While sitting here drinking a nice warm cup of coffee and eating a galleta (cookie), I thought I’d write about my last couple of days here in España. Let’s see.. I guess I left off not fully realizing that I live in such a beautiful place. I still don’t, and I hope that I never do. To give you a brief look into how things work around here, I’ll let you know what it is I do in a given day. You don’t have to brace yourself. You’re in for [...]

Didn’t have class till 2PM today! Sleeping in felt great, but somehow when I got home, I was still tired, and ended up going to bed at 10 anyway… I hope this isn’t still jet lag… I thought I was being really diligent when it came to resetting my inner clock. Uff. So, I had “Islam, Politics and Britain” today. It was a good class – all discussion based, so ill fit right in – but wowwwww, 2-5:00. Could they keep us any longer?! I can’t wait to get back [...]

Before I get started, I’m going to be straight with you all—maintaining a blog is DIFFICULT STUFF, yo. I have nottttt been the most prompt and consistent blogger. But, come on! Give me a break, it’s my first time blogging, and it is DEFINITELY my first time studying abroad! So, obviously, there will need to be a grace period, right? Right, that’s what I thought. I promise that this week will be better. Promise, promise, promise! These promises are mostly for my mother, whom I’m sure is checking the blog [...]

I’ve moved into to my apartment, started classes (somewhat) and am beginning to feel at home in Dublin. This has allowed me to talk to more people, and explore Dublin beyond the tourist attractions and meet some people. Also, my classes this week were a crash course in Irish history and politics. I am starting to see how little I know about the world. In the Irish constitution, it states that Ireland welcomes all people of Irish decent who come to visit, this year in particular. 2013 is “the return” [...]

I finally got to sleep in today. It’s friday and I have no classes! This will be optimal when I travel (I’ve booked my train trip to Paris for the weekend after next!), but for now it’s nice to sleep.  Each day here is so full of new things, new words, new situations. Every day is its own adventure, and I wake up in the morning having no idea what could happen. Some parts of my life, like riding the tram and the bus, and eating dinner I’ve gotten used [...]

The first week of classes went pretty good, next week I have a few more classes starting including my Life Drawing class at the Glasgow School of Art, and two seminars, one for my Scot Lit class and one for my Archaeology class. Nothing too exciting has gone on, and honestly campus seems much quieter than what I expected upon the arrival of the rest of the 24,000 students. But in reality it is still half the population of the U of M! I was able to meet a quite [...]

So my future updates are probably going to be a bit more scattered and probably not as exciting unless I get out to do some traveling sometime! Yesterday was a bit boring, got a chance to sleep in a bit, do a little shopping for groceries, skype home for a while, and attempt at finding my classes. Realized that I need to wear my rain boots pretty much on a daily basis from now on since my shoes were soaked all the way through! I definitely should have bought and [...]

Means I sleep. Which people do a lot here. For a place with absolutely zero nightlife, people in Fes stay up awfully late. Parents, grandparents, two-year-olds: bedtime is about one a.m. And then there are just a lot of naps, vaguely scheduled around the calls to prayer. As a student, it’s a little hard to get used to going to bed so late when wakeup is at 6:45. So you take a nap when you can, maybe 2 o’clock, maybe 6 o’clock, maybe 9 o’clock. Because dinner is at ten [...]

Today we started classes. I had my Children with Special Needs class. I found out my practicum site! I am in a forrest børnehave. We all meet at one location in the city in the morning. A bus takes all of the children and staff into the forrest where the children simply play and enjoy nature all day! It is something unlike anything I have experienced in the United States and I cannot wait to begin! I will start going next Thursday. I just hope I can make it to where [...]

Today is a very big day. Not because of what I’m doing, though tonight’s event is also going to be pretty darn spectacular. Today is big because my host family has INTERNET!!! Over the past couple weeks, my host family has gone from wireless, to only using the Ethernet cord, to having a million and one cousins in the house vying for Youtube access, to no web connection at all. I’ve been adding these posts onto my blog only at school, and let me tell you, I do not get anything done [...]

Monday: We had our first day of classes today. The program is set up so we have a two-week intensive language class and then I start the rest of my classes at the beginning of July. I go to class all morning, have a break for lunch, and then I have an afternoon activity. I am trying really hard in Italian because it is so helpful to communicate with people around here…people speak less English than I expected. We then spent the afternoon at the Vatican. We had a great [...]

Yesterday was my first full day in Chile and also the orientation for my program. Matias and I walked to the metro station together so that I knew how to get there and how to use it. Since he and I go to the same school, we rode all the way together which was much easier than going alone. The metro ride (once you get out from underground) is really beautiful. It passes right alongside the ocean and you can see the coast of Valparaiso in front of you- so [...]

Today we had our visit to St. Thomas hospital to visit our instructor Dr. Msuya and to see where he practices. St. Thomas hospital is a privately owned hospital in Arusha and they see approximately 80-100 patients a day. When we arrived to the hospital at 10:00 am, the waiting room was already packed full of patients waiting to see Dr. Msuya. He is an OB/GYN and serves a good majority of the pregnant women in Arusha. We were given a tour of the facilites by one of the workers [...]

Monday was my first day of my Australian Government and Politics class. I have 2 really cute old men (cute as reminding me of my grandpas ppl!). One was formerly in parliament for 10 years and the other wrote many political books and even ran some big campaigns around here. They talked for about 2 hours then took us to the pub down the street and bought all 11 of us around of drinks. Definitely something I was not used to, but absolutely enjoying!  Liz, my roommate, and I are [...]

I can’t believe it’s less than 24 hours and I will be on a plane to Amsterdam. After a four hour layover in Amsterdam I will be on my way to Tanzania. People keep asking me if I am nervous about going, but to be honest I don’t even know what to expect. I’ve never even left the country, so I can’t imagine what it will be like to live in Tanzania. Thankfully I’ve gotten a lot of help from my coworkers that have either lived in or traveled to [...]