ESPANA

She don't like the way I look on you, I make her nervous 'cause I don't fit in, With my deep brown eyes, cigarette, cowboy boots, I stand alone, Baby I wonder if you know what, You're getting yourself into...

So I'm in Spain. I'm on stop one of my adventure and I'm busy getting my "cultural" feet wet. Here are some things I have learned, things I can adapt to, and things I am not going to ever understand... 

Learnings.... 

1. The people in Spain are B-E-A-UTIFUL!! 

2. Once the Spainards figure out I am not one of them, they immediately guess I am a native of Miami. Maybe that's the only geography they know. 

3. Ice cream is best eaten.... any time of the day. I love them!

4. Cars don't stop, neither do motorcycles

Adaptions... 

1. Staring is totally okay. Yes, eye contact is accepted and expected with strangers, especially hot ones!

2. Life shuts down on Sundays and from 2-5 everyday. Ridiculous? I would say perfect actually. Life is just slower here and it is wonderful. No drive-thrus, no to go cups. Everyone sits and spends at least an hour eating. Typically outside. The U.S. definitely needs to get on board. 

3. PDA is totally okay. I'm okay with this... now I just need to find someone to try it out

4. when you see someone you know on the street, it is required that you stop and talk to them

5. dos besos are way better than a handshake... 

Are you kidding me? 

1. Mullets are acceptable. ewww

2. nothing can beat number 1.... 

Finally. The best part. I LOVE the outfits. I need to add a pair of colored skinny jeans to my wardrobe, but otherwise i fit right in. love love love it!!

Next up... sending Sarah off to Malaga and a week of Spain by myself. We'll see how that goes!

Still got a lot of ground, i haven't covered yet...

I guess the Lord made me hard to handle, So lovin' me might be a long shot gamble, So before you go and turn me on, Be sure that you can turn me loose, 'Cause I still got a lot of leavin' left to do... 

I leave for Portugal in five days

that's 96 hours and 38 minutes 

I'm not sure how I am feeling about it right now. I'm mostly trying to get things taken care of, put away and packed up. I'm making my lists of things to buy and it keeps getting bigger and bigger. It makes me worry about the 70 lb limit. I'm hoping to pack light, but more and more things keep getting put into the suitcase. Mementos from home, a rather large pair of cowboy boots, gifts for new Portuguese friends (or maybe to help make new friends....), things for my friends I'm visiting, a good handful full of dresses, and stuff to last three months (at this rate it seems like i'll make it through a nuclear fall out).  

I've been having this reoccurring dream. It started when I was still at school, before my Organic final and i've had it every night since. It involves me getting tackled/pushed through a series of five walls by someone obviously bigger than me. Then he says, I've found you...now we have to pay for the electricity. A little weird yes, but I always wake in a cold sweat. I've been known to have vivid dreams that tend to come true (deja vu if you will) so I'm a little nervous about this one coming true. I don't think i'll live through five walls... 

Anyway last night there was a little twist. Instead of waking up initially i had a discussion, in my dream, about this dream reoccurring multiple times. The conversation didn't get very far. I just got pushed through another wall. 

...lub dub...

There's a prayer I've been praying, a dream i will always dream and my hope keeps me waiting for the day that you'll come back for me...

Finals are nearly over 

Graduation is tomorrow

Portugal is in eight days

My heart is leaning towards familiar ground and I'm not sure I like it. I mean, I do, but it's not where I should be, and i'm afraid i'll get stuck kicking myself...again. Portugal could not come any faster. Sometimes I fear that I am using it to run away from problems, but I've decided who cares? I have bigger things to worry about... 

...like if i should pack my cowboy boots.... 

Pull

Crisis averted.... 

my worry about the start button in Portugal is not needed. Turns out the machines are made in the US. They will be in English. YES!  

Portuguese word for pull -apushar (go figure) I'm definitely going to get that one wrong!

Please, Slow it down...

Monday is my 21st birthday. It's scary to think about it really. I think I've been waiting my whole life for this day and I'm afraid it might be a big disappointment. 21 is kind of a big deal especially around this college town, but I'll be a week out of finals with enormous homework assignments, ridiculous amounts of tests and one rather silly, yet ridiculously weighted presentation. This is all due the week before finals, and I think that celebrating my 21st birthday might be a not very smart choice, but if i don't live through this week I'll probably regret not going down in a blaze of glory. 

So this blog, like most of my blogs, is going to let you into the ridiculousness that is my brain. There are some things that I keep thinking about, a lot actually. For the most part they are silly and mean nothing, but are something to keep my brain thinking about something rather than falling asleep in class or something like that. So here goes... 

First, I feel like something clicked in my brain this week. I understand science. It's kind of crazy that it has taken three years for me to feel comfortable with it, but finally it's okay. This will probably change by next week, but right now I'm going to bask in the familiarity that is science. 

Second, I will be on another continent in 22 days. I realized today that all the machines in the lab I will be working in will not have English on them. I'm scared. Not of being in a new place with new people and not being able to speak the language, but of the fact that I don't know what the start or stop button looks like. 

Third, When you wear a skirt and go to the bathroom are you supposed to pull the skirt up or down? It's quite the conundrum.  Experience tells me pushing it down is safer. 

Fourth, my feet are purple. Well mostly my toes, but have a nice purply tint to them. I have bad circulation 

Fifth, I will be on another continent in 22 days. I can't get my head around that... I know enough Portuguese to say that I don't understand or speak Portuguese. It's a start right

Sixth, Is what I see as green really what someone else sees as purple but they have been taught that that color is green? We'll never know.... 

That's about it. There are definitely more swirling around this crazy head of mine, but there's only so much the sane people can handle so I'll hold back.