Things are starting to look up!

So I reread my blog post yesterday and I want to apologize for sounding majorly depressed haha. I think it was just an off-day which I'm obviously bound to have being here for 4 months and all. Me and some of my friends who have also been feeling a little down have decided to BUCK UP, we're in Spain and we really have been too hard on ourselves about the whole adjusting to life here thing...we've only been here for (less than) 2 weeks!
So my clothes are finally starting to dry (YAY) and things are looking up. we're starting to plan some trips and I'm getting excited. This weekend, a few of us want to take a bus to San Sebastian (a basque town closeby) and go out there, and then take a bus back in the morning. We have also been in talks of making a trip to Belgium in March for a music festival thing there. I'll let you all know more info when I know more! But it sounds super fun. Also trips are in the works to Barcelona and our own trip to Madrid. We all need to snap out of our funks and start exploring!
Last friday we finally had the chance to visit the Guggenheim museum (the museum across the river from my campus that essentially transformed Bilbao into a city worth visiting)
The art inside was not much to my liking (weird contemporary stuff - we weren't allowed to take pics inside needless to say) but the sculptures outside are the best parts anyways! It was a really gross and rainy day so we couldnt get many good pictures but I will definitely go back on a nicer day to get better pictures of the sculptures outside.

Also, forgot to mention about my classes-- I'm always used to sharing my name with other people in my classes but this semester is RIDIC. There is only one of my classes where I am the only Emily... even in my conversation class, literally a class of maaybe 10 people, there are two of us. The worst is in my intro to lit class though-- FIVE EMILYS, including myself. There's even another Emily W here haha. As for my other classes, I'm pretty sure it's 3 or 4 of us in each. oh well!

Well that's all i can think of for now. I'm excited for the weekend and adventures to come. Love and miss you all

 the only pics i took from the guggenheim visit....did I mention I'm a really bad photographer??? I know my friends took some too so I'll just wait for them to post their pics haha. I've also posted a new pic to the right of me and my friends Victoria and Belen from a club on last Thurs (remember we don't have Friday classes heh.) Enjoy!

Classes, etc..

Sorry I haven't written in a while! I've been having some trouble adjusting to life here so I've pretty much just spent the past week trying to get into the swing of things.
i started classes last monday-- I think my courses should be good, and I'm still trying to gague how they're really going to be work-wise. (Everyone I've talked to says study abroad classes are a joke, but I'm not sure if mine are going to be...) I'm taking two literature classes where we have to read a total of 7 books, so that alone doesn't exactly sound like "a joke" to me. (One is intro to hispanic literature and the other is spanish cinema and literature). I'm also taking a Basque language and culture class, a spanish conversation class, and an intro to hispanic linguistics class. Luckily I already took intro to linguistics in English so i'm a little familiar with some of the terms (although they are in spanish, obviously).
As for class times they are pretty random and spread out.
Mondays and Wednesdays are the same schedule and pretty full days:
11:10-12-- spanish 4 conversation
12:10-1-- basque language and culture
4:10-5:25-- intro to the analysis of hispanic literature
5:30-6:45-- intro to hispanic lingustics
Tuesdays, only 1 class:
4:10-5:25-- Spanish cinema and literature
And thursdays, very spread out-
9-950-- basque culture and language
12:10-1-- spanish 4 conversation
4:10-525-- spanish cinema and literature

luckily i live about as close as you can get to campus so I can come home for meals, in between class, whenever I need to during the day.

Also had my first experience with doing laundry today and let me just say that it was a FAIL. There are no dryers here, so I accidentally took my clothes out of the washer before the cycle was done, and they were basically in a huge pool of water at the bottom. They are still SOPPING wet and laid out all over my room. Hopefully theyll dry eventuallyyyy, but for now I've learned my lesson. I also might need to invest in my own drying rack cause it seems that all of the community ones are always taken.

As I said before I'm having a bit of a hard time adjusting to everything here--the weather, the food, the meal times, the people.... it's all a big adjustment. And I feel like part of my sadness is the fact that I am sad (did that make sense?) Like I feel like I've been here for so long, when it reality it hasn't even been 2 weeks yet! So the fact that I feel like I've been here for, lets say, 2 months, and am feeling homesick has me feeling even MORE sad! I don't know if that made any sense but basically- it rains ALL the time. and is always cold and wet outside. The food is not what I expected it to be at all- it may just be this part of Spain but I've really only had one or two GOOD meals so far. Also, the meal times are hard to adjust to. For instance, me and my friend went to get food around 4pm yesterday since we missed lunchtime at the dorm. I got a DISGUSTING hamburger- it had a patty (i don't even think it was beef....), a piece of ham, a fried egg, lettuce tomato pickles onions and SLATHERED literally drenched in mayo. it was really gross. then I missed dinner at the dorm, missed breakfast and lunch today, so I didn't end up getting to eat again until 830 pm (dinner time) tonight here in the dorm! I need to buy some food to keep in my dorm room.
I guess I'm just feeling a little lost (and am super bummed about the laundry debacle to be honest haha) but I know things will look up. I'm ready to get into the swing of things and to start traveling to other places in Europe.
Sorry if this entry was a little depressing, I just miss you all so much :( I know things will look up soon though.

Oh also, something funny we discovered.......

While shopping at the mall, we found a lot of shirts and things that said REALLY random things in english that didn't even make sense.... I think it's the same kind of thing how a lot of people in america buy clothes that have french written on them or whatever. Here are two random/funny things my friend took pictures of:

"My heart belongs to me" .....?

and my personal favorite:


"Burst out laughing
AHHA
HA HA HA HA HA HA
HA HA HA HA
HA HA HA HA
H :) A"

what?????

First weekend!

Finally feeling muuuch better. I realized that I must have gotten sick from being cold walking around the city but also being NUMB that entire plane ride to Brussels. Also, the food in the dorm is kind of gross, and each meal is only available for an hour (breakfast starts at 830, lunch at 130, dinner at 830) so with my sleeping habits/not liking the food i realized I had pretty much only eaten a few pieces of bread in the past couple days haha. Luckily the food today was a little better (lentil soup and french fries.......so random) and i was finally full and feeling better. thank GOD!
so- this weekend! on thursday, a few of us from my dorm walked around bilbao for a little and eventually ended up at a bar close by. I finally got the chance to try a really popular drink here called the kalimotxo (kali-mocho, it's basque) which is red wine and coke mixed together-sounds gross, i know, but it's really good! we pretty much sat and watched the local people dance salsa, it was amazing! we were all mesmerized by their dancing. the same bar offers salsa lessons every sunday, so maybe i'll go next sunday since I'm now feeling better.
Friday, we got up early and met on campus to have a tour. It's a very small campus and luckily all five of my classes are only in 2 different classrooms so I'll have no trouble remembering where to go. After the tour, we had an academic orientation session and went over some policies at the school and in classes-- essentially, a professor read a booklet out loud verbatim for an hour and a half. so boring.
After that, we boarded charter buses to go visit historical towns on the outskirts of Bilbao. (sidenote-- I've realized I'm REALLY awful at taking pictures because I've never had a camera before, but here are all the pictures I took from the historical towns. Hopefully you all can get the gist of how beautiful it is!)

 
We also had a GREAT lunch at this authentic restaurant-- some hearty soup with all different kinds of vegetables and meats, so good. And then I chose to have the fish with potatoes and then we had some great dessert, i honestly don't even really know what it was, but it seemed like some sort of cake-y, mousse-y thing. We also had some red wine.
Friday night was sooo fun. A big group of us from the dorm went to a club called Fever. We had to take the metro, and in true foreigner form, ended up having to wait outside for about 10-15 minutes until it opened at midnight. The cover was pretty steep, although it included one drink, but I don't think this will be a place we'll go every single weekend, just once in a while, so it's not too bad. The place was huuge, multiple levels and rooms and my friends and I pretty much just danced for five hours (yeah, if you did your math correctly, we didn't leave until five.........oops). So we finally took a cab back, surprisingly cheap and you don't usually tip here (which is nice haha). I didn't take pictures at the club, but my friend Belen did... here are a few!:

 

On Saturday, we grabbed some cafe dulce at a little cafe and we were able to get a little shopping in (before I started feeling sick) The big after-Christmas sales are going on right now and continue through January so there are a lot of great deals everywheree. We only went to the mall though, so I'm hoping to explore some of the more unique little shops in town another time!

I'll write about all my classes tomorrow!

Sorry I haven't written in a few days!

Ah! I came down with a fever yesterday afternoon and had to stay in last night. And then today I've pretty much been laying bed all day, taking medicine, drinking water, sleeping and trying to get better. I'm feeling much much better than I was yesterday so hopefully it was just a 24 hour bug. I'll write a long entry when I'm feeling 100% (hopefully tomorrow!)
Love you all

First full day in Bilbao!!!!

So after getting all unpacked and settled last night, at around 9pm one of the spanish girls in my hall came and knocked on my door to go to dinner in the dining hall downstairs. So I went to eat with her, some of the Spanish girls I had met earlier, and another American student who lives in my hall. Dinner was alright (I picked up some bread, rice, and yucky salad) and afterwards I came back up to get ready for bed. I read some Hunger Games and by about 10:30 I was out. I woke up at about 5:30 WIDE awake and couldnt get back to sleep until about 7. I guess I'm still adjusting to the time change.
At about 8:20, right after my alarm went off, an american girl I had met in the elevator for like 1 minute yesterday came and knocked on my door to get some breakfast downstairs, yay! So I got ready for the day and we went to go eat. I had a churro for breakfast and some weird cookie/cracker things and some coffee. I think we're all still figuring out the dining hall and the food choices (re: the girl I was with accidentally got a cup of coffee creamer thinking it was milk haha)
After breakfast, all the american students gathered in the lobby of my dorm, colegio mayor, and someone led us to campus. Luckily I'm verryy close, about a 2 minute walk until I step foot on campus.
We met in a classroom (a VERY hot classroom-- having a lot of issues with extreme temperatures it seems) and took a spanish language placement test- 85 grammar/vocab multiple choice questions and then one short composition about 1 of 2 topics.
Afterwards, in the same scorching hot classroom, we had a 2 hour long info session about everything and anything- the city and the university itself (except we have the campus tour tomorrow so I still don't know too much).
After the info session, we finally got a chance to see the city! I felt like such a tourist, walking in a huge group with all of our bright blue Deusto folders, so I didn't take any pictures today, but I promise there will be some to come. Finally saw the Guggenheim in person! So cool-looking and right across the river from my campus. We walked to a restaurant and had lunch there- pasta with what i'm pretty sure was just tomato soup on top, chicken french fries and some cheese sauce, and a little cake thing for dessert. Pretty good and I got to meet and bond with a lot of american students in my program.
After lunch we had a tour from a profesora around the city. It was a LOT to take in but hopefully I can learn my way around soon.
After the tour was over, a few girls and I did a little shopping at Cortes ingles which is basically a huge department store with everything ever. I bought a hair straightener there (a necessity if you know me at all). Then we went to a different cortes ingles store down the street and I bought two harry potter books- the first one in spanish for myself and the third one in Basque for Gigi (you're welcome heh).
After 10 hours of walking around I'm finally back in the dorm relaxing for a bit before dinner (getting accustomed to these meal times....) and then a few of us wanted to go out later and get a drink and explore more.
Tomorrow's another long day of getting acquainted with the school and city, can't wait!!!!

jk I lied I took one picture today of this giant baby head statue. You're welcome!

Pictures of my room!

Getting here/first day in Spain!

 I'm finally here! I can't believe it! It was quite a long trip (about 24 total hours of traveling), but I made it. I found it VERY hard to finally leave home and the comforts that come with it (re: bawling in the airport with Dad), but once we said our final goodbyes and I met up with my friend Christian, things started to look up. The first leg of the trip- DC to NYC, was nothing. About an hour long flight. I didn't realize how nice it would be to travel with someone I know! We got some lunch at JFK, had a few-hour layover and then boarded the flight to Brussels, Belgium. I ended up falling asleep for a little while everyone else was boarding (it took FOREVER, apparently there was some "security issue" with a bag they were putting on the  plane- yikes). This was the WORST FLIGHT I've ever been on!! I had a window seat, which I ordinarily like, but in this case it meant being crammed against a freezing cold airplane wall (literally, not kidding, NEGATIVE NINETY TWO degrees outside- there was frost forming on the window) with a young, gross newlywed couple next to me. I did read a considerable portion of The Hunger Games though, which kept me a little sane. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to sleep at all during this eight hour flight because a few hours in, due to the FREEZING temperatures outsides, the entire left side of my body went numb- I'm talking like I thought I had frost bite and was going to have to cut my foot off when I got off the plane. It was MISERABLE. Finally landed in Brussels, thank GOD. Luckily we found some benches in a gate area that we were able to nap on for a few hours (this layover was about 5 hours). We got some food, did a lot of walking around the airport, and then eventually got on the flight to Bilbao. YAY! This was a nice flight- barely anyone on it so we were able to stretch out and get some more rest during this 2 hour flight. We landed, I picked up my 70-pound suitcase from baggage claim (woops, sorry Dad) and we made our way to the woman with the "Deusto" sign waiting for us. A Mercedes Benz van came and dropped us off at our respective dorms. I was able to see a lot of the city on the drive- Chloe you'd die over the mountains here.
Finally made my way to my dorm, got my room assignment and as I was unlocking the door the other girls in my hall must've heard me and they came out to greet me! We went back and forth essentially speaking spanglish to each other. They speak english about as well as I speak Spanish- aka we both have a lot of practice to do. I'm really excited for that though. We talked to for quite a while until they went back to their studying (they have final exams right now- yeah I dunno, I'm confused too) and I decided to go unpack.
My dorm room is small but I'll be able to fit everything just fine. Big desk, 2 decently sized closets with drawers and shelves, a single bed, and my own bathroom (!) --pictures to come. Eventually I had to go down to reception to get an ethernet cord and, true to form, got lost on my way there and on my way back. In my defense though this dorm is REALLY confusing- I'm still kind of scared to leave my room in fear that I won't be able to find my way back AGAIN. Different elevators lead to different floors- for instance, I'm room 510 Izquierda (left), so when I took a different set of elevators to the 5th floor I ended up in a boys' hall. VERY confusing.
Right now I'm still unpacking, tomorrow we have a veryy full day of language placement tests and lots of walking with tours of the city and campus. So I might even go to sleep relatively soon (it's 7:45 pm haha).
Hope this wasn't too boring for my first blog entry! SO excited to be here- can't to explore more and meet more people!
MISS AND LOVE YOU ALL!