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Ok so I thought that flying, especially internationally, was just plain awful but I have officially converted and I now wish all my flying were international and with the Germans because Lufthansa freaking rocks! Can anyone say hot towels, delicious food, big seats, humongous plane, awesome movies/entertainment and hot German flight attendants? Oh yes Lufthansa you have my definite approval. Now if next time I can only get a first class seat where they get to practically lay down the whole flight and each get their own TV. All of us in economy did get the lovely privilege of having our own down feather pillows and nice wool blankets. Overall, satisfied.

The only thing I will say is that the Frankfurt airport needs to get its act together and power some people through security. Picture a crazed American girl running through the airport to get from the far B gates to A26. Thank goodness for those moving walkways is all I can say, otherwise I would have…still made my flight. The plane was a half hour late getting there and when we all boarded we still had to wait another hour for them to de-ice the plane. But sprinting through the airport effectively brings together strangers, as in Meg and my cases. New goal: be one of those people that can go up and randomly talk to anyone and make instant friends with them. One of the guys was one of those types of people and I have to say that he was pretty dang sweet.

Meg and I still got to the Madrid airport 3 hours before our group was meeting so we then proceeded to play cards and take ridiculous pictures after our 2 day journey, as seen below:




Once we finally decided to try and find our group that was an unnecessary adventure. Apparently Terminal 2 at the airport is freakishly huge and other members of our group had been waiting at the other end for hours looking for us. Whoops.

When we finally got out of the airport and onto the bus I have to say that the journey from Madrid to Alcala was not that much different than travelling through any other city. Except for the fact that drivers here are insanely aggressive and everyone drives incredibly close to one another and you constantly feel like there is going to be a 20 car pile-up at any moment. You think I would be used to it after living and driving in Utah…

So from the freeway things seemed pretty similar to the US, but once we got off the freeway and got into Alcala it finally dawned on me that I was actually in Spain. When I pictured Spain this is pretty much exactly what I thought. There are cobblestone streets, old-style tile rooftops, funky shops and overall amazing architecture. There is one central area called the Plaza de Cervantes near the center of the city with a full-on gazebo, statue of Cervantes (writer of Don Quixote) and surrounded on all sides by huge old-style buildings. I am officially in love with this city. And this is why:




The bus was taking us to meet our families that we will be staying with for the next three months and I have to say I was really nervous to meet them. Megan and I are staying with a lady named Blanca, who is too cute and way funny. She lives in practically the center of the city so we can walk most places we want to go. However this was like full-on Spanish language immersion right off the bat. She doesn’t know much English and my Spanish is on a kindergarten level so mostly I just listen and get the gist of things and say “si!” a lot. She lives alone in this great cute little apartment, but hosts students practically all the time. She has been doing this for 16 years! We even have another girl staying here too from Korea. I think her name here is Rosio, but don’t quote me on that. She seems really nice but for both of them at this point I feel like I don’t know them too well because we all don’t speak the same language fluently. I do think that Blanca is set on finding Meg and I some novios because she loves to talk to use about those chicos guapos. And holy heck does she make some delicious food! Me gusta tortillas de patatas! Needless to say I think my Spanish will be greatly improving while I’m here.