Well this week started off rough. Homesick hit hard on Easter. Thankful I got to talk to good friends and my family. I even got to talk to my kitties:] It has been GORGEOUS here in Sevilla. I love it. I wake up and it is warm and sunny. I have taken advantage of laying out in the park and soaking up the sun. Every single day got better and better.

Monday started off really well! I ended the day with our flamenco lesson. It was pretty intense, but really fun. It was hard to get back into the swing of things because I had not been in school for a good 10 days! We had our first spring break. Tuesday was also a great day that consisted of school, a run, hanging out, and the sun. Wednesday we had school, of course, and then had our last flamenco lesson. It was so funny. I am scared for the fiesta we have tomorrow (Monday April 12). Afterwards we went to the park and hung out. It was evening and we played catch with a football and sang songs! Again, thursday and friday were uneventful, but so much fun. I got to lay out for about 4 hours in 80 degree weather with my friends! Saturday was absolutely gorgeous. I went on a run, shopped, went to our activity director’s house to bake, and then went to a discoteca! Wow! It was so much fun... We (rachel, jenna, marissa, rebecca, evelyn, and i) felt like REAL spainards! We didnt eat until 12:30 pm... And didn’t get to the discoteca oh you know until 1:45pm! Ha! Today (Sunday) is just a day of relaxing and oh YES studying!!!! I cannot wait for this week to be over with because my daddy will be here! Once he comes I only have TWO WEEKS of school left and then my auntie comes :]

So this week increasingly got better. I am in a good place, but also ready to go home. I have so enjoyed my time here and wouldn’t change it for anything! I miss being in contact with all of you!

Okay so I wrote this awhile back... but I realized I never updated the blog since I went to Italy. It was a packed last two months or so. A lot happened so I wont bore you with all the details! Semana Santa was great... that was Italy, England, and Puerto de Santa Maria.... Two weeks after that I had Feria. This is when my dad was suppose to come, but due to the volcano in Iceland he was unable to come then. He was able to change his flight. He came the last week I was in Sevilla. Before he came my friends Jenna, Rachel, Stephen, and Jacob had a great weekend just hanging out. Jen, Rach, and I also went to a bull fight. That was very interesting. I never want to see another one. I though it was like going to the rodeo, but little did I know what was to come. So my dad came to Sevilla. We had an amazing time! THat was the first time we had spent time together like that in over 10 years! It was so fun. We saw lots of things in Sevilla. We also went on a bike tour of Sevilla which was awesome. Then we ventured to Malaga which is a beach town on the Eastern Coast of Sevilla! We did a bike tour there too. The biggest event that we did was go to the FC Barcelona vs. FC Sevilla game! We were in the 4th row from the field. We could pretty much touch the players! It was absolutely amazing! My dad was suppose to fly out the following day, but due to the volcano erupting again, was not able to. Needless to say, my senora made some amazing food and welcomed him in! His flight was canceled TWICE! It took him 72 hours to get home! It was fun for him to eat lunch with us twice... because he could speak with my senora! It was super fun. My dear friends Jen and Rach sent me off on my way back to the Estados Unidos.

My aunt was unable to come to Spain so I got to come home early. I was able to surprise Kristen (my sister) at her graduation from PLNU! Her face was absolutely priceless! I wouldnt have changed it for anything. So my dear friend and roommate to be, Lauren Hamlett, picked me up from the LAX airport... Talk about diving right into culture shock! HELLO LA! It was so good tho. I have been back home now for three days. It is a very weird feeling, but so good too. I am having a tough time sleeping... I am not sure what that is all about... but hopefully my body gets used to the food and the days soon! I have yet to have mexican food which is odd, but I have had wonderful breakfasts and yummy sushi and such! I have been able to run along the beach everyday! I still am in shock that everyone speaks english and I dont have to think about how I am going to phrase something in spanish. There are some things I am getting used to, but it is the best feeling to be home! I am off to Bass Lake in about 20 days! I cannot wait to be up there again!

I am sorry for the vague update, but I figured if you want more details then you can just ask :] I’d love to hear from you!!!

Love to all... and so good to be back!

kat

from portugal to valencia to ITALY to england and back

so it has been another week and half since i have updated this blog. sorry about that for those who read it. i went to toledo last weekend. we decided not to go on to madrid, but i was perfectly fine with that! toledo was beautiful! i love cities on mountains with rivers :] also we got to see the windmills in Don Quixote. i mean lets be honest, i have NEVER read that book, but it was cool to see. we went really early thursday morning and came back friday night. on saturday we as in emily and i, bummed around and didnt really do much. we then went to ‘our bar’ and skyped people! afterwards we had dinner with isabel and polished off the night with having liz come over. we made cookie dough and watched ELF! it was a great night!

sunday came around and i got to go find a bus stop that took me to the airport! my momma and jeff came to visit! at the airport i met jeff’s daughter anne and her daughter ava because they only live about an hour away from me (i went down to their house in the beginning of the semester).we then ventured off to go find the apartment we rented for three nights! it took awhile, but when we found it, it was well worth the confusion! the apartment was BEAUTIFUL and three stories! downstairs was the kitchen and living room. the second story had two bathrooms, three bedrooms, and a loft. then the third story was the master bedroom/ bath with a laundry room. we also could outside on a terrace that was two stories. we had a great place to stay.

monday i had school, but that was okay. we found a cute place to eat lunch. my mom and i then ventured off to find a yogurt place i saw! it was delicious. my mom came and joined me at FLEMENCO lessons. after watching me she said these words, “i am sorry sweetie that i didnt put you in dance lessons when you were younger.” i just about died when she said this. she had been laughing so hard! we had a good night!

tuesday i may or may not have played hooky, but jeff’s other daughter julia came! these days were fun filled! on tuesday i found out some exciting news... I GOT RA!!!! i am so very excited! i will be serving sophomores in the MODS (trailer park) next year! i am ecstatic. this also means i could be my brother’s RA hahhhaah!

wednesday was another fun day with the family! we did lots of walking around sevilla! i also got my bus ticket to portugal! we stayed in a very nice hotel on wednesday! everyone leaves thursday to portugal. they rented a mini van! because i had school and a test on friday i was unable to go with, but i will meet them there!

Sorry y’ll that it has been an EXTREMELY long time since i have updated this blog. It has been quite the adventure since i have updated this thing. So where i stopped off was when i went to portugal with my mom, jeff, and his girls. we had a great time with them. we went to lisbon, portugal and it was just like san francisco. i absolutely loved it. upon returning and everyone leaving my good friend katie hazdovac and katie shore came! they were here in sevilla for four days. we had lots of fun. the sun had come out and we were able to go on many walks and eat our meals down by the river. the friday they left, i went to valencia for las fallas. you will need to youtube las fallas, valencia, spain. it is a huge deal in valencia which is just south of barcelona. it is a week long (emily, liz and i went for the last day) and they have these HUGE statue like things and then burn them. i am not doing justice trying to explain it, but they are huge and it was interesting. it was extremely loud and smokey, but cool to go. when we were there we stayed with liz’s teachers (from high school) friend. we were so spoiled. they made the most amazing food and showed us around valencia. they also had a dinner party and we hung out with many spaniards. that also was fun. when i came back from valencia i only had three days left of school until i went to ITALY! so this past week i went to the one place in the world i wanted to go before i died, ITALIA! i went with my dear friends jenna and rachel (from my program). we had THE BESt time!

so we caught a bus at 7:15 am on thursday to catch our flight. we got through security no problem at all and then proceeded to get on our airplane. we flew into milan, italy. once we got there, we had pretty much no idea what to do so we found a bus that would actually take us to milan (because ryanair flies you into ‘the city’ about an hour outside the city) and then went to the train station. we made COMPLETE fools out of ourselves because we obviously dont speak italian and well we would speak english to them in broken sentences and really loud. it was hilarious. we were in milan and not impressed at all. i mean we got our first gelatto and also got completely stared at there so we decided to hop on a train and venture to where we were staying the next two nights; vernazza, cinqueterre. this train we got on is very old and we have little rooms with six chairs in it. we thought that maybe we would have our own room, but no we walked into it and was greeted with this awful stagnate smell of B.O. and a crazy man. this man was no older than his late twenties and his might be the oddest person i have ever met. he smelled so bad and really had no teeth. he also would randomly just speak and or sing. he was so weird! so that was an adventure. we get to our our train station that we needed to get off, so we did. this is where the adventure begins. i was told to bring my head lamp so i did so. please picture this, it is dark out (around 7:30pm), there are three girls (with big backpacks on), and we have some directions we need to follow in order to get to our Bed and Breakfast. these directions we hilarious and we ended up doing switchbacks up this mountain! i had so much fun with it because i felt like i was on trek again! i was also in my chacos and hold this headlamp so we could stay on this NARROW footpath! this footpath had MANY stairs and pretty went straight up! it was insane. when we were treking up this mountain we thought that there was NO WAY anything could be up there, we were proved wrong. after the 15 minute hike we got to this little cute house. we had found it! there was nothing around us, but we proceeded to follow the directions. when we got inside we saw this little old couple. PRECIOUS! the woman only spoke italian and french and the man spoke barely any english, french, and italian. so with our spanish and english we tried to speak with them. the woman was adorable couldn’t really say anything except, water water water. we smiled because we were sweating and replied with a YES! they couldnt believe how young we were. they showed us our room. we just about died. it was so cute. there were three of us with this queen size bed and a little cot. we all looked at each other and said, “together?” so we snuggled lol. we asked the couple if there were any restaurants near here and they said you have to go back into the village. so we treked back down and found an amazing restaurant! when we walked in we were greeted with this tipsy couple from the states who wanted one us to date his son. it was HILARiOuS! we sat down and ordered. i had homemade fresh pasta with pesto, rachel had sword fish, and jenna had ravioli in a walnut sauce. they all were simply amazing! we them saw homemade tiramisu and chocolate souffle so we could not resist it! it was all simply amazing! we then got to venture back up the mountain! we played phase 10 and then gave each other massages and talked. it was amazing. our hostess asked if 9 o’clock breakfast was okay and we replied happily with a yes! that next morning we got up at 8:55am and went down for our feast. she made hot chocolate, coffee, and tea. there was amazing bread, yogurt, and so much more. we had an amazing feast. we got back up to our room and welp... feel back asleep until about 1:30 pm. we didnt really feel bad because it had been raining outside and we just wanted to hike. by the time we woke up the rain had passed. we ventured out and hike along the cliffs of the ocean. it was breath taking. if you are from home it is like hiking in sobranes (sorry for the spelling) big sur. it was amazing! we didnt want to leave. we came to the next little town and had a little lunch. we had pizza and lasagna! that night we also had gotten gelatto and went to a little store to get some cheese, bread, olives, and turkey for dinner. it was so fun. we were back at the B&B by 7 pm. we again played phase 10 and gave massages. the next morning we got up and had our feast again. then we ventured down into the little town of vernazza and hung out there for a little before catching a train to florence. we then spent the next two days in florence. when we arrive here we checked into our great hostel and needed gelatto. we found this great place and got a waffle cone. the guy at the register asked if we wanted to pay together or separate. i replied with a separate, he then said okay 10 euros... i then said um no we wanted to pay separate he then replied again with i know, 10 euros. we died. it was so funny! it was really good! so we walked around florence with out 10 euro gelatto. it was great. later that night we found this pizzeria with cheap pizza and the most amazing pizza! it was delicious! we crashed that night. the very next morning we ran around florence and enjoyed every minute! we saw ‘the david’ and some other really cool things! i have NOTHING bad to saw about italy except for the fact i didnt want to leave! so i parted from from jenna and rachel and flew from pisa, italy to standsted, england.

i met emily and liz in england. i was shocked because everyone spoke english! what?!?! so to make this story short we didnt get to our hostel in enlgand until about 3 am. it was the worst place i have ever stayed and i didnt get one ounce of shut eye! we got up in the morning and hit the ground running. we saw welp pretty much all of london lol. i mean we saw all the important things at least. then we got on another bust to oxford to go visit katie hazdovac and katie shore! we had so much fun with them! the next day we went all around oxford and i was in love! we got to see all of oxford! i loved it! we got to tea and scones in the afternoon! it was so fun. we then got kebabs for dinner. it was all amazing. that night we met my dear friend maupsie (that is what us high sierrans call him)! he also is studying in oxford. we got to meet up! i loved seeing him, too. the next morning katie and i went on a run along a river and in the fields of oxford. it was simply splendid! we then went to this cute cafe before getting onto a bus to then catch the metro to get on another bus to catch our plane! we missed our second bus, but then found another one! we barely and i mean barely made it in time. i had five minutes to check my bag and then had to go through security and SPRINTED to our gate! we made it in time. we laughed about it afterwards! so we made it home safely.

once we got home isabel greeted us with besitos and love! she made us dinner. liz had eaten dinner with us, too (this is very odd for the spanish to allow someone into their home and let alone eat here with them)! it was a great end to our adventures. ALSO isabel informed me that well, we had a parrot now. I DIED! this bird, peepee, TALKS! so this morning i woke up to it talking and whistling. so now not only do i not like the dog i hate the bird lol. as i have been sitting here writing this long blog, i have been listening to this stupid bird talk to me, sing, and whistle.

tonight is the finally of semana santa (holy week)! semana santa is a HUGE thing here in sevilla. sevilla is known for the biggest precessions here there are millions of people here, no exaggeration! tonight i will see one or two probably, but it is so sad because many people here just like it because of the show and not for what it really means. it also breaks my heart because this is a somber week and no one is out on sunday when everyone should be celebrating that JESUS is alive!!!

well i am so sorry that this was forever, but i hope you have enjoyed! i miss you all... really i do! i cant wait to come home. i will be home in about 8 weeks!

oh and yes i forgot this... i will be working up at YSSC (yosemite sierra summer camp) this summer! i am ecstatic! i will be headed up to bass lake for the summer! YSSC is the campus that i went to school at for high sierra!

well i think that is all for now! i want to hear about you all!!!

so lets start with sunday. i pretty much just slept all day and studied, but when i decided to get out of my bed, i broke my pinkie tow. yup that is right, i ran into a little desk in my room :[ i of course was laughing so hard and fell on my bed, but i had a hard time walking...

monday came around and yes it was raining. i toe was swollen and beautiful colors! these past two weeks have been hard because my senoras sister has been in the hospital for awhile, but then it got really bad. emily and i were at home by ourselves a lot, but we were totally fine with it. on monday night her sister passed. it was hard for us and as you can imagine very hard for her. so this week we have kind of been dealing with that and also just loving her the best we can. we didnt see her monday night because she was at the hospital, but tuesday morning we saw her for about 10 minutes and she was off again. there were tears shed, hugs and kisses given, and laughs as well. she said that she was very happy with us, she loved us, and we were really good girls!

tuesday came and i had a test. awesome right? it wasnt bad, but there was a lot of stuff going on at home. emily and i decided to make PASTA (or cookie dough!) in the middle of making pasta isabel came home... we finished our pasta sat down and just watched tv with her. we didnt really talk, but i think just sitting with her was a positive thing.

wednesday it was SUNNY and warm. emily and i went to go study down at the river. we had such a good time! i was beautiful... and by studying i mean writing postcards and reviewing my stuff! i did study (dont worry daddy!). today was a busy day. i had school, lunch, river, skype dates, studying with others, encuentro (american bible study), cono kit kat with liz (cheap ice cream it mcdonalds), dinner, and a long night of STUDYING for my big test i had on thursday.

so i had a huge test on thursday! i think it went pretty well, but i was exhausted! i then had my prayer group that i lead and it was so refreshing! i just sat there sipping on tea (which is super expensive here in spain), eating a chocolate muffin, and getting to talk about Jesus and what is going on with the girl’s in my group! after that, BIGI (bingo) with the old men happened! they are so cute and we had sososso much fun. later that evening we did the PRAYER WALK! it was so cool. i was so happy that we were actually doing it because ever since i got to spain, i wanted to do this. i had help organizing it and then it was put into action! we had two groups of 10 people! we had different places we stoped and prayed for out loud. we all started together, broke off, and then ended together. it started to pour on us, but being able to be together and pray for this city and country was such a blessing!

friday rolled around and welp... i went to MOROCCO! i had such an amazing time. i went with a travel group from sevilla. we left at 5 pm from sevilla and went south to puerta de tarifa. we boarded the ferry and our buses came with! puerta de tanger was full so we had to wait in the waters of the mediterranean for about 2 hours. after we got off the ferry we stood in line exchange our money into dirhams and then had about a 2 or 3 hour drive to

Mdiq. So we had dinner at 4:30 am! afterwards we went straight to bed in our 4 star hotel (and by the way a four star hotel in morocco doesnt mean a four star hotel in the US). we were told not to drink the water or use it except for showering, but we were absolutely not allowed to brush our teeth with it. so what did i do without realizing it? yup i brushed my teeth! oops...

saturday we woke up to a warm humid day. it was beautiful, but slightly muggy. we went to the riff mountains in Chefchouen. i LOVED this little town. It was a white washed city with blue accentS! i could not get enough of it! we ate lunch there and i got this amazing couscous! we had couscous for the next 3 meals after this! any who, we didnt get any time for shopping so i was sad, but it is okay! after being in the city all day we had the 2 hour drive through the mountains back to mdiq. upon our arrival home, we had dinner and a traditional moroccan show! it was super fun:]

sunday was an early morning and off to tetuan. i was thinking by this point i felt really safe. well once we got to tetuan i thought id never make it out. i was so scared. there were police and militia everywhere with their guns just pointing towards anywhere, but the ground. my friend Kate and I clung arms the rest of the time and prayed. we saw a fight between two men and no one did anything about it. it was very odd. anyway most of the people were very nice and it was cool to see that side of morocco. i loved all the open air markets and the bright colors. one thing i noticed was that there were hardly any dogs and our tour guide said this was because the muslims do not like dogs because they are not peaceful animals and that is why there are a million cats! we decided to call the cats ‘monogatos’ translation is monkey cats. these cats were crazy and would climb trees like i have never seen!

through out the trip i tried imagining what it would be like living in this lifestyle, but i could not even fathom. my heart broke for this country, but it is being turned around do to the young king they have. things are looking up and they have hope. overall they are very nice people.

okay so after we left tetuan we went to tanger and saw the atlantic ocean! it was incredibly windy, but no pasa nada! it was gorgeous. when i was here i got to RIDE A CAMEL! it was different. hahah. i was so scared when i was sitting on it and the camel was standing and sitting, but i had lots of fun. after riding camels we went to the point where the mediterranean and atlantic met. once again this was stunning! the ocean was clear and beautiful. we went to the port to get on our ferry! we loaded the ferry and landed in gibralter. we thought this was great until the guides of the trip and said ‘this is not our stop we will be stopping at the next stop and our busses didnt make this ferry because our actual ferry was canceled. once we land our buses should only be about one hour behind us.’ okay so we landed in the other port at around 9:30 or 10 and our busses didnt get to us until about 3:15am. at 3:45am we were finally off to sevilla! so at about 7am on monday i got home!!!!! yahooooooo:]

monday i slept until 2 pm and my senora made me lunch! i was hungry because i didnt have anything since sunday’s lunch. i then met my friend kate at mcdonalds for ice cream and we just hung out talked and exchanged pictures! afterwards my friends (emily, lizzy, andy, and daniel had gone to portugal so i heard about their stories!) and i got together and hung out. we decided a while ago that we wanted to share life stories (testimonies) so one person started and we are going to take turns now! it is so great to have the opportunity to meet new friends and hear about their lives and the things they have gone through! so anyway monday was purely just relaxing!

oh i should mention how the weather was pretty much great the whole weekend, but today (tuesday) it started to RAIN and when i say rain i mean POUR!!!! any way this week is a great week! we had “PUENTE” which in spanish means bridge, but that is what we call like vacation. holiday, or a three day weekend! so we had puente. i only have school tuesday and wednesday and then off to Toledo and Madrid for the weekend! then my first visitor... MY MOM gets in on sunday!!!!!

there are pictures of the trip on my facebook, but i will be uploading the pictures to here very soon!!!

amor y paz,

katarinna

ps my senora is doing very well.

well today is monday and quite an interesting monday! so because i dont have internet at the house which is a great and bad thing emily and i went to McDonalds to skype our moms :] yes that is right mcdonalds! i also would like to mention that it was at 11pm and POURING RAIN! we walked a good 15 minutes to do so... okay so monday morning we wake up and it is pouring! i am so over the rain here, but when it is raining it is not frigid so that is a blessing. i had another examen and that went well. tomorrow i have my last exam for my FIRST CLASS... yup that is right spanish 101 is done with on tuesday! we went to the cathedral for class today. it is the third largest cathedral, but the largest gothic cathedral! it took oh about 500 years to build... can you believe that? it consists of gothic, baroque, arabic, neo-classism, and romanticism styles! we went to the very top which is like 34 stories and i believe 90 kilometers high... the highest building in sevilla. in fact no one is allowed to build higher than the cathedral! i saw where christopher columbus is buried inside, also there are lots and lots of legends about spain! one of them is the following, the outside of the orange patio has two figures of men on the sides of the gates. one of the men has three hands, if you find that third hand you will get married! hahah i laughed out loud at this legend. okay so that is just but i have more :] so that was the cathedral, but then i went to flamenco lessons again today and my teacher sylvia only knows MY NAME? how is that? i am not sure... ;] but she always seems to find me and starts to laugh which then makes me laugh... so lessons are pretty funny! afterwards i met with this missionary here! she is great and we were talking about the prayer walk and much more... i have a test tuesday so i am going to study some more!

ps some things i learned today... DONT ever stand on the corner of a street when it is either raining or it has rained. take my word for it. tonight i was standing on the same corner i do every day right by my school and it was kind of sprinkling and well a car was going real fast past me and i got sprayed by the CHARCOS (puddles)! awesome. also walking across the bridge... note to self... dont walk close to the cars walk against the railing... :] i laughed out loud. today also was the first day that i wore work out pants and my roommates hoodie. i was judged... but i could care less! oh and i met that missionary at starbucks here in sevilla (there are three on the same street this is sickening... sea lo que sea (it is what it is)) and i ordered a lite caramel frap with whip and the guy rolled his eyes at me... apparently starbucks here are not all about the specialties! oh and once again my food had eyes! i told isabel that in the united states normally you arent served shrimp with eyes, legs, and everything else... she said oh well i can get that, but it is less expensive? i was a little confused, i think she enjoys the head, eyes, and legs!!!

so today is tuesday and it was a pretty good day! woke up and again raining... but then i walk outside my FRIGID house and it is hot? okay humidity? my roommate likes to make fun of me because i am always like ‘it is SO humid...’ she like to smirk and say that i couldnt survive where humidity really takes place... thank you california? so i finished class number one today! now i start class number two! i am excited :] after our huge test (the equivalent of a final) we came home and watched the olympics. oh how could i forget, before we went home for lunch at 2:30 we decided to go on a mission to find brown tall boots for me and some soccer kicks for her... we FAILED! apparently Spain doesn’t carry ‘fashionable’ shoes/ boots in size 43? 44? it is tough having huge feet! so i am not a fan of shopping here...

wednesday... once again it was rainy, but emily and i were able to go running right after school! i got a package from my AUNT DEE!!!! (thank you thank you) i started my new class today! so now i am in spanish 102 for three weeks!!!! today was a great day! after dinner i met up with my friends at our local bar/ cafe called Pudilo! We have become locals :] We just hung out and talked (and yes when i say after dinner we finished dinner at 10:30 pm), these hours that spaniards keep are LOCO!

one thing that was hard today was i found out my concentration for my major is not going to be offered until i graduate. what this means is that i am still a liberal studies major, but i have to choose a concentration (special ed) in order to get my degree. so i am not exactly sure what i am going to do because i really only needed to take only those units to graduate! this is a bummer, but i can still get my masters in special ed! they have a concentration in phycology so i am seriously thinking about doing that!

so once again we woke up to the rain. it has rained for oh about 1 week straight now and we still have 7 days of a rainy forecast! isabel (my senora) cooks with these two spices cumin and paprika... i didnt think it was a problem but then it was in every food we were eating so we told her that it was causing a headache for emily. we thought that it might be the cause for her 2 week long headache... and it was a great excuse not to have the spice! ever since we stopped eating the spice her headache went away. BUT today emily didnt have lunch with us... SO the spices came back :[ it was like the base of the soup she made... hahah... that was sad. anyway the day went on and the rain continued to come! i got to skype some special people today and i have skype dates to come which i am looking forward to! tonight’s dinner was great. one it started off with watching the ladies’ half- pipe in the olympics. two we didnt have CHICKEN! three we got to have great new food... and FOUR we had the best conversations! our conversations were the following: us trying to ask what the word is for spelling in spanish, all the different ways of saying ‘cool’ in spanish, us asking her if she knows english (i am convinced she knows english so i asked her)... she knows the word CHICKEN and HI! lol so we taught her the word ‘COOL,’ we also talked about the meaning of ‘mona’ which is cute and people being feo(a) o bonita (ugly or pretty). another topic that we were laughing about was that she kept saying i am a bad kid! she would say “tu eres muy, mala tu eres muy mala” i responded ‘porque’ and she was laughing at me and said random stuff! i proceeded to ask her “tu piense estoy muy loco” (do you think i am really crazy)... no no you are young! this dinner was one to remember! oh and how could i forget about pami (the dog i do not like?) well pami sings! i will try to get it on tape for y’all, but pami only usually sings if isabel sings... i am proud to say that emily and i got pami to sing! dinner was oh about 2 hours tonight!!!

side note: we have been watching the olympics (obviously in spanish) and futbol! so fun!!! we get to see everything live and all the ‘bars/ cafes’ have the games going... SUPER FUN!

Friday was an interesting day. The sun decided to shine! It was very nice and warm so i was able to run for over an hour! I then skyped some more people! We were suppose to go ice skating and surprise our friend because he had never been ice skating! he lives in Indiana and has never gone ice skating? we blind folded him with my scarf and he walked all the way to the ice skating rink, which when we got there, found out they stopped it. we were really sad. while he was blind folded these girls walked by and in spanish said ‘they must be americans because he is wearing a bandana!’ we died it was so funny. after getting home late for dinner we went and got churros con chocolate! it was amazing! so we were able to eat churros con chocolate at 12 am along the river! it was a good night.

well the alarm went off at 8:10 am because we ventured to the Campo of Seville (country side)! the church that i go to here has a ‘retreat center’ in the Campo and they needed help cleaning and painting it to get ready for a camp/ retreat. nine of us from our program decided to go! we got on a train that took us about 1.5 hours north of the city. it was so nice to get out of the city and not to mention BEAUTIFUL! it was so funny because the train stopped in the middle of the train tracks and was like this is your stop. we were in the middle of no where and not even at a train stop, but there was one little building and that was it, the retreat center! so the day began! we painted like the equivalent to 5 rooms and cleaned! It was super fun and FREEZING! because i only have two pairs of pants here i wore running shorts, i froze and everyone was pointing out the fact i was wearing shorts. it was quite funny. they also told me that i would have really strong legs if i wear shorts in the cold? verdad? no se! we were gone for 13 hours. It was great tho to be able serve a church here that i go to. i ran to Pulido (our bar/ cafe to get internet) in the rain to get on skype for a second. when i was there both the FC Barcelona game was on and as well as the Sevilla FC game! I love watching futbol here and the olympics! after returning late we had dinner at you know, 11:15 pm! emily and i decided we just wanted cookie dough after dinner, soooooo we made some and ate it! isabel things we are crazy, but we didnt really care! cookie dough and conversations!

so it is sunday now and i woke up at 12:15 pm. my schedule here is not so consistent for me. i like to have a schedule and i have been in school for 4 weeks now... and still no schedule! sea lo que sea (it is what it is). today i just needed to be alone and quiet. i have been lying in bed all day just reading my bible, doing my devotional, STUDYING (i have two tests this week), homework, sleeping, and catching up on random things. it is still raining... life is good.

this week was harder, but i am glad i am here. i would not say i am homesick by no means, but i am missing people and simply things like:

my friends, family, hot shower, warm house, pasta, hoodies, sweats, and the wilderness! it is fun to live in the city tho and being able to WALK EVERYWHERE is amazing!

I hope your week has been blessed and going well.

amor y paz

katarinna

okay well it has been another wonderful week here in sevilla! once again we had a 4 day week:] got to love it! it has been raining here and freezing, but no pasa nada. it has been glorious in the mornings so i have been running in the early morning!

monday was just another average day of going on a run and going to school. we (my roommate and i) have found our favorite bar/ cafe that has free wifi. we have become regulars there. it is called Puldio. they are very friendly here, but the guy who is working there all the time just laughs at me because whenever i order i start laughing! he knows that we are both learning spanish so he helps us, but let me tell you the spanish accent (lisp) is really hard to understand so i just laugh A LOT! so we go to Puldio to get cafe con leche and wifi gratis (free wifi)! oh and yes and this night isabel served me food that still had eyes, legs, and bones. she had cooked gamba (shrimp) but left all the stuff on it... i was thoroughly disgusted. then the fish she cooked still had the skin and bones on it... i almost died! hahha is was not good and i love seafood so that was hard to swallow.

tuesday consisted of the same thing and also preparing for my presentation in spanish! i loved getting ready for this because i actually already had done one of these in high school, but i got to talk about things i like to do, the wonderful city i live in, and MY FAMILY!!! our senora, isabel surprised us with these ice cream bars like a hagen daz bar. we were one so surprised and to so EXCITED to have dessert and not fruit or yogurt!

wednesday i went to school and came home to fall asleep for three hours! i have been sleeping way too much here. i love it tho. so they do take siesta which i may have already said i thought was fake, but the shops do shut down from about 2- 5! when i say about 2- 5 they usually close early that 2 and open after 5... their work ethic here isnt quite the standard we have at home... but it is cool they spend that time with friends and family! so after my three hour nap i went to encuentro (the english bible study, but we sing songs in both english and spanish)! after this bible study i talked to our activities director about organizing a prayer walk here in sevilla. she thought it was a great idea and put me incharge. i was not really expecting this, but i am meeting with her on monday to bounce some ideas around about it. i am very excited about this! at azusa pacific our theme this year is ‘God in this city’ and i really have seen that here, too. when i run here i see lots of gorgeous things, but also a lot of pain and hurt. so here i go... organizing a prayer walk. prayer for this would be great! we wont do it probably for at least another week, but i will keep you updated on this!

thursday rolls around and i had my presentation! it went very well. our three day weekend started :] again i slept for three hours and then just kind of hung out! i got to skype with a few people :] the group of people i hang out with (emily, lizzy, daniel, and andy) and i met at ‘our corner’ which is right by this cafe called cafe de indias. we seem to hang out on this corner a lot and just talk. because calling and texting is so expensive here we just meet at the corner and make plans :] it is fun.. so we met at like 11:15 pm to make plans for friday!

our friday consisted of lots of rain, sleep, and brownies and cookies :] we tried to go to the alcazar. this is the place where the royalty come and stay when visiting sevilla. who would have thought the day we try to go the PRINCES decided to come and stay? so we saw where they were staying, but couldnt get in :[ it is okay i have over 3 months of being here! we were freezing so we came home got back into our pjs made hot chocolate and ate crackers with nutella. we sat by our heater, washed disney channel, and studied! isabel came home and fed us yummy food... it consisted of homemade sopa de pollo (chicken noodle soup) and spanish tortilla (the best food in the world! it is potatoes and eggs... like an omelet but better)! guess what i did after this? yup fell asleep for three hours:] we decided to go to our school which was having this valentines party (i hate valentine’s day, but sea lo que sea (it is what it is)) and i got to meet some other awesome people (who are christians studying at another university)! we did ‘speed dating’ which was fun and they fed us banana bread, chocolate chip cookies (chocolate chips dont exist here so it was shaved chocolate), and BROWNIES! it was a glorious night. we came home and ate dinner with isabel. actually most senoras do not allow their ‘kids’ (us students) to enter their kitchen, but isabel lets us do whatever! so we got to help her prepare dinner :] it was so fun! after having a great dinner we went and found this cute little bar on the river and sipped on some sangria! emily tried it for the first time and i just simply enjoyed it! we had lots of great conversations!

saturday woke up at 11:30 am and decided to go on a run! it was frigid, but beautiful. we ran for about 45/ 50 minutes! it was so fun. um well then we just went to the city wall!!! it was so cool and so much fun :]

on friday night when we were out we were amazed by how many old people were out! i mean we have yet to be up later than our senora... CRAZY! we came home at like 2 am and she was still awake until like 3 am!

isabel has come up with all these names for me and calls me the following:

chica (girl)

chicatita (little girl)

chicie (not sure)

pequina (little)

nina (little girl)

hija (daughter)

okay well i think that is all for now ask me if you have any questions!!!!

amor y paz,

katarinna