Hotel Saray Granada

... show I went to Jess, JoJo, Brandi, and Andrew to a bar. It was neat, free tapas again and there were all Spaniards...not a single other American. This was good news because as I heard from a maid in Madrid and from the study abroad office at CSU, Granada is full of Americans. I felt like everywhere I went in Granada there were American students. While you can learn Spanish and speak Spanish to all the locals, which there are hundreds of thousands ...

... look at the schedules I proposed and consider them leaving the hard feelings behind us. Fernando took a look and denied them.<br><br>I love my co-worker Juan! He also is really frustrated with how the school works and sympathizes with my problems with the administration. He offered to come with me and go talk to them the following day. I decided the best I could do now was ask for my old schedule back plus the meeting Monday afternoon (5 days of work per ...

... je dors dans une caravane, dans le jardin, j'ai une casita, c'est chouette!  J'investis très rapidement les lieux... Ca me fait beaucoup de bien de me poser dans un endroit si calme, et rempli d'une belle énergie de vie! La vie simple de la campagne me plaît.. A côté de la caravane, se trouve une douche solaire (yeah!) et des toilettes sèches!! décidément y a tout pour me plaire ;-) J'essaie de parler espagnol, je sens que mon ...

... Probably not Mike or Shae's favorite part of the trip. But, I loved it. Shae fell asleep right off the bat, which was probably best. <br><br>Alhambra is a fortress compound with amazing gardens, palaces, military fort, museums, etc. It overlooks the city of Granada and is one of those magical places you hear about. It has been nominated for one of the new seven wonders of the world. We only ...

... into spain. However passport control here is not quite like in Australia. you could walk past the gaurd with a blank piece of paper and he would wave you through!! A few of us contimplated swapping passports just to see if they would pull us up!! haha<br><br>Not only that, to get back to Spain you had to physically walk across the Gibralta International Airport runway. They have a big boom gate they put down when a plane is about to land. Weird... so ...

... a tiny whimper, repeated for 30 minutes, followed by a shower - sinners. Perhaps this morning they were hammering a portrait of the Virgin Mary to bless their place of conception. Nevertheless, I banged on the wall four times in my best "Stop hammering religious portraits on the wall at this hour"- knock. Carrie then thought to add, "You know what, I don't think it's them. It's coming from over there." Oh well, it stopped either way and I went ...

... Me) and Positive Pat (Millis) Our efforts were effective. Some people began to cheer up, and we are pretty sure we are the sole reasons for the sun coming out on a rainy day. Domination. Nevertheless, we got to school, and the kids in my class were a little apprehensive because we liked the teachers we had in Barcelona so much. Our first teacher was named Santi and he was a very stern, vociferous man probably in his ...

... Another thing that I found interesting is that the Arab style castles/fortresses do not consist of any decoration on their outside walls, only on the inside. The only decorations one sees upon entering the Alhambra is a huge carving of a stone hand which represents Muslim faith and also a carving of a giant key- which historians are still not sure about what it represents. Besides that, all of the effort in decoration takes place on ...

... The funky backpacker" that was an absolute delight. In 3 days I managed to spend time going out on the town with a group of Spanish girls from Alicante, some hitchhikers from Holland, and some very nice sisters backpacking around Spain from Austrailia. This melting pot of nationalities was amazing, and lead to some very interesting conversations about US politics, world happenings, and different perspectives. It's interesting now to see just how everyone looks at us ...