In the beginning...

Warning: This is a journal like thing for me, so some of these things may not seem very interesting but I am a pro at journalling and write about basically everything that comes to mind because why censor my thoughts ya know.

Before I began my adventure to Santiago, I figured I should buy another tube of toothpaste since its the one thing I cannot live without. However, Crest disappoints me with this information (which means click on that, even though its not important whatsoever to the story). I am being forced back onto mint toothpaste it would seem, which is the 2nd most disgusting flavor of toothpaste, the 1st most disgusting flavor being cinnamon. Maybe I'll just go for the toothless look from now on....#reallyupset #boocrest

I arrived in Santiago yesterday, January 22nd. To get there, I took a sketchy plane ride to the Chicago airport. First, the plane was delayed like a half hour while we were already out on the run way because a light had come on. The pilot explained it as being, the company needed to fill out some paperwork. So we were delayed because they failed to have paperwork filled out before the plane was supposed to take off I guess. Then, the turbulence was really bad and we were getting blown around everywhere. The people on the plane were actually doing collective gasps which was pretty entertaining for me whenever the turbulence would whip us around. I'm sure the airplane was just listening to the whip nae nae song somewhere. So all in all that was a sketchy plane ride and airplanes should not be allowed to listen to the whip nae nae song.

Because blogs are boring without logos of Iberia

In Chicago we made it safely out of Chicago on Iberia, we didn't even lose the plane like last year! Improvements from last years flight definitely. Luckily this plane ride wasn't sketchy. There was barely anyone on the flight though, so I had my own row basically that I could lie down in and nap. Last year, I had problems with my ears feeling like they were going to implode on the plane ride. Since I have tons of ear problems because of my allergies, I am extremely intolerant of ear pain so this year I tried these weird plugs called "Earplanes". They are supposed to reduce noise or something, but my doctor said they would also help relieve the pressure and keep my ears from perforating. My ears perforate enough as it is. I'm not sure if Earplanes actually work or not because I was also hyped up on allergy meds to help them out but they felt and made everything sound like normal swimming ear plugs do.

Don't worry I googled a picture of it so you wouldn't have to since I only took snapchats of it.

So anyhoo, the Madrid airport is cool and all, but 8 hours in the airport was rather tedious. I was ready to sleep but I couldn't sleep in the airport. The Madrid airport is probably one of my favorite airports out of the many I've been in. It has some pretty cool architecture.  While in the Madrid airport, there was a slight scare when my travel card decided it had the wrong pin number and I couldn't use it. Luckily my mum decided to be up at 3 in the morning, and told me what pin number it had been previously assigned. Somehow it hadn't been changed from what it was assigned to what I had assigned it. I have no clue how it managed to not change when I distinctly remember changing it, cause I really hated the way I had to change it, but I probably did something stupid....

The next plane ride was probably only an hour or something. My fitbit must not work in the sky  because apparently I didn't sleep. I was out for that whole plane ride though. Literally, the whole plane ride.... I woke up for the announcement that we were landing but was out again until the plane actually landed. I wish I had slept like that on the other plane rides! After a few fails on our part because who reads signs at airports, we managed to get our luggage successfully and from there we were picked up from the airport by people (obviously we left the secure part of the airport to find these people), also I failed to mention I was traveling with Timothy and Morgan from the Chicago airport. They missed out on the sketchy plane ride, pobrecitos. 

Tortilla Espanola in the flesh

I met my host mom, Marisa, and she cooked me a tortilla espanola (basically amazingness on a plate). She's awesome. I'm not sure that I actually understand everything she tells me, mostly because I am super jet lagged and not following the conversation well, but she goes back and reexplains things pretty well. She made it very clear that this apartment, which is adorable and very homey, is my home and not just some stranger's home that I'm living in and that she is my Spanish mom not a stranger. So after my quick dinner, which was at like 7pm and pretty early for dinner, I went to bed where my fitbit tells me I slept for 14 hours straight. I obviously needed a bit of sleep or something. 

So today, Jan 23rd, my host mom and I had breakfast together (at like noon because I am a loser and slept 5eva) and then we went on a walk so she could show me where all the places I would need to go for orientation were. So hopefully on Monday I won't get lost and I actually soaked in everything she said! Otherwise, hopefully I'm more map literate than I think I am. I could still find my around pretty well from last year, except for the parts where I wasn't last year because well how would I know those parts? ;P We chatted about last years visit a bit, which I'm not sure if I actually made sense in what I was saying because even after 14 hours of sleep I'm not in thinking/awake mode yet. After our walk, we went back to the apartment and ate some food cause lunch ya know. 

Btw for those who asked me, this is Spain's flag

After my siesta I just kinda chilled in my room until it was time for tapas. My host mom went out after siesta time to visit her aunt, making sure to give me her number in case I got lost, which made me realize I should probably use my spanish phone.... We went out and got tapas and wine. We being the group of study abroaders minus 3 people, so Mary, Margaret, Morgan, and Stephanie. Poor Stephanie being the only non-M'er. I got lost on my way to the park to meet up with them and had a nice little adventure of randomly choosing streets to go up and down because I couldn't find my way. I did have a map in my pocket so I wasn't concerned about it, but I never actually used it because that required figuring out where I was. I just went with my gut and I eventually got there!

We walked around old town for a bit, which is my 2nd favorite place in Santiago, Parque de la Alameda is my 1st favorite place by far. Eventually we found a bar to go eat and drink in and just chatted for a couple hours. It was a fun night and I successfully made it home, which was a worry since I had gotten lost on the way there! I wasn't able to open the apartment complex's outside door though so I had to buzz my host mom. Luckily she was awake or I would have been SOL! 

Disclaimer: I admit to adding pictures because google was calling to me, so none of these pictures were actually taken by me. Google just wanted in on the magic of my first blog post.