Thursday, December 13, 2012
Lo siento una vez más
It´s been busy with exams, packing, figuring out my flight, getting ready to leave, and overall the lack of the computer. So, don´t know if this will get updated much more other than my photos from my last few trips. I´ve got one more final to take tonight, then I´m off to Italy for a week, then back to Sevilla for two days, then back home to Indy on the 23rd in time for Christmas.
Munich:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3963442962217.2173221.1164630540&type=1&l=0329b2ae04
Dachau:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3963392040944.2173220.1164630540&type=3
Betis v. FC Barcelona
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3963369320376.2173219.1164630540&type=1&l=0d503df503
Granada:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3932365225293.2172784.1164630540&type=3
Definitely a problem on my end with the photos. Here´s the updated links. Let me know if this doesn´t work either.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Photos and Videos
It´s been a busy week, so hopefully I´ll get a post up tomorrow or at the latest on Friday, however, pictures and a few videos from my trip to Lisbon, Portugal and the Derbí soccer game between Sevilla and Betis, who are crosstown rivals. It was a big game and kinda crazy. More videos to come from the game.
Click Here for Lisbon Photos
Click Here for Soccer Photos
Video from Start of Game
Short Clip of Soccer Move
Will add more videos when I finally get them up. The internet at school is slow.
Greg
Click Here for Lisbon Photos
Click Here for Soccer Photos
Video from Start of Game
Short Clip of Soccer Move
Will add more videos when I finally get them up. The internet at school is slow.
Greg
Friday, November 16, 2012
Finally posted...
http://iuoverseas.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/football-on-the-mind/#more-6901
Before I'm off to Lisbon for the weekend, here's my IU Overseas post about futbol aka soccer in Spain. Videos included.
Luego
Before I'm off to Lisbon for the weekend, here's my IU Overseas post about futbol aka soccer in Spain. Videos included.
Luego
Monday, November 12, 2012
Finalmente, Valencia y Paris
I´m hoping for this to catch up my blog. Sorry for the length.
So, last three weekends have included a trip to Valencia and a trip to Paris/Bayeux. So, in that order.
My trip to Valencia was interesting. I originally planed on just going by myself but then ended up going with three other people from my program. It´s funny because that´s how all my trips have gone so far. I booked the trip, then other people told me that they were going when we asked each other about future trips/plans.
So, my Valencia trip started on a Friday night and we got into Valencia at around midnight, or at least when we got to the hostel. We went to get some dinner then just relaxed at the hostel gearing up for the next day. The day started walking down a dried up river bed that was turned into a park. My señor told me before I left that it was one of his favorite parts of Valencia. Explanation time; I doubt most of you know that Valencia (the region, which is similar to a state) currently is struggling with floods. The actual city of Valencia isn´t but the villages are. The reason why the city Valencia isn´t is because the main river that used to cut the city in half was diverted outside of the city sparing Valencia from floods. Now, it´s a beautiful, 11 km park that takes you straight to the Museum Park. That´s where the Arts and Science Museum, the Aquarium, and an IMAX is located. The whole park just looks awesome. It´s all surrounded by water and the buildings are white and modern. Really cool overall.
We went in the Arts and Science Museum because it seemed the coolest but was also the cheapest. For those that are familiar with the Indianapolis Children's Museum, it was exactly like that but better. It definitely brought out the child by pushing buttons, building stuff, and just cool sciency stuff and the best part was the Marvel exhibit. So much comic stuff and I don't know who enjoyed it more, us or the little kids. Then we headed to the beach which was interesting because it was basically surrounded with mountains.
The next day, we just walked around and went to this market. This market was next to the soccer stadium so it was cool to see the soccer stadium of Valencia CF and compare it to all the others I´ve seen. But the market on the other hand, it was like a garage sale. Any and everything you could imagine was being sold. Some just seemed like they found it in the trash. There were facet heads, books, super glue, and just random/weird stuff. From there we walked around, found the touristy part of the city and stayed there for a while. We found a cathedral that had a holy grail in it but didn't have the time to see it. The rest of the day was wandering around until we found something cool and until our flight back home to Sevilla.
For anyone that missed photos of Valencia: click here
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Next came midterms, which was an interesting week to say the least. This is when my laptop got coffee spilt on it. But exams went well overall. Needless to say, after exams and a coffee disaster, I was ready for a break and to leave Spain. I left for France on Wednesday immediately after my exam and got there smoothly. It was Halloween and where I stayed the first night, everyone was dressing up getting ready to go out. However, since I had a train to catch the next day at 7am in a country where I don´t know the language, I opted for a good nights sleep.
So, the next day I head out to Bayeux, France which is in the region of Normandy. Before I booked the trip, I assumed that the Normandy D-Day beaches were in the city of Normandy, but that´s incorrect. The closest city to the beaches is Bayeux, which is in the Normandy region. Therefore, I decided to go to Bayeux to get to the beaches. The train ride was interesting. After a confusing 20 minutes of getting to the train station that included a mix of Spanish, English, French, and mad hand gestures, I finally arrived but couldn´t find my train. Turns out that the Bayeux wasn´t the last stop. So, a huge announcement in French goes off about 10 minutes before our departure and our track number hadn´t been announced yet. A random guy comes up to me and asks, "Do you speak English?" Obviously my first reaction was to make sure my hands were in my pocket so I didn´t get pick-pocketed But, he was also going to Bayeux and was wondering what was going on. I responded that I didn´t know but he started freaking out saying something was wrong. Who knows what the announcement was, but the train shows up and we´re off. The landscape was beautiful and a great ride.
Two hours later, I arrive. I get off the platform and head to the bus stop that the internet told me to go to but the next bus doesn´t leave for another 2 hours. I walk in circles trying to figure out what to do. I head to the huge billboard saying, "English speaking tours to D-Day beaches start here". I walk over there thinking they´d be able to help me but no one speaks English or Spanish (and Spanish is completely different than French, so no help there Romance languages...) and so my circling continues. I find some people that speak English, but they´re not going to the beaches, "But, hey there´s a rainbow, so you have hope" was his response as well. I continue my circling again and head to the front of the building where the sign pointed hoping that they speak English in the hotel. Once again, a conversation in Spanish, English, hand gestures, and French ensue. He brings out the lady "that speaks English" who turns out to be the same lady who doesn´t. I´m told taxi is the only way. I find a taxi and he tells me its 50€ one direction, which was about how much I had total for the day. So, I had 8 hours to kill in this city. I walked around the "important" parts within 20 minutes and started to worry what I´d do but it was probably one of my favorite parts of the trip and for my time in Spain. I stumbled on a mass in the Cathedral because it was All Saints Day which was cool to see. Then, I wandered around the city and found so much cool stuff. Turns out this city was the first city liberated in WWII and the British did it. The city was built on a river then the citizens diverted the river into canals which made it a important city. There were a lot of plaques commemorating this. But at one point, all the bells in the city went off and it just made me think about how it would´ve sounded when the city was liberating. It was an incredible experience.
But, long story short, I wandered around this city for 8 hours constantly stumbling on cool and interesting things. It was interesting cause no one spoke English or Spanish and I don´t speak French. It made it an experience for sure because I tried speaking Spanish because it´s a romance language and in the same family as French, but the pronunciation is different.
Similarly to Valencia, I found out friends were going to Paris as well, but a day later. So, I went to Bayeux then I met my friends in the train station when I got back to Paris and headed to the hotel because we were all exhausted.
The next day we started at McDonalds because it has free wifi since our hotel had problems with theirs. From there we walked to the Basilica of the Sacré Coeur which is up on a hill. It had an awesome view at the top and an awesome mural/painting inside. Next we slowly made our way to the Arc de Triomphe. This ended up taking a few hours because we stopped at a fruit store which had amazing and fresh fruit, almost every pastry shop because of the awesome looking and smelling food. Everything was good. I don´t think I´ve had a croissant that good before. We ended up stopping at this cemetery which had a lot of famous people in it. Finally before we got to the Arc de Triomphe, we found Indiana Cafe. Since two of us go to Indiana University and the other´s from Indiana, we had to stop and get pictures, then go in for a coffee to warm up. It´s a chain that´s themed around the Indians, but we´ll all agree that it´s really Indiana instead.
The Arc was cool to see and the view of the skyline from there as well, but we made our way to the Eiffel Tower. We got there around sunset which made the scene even better. However, we lost one of our own in the mess. Finally after finding everyone, we took a bunch of pictures of and around the Eiffel Tower then headed to the Lourve. The Lourve had so much art and it´s huge. It used to be the Royal Palace, but now is a museum. So much to see and do. We stayed for about two hours until it closed but were able to see all the famous stuff like the Mona Lisa and the two famous sculptures whose names escape me.
The next day we dubbed the food day. We started our day again at McDonalds for the free wifi and then went to a park. It was this huge park and really open and green. There we had our first crepe which was nutella and it was amazing. So good. Next we went on a hunt for macrons which are like macaroons but those are with coconut. It was next to a plaza and the macrons were incredible and rich.
Next on our stop was back to the center to get to Notre-Dame. Notre-Dame was so awesome to see. Everything was just as ornate as it seems but pictures just can't do it justice. The stain glass is unbelievable and the church is huge. Next we went over to the Lourve to get pictures in the daylight then stumbled on a bridge that had a bunch of locks on it. The locks symbolized a forever bonding/locking of love by whomever put it there. It was cool to see but the view from the bridge was even better. We could see the Eiffel Tower on one side and the other was the river splitting around Notre-Dame and this was all at sunset. We ended the day heading out to some neighborhood and getting crepes there as well. However, when we got back to the hotel, we found the Notre Dame v Pitt game on tv live. It was in French, but an awesome experience to see Notre Dame win in triple overtime while in France listening in French. Finally, the next day we headed back to Sevilla.
For Paris photos: click here
I´ll update again about this weekend and my upcoming trip to Lisbon with my program next week, this blog is on the long side. Lo siento
Luego,
Greg
So, last three weekends have included a trip to Valencia and a trip to Paris/Bayeux. So, in that order.
My trip to Valencia was interesting. I originally planed on just going by myself but then ended up going with three other people from my program. It´s funny because that´s how all my trips have gone so far. I booked the trip, then other people told me that they were going when we asked each other about future trips/plans.
So, my Valencia trip started on a Friday night and we got into Valencia at around midnight, or at least when we got to the hostel. We went to get some dinner then just relaxed at the hostel gearing up for the next day. The day started walking down a dried up river bed that was turned into a park. My señor told me before I left that it was one of his favorite parts of Valencia. Explanation time; I doubt most of you know that Valencia (the region, which is similar to a state) currently is struggling with floods. The actual city of Valencia isn´t but the villages are. The reason why the city Valencia isn´t is because the main river that used to cut the city in half was diverted outside of the city sparing Valencia from floods. Now, it´s a beautiful, 11 km park that takes you straight to the Museum Park. That´s where the Arts and Science Museum, the Aquarium, and an IMAX is located. The whole park just looks awesome. It´s all surrounded by water and the buildings are white and modern. Really cool overall.
We went in the Arts and Science Museum because it seemed the coolest but was also the cheapest. For those that are familiar with the Indianapolis Children's Museum, it was exactly like that but better. It definitely brought out the child by pushing buttons, building stuff, and just cool sciency stuff and the best part was the Marvel exhibit. So much comic stuff and I don't know who enjoyed it more, us or the little kids. Then we headed to the beach which was interesting because it was basically surrounded with mountains.
The next day, we just walked around and went to this market. This market was next to the soccer stadium so it was cool to see the soccer stadium of Valencia CF and compare it to all the others I´ve seen. But the market on the other hand, it was like a garage sale. Any and everything you could imagine was being sold. Some just seemed like they found it in the trash. There were facet heads, books, super glue, and just random/weird stuff. From there we walked around, found the touristy part of the city and stayed there for a while. We found a cathedral that had a holy grail in it but didn't have the time to see it. The rest of the day was wandering around until we found something cool and until our flight back home to Sevilla.
For anyone that missed photos of Valencia: click here
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Next came midterms, which was an interesting week to say the least. This is when my laptop got coffee spilt on it. But exams went well overall. Needless to say, after exams and a coffee disaster, I was ready for a break and to leave Spain. I left for France on Wednesday immediately after my exam and got there smoothly. It was Halloween and where I stayed the first night, everyone was dressing up getting ready to go out. However, since I had a train to catch the next day at 7am in a country where I don´t know the language, I opted for a good nights sleep.
So, the next day I head out to Bayeux, France which is in the region of Normandy. Before I booked the trip, I assumed that the Normandy D-Day beaches were in the city of Normandy, but that´s incorrect. The closest city to the beaches is Bayeux, which is in the Normandy region. Therefore, I decided to go to Bayeux to get to the beaches. The train ride was interesting. After a confusing 20 minutes of getting to the train station that included a mix of Spanish, English, French, and mad hand gestures, I finally arrived but couldn´t find my train. Turns out that the Bayeux wasn´t the last stop. So, a huge announcement in French goes off about 10 minutes before our departure and our track number hadn´t been announced yet. A random guy comes up to me and asks, "Do you speak English?" Obviously my first reaction was to make sure my hands were in my pocket so I didn´t get pick-pocketed But, he was also going to Bayeux and was wondering what was going on. I responded that I didn´t know but he started freaking out saying something was wrong. Who knows what the announcement was, but the train shows up and we´re off. The landscape was beautiful and a great ride.
Two hours later, I arrive. I get off the platform and head to the bus stop that the internet told me to go to but the next bus doesn´t leave for another 2 hours. I walk in circles trying to figure out what to do. I head to the huge billboard saying, "English speaking tours to D-Day beaches start here". I walk over there thinking they´d be able to help me but no one speaks English or Spanish (and Spanish is completely different than French, so no help there Romance languages...) and so my circling continues. I find some people that speak English, but they´re not going to the beaches, "But, hey there´s a rainbow, so you have hope" was his response as well. I continue my circling again and head to the front of the building where the sign pointed hoping that they speak English in the hotel. Once again, a conversation in Spanish, English, hand gestures, and French ensue. He brings out the lady "that speaks English" who turns out to be the same lady who doesn´t. I´m told taxi is the only way. I find a taxi and he tells me its 50€ one direction, which was about how much I had total for the day. So, I had 8 hours to kill in this city. I walked around the "important" parts within 20 minutes and started to worry what I´d do but it was probably one of my favorite parts of the trip and for my time in Spain. I stumbled on a mass in the Cathedral because it was All Saints Day which was cool to see. Then, I wandered around the city and found so much cool stuff. Turns out this city was the first city liberated in WWII and the British did it. The city was built on a river then the citizens diverted the river into canals which made it a important city. There were a lot of plaques commemorating this. But at one point, all the bells in the city went off and it just made me think about how it would´ve sounded when the city was liberating. It was an incredible experience.
But, long story short, I wandered around this city for 8 hours constantly stumbling on cool and interesting things. It was interesting cause no one spoke English or Spanish and I don´t speak French. It made it an experience for sure because I tried speaking Spanish because it´s a romance language and in the same family as French, but the pronunciation is different.
************************** For Bayeux photos: click here **************************
Similarly to Valencia, I found out friends were going to Paris as well, but a day later. So, I went to Bayeux then I met my friends in the train station when I got back to Paris and headed to the hotel because we were all exhausted.
The next day we started at McDonalds because it has free wifi since our hotel had problems with theirs. From there we walked to the Basilica of the Sacré Coeur which is up on a hill. It had an awesome view at the top and an awesome mural/painting inside. Next we slowly made our way to the Arc de Triomphe. This ended up taking a few hours because we stopped at a fruit store which had amazing and fresh fruit, almost every pastry shop because of the awesome looking and smelling food. Everything was good. I don´t think I´ve had a croissant that good before. We ended up stopping at this cemetery which had a lot of famous people in it. Finally before we got to the Arc de Triomphe, we found Indiana Cafe. Since two of us go to Indiana University and the other´s from Indiana, we had to stop and get pictures, then go in for a coffee to warm up. It´s a chain that´s themed around the Indians, but we´ll all agree that it´s really Indiana instead.
The Arc was cool to see and the view of the skyline from there as well, but we made our way to the Eiffel Tower. We got there around sunset which made the scene even better. However, we lost one of our own in the mess. Finally after finding everyone, we took a bunch of pictures of and around the Eiffel Tower then headed to the Lourve. The Lourve had so much art and it´s huge. It used to be the Royal Palace, but now is a museum. So much to see and do. We stayed for about two hours until it closed but were able to see all the famous stuff like the Mona Lisa and the two famous sculptures whose names escape me.
The next day we dubbed the food day. We started our day again at McDonalds for the free wifi and then went to a park. It was this huge park and really open and green. There we had our first crepe which was nutella and it was amazing. So good. Next we went on a hunt for macrons which are like macaroons but those are with coconut. It was next to a plaza and the macrons were incredible and rich.
Next on our stop was back to the center to get to Notre-Dame. Notre-Dame was so awesome to see. Everything was just as ornate as it seems but pictures just can't do it justice. The stain glass is unbelievable and the church is huge. Next we went over to the Lourve to get pictures in the daylight then stumbled on a bridge that had a bunch of locks on it. The locks symbolized a forever bonding/locking of love by whomever put it there. It was cool to see but the view from the bridge was even better. We could see the Eiffel Tower on one side and the other was the river splitting around Notre-Dame and this was all at sunset. We ended the day heading out to some neighborhood and getting crepes there as well. However, when we got back to the hotel, we found the Notre Dame v Pitt game on tv live. It was in French, but an awesome experience to see Notre Dame win in triple overtime while in France listening in French. Finally, the next day we headed back to Sevilla.
For Paris photos: click here
I´ll update again about this weekend and my upcoming trip to Lisbon with my program next week, this blog is on the long side. Lo siento
Luego,
Greg
Thursday, November 8, 2012
Catching up...
Ok, I know it's been a while since my last meaningful post. So here comes a big post or two spilt up to explain what's happened essentially in the past month.
Let's see, in order (which this will be split up into two posts):
(this post)
1) Travelled to Barcelona Click for Barcelona Pictures, if you haven´t seen them yet. No added or new photos since the last post of photos
2) Stayed in Sevilla for two weeks
(next post)
3) Travelled to Valencia
4) Travelled to Paris
So, a friend and I travelled to Barcelona in hopes to see arguable the best two teams play each other. Right when we got to Barcelona, we travelled to the FC Barcelona stadium, Camp Nou. Definitely amazing and so huge. The first room you go into is just a room of gold and silver from all the trophies. It´s just ridiculous and the field/stadium are huge and just as crazy. We were about to scalp some tickets, but they just didn´t seem reliable. From there, we went to get a bocadillo then back to the hostel. We had heard of this awesome light and water show. It was around the Olympic Park which was cool. Above the fountain show was this hug Palacio. No idea what it´s for but, it was a great backdrop because it was up on the hill. From the top, you get a great view of the city. Here´s a video of it.
Saturday, we went to Sagrada Familia, La Casa Pedrera, which are both designed by the architect Gaudi, and the Picasso museum. The Picasso museum was a little to modern and abstract for me but still cool. La Casa Pedrera was really cool. It was originally built as an apartment complex for wealthy family. It has "stormtroopers" at the top and is very modern and a little out there. La Sagrada Familia is amazing. It´s so ornate and looks awful from a distance but the closer you get, the better it becomes.
We decided to stay Sunday to watch El Clasico in Barcelona. We started the day at Park Güell which is set
on the side of hills and you can see the entire city. It was one of the most beautiful parks I´ve been to. From there, we just walked around the city, got lost, and enjoyed the time until the game. The game was crazy. Ended up being a 2-2 tie, but hey it was a lot of fun watching it in Barcelona. Then we had nowhere to sleep so wandered the city until our flight left at 6:30, got back to Sevilla at 8:30 then went to class. Class was definitely rough.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For the next three weekends, I was in Sevilla which was relaxing. I got to show my friend and his friends around the city, which that was talked about in Plans Change
But, here´s the video of the procession thanks to Chris Ratsabout.
Other than that, it was relaxing being in Sevilla, experiencing Sevilla, and hanging out with friends. There´s nothing else that was really exciting during those three weeks. So, hopefully tonight before my next class I´ll get the other post written, if not, it´ll be Monday at the earliest cause I don´t have Internet access or anything useful to write papers other than at my Study Center which will be closed.
Luego,
Greg
Let's see, in order (which this will be split up into two posts):
(this post)
1) Travelled to Barcelona Click for Barcelona Pictures, if you haven´t seen them yet. No added or new photos since the last post of photos
2) Stayed in Sevilla for two weeks
(next post)
3) Travelled to Valencia
4) Travelled to Paris
So, a friend and I travelled to Barcelona in hopes to see arguable the best two teams play each other. Right when we got to Barcelona, we travelled to the FC Barcelona stadium, Camp Nou. Definitely amazing and so huge. The first room you go into is just a room of gold and silver from all the trophies. It´s just ridiculous and the field/stadium are huge and just as crazy. We were about to scalp some tickets, but they just didn´t seem reliable. From there, we went to get a bocadillo then back to the hostel. We had heard of this awesome light and water show. It was around the Olympic Park which was cool. Above the fountain show was this hug Palacio. No idea what it´s for but, it was a great backdrop because it was up on the hill. From the top, you get a great view of the city. Here´s a video of it.
Saturday, we went to Sagrada Familia, La Casa Pedrera, which are both designed by the architect Gaudi, and the Picasso museum. The Picasso museum was a little to modern and abstract for me but still cool. La Casa Pedrera was really cool. It was originally built as an apartment complex for wealthy family. It has "stormtroopers" at the top and is very modern and a little out there. La Sagrada Familia is amazing. It´s so ornate and looks awful from a distance but the closer you get, the better it becomes.
We decided to stay Sunday to watch El Clasico in Barcelona. We started the day at Park Güell which is set
on the side of hills and you can see the entire city. It was one of the most beautiful parks I´ve been to. From there, we just walked around the city, got lost, and enjoyed the time until the game. The game was crazy. Ended up being a 2-2 tie, but hey it was a lot of fun watching it in Barcelona. Then we had nowhere to sleep so wandered the city until our flight left at 6:30, got back to Sevilla at 8:30 then went to class. Class was definitely rough.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For the next three weekends, I was in Sevilla which was relaxing. I got to show my friend and his friends around the city, which that was talked about in Plans Change
But, here´s the video of the procession thanks to Chris Ratsabout.
Other than that, it was relaxing being in Sevilla, experiencing Sevilla, and hanging out with friends. There´s nothing else that was really exciting during those three weeks. So, hopefully tonight before my next class I´ll get the other post written, if not, it´ll be Monday at the earliest cause I don´t have Internet access or anything useful to write papers other than at my Study Center which will be closed.
Luego,
Greg
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
While You Wait
In the mean time, to tide people over, here are pictures from my most recent trip to Valencia
Photos from Valencia
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3799492543559.2170448.1164630540&type=1&l=fe27b55974
Videos from trips (don´t know if you´ve been able to see them or not)
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=vb.1164630540&type=2
Well, like I said, off to France.
Photos from Valencia
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3799492543559.2170448.1164630540&type=1&l=fe27b55974
Videos from trips (don´t know if you´ve been able to see them or not)
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=vb.1164630540&type=2
Well, like I said, off to France.
IU Overseas Post
Until then, here's my IU post to tide the storm
http://iuoverseas.wordpress.com/2012/10/30/daily-grind/
http://iuoverseas.wordpress.com/2012/10/30/daily-grind/
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