Almost two weeks?!?

We just ended our first week of classes, it's crazy how the time I've been here feels. At the same time that I feel like I've been here forever, it seems that every minute I feel like time is moving very rapidly and that I'm going to have to leave at any moment. It's quite strange.

I'm really enjoying my classes and I think I'm going to learn a lot. Both of our professors are amazing, which I may have already mentioned. My literature professor teaches at Grand Valley during the school year, but is from Bilbao, and she is fantastic. Brittany and I have to complete the first project this weekend and present next week for the class. For this presentation she gave us a video camera and we had to make up 10 questions about the topic we were reading/discussing currently (Latin American conquistadors/the beginning "discovery" of the Americas/the indigenous people) to ask local Spaniards. After she checked over our questions, we now have until Tuesday to ask people of different generations these questions. What a great format! Not only will we be able to practice our Spanish with locals but it's a great way to learn about the mindset of the country.

Brittany and I went shopping the other day in Bilbao and bought the cutest shoes! Perhaps I'll post pictures in my next post or so of them. There was also a performing arts street festival happening that week so we went to see a couple of them for free in the streets of Bilbao, very cool, and mostly there were a whole lot of small Spanish children...soooo cute! All of which probably speak better Spanish than me.

This morning we got up fairly early (8 am)after getting home fairly late (3 am) to go on our excursion to Urdaibai, which contains the Biosphere Reserve. We visited Gernika, the historic capital of Pais Vasco (the Basque country aka northern Spain) and the title/topic of one of Picasso's famous paintings. We visited la Casa de Juntas which is an assembly house where there was the tree of Gernika which is a symbol of the Basque people and there is this really old tree trunk inside of kinda like a gazebo and a newer tree on the property that is the great grandchild of that original tree (from its acorns' acorns jaja). We also visited the museum of Gernika called "el Museo Gernika-Museo de la Paz", or Peace Museum, after the bombing of Gernika on April 26, 1937 during the Spanish Civil War. It had a lot of exhibits and quotes, clips, etc. surrounding the theme of peace and I liked it a lot because I just find it really interesting learning about the past of a city.

We also visited Mundaka which is just a beautiful city in Urdaibai and there's a beach, etc. It's known for its waves and surfing. We just walked around the cliffs/shore/scenery and took pictures.

Fiesta in the town of Santurzi tonight, planning on coming back early (aka 2-3 AM, people fiesta until 7 AM or later...ahh) due to tiredness...fiesta + siesta.