Ramblings of a Wandering Luney

I'm still loving it here in Spain but at the same time I'm a bit frustrated. And this is my place to whine, not so much to talk about all the wonderful stuff that does exist here but instead that parts that are hard. This place is for me to vent.
The only way to meet people is to go out at night to bars and discotecas, but those are the places I don't like to be anymore, especially not the discotecas. They were fun at first, but now I'm just [crap i just hit a button and lost all i had typed from that point on. go me.] getting sick of having to deal with some people. I meet some cool spaniards and get to hang out with my girls, but it just doesn't feel worth it to have to work so hard avoid other people. The bars aren't quite as bad, but sometimes can be. The catch 22 is that there is nothing to really do during the day to meet people. Hopefully the university bible study and soccer will help. Maybe that's the key, getting more involved in everything. I'm looking forward to my internship starting and maybe meeting people through that. Its also been hard cause my two good friends here have a lot of money, parents who are doctors and professors. They tend to get upset and not understand why I have to be careful with money. We discussed it yesterday and from now on I think it'll be better. I think they're understand better now. Yesterday was rough. I really don't want to talk about it. But Italy will be fun, I'm looking forward to it. It'll be a good break from here as much as I love being here. When I get back, I jump in full swing so that'll help to I think. Its just been a really quite last two weeks which have been hard and I haven't been sleep well, so maybe that's a large chunk of it. I'm off for dinner. Love you all.

I MISS HIM SO MUCH! :-( I swear I can feel my heart physically hurting sometimes.

8 weeks right? In february things will pick up beyond belief. I'll have 5 classes and my internship will start...so hopefully things will fly by. Don't get me wrong, I love being here. Spain is amazing: the people, the culture, the food...its just hard to be away. Funny, I've never had trouble being away...

I'm learning how to keep away the sketch guys and its working! And I'm getting better at approaching peopl e(girls too!) without fainting! Yay for Alfonso's class.

I really want to reflect God more in my life and seek after him more while I'm here. Its weird wth it being in another language but cool cause it reflects how big God is, how he spans culture and languages. Also, the words in teh spanish version of the bible is sometimes different from the English version and gives a bit of a different..not meaning, but together makes a more full view of what hte author was saying (since greek and hebrew are richer langauges than modern ones). Its kinda cool.

Ok, must go freeze my butt off and hopefully find someone who lives in my building since I forgot my keys. Adios!

Right now tehre is a beautiful pink sunset across half the sky and is still spreading, and the lights on the fountains have just turned on. Couples are on every bench cuddled, kissing, etc. Here people are not ashamed to be very touchy and kissy in public. Rather romantic. Makes me sad.

So, at the moment I'm beyond sick. I can't talk, I'm completely mute. Its very hard to be mute and try to get around in a city. People aren't very patient when you try to right a note to ask them something. The medication here is so different and I have yet to find something that helps. Luisa is convinced that eating an onion will help. Yea..not so sure on that one. In the mean time, I kinda want to cut a hole into my chest so that some air can actually get to my lungs instead of trying to force its way through my inflammed throat.

Ok, enough whining. Last night was great! Sooo weird though. One of those experience that... yea. Learned a new word too. :-)

I went hiking in the mountains yesterday and just sang praises to God cause it was soo beautiful. I have never seen a view like that in all my hikes or camping trips in the apalachain. It was overwhelming beauty. Chelsea and Katey stood me up so I went alone, but it was nice to be alone. I hiked for four hours and just enjoyed the peacefulness. Its amazing that these trails go out from behind my apartment!

I made friends last night!! Too bad they live in Madrid. We'll just have to go visit them some weekend.

I've been feeling at bit left out. Chelsea and Katey are so close and they live close together. They decide what they're going to do then call me and my opinion doesn't matter. I feel ganged up on a lot. But Patty has started hanging out with us which has been nice. SHe's in my immersion classes. Really sweet girl. So its nice to have someone I can hang out with when the other too start closing off.

I love it here though, being in Europe. It has an ancient beautiful that America lacks. And the people, they're ideas and culture are so different, so relaxed. I dunno, its a nice change of pace from being in the States.

Hola! Vida aqui es divertido, hermoso, pero dificil. Las chicas son pijas y los chicos son vulgares. Pero, encontre algunas personas en la iglesia quien eran amables. Estoy un poquita enferma ahora, pero estoy mejor hoy por causa de la medicina. Me encanta la cultura, el ciudad, y mis profesores y mi madre aqui (Louisa). Si la gente mi edad eran mas amables, me quedaria aqui. No, este era una mentira. No podria quedarme aqui. Se extrano Mateo tan mucho. Pero estoy alegre que estoy aqui, pero, deseo que el estaba aqui tambien por que se echo de menos. No hay mucho para hablar de aqui. No pienso en mucho afuera de las clases, el idioma, la cultura, mi novio, y que voy a hacer el proximo dia. Pero, eso es lo que estaba en mis pensamientos. Pues, necesito ir. Adios.

Ah, my blogger is all in spanish. Oh well. This journal is now for me to post more of feelings than what is happening. The other blog will be for what happens. (once I get my lap top working cause I hate using this computer). So...I love it here, being able to walk places, all the new stuff, the architecture, history, my ¨mom¨. But I miss Matt soo much. Its hard during the quiet times. I´m ok when I´m busy, but when it gets quiet... I´m use to being without my friends or without my family. But not him. ugh. I enjoy hanging out with the other girls, but four of the girls refuse to use Spanish outside of class which makes it hard. Because its hard to start thinking in spanish again after i start speaking in english. So probably, I´ll write this journal in spanish sometimes. My classes are fun adn my professors are hilarious. But one girl is going to drive me insane. I really want to smack her sometimes. The french girl and brazil girl adn one from Massachusetts are cool though. Just the Oregon girls are going to be tough to deal with. There is also a guy from ALaska. Jasmine is in the class with me. Its freezing here and we do not have heat in the apartment so we wear jackets alot. My mom thinks its funny when I huddle by the heater at night =-P I enjoy my host mom. She is very sweet. BUt I can´t wait until I get a cell phone because it is boring in the afternoon adn night when I don´t have anything to do. I live about 20min walk from all the interesting things and even further from the language center and university adn other girls. That part I´m a bit disappointed about, but not terribly. I´m just glad I can walk and I enjoy walking. Its a beautiful walk. For part of it the river is on one side of me and a park is on the other (mom said to not walk there late at night) and when I´m going home the Sierra Nevada is ahead of me. The people here aren´t terribly friendly, but I hope to make friends at the University adn maybe when I go out. We found an IRish pub with Karioke, dancing, and wireless internet. So I may go there sometimes. Things here close down at 8pm but reopen at 11pm. Some places don´t even open until 3am!! So different than the US. Its hard to sleep at night one cause i miss him, but also a highway is out infront of the house which is noisy and the apartment walls are thinner than calhoun and i can hear the people in the apartment next to me talking and moving about. I can also feel all the matttress springs in my bed and tehy dig into me. BUt I have five wonderful blankets which make the bed feel so cozy. Its nice to have my own room as well with a view of the sierra nevada. I put pictures up to make it feel more like home and since it is so small , the few pictures I brought make it feel well decorated and very much my own. Despite everything, I´m very glad to be living where I am.

Vale, ahora necesito cambiar mi mente al español. Tenga un buen día. (yay for spanish keyboards).

Today was more preparations to leave. Nearly got screwed over by the bank though. That sucked, but it got worked out. I also remembered why I hate prissy barns. They have so many really dumb rules and take the fun out of riding. I love the kinda places where I ride, sooo laid back. I really came close to saying something to that woman, but held my tongue. Its that time of year where all the horses have thrown shoes as well. Chief and Luke are missing one each (farrier is coming tomorrow) and Chico was lame. But at least I got to hang out at the barn one last time. I love riding. I always realize how much I enjoy it when I come home and get to ride again.

Dinner with dad and the movie went well. Mom got tipsy and said she thinks I'm still depressed and need to up my meds but dad disagrees. I don't think I need to up them, I don't think I'm that bad right now. I have low points, times that are worse, but all in all I'm doing much better. I was good to have a relaxing night with the family. I spent the rest of the night after that packing. I have some more errands to run tomorrow and finish up packing. Its so close now. Two days. Weird huh? Still kinda unreal. I realized I forgot to complete one of the papers I was suppose to. I'm going to e-mail the study abroad office tomorrow and see if I can get it worked out. There's just so many papers from multiple places on campus and its so unorganized. I guess I knew that's what I was getting into when I joined a new major and knew I'd be one of the guinea pigs. It'll be good though. I'm looking forward to it. I love seeing other cultures and places. It'll be good for me. I feel I'm at the point where I'm ready to leave. I'm less fearful and more "let's do it!" Maybe its just the wine...

Feeling very overwhelmed. I started packing and going through all my stuff today. It started out pretty fun, I had music on and was able to go at it at my own pace. I was going to wait until Friday but decided to get a jump on it. There is more than I thought, and it is taking longer than I though. Also, being allergic to dust doesn't help cause the more I pull the old files and stuff down from my closet to pack away the more sick I feel and the less I want to keep working at it. But at least I got most of it done today. This break has flown by and time has caught up to me. But I didn't manage to finish making all my notecards to review spanish grammar for my placement test.

I took my computer to DCIT this morning, left around 7:45 am. Sarah came with me. We were in Clemson until 1pm waiting on it (because that was when we had to leave to get her back in time for her doctor's appointment). We spent most of our time in Moe Joe's: her working on her econ and me working on spanish. After that we went to the Anderson mall for a bit. We were running late on our way back and Pot belly deli put us even more behind (but its always worth it). It was good we were running late though cause they finished with my computer just as I got back to DCIT. They hadn't done a full hard drive check because they didn't have enough time. They couldn't fix my wireless (the reason I went down in the first place), because it miraculously decided to work for them. Basically they just did a virus scan and defraged it. Oh well, at least that's better than nothing and I got to hang out with my sister with was nice. I was excited she came (and astonished that she'd give up her day like that) so I could spend time with her before I left. We were running late getting home so I drove her to Asheville for her doctor's appointment and did more Spanish while waiting. We dropped by to see Jud on the way home. All in all it made for a very long and tiring day. Tomorrow is not shaping up to be any more relaxing. oh well

So that's been life today. Haven't had too much time to think, but it hasn't been a bad day. Now, I'm going to take some time to relax before crashing. Good night.

I suppose I should update. I managed to finish the errands I needed to, but its was kinda stressful around the house last week and when I left for Matt's there was more tension between Dad and I, which ended in my crying and a few more e-mails working it out. But my time in Columbia was good. It was good to see his family and of course I enjoy spending time with him. Movies and tv and yard work and spanish. I feel so inadequate at spanish and I'm about to leave! Oh well, if all else fails I can study on the plane right? and in my two 3 hour layovers... I'm going to miss him.

I have a web cam though! That'll be great for talking to people since quite a few people have them now. I'll have to be careful not to be on too much so I still get emersed in the language and culture.

This week I still need to pack and study; and now I found out I have to make a trip to Clemson to get my computer fixed. Which will probably mean hanging out there to wait for it to be fixed (if its fixable). Oh well. At least I figured the problem out now before I was in Spain.
(Written about twenty minutes later: YAY! I just found out Sarah is going to Clemson with me to get my computer fixed!! Which also means we're leaving at 7:30 am.....oh well, at least I get to hang out with my sister!!!)

Time seems so short now. Tomorrow I'll spend the day in Clemson, have Thursday with the family, pack Friday morning, relax teh rest of the day and leave Saturday. Into the unknown. Very exciting. It pulls at my adventurous side which seems to have been hiding as of late. I don't know what became of me, I've been so shy in new situations, so fearful of the unknown which is not like me. Hopefully this will rejuvenate me some. I'm excited about traveling and seeing a bit more of the world. I love traveling.

Got some errands done today, cleaned up the garage, hung out with the family and the cats. I took a nice long bubble bath and read. So wonderfully relaxing. Maybe I'll go riding this week. Thankfully all I really have left to do before i leave is the computer, packing, and a dentist appointment..oh and ordering Euros. But none of that should be too bad. I already made a list of all I need to pack. Very detailed list.

Oh! Another one of my friends is engaged!! On of my apartment mates!! I had an idea that it was coming but I was stilll surprised by how soon. I'm so excited for her! He's a good guy. I wish I was still around to hear the stories and be excited with her, but e-mail will suffice.

So how am I? I pretty relaxed and peaceful in Columbia compared to what I have been. I mean, it had its times (like when I checked my e-mail), but it was probably the best emotionally that I've been in awhile. So far it has carried over to being at home today. Hopefully, it will become the norm and get even better.

Alright, I should get sleep so I can wake up and drive bright and early tomorrow. Fun! Have a lovely night.