It's like freshman year, but without the awkwardness...

So I just got back from a night out, but I'll talk about that later because I want to blog about my first day. Yes, I'm updating a lot, but that's because I have a lot of free time because classes don't start until Monday. I'm sure after that I won't update daily.

I want to talk about the first day in Sevilla. Yeah, you've already seen the pictures probablamente, but they don't do it justice about how happy this city makes me feel so far.

So like I said, I had taken a nap until about 12:30 before I pulled myself out of bed to talk to people in the hotel. It really took my back to freshman year when everyone would have the doors open. I met a lot of people just from my hall--Brenna from Santa Cruz, John from somewhere else (he lost his luggage too). Then a few of us went to lunch at around 2:45. Only problem was that it was everyone's lunch hour, so everything was closed except for the American chains--so we ate at KFC. I couldn't understand the cashier at first, but after she repeated what she said, I laughed because I should have known: "Crispy or original?" (but in Spanish of course). I poured a 5-hour-energy drink into my Fanta, and it actually improved the taste. By the way, those things WORK. I didn't feel hyper or buzzed, just not tired anymore. I could just function normally after I drank it. As we sat there, Sarah made a comment that we all agreed on--there are so many good looking people in Spain. Men, women, young, middle aged...Blake said that he'd "never seen so many beautiful people in [his] life."

And then we went back and literally hung out in the hallway, sitting and chatting--found out another guy--James--had lost his luggage too (European airlines kind of suck). Serio, there were about 8 of us sitting out in the hallway, and it really reminded me of Denton Hall. We even commented on the fact that we all felt like freshmen in college, but that it felt really cool.

My roommate for the first night was Kevin C from Illinois--he is a really outgoing guy, likes good music, and is hysterical. Like me, he's studying abroad partially so he doesn't graduate early (he's a senior now). He pitched the idea that we should all walk around before dinner and see a bit of the city, and we all agreed. Again, you've seen the pictures, but we all kept saying that Sevilla looked like it was out of a storybook. The architecture is old and beautiful, and the streets were perfectly clean (probably because of the street cleaners I saw during my 2am taxi ride). The 7 or 8 of us sat out by the river for a while and just took in the view. It was unbelieveable, I hope you can get a sense from the pictures. I can't wait to bring my homework out there and just read or write or something. Then we went to a corner restaurant and ordered a beer each. I'm not really a beer person, but it was actually really good--Cruzcampo is a popular beer in Seville because it's brewed really close to the city.

We got back to the hotel for dinner, which was really good. We started off with a salad and some tuna, then had some roasted chicken, followed by a chocolate mousse cake for dessert. It was really funny because all the guys sat together and therefore all the girls were together. We realized then just how few guys there are on the trip (UPDATE: our Señora said last semester there were 150 student with CEA, and only 12-15 males--crazy.). Unfortunately, part of conversation turned to politics (darn election years). I was surprised that most of the people at the table were Republicans (because in CP, that's rare). Anyway, the guys I ate with were pretty cool. Jared Couch, one of the many Cal Poly students, is really cool--he says "gnarly" a lot when he thinks something is either cool or weird (so context is everything).

After that, the whole group went on a horse and carriage ride through the city, seeing a lot of the sites that eventually we'll explore in depth. It's so weird to think that I'm living here for the next 3 months. It was really nice--we saw the University of Seville, where I'll be taking classes in three weeks. It's a really impressive building. We also went into the Plaza de España, which is where the main administration building of the city it. It was gorgeous--the design of the ground, the fountain, the building itself--seems like a good place to walk around or sit with a book.

Afterwards, I went out with a couple of the guys (this must be shocking to some of my UMD friends), and we just sat outside a bar and talked over a couple drinks about music, where we live, what we're trying to get out of the trip. It was really cool and I'm excited to hang out with these people.