Ah, I've reached another end in my life. Today is the last official day of Summer of Solutions Worcester 2009.

I'd like to tell you all about how much we've gotten accomplished in just these two past short months. I focused mostly on the Green Jobs messaging campaign and the Weatherization Team's first Energy Barn-Raising in Worcester.

In the Green Jobs project team, we created a Green Jobs Zine for Worcester, check it out at the link below: http://www.summerofsolutionsworcester.org/green-jobs-project/Worcester%27s_Green_Jobs_Zine_1.pdf?attredirects=0

We took this as an opportunity to start the creation of our Green Jobs materials in a more informal way to get the creative juices flowing. We had a mixture of collages, articles, fun facts, sketches and doodles, and bullet points, and much much more! This was my first time making a zine, and it was really fun to do it in a collaborative way. We then distributed this zine to different locations around Main South (Worcester). We are currently working on a more professional-looking brochure, which I can probably post when we have completed it. We've decided to seek a local printer who uses recycled paper to print our brochures.

In the Weatherization Team, we held the first Energy Barn-Raising in Worcester! I spent a lot of time flyering and emailing blasting to publicize the event all along with other teammates. My position in the team was Volunteer Coordinator so I was in charge of organizing the volunteers and being their contact person. The day of the Barn-Raising I was the overall go-to person, I went around to all the working teams to make sure everything was going smoothly, saw if they needed any thing like tools or some water to drink, and tried to be a good time-keeper. However at the end, it was a bit difficult to get everyone finish working at the same time.
 I am now including a copy of our press release so you can understand more about our event:

Saving Energy Money and the Planet - All in a Day's Work 

50 Local Volunteers Gather for an Energy Barn-raising at the Father Brooks House

 Worcester, MA – On July 25th, 50 people from local schools,

organizations, and neighborhoods gathered at the Father Brooks House

on Arthur St to learn skills, save energy, and have fun with the first

energy barn-raising! Yet there were no barns involved in this event,

and the main goals were to make a real and immediate impact

on the environment all the while encouraging a collaborative effort within the

community. Approximately 50 volunteers broke into nine different teams

to learn and work on different tasks, including sealing air leaks,

insulating the hot water heater, measuring the energy use of different

electronics and appliances, and replacing  inefficient incandescent

bulbs. Through hands-on work, participants learned new skills to take

back to their own homes in order to save energy and money. And after

the work was completed, everyone celebrated the success with food,

music, and fun!

The day began with an orientation in which the organizers explained the

origins of the idea for a Barn-Raising, how the project was planned by a small team of volunteers, 
and how volunteers could stay involved after the event. Staff and

residents from the Brooks House spoke about the organization, what it

means to them, and how the energy barn-raising will bring benefits to

their programs  by providing energy savings and a more comfortable,

efficient home. This project was an exciting collaboration that

provided hands-on educational opportunities for all participants and

real energy and monetary savings for the Brooks House.

After the orientation, volunteers then chose which tasks they would like to

be involved in and the teams dispersed throughout the house. By the

end of the day, the groups had successfully insulated the hot water

heater, caulked many  leaks, weatherized three door frames, and did major

construction in the attic sealing off the enormous heat leaks. Among

smaller things, they installed faucet aerators to help conserve water

– reducing the flow from 2.3 gallons per minute to 1.5. However, the

biggest change that could be calculated immediately was the installing

of 50 energy-efficient CFL bulbs; an act  alone  that

will prevent over 8 tons of carbon dioxide emissions and save the

Brooks House over $2,600 in electricity costs over the next 10 years!

The energy barn-raising in Worcester was modeled after that of the

Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET) in Cambridge, Massachusetts -- a

cooperative movement inspired by the team-work that takes place

during barn-raisings in the Amish tradition. The emerging group in

Cambridge has had enormous success reusing this historic model of

local collaboration, hands-on work, and post-work celebration as a

model for climate-change solutions at the community level. These

events offer an immediate and rewarding step towards resolving this great crisis

of our times, while also serving to  reawaken our need to connect and

collaborate with our neighbors, something that many agree we need to

do here in Worcester.

Worcester's first Energy Barn-raising this past Saturday proved to be

a  great success as 50 people, ranging from age 12 to 60, and coming

from  as  far as Beverly to Worcester, gathered together to help make

these  major improvements. In summary, it  is what the organizers

hoped it to be and showed we can do something at the grassroots level

about climate–change. Thanks to all who were involved!

If you are interested in participating in a future Energy

Barn-Raising, check out www.EnergyBarnRaising.org (yes we have our own website as well!)

Here is a link to the awesome article that was written about us in the local newspaper the Worcester Telegram and Gazett

http://www.telegram.com/article/20090726/NEWS/907260458/1003/NEWS03

The night before, Ashley and I spent a few hours making some bad-ass capes so that 
Team Leaders could be easily identified and feel super-cool the day of the barn-raising:

And here are some other photos from the day!

We had a major success! Last night we met post Barn-Raising with people outside of our working team to discuss the future of Barn-Raising in Worcester. We will meet bi-weekly and hopefully if enough interest is there and we get another place to hold a Barn-Raising we will have one in mid-Septemeber. Otherwise, we are aiming to have one on

24 October 2009 INTERNATIONAL DAY OF CLIMATE ACTION (check it out here for more information: www.350.org)

Also last night, we finally held our Zero Gravity Open Mic. It was a great way to start ending the week with a huge variety of performances, tea, coffee, and not to mention desserts! We had people perform their own songs, other people's songs, read their own and others poetry, have lots of kazoo playing, spoken word from the Medical Encyclopedia, and an impromtu karaoke session.

Today is our BLAST OFF DAY! We are going to have lots of fun games on the Clark Green, a period of reflection/ice cream social, and a huge cook-out in one of the Community Gardens that has been worked on by Summer of Solutions Garndening Team. Right now it is raining, but I really hope it gets better!!!

Hang in there world!

hello everyone out there! I can't believe I've been back in the states for more than 2 months now!

I finally made up my mind in those past two months to move to Worcester and live with 6 other girls. I also decided to do the Student Acitivity Fund once again, which is a grant given out by the Veatch Fund of the Long Island Council of Unitarian Universalists to fund high school and college students to do social justice/action work (namingly unpaid and not for school credit). So this summer there are many more students participating in SAF, possibly due to this economic predicament and impossibility to find work, so we have 56 students participating with the same amount of money. They are trying out this new way of figuring out the budget for all the SAF-ers by working a max of 200 hours by July 10th, then calculating to see if there is enough money for students to continue to earn funding after this date.

Anyways, I was originally going to intern at the Central Mass Area Health Education Center (right near Alex's house) and help out with the Latino Mental Health Project. Turns out the project is based in Framingham and after I attended the interviewer trainer, learned they wanted a minimum of 5 interviews conducted per week these being in only Spanish or Portugese. I thought it unrealistic for me to drive to and around Framingham 5 days a week and to conduct a interview in a non-native language. It would have been fun to shadow an interviewer, but they seemed to be struggling with the research in general that I felt like I was just being a nusaince and there was no place for me. I do have a contact there now ( I was just in communication with the executive director, who was always so busy) so I may try to help out with data entry and data analysis in the future.

As for that, I was going to be doing that internship and participating in Summer of Solutions part time (www.summerofsolutionsworcester.org). Yet, I am entirely devoted to SoS at this moment. I am mostly focusing on the Weatherization Project and Green Jobs messaging campaign. I really enjoy what I am doing and it's great to know that I am really making a difference and helping bring change for the better. I like being able to work in a consensus-based atmosphere where I don't feel like an inferior or out of place. There are mainly 2 meetings a week per project, so we devote that time to planning and processing the projects. For the weatherization project, we have a date for our first barn-raising (where members of the community come together to weatherize a building, be it a community center or just a home, in order to make it more energy efficient)! I am just learning a lot. I went to 2 Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET) trainings in Cambridge and learned some really easy , cheap, and effective ways to weatherize a home.

Another great thing with SoS is we have lots of potlucks and fun times together. We have 2 potlucks a week at different apartments with sometimes speakers! We also have skillshare times, and I went to my first tonight which was a workshop on Time and Stress Management.

I feel like there are so many people in Worcester for the summer, I think I am just missing one person who I wish was living here, but sadly he is at home very much enjoying himself. I will update more at another time because I am getting sleepy and my thought pattern sloppy.

Buenas noches!
-Liz 

hey all! so i've been really horrible in keeping up with this. let's see where i've been since my last post....

-Granada: last city to be conquered during the reconquista from the arabics, the place where Federico Garcia Lorca's house it (well his summer house, but where he lived right before he was assesinated during the Spanish Civil War), home to the famous Alhambra (which means red land), filled with hippies, has an arabic neighborhood called the Albacyn which is basically a labyrinth and has great views of the Alhambra especially at sunset. also surrounded by gypsy caves. ran into emma in granada!!

-Alex visited: we did some touristy things like visit the Prado, Palacio Real, and ate TAPAS. but we also took a day trip to Toledo which is really old and has lots of curvy roads and paintings by my favorite EL GRECO. supposedly his house is there, but it was closed for restaurations and I learned that it wasn't really his house. He did do many of his great works in Toledo.

-Sevilla: Alyssa and I visited some the lovely Sevillana sites like the reales alcazares (BEAUTIFUL and full of mudejar-mix of christian and muslim-architecture), the Maria Luisa Park, Plaza de Espana. We also saw an sick ass Flamenco show in this authetic Andalucian patio in the antique Jewish neighborhood called Santa Cruz. the place was called Casa de la Memoria. We also visited all the Clarkies: Sasha, Ally, Emma, Kai, and Sophie!! :)

-Valencia: spontaneous trip for our 5-day weekend (puente or bridge) with Rob to see the famous FALLAS festival. we got to Valencia at 5am and walked the streets and saw many fallas which are like these huge charicatures made of wood and wax. crashed at our friends' from tandem's apartment which they rented there and it was right next to the beach. saw the Fallas get blown up, which is called the Crema or Burn, and an sick ass fireworks display. had some interesting experiences, met some cool people. we also discovered a huge pirate park and visted the futuristic city of arts and sciences. and ate cream cheese and a baguette in a park. oh and we can't forget how we found the huge virgen mary made out of flowers!!

-Semana Santa (SPRING BREAK): I went to Lisboa Portugal and Marrakech, Morocco!
in Lisboa, we stayed in the historic part of town and it was really nice and tranquil. we stayed at a precious hostel with a beautiful terrace that had a lovely view of the ocean. we made good friends with our 4th hostelmate. we visited the close by areas of Sintra and Belem. Saw an awesome monastery, the cloisture was the best part. we also ate a lot of awesome pastries called Nata. I also had laryngitis for the most part. oh yeah we also saw Fado music which is apparently Portugese blues.

Marrakech, Morocco=tourism capital of Northern Africa....our hostal was very close to the famous and ALWAYS busy square, you can't walk anywhere without anyone trying to sell you something or other. i spoke a little bit of spanish, french, english, and even italian. everyone assumed we were spanish so that was cool. we visited a lot of famous sites for only a euro and saw a lot of arabic architecture. we also ate a lot of cous-cous and tagine veggies. and pastries, can't forget the pastries! we tried to go on a day trip to the Altas Mountains to ride camels, hike, and eat with a Berber family. But hey there was a taxi driver protest blocking the way to the mountains! They were apparently protesting a new law being passed that prohibits taxi drivers from driving if they've hit someone in the past...

I also took a day trip to El Escorial and it was pretty interesting. the way it was built was very symbolic about life and heaven. hmm maybe i will explain it another day.

right now i am going to meet with Teresa Ruano (an old tandem teacher I had at Clark for a year) to eat crepes near Sol! I finished two finals, and only have one more which is tomorrow. It is Spanish Cinema...and kinda nervous about this one because we haven't learned much all semester and there are only 2 questions on the exam...

Well, wish me luck!! and I'll be returning home this Sunday April 26th. I can't believe it!!!!

I'll be seeing you!

Here's a fun video  of Carnaval in Cadiz I found posted by our good Belgian friend Oli:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tkgr8eCCT2Y

All of last week, many of my classmates were full of anticipation and excitement to attend the Carnival Festivals in Cádiz (city in Southern Spain), and I was sad that I wasn't going and that I was going on a silly day trip to Toledo. But then came Friday night, and the spontaneity kicked in full force! (Prior, Claire, Shana's roommate and a fellow Clarkie, was planning on taking a bus down to Cádiz just for Saturday night's festivities and then catch a bus back to Madrid Sunday, yet she developed a cold so things were looking shakey.) However, Shana, Claire, Rob, and our good friend from Belgium Oli, bought tickets to go to Cádiz! Of course, I didn't want to miss out on this opportunity, so I went down to the bus station to purchase my own ida y vuelta (roundtrip) ticket! Then that night, Rob, Shana, and I went to go see Revolutionary Road. Wow, that was really interesting, yet sad movie.

Soon came 10AM Saturday morning, and we were all on our way to Cádiz, an 8-hour trip mind you!! I was sitting next to a native of Cádiz, who now works in Paris, and he got so enfadado (angry) when the bus driver decided to take a road that would take us out of our way to our destination: party land! We discovered that this was the first time the bus driver had ever been down South, but the hour detour did not really bother me because I was so excited to see the paisaje (landscape) of Southern Spain. Finally, after 9 hours, we arrived in Cádiz, and we're left off practically on the beach. We ran to the beach and got to see this huge red-orange sun disappear into the horizon! AMAZING! Oli went right into the water, and the water was not warm! Then we walked about an hour to the center of town where we entered through the gates with lights that read CARNAVAL with a mischevious looking clown in the middle.

We went to Cádiz not knowing what to expect, but knew that there would be lots of costumes. Everyone was dressed up! Luckily, Claire brought face paint and gold ribbon so we could all disguise ourselves in one way or another. I was a flower child, Shana was a leopard, Oli was braveheart (in my interpretation), Rob was an old sexy man-woman, and Claire was a chick with stars on her face! All the people at Carnaval were really friendly and just wanted to talk and talk. Basically, Carnaval turned out to be a huge botellon (which means a huge gathering of people drinking in public areas) but with all the people dressed up in costumes. I guess you could say Carnaval is Spain's Halloween.

Later in the midst of the chaos, we were able to meet up with the Clarkies who are studying abroad in Sevilla: Kai, Sasha, Sophie, and Ally (we missed Emma!!). It was so nice to see them and be able to find them in the approximately 2 million disguised people croweded into this smallish city center. We got to see one group of all male singers perform around 3 or 4am. We sadly had to say hasta luego to our Sevilla kiddies because they were catching a 5:30AM bus back to Sevilla. Yet, we partied on!

There were some cars that had huge sound systems in their trunks and were blasting music, soon enough there was an awesome dance party in the street! At around 7AM, we went to go search for our friend Oli, who had gone to take a little rest on the beach (which I remind you was pretty freezing). As we left Carnaval, the sun was coming up and helped me wake up a bit! You could see the aftermath in all the trash, bottles, and piss all over the streets...not a pretty sight.

Luckily, I caught at 10AM bus back to Madrid and passed OUT. Arrived in Madrid around 6pm.

That was quite an experience, I'll say! (waiting for people to post pictures since I did not have my camera with me at Carnval!)

hello hello.

so yesterday in class we started going over the perfect future tense, which makes absolutely no sense to me most of the time. perfect future tense is like "i will have done this," for example: "by 3pm tomorrow, i will have finished my test." (which is true, because i have my first ORAL EXAM tomorrow!) but it just doesn't always translate to the english language grammar rules and are so ingrained in my head. this is the point where we are moving in the bigger, and more advanced things. and this kind of scares me, but is exciting. my profesor juan told us (and tells us often) that we are the smartest group of kids at tandem. really flattering!!! :) i love juan! too bad i still don't understand perfect future tense...soon i will! i hope.

this past weekend, i went on a day trip to segovia, a city about an hour by bus outside of madrid. originally, there were 30 somewhat tandem students signed up to go on this trip, but once our program director warned us of COLD weather, the list dropped down to 6 students (including me). Alyssa and I were the only clarkies who went. we went with our lovely tour guide Sonia, and it was very chilly. however, on the bus ride there, i could see huge beautiful snow-covered mountains. snow, the snow untouched by contamination, is so beautiful and i don't know how one could hate it. there wasn't actually very much to see in segovia. there was an abundant number of churches (romantic, arabic, and gothic style) due to the clashing of religions through history. i also learned that segovia is known for is gastronmy, mainly it's cerdito (baby pig!!) how sad. one knows that the cerdito is really good when one can cut the meat with a PLATE. there was a picture of a man holding a plate to cerditos on a restaurant's window. gross. and terrible! but probably very delicious for those meat-lovers. we also visited the alcazar (which is a castle but was more associated with the military and protecting the state) which had an amazing view of all the beautiful scenery surrounding segovia! when it gets warmer, i'd love to take a bus out there again and go hiking along the path there. and finally, we visited the cathedral which was absoluetly and intricately designed on the outside. (picture of me in front of it on facebook!!) and i can't forget the roman style aquaducts!!

i am really enjoying my cinema class. we watched part of pedro almovodar's hable con ella, which was sooo weird! basically these two men are in love with women who are in comas. we paused at a scene where a shrunken man is walking into a ginormous vagina. okay you need to see this, that is all i am saying for now.

 

two friends and i went to cordoba for a weekend trip. we got to cordoba late friday night about 11pm because of traffic. we got some yummy tapas for dinner and had a nice sleep in our antique and cozy hostal. the hostal had free breakfast! something very small like a crossaint or toast, but still it was perfect.

then saturday we barely had any rain and we were out for the WHOLE day. We left to go to the mezquita (mosque) around 10am. we were there for a couple of hours. it was HUGE and GORGEOUS! 2400 square meters! Can you imagine? Don't worry I have TONS of pictures! there was a huge mixture of cultures and religions, muslim and catholicism because of the conquering of one culture over the other. apparently the mezquita was built over a whole bed of cathedrals and then the mezquita was made into a cathedral itself.

since my battery charger for my rechargeable batteries broke (due to me not using the voltage converter)I ended up  buying some batteries for my camera, but they died within a matter of minutes! I think it was because the voltage of the camera was different than that ofthe battery. I'm not sure. But I somehow managed to take 100 or more pictures by switching between four almost dead batteries and giving them special battery massages. Haha!

Then we walked around the alcázar (fort) and the cute little town within it. Southern Spain architecture and coloration is just gorgeous!! so much yellow and awesome tiles and mosiacs. We
stopped at a little place for bocadillos (sandwiches) and my lunch was under four euros. Then we went searching for the sinagoga (synagogue) and found the calle de los judios (literally meaning, jew's street!). The sinagoga was very small yet beautiful. it's one of the three sinagoga's still standing in spain (the two others are in toledo).

then we decided to get some ice cream near the mezquita. we sat on the steps outside the mezquita to eat out ice cream and just relax for a while. there was this man (in his 50s?) who seemed to be listening to our whole conversation. then he asked where we were from in america and we just started chatting for about an hour. His name was Angel and he was a really lovely man! From Córdoba, he went to work in Australia where he met his first wife. Then he moved to Reno, Neveda. He did a great deal of traveling along the West Coast. But in the end, he decided to move back to Cordoba while his children are in Australia and America.

All of the sudden, the entrance to the mezquita closed and i asked him if he was meeting someone there or if he was going somewhere. He told he was going to watch the womens finals in “professional” indoor fútbol. So we went with him to this indoor stadium and watched a free fútbol game! And that the players were women was even more interesting. The team I wanted to win lost. They were tied at the end and went into two over times, still tied. Each took 6 penalty shots on each other. Lame!!
 
Anyways, there was one girl who had a mohawk (the mohawk part was bleached), then a side of her head was like shaved, then a mullet and a rat’s tail! Then there was Patria who we secretly believe is a man.

We decided not to stay for the next game and all left. We spent another two hours walking around (with one goal of finding a place to buy a bottle of wine, and he was so nice to try and help us, but the town was very small and almost everything was closed at this time of night). But he showed us cool little places like calle de las flores, which was a little corner with a fountain with so many potted flowers on the walls. We also went to the Bodegas de los Campos, which is a very famous restaurant where visitors sign the wine barrels.
 
Finally, it was 9am and we were getting hungry! So we decided on a small restaurant and Angel said good bye. The raciones (portions) we ordered were amazing! Spinach with garbanzos, patatas bravas (potatoes with a yummy yummy sauce), and fried gambas (shrimp). The two bottles of white wine, perfect!

Today we went on a quick trip to the archeological museum, where we got in for free. They asked our nationality and my friend, Daria, who is from Russia, responded Russian, and so the ticket lady must have assumed we were all from Russian and allowed us free entrance!
 
Then we headed for the bus and now I am back in Madrid. Ready for a shower and a great sleep! My monográficos (electives) start this week! I am taking Spanish art and architecture and Spanish cinema. I’m excited, but not excited about having class from 9:30am-5pm every Tuesday and Thursday!

Ciao!!!

YEY OBAMA!!!! So today was very busy! After classes, I book a hostel with some girlies for our trip to Cordoba at the end of this month, then did some homework, then went to our scheduled program Gymkana. Gymkana pretty much means scavenger hunt (i think). My profe Juan, quien es tan GUAPO, organized this in the huge beautiful Parque de Retiro. We split up into two groups (the three because 4 people arrived late). In the end, my group ended up just walking around like the whole park not finding a single damn pista (clue). Rob and Jessica's team were the only ones who found a pista, only ONE though. Haha.

Then afterwards a group of us, almost all of the Clarkies, went to the Hotel Intercontinental where the Democrats Abroad were holding a live screening of the Inauguration. Sooo many Americans came and there were so many reporters there. It was pretty awesome! I was soo happy that Aretha Franklin sang! I never realized how religious this ceremony is, being sworn in on a bible and an opening prayer, but it all makes sense since our country was founded on Christian ideals. Shana and I got interviewed by a columnist for a Chicago newspaper called the Sun (I think)! Maybe I'll be able to find myself online but hopefully I don't sound too unintelligent in her quotes of me. She asked us difficult questions like how do we responsible as Americans abroad, what do you want to do when you get back to America...yadda yadda!

Then a group of us went to a bar/pub called Dubliners where other Tandem students went to go watch the Inauguration. Being drunk at 8pm is sort of weird, but this day called for una celebracion!!

I think tonight calls for early bed time! Buenas noches

haha, we had our first clase de ortofonía (pronunciation class) and wow was that interesting! the professor that taught it was Christina, who was my conversation teacher, but today we switched and have Queralt. Tandem apparently likes to switch up the profs in order to expose you to a bunch of different accents. Queralt is not a common name in Madrid because it is Catalan. Anyways, this class was great. We spent an hour learning how to correctly prounce vocales (vowels). Most of the time we went around the room individually and repeated or sounded out vowels. The exercises got increasingly more difficult where we ended by having half the room say a bunch of vowels not letting the other side of the room see what was written down, then they had to guess what was said. It was very difficult for me to stop myself from bursting out laughing when you are in a room of people going OOOOOoooo Ooooooo! (sound for U) haha. Just imagine this will you. Maybe you have to be there to believe it.

i have been keeping busy for the past two days (being out of my casa from 8am to 9pm). Yesterday I attended a Tertulia at the Cafe Barbieri. A Tertulia in Espana is when a group of people meet weekly to discuss different topics like politics, ideas, etc. but here a person is respected and listened to. So in my tertulia we were split up by proficiency level and then divided into groups of 5 at each table. We ordered tea, coffee, hot chocolate and just talked from about 3:30 to close to 6pm. It was really great! We started off by talking about Obama, then presidents of different countries since there were people from different countries like France and Germany in my group, then more controversial things like abortion, which then led to people sharing personal stories, and then a girl asked if anyone heard of the vagina monologues and then i started talking about me performing in it. Then we ended by talking about gender and this was so hard for me to talk about in spanish. I was trying to talk about the things I learned in my seminar class which was very difficult but it was fun and i tried to get some things across.

Today I went to the Prado Museum! A professor from Tandem, Sonia, was our museum guide and took us to see paintings of Velasquez and Goya. It was so amazing to see all these paintings in real life after taking my Spanish Art History class last year. I saw paintings like Las Meninas and el 3 de Mayo, just wow. I can't explain how amazing it was to see these paintings in their actuality, they were huge! A few of us decided to stay after and re-look at Goya's pinturas negras which he did on the walls of his house before he died and they were then cut out of the walls and put into frames. These were amazing! They represented humanity, the brutality and pointlessness of war, death and other more heavy dark themes. We also saw some paintings by El Greco and others by Reubens, and some German artists.

Tomorrow I have nothing doing after school so I can relax and come by to my casa and have a nice cooked meal. I want to explore the area where I live to see what neat things are here. Ally and Sophie are stopping in Madrid this weekend on their way to Sevilla! Yey!

I don't remember if I mentioned this in my last post, but I have another house mate now. She lived here last semester and came back for another semester in Madrid. Her name is Kate and she is from Washington State and goes to Dominican University in Nor Cal. She is very sweet, but she doesn't start classes until February. Having another American in the house put me more at ease when we are all eating together. Yet it is bad at the same time because I speak English in my house now. 

i have been keeping busy for the past two days (being out of my casa from 8am to 9pm). Yesterday I attended a Tertulia at the Cafe Barbieri. A Tertulia in Espana is when a group of people meet weekly to discuss different topics like politics, ideas, etc. but here a person is respected and listened to. So in my tertulia we were split up by proficiency level and then divided into groups of 5 at each table. We ordered tea, coffee, hot chocolate and just talked from about 3:30 to close to 6pm. It was really great! We started off by talking about Obama, then presidents of different countries since there were people from different countries like France and Germany in my group, then more controversial things like abortion, which then led to people sharing personal stories, and then a girl asked if anyone heard of the vagina monologues and then i started talking about me performing in it. Then we ended by talking about gender and this was so hard for me to talk about in spanish. I was trying to talk about the things I learned in my seminar class which was very difficult but it was fun and i tried to get some things across.

Today I went to the Prado Museum! A professor from Tandem, Sonia, was our museum guide and took us to see paintings of Velasquez and Goya. It was so amazing to see all these paintings in real life after taking my Spanish Art History class last year. I saw paintings like Las Meninas and el 3 de Mayo, just wow. I can't explain how amazing it was to see these paintings in their actuality, they were huge! A few of us decided to stay after and re-look at Goya's pinturas negras which he did on the walls of his house before he died and they were then cut out of the walls and put into frames. These were amazing! They represented humanity, the brutality and pointlessness of war, death and other more heavy dark themes. We also saw some paintings by El Greco and others by Reubens, and some German artists.

Tomorrow I have nothing doing after school so I can relax and come by to my casa and have a nice cooked meal. I want to explore the area where I live to see what neat things are here. Ally and Sophie are stopping in Madrid this weekend on their way to Sevilla! Yey!

I don't remember if I mentioned this in my last post, but I have another house mate now. She lived here last semester and came back for another semester in Madrid. Her name is Kate and she is from Washington State and goes to Dominican University in Nor Cal. She is very sweet, but she doesn't start classes until February. Having another American in the house put me more at ease when we are all eating together. Yet it is bad at the same time because I speak English in my house now.