The Undocumented 6 Days.

Well... I know what you are thinking.. this is going to be a long one.. and to be honest, you are probably right. This entry is not for the faint of heart or people weak at the eyes... this could get into epic lengths and you need to be mentally prepared to embark on this challenge. With that being said, I will try to entertain you line by line; period by period, while still being truthful and without exaggeration.

I've got my Mumsford and Sons playing... it's Go Time.

As far back as I can remember is Nov. 12... and that's only because it was my friend Kristian's birthday and I posted an extremely witty post on his FB wall wishing him a happy birthday... it was The Office themed. The rest of this day was pretty uneventful... Colleen and I got so bored in our room that we ripped out at sheet of notebook paper and played 2 games of TIC-TAC-TOE (1 tie, 1 domination [by me]) Then we moved on to HANGMAN. Man I love that game. Our word choices consisted of:

• Stale bread
• Mountain
• Herba Buena (it's minty chicken broth soup we eat here.. Colleen can't stand it... it's not my favorite, but I can down it)

After Colleen and I's extreme fun with tic-tac-toe and hangman, we decided to hit up a tapas bar called POE with some friends. Let me just tell you something about POE... it's freaking amazing! For a number of reasons:

1. The owner is British and speaks English (in case you need to use it)
2. He's freaking cool!
3. The drinks are cheap
4. Most importantly, the Tapas are AMAZING.

"Courtney, what you mean by the tapas are amazing? What kind of food are they?"

Great questions... POE had the following:

• Spicy Thai Chicken
• Super great Pork and Pineapple skewers
• Coconut chicken

*** tapas can literally be anything... the definition of the word "tapa" just means a "light snack".. and the super great thing about Granada is that tapas come FREE with your drink!***

After we finished at POE, some of the people we went with decided that they wanted to go spend the rest of the night at Botellon so Sarah, Evelyn, Colleen and I went and hit up an Arab Teteria (tea house). Arab Teterias are literally the best. They are like the American equivalent of a coffee house.. super chill and not usually too incredibly crowded (unless it's finals week at Mugs) At the teteria we just talked, told funny stories, and played with candle wax... we are super fun. When the clock struck 2am, we decided it was a good idea to head home and go to sleep, so we all walked Evelyn home and that's when it happened... some drunk guy on the street said to me in passing,"Hola Puta!"[Hey B!+ch]..first time for everything I suppose.. at least to my face. Colleen and I slept until 1230pm the next day. Glorious.

Nov. 13

Today was a Plan B kind of day. Today was the day I was to experience my very first "futbol" game. Granada vs. Barcelona B. What makes such an exciting day a Plan B day? Well, for starters getting to the stadium. My friends and I had plans to meet people at Correos to find/catch the bus that would take us to the stadium. When everyone had arrived to the meeting place, we all made our way to the appropriate bus stop. Luckily, right as we were getting to the bus stop a bus was pulling up (WIN!)... we even saw other API people on the same bus... we were feeling pretty confident about this one. We also know that the stop for the stadium is one of the very last stops... so we ride this bus for about 20-25 minutes and finally get off at the last stop. Where were we? In the freaking middle of no where! We looked at the map on the bus stop and realized we were on the complete opposite side of Granada from where the stadium.. all 9 of us were ticked. [We all REALLY wanted to go to the game] So we all stood there pouting and cursing API for not giving us better directions while waiting for the next bus. When the next bus finally arrived, who did we see? 5-6 other API students who made the EXACT SAME mistake we did... so in total there were roughly 15-16 people in the WRONG PLACE! How does that happen?! Everyone couldn't help but laugh when we saw the other kids.

So.... we all got back on the bus and made our way to the other side of town only to get to the stadium 30minutes late and have to wait for our tickets to get given to us. Nevertheless, we made it in... and it was PACKED! I expected there to be some people there, but not this many. No siree. This was no Aggie Football game, but it was still fun and exciting.. Spaniards have incredible spirit.. and they pretty much rock at The Wave. Throughout the game, the Granada fans were making paper airplanes and throwing them into Barcelona's goalie box... their accuracy was amazing. I picked up an airplane that didn't quite make it onto the field and it is safely taped in my journal. :) For those of you wondering.... Granada won.. 4-1.. it was a bit of a beating. To celebrate the win, I bought myself a leather jacket from Stradivarius.. it's smokin'... it also matches the one my BD has... NBD.

Nov. 15

This is unarguably one of the best days of my life. I went and hiked the SIERRA NEVADAS! (Pics on FB) Just to clarify, I hiked the Spanish Sierra Nevadas... not the American ones.. there has been some confusion about the geography of these mountains, so I just wanted to make that clear. Here's a quick run down of my day:

6:30am wake up and put on the following:

• Tights
• Running shorts
• Tenni-runners
• "Grandpa Sweater"
• Scarf (essential)
• Columbia fleece

I also packed extra shoes, heavy jacket, and extra socks... I was prepared for anything... except rain... which thankfully it wasn't raining.

Then my friends and I made our way to the Bus Station to catch the 9am bus that would take us up to the mountain and bring us back down at 5pm... (this was an all-day thing) The ride up the mountain was pretty scary.. you have this huge charter bus on a really skinny and windy( as in lots of curves) road and all the while it's foggy. I won't lie.. I got a little nauseous. During the ride, up (approx. 45min) I was really depressed by how gloomy and foggy it was and I remember wishing it was a beautiful sunny day. Within 10minute... Wish. Granted. We had finally made it far enough up mountain to be above the clouds and all we could see was this sea of clouds below us.. it literally looked like we were in a different world. Once at our stop, we all hopped off the bus only to be greeted by the biting cold wind. For a split second I regretted not wearing more clothes. After everyone had gotten over the initial shock of the cold, we began our way up the mountain.... sometimes we took trails.. sometimes we made our own... it was a complete blast. Who knew you could have so much fun on a big rock? We climbed up into abandoned observatories, slid down the sides of hills, and most fun of all... made our own spin off of Man vs. Wild.. Sarah (Sarah the Magnificent) and I (Courtney the Courageous) are the hosts/stars of the show and Evelyn was the Cinematographer. So funny... or at least Sarah, Evelyn, and I thought it was... the others just looked at us like we were idiots.. I felt bad for them that they couldn't let themselves had a little juvenile fun. I've recently been told by Evelyn the Cinematographer that the movie is almost ready to be released... just have to cross some Ts and dot some Is. We probably hiked for a total of 5-6hours and my body was PUMPED about the great exercise that is mountain climbing. People talk metaphorically about climbing mountains.. but I LITERALLY climbed a mountain... I don't mean to rub this in anyone's face, but as I stated before, it was one of the best days of my life. I also scratched "go hiking" off my Bucket List... (WIN!) Although now I kind of wish I would have written "climb a mountain"... it sounds cooler. Whatevs. I slept like a baby that night.

Nov. 16

I procrastinated a lot today.. I had a presentation for my POE class (in Spanish) two days from today and I had zero motivation.. I'm really over school.. it's a bad way to be, but it's true. Because I am over school, I am over being nervous about getting up in front of my POE class and speaking in Spanish... it just wasn't worth the energy. Today was the day of my presentation over the Autonomous Community of Galicia... thankfully this presentation was in English... I think it went well.. the class didn't look like they wanted to shove their pens into their eyeballs... so I'll chalk that up to a WIN! That is all.. rather uneventful. Other than the fact that I tried to tell my class that Bill Clinton's daughter was named Hilary. I'm an idiot.

Nov. 17

Today marked the day of 1 month until I set foot on American soil. It was a bittersweet day... bitter in the sense that I'm going to be leaving Spain soon and sweet in the sense that school will be over. Like I wrote in my journal:

"Some days it feels like a lifetime and some days I want to stop blinking so that it lasts longer."

Today in my grammar class Fermin was in an especially rebellious mood... Instead of going into detail... I'm just going to leave it at the fact that I learned how to say F You (multiple times)... I would have been better off not knowing.. but any knowledge is good knowledge right? That's what Adam and Eve thought.. I'm a firm believer in the idea that "Ignorance is Bliss".. in some instances of course. Next on the agenda was POE... presentation time... it was well... rocky.. and it lasted 40 minutes (when it's only supposed to last 20)... it's fine.. people only wanted to gouge their eyes our a little. The rest of class was surprisingly fun.. we had to get into groups and talk about festivals and fairs that take place from where we are fun... I talked about the Texas State Fair.. I told about all the crazy fried foods (they were appalled... I informed them I was from the south and that's just how we roll) , the big ferris wheel [Aka Texas Star], and the Red River Shoot Out... people were fascinated. I got asked if hog wrestling took place there.. I told them.. probably unofficially... you never know what Texans are going to do. Good talk.

Dos Besos,

Courtney