The first day

Bienvenidos a Espana

We finally arrived in Spain after being delayed in the Philadelphia airport and having to change planes. Customs was a breeze all you had to do was show them your passport and they welcomed you into their country no questions asked. Baggage claim was another fun adventure. Luckily all of my bags were there. Only one girl was missing her bags, lost some where in her connecting flight from London. On my flight there were nineteen JMU students, so we only had to wait for thirteen more people to come into Madrid. Then we took a two and half hour bus ride to Salamanca. The scenery was very different from the typically American Highway. There was lots of open land and there were several cattle randomly roaming the open fields. We passed through several small towns on our trek toward Salamanca. When we arrived in Salamanca our madres were there to great us. Our madre’s name is Ascension, she is in her late sixties or seventies. Of course Sarah and I packed the most stuff, so we had an embarrassing scene trying to fit our luggage into one tiny taxi. We ended up having to get a separate taxi for our luggage. Our Madre’s apartment is right in the center of the city, only a five minute walk from the Plaza Mayor. She lives on the fifth floor. Sarah and I share a room that’s about the size of a walk in closet. I can hold a pencil in each hand and draw on both walls! Miraculously all of our stuff actually fits, but in my dresser there are these random slanted shelves that makes my clothes fall off. After unpacking and taking showers, our Madre fed us. This was interesting she sat and watched us and talked to us. Our course we manly just smiled and nodded because I could not really understand her. I think she was talking about her daughter, No se. She did tell us that we had to finish all the food she made and she kept asking whether we liked her cooking. I was so full by the end! After dinner we went down the street to an extremely convenient internet café. The internet was free and I spent my first Euros in Spain on a very strong cappuccino. After getting in touch with the world. We left the café and met Colleen and someone in front of our apartment with their Madre, who just happens to be the niece of our Madre. We walked to the plaza and met other JMU people. The walk to the plaza was the most exciting thing so far. There were so many shops with clothes and boots and everything and all the stores had giant signs that said REBAJAS!!! This means everything is 50-70% off!! I can’t wait to go shopping. The plaza was breath taking. The whole square was lit up, the white stone looked beautiful against the dark sky. As we gathered in the plaza several Spaniards came up to us asking if we would come to their bar, we ended up going to bar called Atagualpa (I think). It was only 3.50 euro for all you can drink cerveza.