If in doubt...eat churros

Top Tips One of the things I was looking forward to most about my Year Abroad was all the travelling I'd be doing: I even wrote a (slightly optimistic) list of everywhere I wanted to visit. Having not been to much of mainland Spain (or Italy) before, this is definitely the perfect opportunity to visit new cities, take in the culture and be a tourist, all whilst practising my language skills, of course... However, everyone knows that travel can be tricky and very expensive if you're not careful, so I have compiled a few hints and tips from what I have learnt so far. 1) Be a tourist in your own city. It's great to want to travel all around the country, or even  continent, that you're staying in, but it's so important to experience the beautiful city you're living in too! You obviously chose it for a reason: be it the food, history, or even nightlife, so explore it. This is even more important if your friends and family are coming to visit you because you wan...

If you're reading this instead of studying the differences between 'por' and 'para' or swotting up on your subjunctive triggers, this is the post for you.  Whether you're getting ready to go and live in a country for a semester or a year, it's very easy to want to have perfect grammar to impress the locals. Let's face it though, in reality no one talks like they're writing an essay on global warming. There are far more important things that will help you get by and communicate in a foreign country. Read on preparation tips... We'll start with the activity you're going to spend about 80% of your time doing: eating and drinking. When in a restaurant in England, it's common to be really polite and use "please" and "thank you" like it's going out of fashion. This isn't the case at all in Spain, as we quickly learned. Of course, no one is rude to the waiters, but you won't hear a "Please may I have......

Swan Lake Last Sunday we went to a performance of Swan Lake, "El Lago de los Cisnes" by the Russian Classical Ballet school. I've been desperate to see a live performance for years, so this was a dream come true. I'm now trying to persuade my mum to go see The Nutcracker - it won't take much. One thing I don't quite understand though is Spanish etiquette in theatres. My first encounter of this was in London this summer when I went to see Mamma Mia! There was a Spanish family sat next to me (I was earwigging) and they were munching on popcorn all way through the production. How not okay. It was really frustrating and to be frank, I thought they were really rude for doing that. However, after going to see Swan Lake I realised that having popcorn is  the equivalent to us guys at home having an ice-cream in the interval. So we thought "when in Rome" and decided to have some ourselves. It was gross, it was just plain popcorn; we even didn't get...

Our Adventures... Gibraltar - 29/09/18 Here we go again on another organised trip, and this time it was actually super organised.  Once in La Línea, a small Spanish town on the border, we prepared ourselves for security. Out come the passports and the serious faces. And what for? Nothing would be the answer. A door in the border control building was simply left open and in when went. Safe, right? We then got to walk across Gibraltar Airport runway as it is built horizontally across the peninsula. SO cool.   T he Rock was amazing and we did so many steps climbing up it. Our legs are really beginning to hate us. When we got close to the top we had to pay in order to go through the nature reserves and to get into any tourist attractions, such as the monuments and museums.  Before, we set off for the trip we had done plenty of research about the famous monkeys of Gibraltar and we were both a little anxious of being near so many, but we knew shouldn't miss ...

Oh the culture shock! This one hits hard believe me... Before I embarked on my year abroad, I didn't think that life as a student in Spain would differ that much but it really does. I wasn't ready for the changes at all. Spanish students seem to be a lot more relaxed about time management and standard of work. This is a real struggle for me as I've always been a bit of a perfectionist. However, that's not possible here. With group work I've found that things are left super last minute (11pm the night before deadline. Nope.) and there's no rush or sense of wanting to be prepared.   Teachers are no better either. It's impossible to find out when exams are, some teachers suggest looking on the exam timetable whilst others tell you you're doing an exam when you rock up to class. The worst part of it all is trying to arrange your life around this. As an erasmus student booking flights is a big thing; you want cheap flights but you never know when...

Our Adventures... Almuñécar - 15/09/18 We decided to adventure to the coast for the first time since we've been here. The weather was a little bit cooler than what we've got used to but that didn't stop us. We used the ALSA bus service to get there, taking a little over an hour, but the tickets are super cheap, which was handy because we still hadn't been blessed by the Erasmus grant Gods.  When we got there we decided to head straight for food as we were starving. Seen as though it was Annie's birthday, we treated ourselves to a posh meal. Fancy veggie mushroom burger and grilled duck with blueberry sauce - yum!  Then it was time for some sunbathing and a dip in the sea. It wasn't as cold as we expected to be honest, it was like getting into a lukewarm bath (but Rebeka thought otherwise). After we dried off, we went for a little wander before going back to the beach to chill out for a bit longer. Just before we left, we watched a storm come in...