Rebajas

Rebajas in Spanish means like sales. All the stores are advertising “Rebajas” for their clothes and shoes and other merchandise. Sometimes I feel like I live on

Michigan Avenue

; I pass by stores to get to class and people in Granada are always shopping.

So basically this week I had class, which is boring and sometimes confusing, but I figured I could suck it up for one more week. I try to do something fun every day after class to just get out of the house and experience the city.

On Tuesday, the CEA took us to this place in Granada called Carmen de los Matires at 4:30. Carmen de los Matires is a garden, well technically it’s four gardens. We had to walk up these stairs and up a steep hill to get to the gardens. The CEA takes us to a lot of cool places in Granada, but they always require a walk, and normally also require hills and stairs. But the walk is always worth it. When we got to the top of the hill, we could see the whole city. It was sooo pretty.

Angie told me about the history of Carmen de los Matires after the visit. She said that the area was owned by the Moors a really long time ago and they used to bring Christians up there to torture and kill. It’s now like a memorial for them. I think if I had known that before, I would have looked at the gardens differently.

The first garden was modeled after the Alhambra. It was really pretty. Another highlight was the peacock. Everyone was taking pictures of it. I had no idea they had peacocks in Spain.

The second garden was by far my favorite. It was called the English Garden and it was all palm trees. There was a beautiful fountain in the middle of the trees and, of course, there was a gorgeous view of the city of Granada again. We took a lot of pictures, and of course, my camera battery started to die.

The third garden had like a little river going through it, but it wasn’t really a river. It reminded me of like those little fake rivers at a petting zoo where there is water and you can cross it at a bridge. We saw birds swimming on the water. I think they were ducks but they were all white. After we crossed the bridge, there was a little tower made of rocks. We climbed up it, and Dani, the guy from the CEA, told us that standing in this tower is the tallest point in Granada. I felt kind of like Rapunzel, and even more when Anna told me to dangle my scarf down the side of the tower. This garden was called the French Garden.

The last garden reminded me of the movie Hercules. Remember the scene where Hercules ditches Phil and goes with Meg to the fountain place and then she sings “I Won’t Say I’m In Love”? Well it looked like that. There were bushes cut in like mazes and broken statues and a big circle fountain. This place is also where we learned why people don’t eat the oranges off the trees in Granada. Angie asked Dani if she could eat an orange off a tree. He said sure but he wanted to try it first to make sure it was okay. He spit it out right away and said it tasted like a lemon. Angie then decided to try it anyway and had a similar experience. So, moral of the story, if you ever go to Granada, buy your oranges in a store.

After the Carmen de los Matires experience, Angie had told us that she found peanut butter in this place called Corte Ingles. (That means

English Court

in English.) I have been looking for peanut butter ever since I arrived in Granada, and I had gone almost 3 weeks without it. I searched countless grocery stores around the city and found nothing. I was getting desperate, so I asked my teachers where to buy “mantequilla de cacaohuate.” They said they don’t really have it here and they don’t eat it. I feel so bad for the people who live in Spain. Anyways so I have been dying for peanut butter, and after having expressed this in class, other people told me they feel the same. I guess Corte Ingles was the place to go!!

Now I had been there before, and it reminds me of Macy’s. She said if you go to the basement they have a grocery store. Plus, Lindsay and Sarah and I wanted to buy our Senora flowers because she is going through a tough time with her son being in the hospital. So Lindsay and I headed over to Corte Ingles to buy some peanut butter. We got to the basement and, perfect, we found a flower shop. We bought our Senora some flowers and then headed over to the rows of shelves of food. I was hungry, so this was not the best time to be in a grocery store. But we split up and searched and finally I found it!! Lindsay and I bought peanut butter, these cookies Angie told us to eat them with, and Ritz crackers. We basically ran home and started eating peanut butter. It was the best thing in the whole world.

Then we both skyped our families and had dinner with Sarah and Senora’s sister. Then, something else amazing happened. We skyped Jackie!! For those of you who don’t know, Jackie is my big sister in my sorority. Then Jackie said she had to go to the ADPi House for a meeting, so we asked if we could go with! Jackie brought her laptop to the house and skyped us back! We were able to Skype with Jackie, Brittany (our President from last year), Eryn (our President this year), and Kristie (Standards). It was so awesome!!! I miss them so much and it was so great to be able to see them and hear their voices!! Then they had a meeting and it was 2am and I had to wake up at 8am for class the next day, so we had to go.

Then Wednesday I went for a run/walk with Angie after class. Then at night I met up with Anna, Angie, and 3 other people to plan our trip to Ireland. We bought airline tickets! I was so excited. Then we had a language exchange meeting at 8:30pm. It took forever to get started. We walked for like ever to this random corner by a shady movie theater and waited there for like 20 minutes. Then we crossed the street and stood in some random alley. I got partnered up with this girl named Mara who’s 20. She was actually really good at English. We all then walked to this restaurant. Mara and I sat at a table with 2 other ISU students and 3 other Granada kids studying English. It was a lot of fun! Mara and I talked about Harry Potter, How I Met Your Mother, and Penelope Cruz. She asked me about Chicago and I asked her about Granada. We also talked about skiing, our families, our friends, and where we live. I showed her my driver’s license and she told me that in Spain you have to be 18 to get one, but the drinking age is also 18. We spoke in both languages- I would speak Spanish and she would speak English, and then we’d both speak Spanish or we’d both speak English. It was really cool because we actually understood each other.

Thursday was my last day of class before the test. After class Angie, Lindsay, and I tried to print our tickets for Italy, but that didn’t work because there was a class in the computer lab. So instead Lindsay and I went shopping! She bought gym shoes for our hike tomorrow. We both bought cardigans from this store called Pull & Bear. I was so excited- my first European clothes! It was only 6 euros and I paid in coins. Then I bought leggings because my stupid tights ripped. We got dinner at Kabob King and the workers there obviously knew we were American. They were laughing at us but they were really nice. It’s one of my favorite places here. Then Sarah came back late and we were home alone that night. Lindsay and I found out that this commercial on TV where these 2 girls sing about Rebajas is the same thing as this song we saw in that Spanish musical, and the same 2 actresses are singing it. It was pretty exciting. Sarah and us bonded over sororities. We talked about recruitment and the fact that she knows some people that we know too. She knows my cousin Jill, my mom's friend's daughter, and a girl in our sorority has a twin in Sarah's sorority. Talk about a small world.

Today, Friday, was the test. My test consisted of a listening part, a reading part, and a grammar part. The listening and reading were together, but the reading part was so stupid. It was about an “ordenador” which I had no clue what that meant. I guessed it meant laptop, and it means computer, so I was basically right. They asked if we had one, what you can use it for, is it easy to use, etc. I just kind of wrote a lot about computers and my experience with my laptop. Then they starting talking about videogames which definitely was not in the text because I read it like 8 times. I just said I don’t like videogames but my cousins do.

Then we had a little break, during which Angie and printed off our plane boarding passes to Italy!! I was sooo excited. I can’t believe I will be in Italy in 3 days!! Then we finished our test, which was the grammar part. It wasn’t as bad as I thought. Then Angie and I returned our textbooks. It felt so good to be done with the test for the intensive course!! I came back to my room and started getting ready for Italy. Luis is still in the hospital, but I think he is getting a little better, knock on wood. We had lunch with Senora, and Sarah is hiking all day.