I made it! After around 30 hours of traveling, I arrived in Cáceres! All of my flights went smoothly and none of them were completely booked, so I had a lot of room on all of them. Right when I got off of my flight that landed in Madrid, I coincidentally saw three other students from my program! This was a HUGE blessing because it took us a little while to find the meeting place where we were to reunite with the other students and our program director, Toñi. In the Cáceres program from Iowa State , we have 13 students with all different types of majors with one thing in common: Spanish!
After all of us met, we waited for Toñi to arrive and, when she did, we got on the bus and drove the 3.5 hours to Cáceres. On the bus, all 13 of us got to know each other. I am really excited to get to know these people more! So far, I can tell our group is pretty solid! Neither of us know one another super well, so it will be fun to get to know them more! We are all also pretty easy going which, I think, is very important for living in another country for a period of time.
Once we got to Cáceres, it was raining like crazy which was kind of a bummer, but we weren’t outside for long anyway. When Kyra, my roommate and I got to sweet Isabel’s, my host mom’s, apartment, we unloaded and ate dinner. This part of the night was a struggle. We ate with Isabel and Rosita, a student at the university I will be studying at from Mexico. We talked to them during dinner. I could not understand them for the life of me. Maybe it was because I only slept for two out of my 30 hours of travel, but it was so tough for me to understand what they were saying and then form a response. That night I slept a much needed 11 hours and was ready for what our first day in Cáceres would bring!
The next couple days we spent time getting ourselves oriented with the city. It was a little dreary the first day but still way warmer that Iowa. I saw that the temperature was 50 degrees so I thought, “Cool, I can just wear a light cardigan and not a coat and I will be fine, especially if we are walking around.” Boy, was I wrong. When I got to the meeting point, everyone’s host moms had walked them there as well and all of them where saying, “Ay, hace frío! Dónde está tu chaqueta y bufanda?” Translation: “Dang girl, you insane? It’s freezing here and you're wearing that?” Anyways, besides the travesty of my lack of warm clothes, the two days went very smoothly.
And on the third day (today), we rested. We didn’t have any concrete plans to meet with anyone, just to spend some time with our host families. So, after sleeping the majority of the morning, Kyra and I ate lunch during siesta and made plans with some of the others in our group to walk around Cáceres. Side note: Siesta is between the hours of 2-5pm where everything is closed so everyone can eat dinner with their families and nap. In conclusion, it is the best thing ever implemented and should be mandated in the U.S. Anyways, we met some of the other students at the biblioteca (library) and went around old town. It is absolutely gorgeous. So rich in history and filled with hidden gems around every corner. There are a few pictures from today included in this post, and they don’t even do it justice.
So far, I love Cáceres and can't wait to see what the rest of this trip brings! This week, classes and internships start. Bring it on!
Adventure Awaits,
Maddie
