Sunday, October 26, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
update on life in seville
So, I thought I would just post a little bit about what's been going on in Seville.
Yesterday I started my volunteer work at a high school in Sevilla. It is going to be such neat experience. I'll be going there every Thursday for about 4-5 hours. It's about an hour in transportation there, and an hour back, but I don't mind. Yesterday was my first day, so I met the teachers I would be working with and shadowed the classes.
In the first class, a level one English class, the teacher gave them the whole class period to ask me questions. It was really entertaining. They asked me things like, "What do you eat in America? Do you think the guys in Spain are handsome? Do you celebrate Halloween? Are you cold (I was wearing shorts)? and of course... "Do you like Obama or McCain?" They were all really surprised by my American accent. Most of the English that is taught in Spain resembles British English, so they had a hard time understanding what I said. For example, when I told them my age, I said, "twenty"... but in America we say something more like, "twenny."
In the next class, I just observed. They were reading a story in English. Each student got a chance to read, and it was really interesting for me to listen to the mistakes they made in English pronounciation. It makes me realize how hard English would be as a second language, seeing as it's not very phonetically forgiving.
In the third class, I was asked to give a presentation on myself. I talked about my family, my school, the differences between Spain and America, etc. The professor wanted me to just "be the teacher," so I was put in the front of the class an expected to keep the class in-line, use the white-board, ask them, questions, etc. At the end of the class, the teacher asked them questions on what I had said to see what they understood. They did pretty well! The teacher said that for my first time, I did a great job in front of the class, so that makes me excited. :)
One of the things that I was told when I came to Spain, is that they are much more open about grades. In the US, grades a personal thing, but here in Spain, everyone knows everyone's grades. I never realized what this really meant until the beginning of that third class, when the teacher was handing back tests. As he handed back each test to each student, he would say out-loud, "this is good...." or many times, "this is bad. very, very bad." I couldn't believe it!
The last class was much like the second, I just watched them read a story. It's always neat to see what words the teacher has to define for them, and things like that. Next week, I'll be working with my own group of students, practicing English and helping them. I'm excited!
This weekend, I'm going to Granada (a city in southern Spain) with the program here. I'm really looking forward to it. I'll post an update when I get back.
Take care!
Yesterday I started my volunteer work at a high school in Sevilla. It is going to be such neat experience. I'll be going there every Thursday for about 4-5 hours. It's about an hour in transportation there, and an hour back, but I don't mind. Yesterday was my first day, so I met the teachers I would be working with and shadowed the classes.
In the first class, a level one English class, the teacher gave them the whole class period to ask me questions. It was really entertaining. They asked me things like, "What do you eat in America? Do you think the guys in Spain are handsome? Do you celebrate Halloween? Are you cold (I was wearing shorts)? and of course... "Do you like Obama or McCain?" They were all really surprised by my American accent. Most of the English that is taught in Spain resembles British English, so they had a hard time understanding what I said. For example, when I told them my age, I said, "twenty"... but in America we say something more like, "twenny."
In the next class, I just observed. They were reading a story in English. Each student got a chance to read, and it was really interesting for me to listen to the mistakes they made in English pronounciation. It makes me realize how hard English would be as a second language, seeing as it's not very phonetically forgiving.
In the third class, I was asked to give a presentation on myself. I talked about my family, my school, the differences between Spain and America, etc. The professor wanted me to just "be the teacher," so I was put in the front of the class an expected to keep the class in-line, use the white-board, ask them, questions, etc. At the end of the class, the teacher asked them questions on what I had said to see what they understood. They did pretty well! The teacher said that for my first time, I did a great job in front of the class, so that makes me excited. :)
One of the things that I was told when I came to Spain, is that they are much more open about grades. In the US, grades a personal thing, but here in Spain, everyone knows everyone's grades. I never realized what this really meant until the beginning of that third class, when the teacher was handing back tests. As he handed back each test to each student, he would say out-loud, "this is good...." or many times, "this is bad. very, very bad." I couldn't believe it!
The last class was much like the second, I just watched them read a story. It's always neat to see what words the teacher has to define for them, and things like that. Next week, I'll be working with my own group of students, practicing English and helping them. I'm excited!
This weekend, I'm going to Granada (a city in southern Spain) with the program here. I'm really looking forward to it. I'll post an update when I get back.
Take care!
Monday, October 20, 2008
Bienvenidos a Madrid!
Hello, everyone! I apologize for not updating in a while, but I was waiting until I had some interesting news to share and some new pictures. ☺ This past weekend I went to Madrid with my friend Nanou, and it was a lot of fun! So different from Sevilla!We took a bus there from Sevilla (it was the cheapest way—about 30 euros round trip, but took a little over six hours). We got there Friday night around 7:30pm and went right to our hostel. The hostel was actually a female residence hall for students studying in Madrid for the year, but they rented out available rooms to people looking for a temporary place to stay. The room we had was really nice… the beds were comfortable and it was very spacious. However, we ended up having problems with the lock on our door. Saturday morning, after taking showers, we went to go back in our room to change, but we couldn’t get the lock open. We found someone to come open the door for us, but she couldn’t get it open, and eventually a guy had to come and change the lock! There was no “receptionist” either, so when we wanted to leave on Sunday, we couldn’t find anyone to give our keys to. Haha, it was quite the adventure. It was a pretty good location though, and fairly cheap, so I really can’t complain.
On Saturday we went to the Prado… it was by far my favorite thing we did. It was so amazing to be able to see the actual works of Velazquez, Goya, and all of the other painters I had learned about in my Spanish class. Seeing pictures of them on slides was nothing compared to seeing the beautiful paintings in person! It was amazing! After, we visited the outside of the Real Academia Espanola (basically, the language police), and then took a walk in a huge park/garden. We saw the crystal palace (there’s a picture of it in my photos)… that was really pretty. Next, we took a walk through the shops and downtown area and got lunch at a local restaurant. (I <3 Spanish food!) Later that night we met up with Tori (friend from back home studying in Madrid this year) and went to a café for a while and that got dinner around 11pm.
Sunday we went to the royal palace (the old palace, where the royal family used to live). It was absolutely enormous, and made me sick just to see how much money was put into it. It was interesting that they only let you see the public rooms (the huge dining hall, the throne room, etc.) We didn’t get to see any of the private rooms, or the places where the servants slept, etc. Everything was extremely ornate and elaborate. We also saw the royal pharmacy and all of the battle armor.
All in all, it was a great weekend trip, and I feel much better about my Spanish skills after spending time in Northern Spain! I realized just how hard the Andulusian (southern/Sevillian) accent is. It was much, much, easier to understand the accent in Madrid. There was also not nearly as much of a religious influence. In Sevilla, there are pictures of the Virgin Mary everywhere… in the street, in bars, etc. You don’t see a lot of that in Madrid. Madrid is also much more modern, and the streets are much wider and straighter.
Well, I’m off to class! Feel free to leave comments. ☺
Saturday, October 11, 2008
cumpleaños :)
Hooray! I am officially no longer a teenager! Yesterday I celebrated 20 years. :) My señora let me choose what I wanted to eat that day, and we cooked lunch together. She bought me a cute shirt too; she's so sweet! Her husband bought me two books too! One book is a Spanish play, and the other is a book of Spanish poetry. After lunch we had a desert that my señora made... it was made from milk, sugar, and cheese, and had cookies and caramel! It was really tasty-- very unlike anything in the US. Later I went out with my friend Nanou to hang out, and then later at night we went out to a Spanish disco to go dancing. It was a lot of fun, we danced the night away to merengue, bachata, salsa, raggaeton, and more. :) It was a great day--on top of all that, I got some wonderful emails from my friends and family, and I hear that my nephew Matthew even blew out some candles for me at home. :) My boyfriend Bradley even sent me flowers!! (See photo). My room smells so fantastic now... He is just so great. :-D Muchas gracias a todos!!
Monday, October 6, 2008
the garbage man always comes by at 1 in the morning... and my window is right above the street
hey all!
Just wanted to update and let everyone know that things are going well! Time is going by fast! I'm on my second week of classes now, and all is well. There are a lot of foreigners in my class at the university... today I met two girls from Italy. ciao, bella :) Also today, for my journalism class, we took a little field trip to a local newspaper office, and spoke with one of the editors about how the newspaper process works, the problems in the media-world, etc. It was really interesting.
I've found that I can understand Spanish pretty well when people speak directly to me, or when a teacher is lecturing, but it is sometimes near impossible to understand when young people speak to each other. It's much easier when adults speak to each other, but youth often use super slang/colloquial speech... and it's almost like they could be speaking Chinese and I would understand just as much. I'm picking up on some local slang like, "que guay" or "que chula" (how cool)....
Sunday I partcipated in a 5K run with about 3500 other women. It was fun, but really crowded. :) Other than that I've just been hanging out with friends, speaking in Spanish, and eating some good food.
I think it's interesting how much smoking and drinking is like a second nature. Smoking is very common, much more common than in the US. And people have a way different attitude towards drinking than that I find in Madison. People have a beer, a glass of wine, sangria, etc. with lunch, dinner, or just when hanging out. Even at church things I've been to, its just a natural part of hanging out. People have one or two drinks casually, and enjoy them. The difference is, they don't seem to binge as much as they do in the United States. It's an interesting observation I've been making...
Well anyways, it's almost 1am, so I'm gonna get to bed!
Buenas noches :-D
Just wanted to update and let everyone know that things are going well! Time is going by fast! I'm on my second week of classes now, and all is well. There are a lot of foreigners in my class at the university... today I met two girls from Italy. ciao, bella :) Also today, for my journalism class, we took a little field trip to a local newspaper office, and spoke with one of the editors about how the newspaper process works, the problems in the media-world, etc. It was really interesting.
I've found that I can understand Spanish pretty well when people speak directly to me, or when a teacher is lecturing, but it is sometimes near impossible to understand when young people speak to each other. It's much easier when adults speak to each other, but youth often use super slang/colloquial speech... and it's almost like they could be speaking Chinese and I would understand just as much. I'm picking up on some local slang like, "que guay" or "que chula" (how cool)....
Sunday I partcipated in a 5K run with about 3500 other women. It was fun, but really crowded. :) Other than that I've just been hanging out with friends, speaking in Spanish, and eating some good food.
I think it's interesting how much smoking and drinking is like a second nature. Smoking is very common, much more common than in the US. And people have a way different attitude towards drinking than that I find in Madison. People have a beer, a glass of wine, sangria, etc. with lunch, dinner, or just when hanging out. Even at church things I've been to, its just a natural part of hanging out. People have one or two drinks casually, and enjoy them. The difference is, they don't seem to binge as much as they do in the United States. It's an interesting observation I've been making...
Well anyways, it's almost 1am, so I'm gonna get to bed!
Buenas noches :-D
Friday, October 3, 2008
FIN DE SEMANA!
My first week of classes went really well! I love my professors and I’m super excited for the classes as well. ☺ I’m taking three classes at the CIEE program study center: A journalism class, were we publish a magazine at the end of the semester, introduction to Spanish linguistics, and Advanced Spanish phonetics and phonology. I’m also taking one class at the University of Sevilla, Theory of Language and Theoretical Linguistics. (Can you tell I’m a Spanish & linguistics major? ;) ) So far I love all of the classes… a lot! I even get to do outside research and field work in some of them… so it will be really fun!
It was kinda funny… the first day in my class at the University, the professor asked, “So everyone can read in English, right? Because the readings are in English, since most linguists of the twentieth century published their works in English…” I thought it was humorous that it’s a given that everyone in the class could speak English. Most of the people in that class are foreigners as well, so they are here studying in Spanish, which isn’t their native language… yet, of course they know English. :-O Foreign language is so important! I wish that they would keep it in the elementary schools…. It has made such a different in my Spanish, having been able to start learning in fourth grade. I should write a letter to them. ☺
I’ve found that the language aspect is so difficult because of the content of what I’m speaking. For example, I can talk pretty quickly if I’m talking about my day, or my family, or what I like to do. But when I start talking about the presidential election or Catholic teachings… it gets a little more shaky. Practice Practice Practice!
I’ve also started taking Sevillanas lessons! Sevillanas is a type of dance from southern Spain… kind of like flamenco. The locals all know it… I told my senora that I had started taking lessons… and she stood up and started dancing a little bit… it was cute. ☺
I hope everyone has a wonderful day! ENJOY THE WEEKEND!
Con mi amor,
Marisa
It was kinda funny… the first day in my class at the University, the professor asked, “So everyone can read in English, right? Because the readings are in English, since most linguists of the twentieth century published their works in English…” I thought it was humorous that it’s a given that everyone in the class could speak English. Most of the people in that class are foreigners as well, so they are here studying in Spanish, which isn’t their native language… yet, of course they know English. :-O Foreign language is so important! I wish that they would keep it in the elementary schools…. It has made such a different in my Spanish, having been able to start learning in fourth grade. I should write a letter to them. ☺
I’ve found that the language aspect is so difficult because of the content of what I’m speaking. For example, I can talk pretty quickly if I’m talking about my day, or my family, or what I like to do. But when I start talking about the presidential election or Catholic teachings… it gets a little more shaky. Practice Practice Practice!
I’ve also started taking Sevillanas lessons! Sevillanas is a type of dance from southern Spain… kind of like flamenco. The locals all know it… I told my senora that I had started taking lessons… and she stood up and started dancing a little bit… it was cute. ☺
I hope everyone has a wonderful day! ENJOY THE WEEKEND!
Con mi amor,
Marisa
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