for spring break in Sevilla! We are going from Sunday the 27th to Wednesday the 31st! woo happy holy week!

Tuesday was yesterday. I came home and studied bunches! I've been so good this week! Then Jano and I went to dinner at Gino's. I had farfalle primavera which was sooo good! BUT, European service has dipped to a new low. They now have buttons on your table that you press when you want the waiter. Now the server can literally do nothing all the time. He or she doesn't have to pay attention to you AT ALL until you press a little button and it calls. hmmm...Jano likes it though.. Then we started to watch el secreto de sus ojos but I fell asleep..I also had to do my first translation assignment on Tuesday and it's hard! It's so much more difficult than just talking without translating. I also made an english friend in my translation class because she's in my group.

Today is Wednesday, St. Patrick's Day! Today I had one class and I came home and was super productive again! so much studying and translating going on in there. except for the break I took to watch American Idol..and since I've been so good this week I'm going to go out to celebrate St. Patty's with my American posse.

Friday is Valencia!! wooo

sorry my blog is so boring and pictureless..

love you guys!

Lauren's birthday!

Hello friends!

Last Friday, Jano and I went to Toledo. It was pretty rainy and we didn't really want to spend any money so we just went out and had a couple of drinks with his friends for about an hour and a half and then came home.

saturday, Jano and I went to a nice dinner. We ordered an appetizer sampler platter and really good venison with like a marsala sauce I think. Then when we got home Jano made crepes with nutella. That night we went to some girl's apartment for her birthday party, but it wasn't really even her birthday! It was mine! Not to steal her thunder or anything...

Sunday, all of Jano's family came over to celebrate his sister's birthday and mine. Jano's parents got me the board game Party, Jano got me a toaster, earrings and a necklace, his aunt got me a bracelet and his grandma got me a coin purse! I didn't expect so many gifts! They even made us each our own cake and mine had candles that said 21 on it! We played Party once and then we played poker. I got second place because on the last hand we both had a pair of 7's , mine with a 10 and his with a 4, and then on the river another 4 comes up! :( Oh well! When I got home on Sunday night, I had a birthday card from Buddy and Vickie waiting for me!

Monday, I went shopping to buy my parents gift! I got jeans and a shirt from Zara and a pair of lace-up short boots! Thanks guys! I also got my eyebrows waxed, and went to lunch with some friends from school. That day when I got home, I had four cards waiting for me from my Aunt Kathy and Uncle Vince, Aunt Bette and Uncle Steve, Lauren, and my grandparents! They gave me a little bit of money that I will most likely, unfortunately, spend on books for school.

Tuesday was productive. I washed my sheets, swept and mopped the floor in my room and typed up my notes in a new blog so that all of my friends and I can share notes from class. I also went to the Taste of America store. I bought homemade tortillas, black beans, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and a chocolate chip cookie mix to make cookies for my roommate's birthday which is today!

Today is Wednesday and I just got home from class and there were flowers from my very wonderful, thoughtful, sweet and amazing mother waiting for me! They are beautiful! Now I'm going to watch the American Idol episode from last night and read El Lazarillo. love u all

Lauren has a visitor!

Rachel came to visit me this weekend!

but first! on Thursday, Jano, Cris, David and I went to Rodilla! They make sandwiches and stuff that are really good but usually overpriced. Howevverrrr, All of us are members so we got 4 sandwiches for 3.20! woo hooo. The best one was pollo al curry, curry chicken.

Then on Friday, when I got out of class, Jano and I went to the airport to meet Rachel who was supposed to arrive at 5:30. Apparently, due to an air traffic controller strike in France, her flight was delayed and didn't get in until 7:30. As much as we tried not to waste money on food, we ended up buying a chocolate pastry (napolitana, my fav) and a bag of chips that Jano swore cost 90 cents. Then, when the cashier said they cost 1.30, Jano said, no, they cost 90 cents. Anyway, it didn't say 90 cents anywhere...hmm. These are the kind of crazy things that happen to me in Madrid. When Rachel arrived, we went out to have sangria and tapas. We ordered Iberian Ham, croquetas, tortilla espanola and sangria. Rachel didn't like the sangria or the tortilla. Then Jano decided he was still hungry so we went to Don Oso (home of reallly really good burgers for only 2.10!!) and after to McDonalds where I have discovered coffee with ice cream! I don't think we have that in the states but it's really good and only a euro! Again, really exciting stuff going on here!

Then, Saturday, Rachel and I got up to go site-see a little bit, but it was raining so it wasn't as active and impressive as it could have been. We went to Plaza Mayor, Sol, Gran Via and the palace. After that we went home, had lunch and siestaaa. That night was supposed to be a huge party with all of Jano's friends from home, from school and my American friends. Welll, it ends up it was Jano, Rachel, Jano's friend Juan and me, but it was still really fun! We went barhopping in tribunal, ordered the smallest pitcher of beer I have ever seen and then kicked ass at fusbol! Oh yea! We decided to take the night bus home to save some money, something I have never done to my new house. Inevitably, Rachel and I ended up in the middle of nowhere at 4 in the morning freezing our assess off. (Don't worry mommy I was totally in control of the situation.) Thanks to the ipod and cell phones, Jano was able to come to the rescue on his shiny, yellow horse. It ends up we were in Christiano Ronaldo's neighborhood, so I don't think we could have been much safer anywhere else in Madrid!

Sunday we went to Jano's house and he made us very very yummy chicken. Then Rachel took a 5 hour siesta. That night we went to VIPS for dinner and went home to watch U.S. vs Canada in hockey! It took us awhile to find somewhere to watch it online, and many porn ads came up. We were even just watching the facebook posts people were putting up about the game to know what was happening for awhile. We found a website just in time to see the last-minute goal and overtime. After we lost, we went to bed. Rachel also gave me a present! A shot-book page converted into a page for people who don't have shot books, haha. Thanks so much for coming and everything, babe. It was so nice to see you.

Monday morning we got up at 4:45 to take Rachel to the airport. Good news, that early in the morning we didn't have to pay the tolls! I got home at 6:15 and was able to sleep for another hour and a half or so before I had to get ready for class. Monday, I was informed of something extraordinary! There exists a website where I can watch not only project runway, but also The Bachelor, American Idol, America's Next Top Model, 30 Rock, Dexter, Californication and pretty much anything else. Not to mention they have movies on there! So far I've caught up on Project Runway, watched 4 hours of American Idol, an episode of The Bachelor and The Lovely Bones. :) I almost feel like I'm in the U.S.

Tuesday nothing exciting happened. I spent the night at Jano's and we had sandwiches for dinner.

Wednesday, today, I went to the store and bought myself a second pillow and a second towel!! It's almost like I have a real home now! The only thing I couldn't find was the clear plastic hair rubberbands I use, sooo if anyone was thinking of sending me a care package...haha

OH! I almost forgot, one of my roommate's friends told me about an American store where they sell American brand food and stuff. Rachel and I checked it out online, and basically it looks really expensive. A box of Lucky Charms is 8.50 euros. The only thing I considered buying were the measuring cups and spoons for making American recipes. They also had chocolate chip cookie mix that was pretty reasonable.

I also signed up and paid for a trip to Valencia for las Fallas on March 19th! wooo. Las Fallas is a festival in Valencia where they spend all year building these wooden figurines and then burn them at night, eat Paella and drink. A couple of friends and I are going to do that, and I'm suuuppeer excited..

P.S. Think of me on my birthday :( I wish I could be there to celebrate with you guys. It's going to be hard to celebrate my 21st here, but I know Jano and his family will make it special for me.