Hannah McDaniel - Summer 2018 (Viterbo University Faculty Led Program)

Today was the Spanish holiday Corpus Christi so we had a free day. Hanna and I decided to try and get the most out of Spanish immersion experience by going to watch the corpus Christi precession. There was a mass at 8 and then the parade started at 8:30 so we left the apartment at 8 for the parade. As we walked, we saw that some of the streets were covered in rosemary sprigs, creating a path for the parade to follow! Many of the storefronts were decorated ant there were plenty of catholic alters all around. The Corpus is the feast of the Catholic Church so the holiday Corpus Christi is held to celebrate the Eucharist. All of the alters I saw had bread in them representing the body of Christ and some even had bread in flower bouquets. We went to the Plaza San Francisco and found a spot to watch the parade. There was a children’s choir and a band that stood on the Plaza steps and played music as the precession went by. It was different from any parade have been to, it wasn’t loud or c...

We met at the train station at 9am to take our bus to Cordoba. I stopped in the McDonalds at the train station to get coffee and I met a nice man from South Africa! He was vacationing in Spain for a few weeks. I told him that a few of my friends have just finished studying in South Africa with a group from my school! This made him vary happy, he said travel is the best way to learn! He Also says he wants to visit the United States! I think he should! Especially since he spoke English! It was about a 1.5 hour drive. We met our tour guide at Cordoba who lead us through the giant mosque/cathedral. Our guide told us that in southern Spain, if you want tourism go to Seville, if you want romanticism go to Granada, if you want history go to Cordoba. Historic is the best way to describe Cordoba. I love history so Cordoba was especially thrilling. Christians ruled Cordoba until 786AD then it was overtook by Muslims who ruled it until 1236 when it was retook by Christians. I call it a mosque/...

Before the trip, I asked Maria about fun things to do in Sevilla during our free time. She told us that she highly recommended the Arab baths of Sevilla. It’s kind of like a spa made from the ancient Islam bath house from when Muslims ruled Spain. When Christians retook the country, they didn’t tear down the bath area, so now it is restored and used for the same purpose it was built for! There were many options for spa visits we could choose. Some included massages, a visit to the rooftop bath or the wine bath. Hanna, Brooke and I chose the option where we could wander through their 6 main baths: warm bath, hot bath, cold bath, salt bath, steam bath and jet bath. When we got to the Arab baths, we were allowed to sit in lobby and drink tea while we waited for our session. Then we were lead upstairs to a locker room where we put on soft robes and aqua socks on our feet! We were then free to wander through the maze of baths for 90 minutes. The cold bath reminded me of taking ice bath...

Hanna and I slept in today, as most Spaniards do on Sundays. We got up and watched some cartoons with the kids who are getting cuter each day! We then got breakfast at a café. I got a chocolate croissant and a Cappuccino con coco! So delicious! I’m definitely going to miss these Spanish pastries when I go home! After breakfast Hanna and went to the Sevilla cathedral to see if we could attend a mass. I had heard that mass at the cathedral was free and all we had to do was show up when it was about to start. But when we got to the cathedral entrance, there was quite a crowd. Just inside the cathedral there was a metal gate and a security guard. I asked if we could go in for mass and he said yes and let us through the gate. He didn’t speak much English, but I think his job was to prevent tourists from getting in the cathedral only for sightseeing, and he was only letting those in who wanted to attend mass. The service was beautiful, it was in Spanish so unfortunately, I could only unders...

Hanna, Griffin and I got up early so we could check out the Granada cathedral before heading back to Sevilla. It is smaller than the Sevilla cathedral but just as beautiful! We tried to go inside but it was closed until 10 am. So while we waited, we got breakfast and did some shopping. I had cafe con leche, and toast with tomato and olive oil. The tomato was delicious! It wasn’t tomato slices, but puréed tomatoes that I spread on my toast! We had fun wandering around the city of granada. We stumbled upon a gorgeous building that I found out was the city hall. There were some guards in uniform and many policemen. There wer many people setting up flowers and gathering into the city hall. I later looked up Granada holidays and found out that they were prepairing to celebrate Feria del Corpus de Granada. This event is is Granada’s biggest fair. It starts every year on a Saturday, at midnight, with the alumbrao, when thousands of lights are turned on the main entrance to the fairground...

Hanna and I woke up at 8:30, packed our backpacks for Granada and met at the train station to take our bus to Granada! It was about a 4 hour ride and I slept pretty much the whole way! We arrived around 1:30 to Granada! The town was named after pomegranates, so pomegranate are the symbol of the city! There were pomegranate trees everywhere! The trees has blossoms but no fruit because pomegranate season is in the fall. Our tour guide had us use headsets so that we could hear what she was saying even when we weren’t close to her, but if i got too far away, I would start hearing static. This was good because I tend to wander around when taking pictures, so when I started hearing static, that was my cue to go catch up to the group! We toured Alhambra, a beautiful palace built by the Islam’s before the Catholics took over in 1492. It was full of the most gorgeous flowers I had ever seen! The roses were huge and there was colors everywhere you looked. The entire palace smelled like a f...

Hanna and I woke up at 7:30 so we could get Café con Leche before our 9am but trip to Ronda. We met the group at the McDonalds by the train station. I was curious, so I looked around the McDonalds to compare it to the US, and wow, there a difference! The McDonalds has shelfs of beautiful pastries, macaroons and fresh oranges. They also have a small basketball room and a mini track for the kids to play in instead of a McDonalds play place. After exploring, we got on the bus and headed for Ronda! I’m really glad we got coffee because then I didn’t sleep on the bus and the drive to Ronda was beautiful! It took about 2 hours. This was 2 hours of beautiful olive orchards, sheep herds, and mountains. By the time we got to the town of Ronda, we were pretty high up in the mountains. We had a little bit of free time and then we met out tour guide. She asked Sean if the tour should be in English or Spanish. Her English was great, I understood every word!  Plaza de Toros de Ronda She gav...

Hanna and I woke up at 9 so we could go get breakfast at a café before meeting at the bus stop at 11. We had seen people eating big pieces of toast with olive oil and honey so we wanted to try it! We went to a café by the by the bus stop and ordered Café con Leche y Tostada con aceite de olive y miel. (we had to look up the Spanish word for honey!) I was amazed that something so simple could taste to good! The quality of the bread and olive oil really makes a difference compared to food in the US.  After breakfast, we met the group at the bus station and traveled to Heliopolis. We got back into our project groups and finished our presentation. Then we practiced presenting our presentation. I made sure to speak very slowly, loudly and clearly. Sean said we would have to speak even slower for the kids to understand us. I asked our project partner, Jose Carlos, if he thought we (the Viterbo students) were speaking fast, he said yes! It’s interesting because Spanish here is spoke...

Hanna and I woke up at 8 to meet at the bus stop at 9 to go to the culinary school. Today we were working with younger culinary students, about our age, to plan a presentation for children on how to make 3 traditional dishes and what nutrients they have. The children we will be presenting to are all taking English classes so, our plan is to first present to them in English so that they practice English comprehension, then present to them in Spanish so they understand. At the culinary school, 4 students gave us lists of their favorite Mediterranean dishes to make I am in the dessert group so we chose to present Arot con Leche. We plan on explaining the health benefits of calcium from the milk, fiber from the rice, vitamin c from orange and lemon and health benefits of cinnamon. Jose Carlos, culinary student in our group will make the dish while we present. We were told to speak very slowly and use basic English when talking to the kids because English is still new to them! This makes s...

Originally we were supposed to meet with the Helioplis culinary students at 10am, but they decided to push it back to 12. I believe in Spain plans change a lot and get pushed back because people are flexible and like to sleep in! We were told to meet at GoFit gym at 11am. Hanna woke up at 8 and left to go get Café Con Leche and walk around before meeting the group. The GoFit gym was on the other side of our apartment than Santa Cruz (where the palace and cathedral are) so we hadn’t seen the area yet. It was a lot newer, still beautiful but no ancient buildings. While drinking coffee we acted as the Spanish do and sat there for about an hour just talking and relaxing. All the servers I’ve encountered in Spain let you sit for as long as you want and don’t bring you your bill until you ask for it. My prediction is that the Spanish believe it would be rude for them to bring the bill before we ask for it because that would be as if they were kicking out of the restaurant. Also, Spain sim...

We woke up at around 9am and checked out of the hostel. There were 2 middle aged people sitting on the deck, I talked with them a bit. They were from a suburb of London, and were backpacking through Spain. I saw a lot of backpackers on our trip to Portugal. I really enjoyed my experience at the hostel because someday, I might want to backpack through Europe and this is the kind of place backpackers stay at. After checking out, we took a walk on the beach, then went to a restaurant for smoothies and juice. I had strawberry juice and the woman running the restaurant went to the fridge, grabbed a bunch pile of strawberries and juiced them right in front of me! It was almost as good as the orange juice. We took a 12 oclock bus out of the beach town to downtown Faro, the historical district. We walked around and took pictured of the beautiful architecture and streets.  We saw a huge motorcycle gang with about 200 motorcycles, all wearing jackets that said France or Portugal. We ...

We got up at 6:00am to catch a 6:30 cab for our 7:30 bus ride to Faro Portugal. The bus stopped at the Spain/Portugal boarder and a police man got on the bus to check all of our passports. Unfortunately, he didn’t stamp them. The bus brought us to the Faro airport. We took a bus to the bus station so we could buy bus tickets for the next day. Then we took a bus to the beach town where our hostel is. We checked into the hostel. One room with 8 beds. 7 of us came and we are sharing the room with one other woman. We spend the rest of the day on the beach. I bought a really pretty beach towel because I didn’t bring one. We were so tired that we all fell asleep on the beach!  After napping I swam in the water and took a long walk on the beach. There were so many pretty rocks and shells. At night we walked around the beach town and went to dinner. I had cabbage and bean soup and a salad. I got to try Patricia's squid rice dish and Griffin's shellfish rice dish. We ate lots of ...

Alcazar de Sevilla On we Friday had breakfast at the apartment. We met at SAIIE, we walked downtown Sevilla and toured the palace of Sevilla: Real Alcázar Sevilla. I learned that the royal family stays at the palace about 3 times a year for business and maybe even more for pleasure. The palace is huge, so many rooms I lost count. There is a mix of architecture inspired by the Muslims and renaissance Catholics. Next we visited the cathedral. Tumba de Cristobal Colon Inside the cathedral is Columbus’s tomb. His body is held up by 4 people, representing the 4 kingdoms of Spain. The Spanish funded his excursion to the United States. We climbed to the top of the bell tower at the cathedral and looked at the view of the city of Sevilla. It was magnificent, simply stunning. After the tour of the cathedral, it was about 2pm so we walked home for lunch. At first our host family wasn’t home so I messaged her on WhatsApp. She said she is picking up the kids and they would be righ...

Alcazar de Sevilla Thursday May 17 I woke up to a flight attendant offering me coffee and breakfast. My watch said 11:55pm but it was nearly 7am in Spain so we had to get on the new time zone! We landed around 8am in Madrid. We went through customs and had a 3 hour layover. I was getting really tired so for 2.5 euros I got a Café con Leche. The literal translation is “coffee with milk” but it is more like a latte or cappuccino. It was so delicious and it woke me right up! After that, I had no trouble sticking with the new time zone. While waiting at the terminal, I met a really nice man from Iowa. He was visiting his daughter works as an English tutor is Spain. This was his 3rd trip to Sevilla and he gave us the tip to try ALL the food you are served because sometimes the food that doesn’t look that good actually tastes the best! At 11:30 am we boarded our 3rd and final plane for the day. And at 1:30pm, we were in Seville! We were given packets with our senoras address and phone n...

Wednesday May 16 My class met at the La Crosse Airport at 8:30am for our short 10 am flight to O’Hare Chicago. At Chicago we had a 5 hour layover. To pass the time we ate at Chilies, shopped for gifts for our host Senoras and I practiced my Spanish! At 5pm we boarded our flight to Madrid! The flight was 8 hours, I practiced a little Spanish at the beginning, the watched the greatest showman with Spanish subtitles to help me learn more of the language. The flight attendants served us gnocchi, salad, cheesecake and bread. After eating I fell asleep.