mis primeros dias en granada

hola mis amigos! It's been a whirlwind of a few days but Ella and I are safely and happily in Granada. We got here two days ago but it actually feels like 5. We flew from Barcelona on Wednesday which was actually the quickest flight ever it was silly. The airport process was longer than the flight time. Then we were picked up by a CEA representative and brought to our homestay. Our madre is Lola and and our padre is Jesus and we have an older hermana Carmen. The best part by far is the dog named Bimbo though (pronounced "beembo") He looks like a mix between a german shepherd and a chihuahua. I don't really know how that works out and I don't ever want to but somehow it made a really cute dog. Bimbo and I are besties and now he jumps up on me when I get in the house.

Bimbo (see what I'm saying???)

Ella and I ate lunch with our host family that afternoon before unpacking. We have our own room right as you walk in the house so we never disturb them when we come home which is good. Only one bathroom though for everyone. Kind of awk but we've managed. So how the meals work here is we wake up in the morning and have like a piece of toast and yogurt and then their biggest meal is lunch. Everyone comes home for lunch and all the shops around close up for 4 hours. It's a real life siesta no joke. We sit down con la familia and eat a huge meal and watch the news and chat for like two hours. The food is so rich I'm still getting used to it. Lola doesn't force food on us and we don't have to finish but since Big Ray never let us leave the table until we were done as kids I have a weird complex that I have to finish everything and its really screwing with my stomach (also trying to explain this to my padres in spanish was dumb they looked at me like I had 14 heads). The parents basically only address Ella and I think they think I may be retarded. We're only speaking in Spanish in the house and honestly even writing in this now I keep catching myself writing in Spanish. So, Ella talks to the padres and then every once in a while they ask if I understand which a little over half the time I do. Lola is an awesome cook and its weird having someone prepare every meal for you and clean up after you but they insist on it. We've only eaten dinner here once and they don't eat with us cause idk I think they just don't eat dinner and are locos but we don't eat dinner until around 9 or 10.

The first night we got here we used whatsapp and facebook to get in touch with other Tulane people and it was pretty complicated cause once we left the house and didn't have wifi we just had to hope we got to the right place and we would find our friends. Having our first time exploring the city be at night was not a good idea. Ella and I got incredibly lost but were too embarrassed/nervous to pull out a map. So we walked until we found the main streets and finally made it to the Plaza de Toro where we were meeting everyone for tapas. Ella and I were the first to get there so of course we were freaking out thinking we were in the wrong place. We sat outside near the sidewalk so if anyone walked by we'd see them. On the menu it had the wine price as 12 euros so we asked our waiter how much the bottle was and when he said he'd have to look it up we assumed it was 12 euros for the glass and he came out with these tiny glasses and we were like shit we picked the most expensive place in Granada but we can't leave cause we won't find everyone etc etc. In Granada at almost every tapas place before midnight or so when you order a glass of wine, you get a free tapa. so with every glass of wine we have we get una tapa gratis. literally a hungry american college student's dream (...my dream). So finally Becca and Rachel got there, who had also gotten lost, and Ella and I insisted on getting the check cause of our crazy expensive glasses of wine. We get the check...... the glasses of wine were 2 euros and we're retarded. The bottle was 12 (wine is cheaper than water here its crazy) and so naturally we stayed and ordered more.

The boys arrived a little later and it was cool cause I didn't know a fair amount of the Tulane kids on this trip before getting here. Dash, Sam, and Harry had been at this tapas place earlier in the day and made friends with the waiter Rueben so Rueben served us bottle after bottle. There was 9 of us and we just sat and chatted for so long over some vino it was great. Then out of nowhere Rueben just brings us free tequila shots. We're not sure why or how this happened but it turned into that kind of night. After nice tequila shots (disclaimer they don't have bad bar liquor here really, so instead of drinking pepe lopez he gave us chilled jimador.....wut?) more wine, and then some other sugary shot Rueben fed us, we decided we had to go out and party with Rueben. We gave him 11 extra euro for his service and we literally had to force him to take it. cmon Rueben 18 free shots deserves a simple 11 euro. But no from there he led us to some other bar and used the 11 euro to buy us all more drinks. Rueben was loco but muy divertido and told us of some other club to go to called Mae West. At this point we were all pretty loopy, most of us were a little jetlagged and delusional, and loving on Rueben so we were very much inclined to go clubbing con el. We got there and it was pretty empty (everywheres been pretty empty cause this is their summer vacation from like everything, work school etc the spaniards are the chillest of bros around). but it was really fun we drank and danced a bunch (disclaimer: spaniards hate it when you dance on tables, chairs, any raised surface I've gotten yelled at some many times. stupid americana). Come 4:30 am all the jetlagged homies were zombies and we all decided to call it a night and sleep.

los hombres de Tulane

the next day was filled with boring orientations and tours and none of us were feeling too hot so it made it worse. It was nice to get our bearings of the city in daylight though. Its unbelievably beautiful and Ella and I are so close to the city center, a beautiful park, a nice river, and other kids in homestays. We went out for tapas again after dinner con la familia. This tapas place was not as great as the times we shared with our amigo Rueben. We had to leave at like 1 which was awkward timing cause no one goes to the clubs until 2. So naturally instead of walking around and waiting it out we were the first ones in and probably some of the last out too. This club was called Camborio and Brandon and Adams host brothers told us to go there. It overlooks the Alhambra the view is actually amazing, literally breathtaking. A ton of Tulane kids went as well as other people on the program. We hung out with a lot of Spaniards which was cool. A lot of people don't speak English which forces us to use Spanish and I really like it. Also when I'm drunk I'm so much better I think I'm so cool. I was talking to one guy who would speak to me in English and I would talk back to him in Spanish cause we both wanted to practice and we would correct each other and it was interesting having one fluid conversation in two languages. The people here are so friendly and willing to work with us on the Spanish its awesome. Also it helps having cool 16 and 18 year old Spaniards bring you to clubs and introduce you to their friends (it makes me feel ancient.... and also a little washed up these young spanish girls are hot i can't lie). We were having way too much fun and Ella suggested watching the sunrise at the Alhambra and at the time we thought it was a great idea. Then we remembered we had orientation at 10 am and the sun doesnt rise til like 8. We left at 6 am I think (no concept of time anymore idk) walked halfway cabbed halfway parted ways with people being like oh see ya in a few hours at orientation jajaja.

Ella and I set four alarms and I put my phone on the other side of the room so I would have to wake up and get it. We woke up at noon in a panic, confused as to why we slept through four alarms and found my cell phone under my pillow and hers turned off in our desk drawer? It was fine though because once we showed up to orientation we got all the info everyone else got in 4 hours in ten minutes so it was nice. They had to take our pictures for our IDs and I'll be sure to post a picture of what a disaster I looked like. Stupid americana. Ella and I just booked a romantic getaway for her birthday in December in Rome, so excited! We have like 5 days there to travel around Italy too because we have a long weekend that weekend and I'm quite excited. Tomorrow we're going on a tour of la Alhambra and after the view from last night I am ecstatic. We have to be up and at our meeting point at 8:30 am though so needless to say we won't have ourselves a night like the last. Tonight I'll only have a few glasses of wine and enjoy the free tapas con el vino y mis amigos. This post is long and not that great but its still the first couple days, more shenanigans to come. Adios