Hey Everyone,

This is my first blog and it's kind of a test. I have created this blog in order to keep my family and friends involved in my experiences that I am having this semester while I am in Spain. So here goes nothing...

My Adventure So Far

I arrived in Spain on September 1st and had orientation for my home stay the next night. It was brief but we were assigned our host families the following day. I am here with 8 other NMSU students but our program is fairly disorganized and we chose to stick together as a group of friends. My host family is amazing and I have been living with them for almost 3 weeks. They do not speak ANY english so this is a great opportunity for me to force myself to learn spanish. Through the program and my host family, I get breakfast, lunch, and dinner made here at the house every day. It is amazing that way because I am getting so many different Spanish dishes. Unlike in America, the dishes over here are incredibly diverse and they generally incorporate bread and vegetables with every meal. I have been a picky eater my whole life but that changed quickly once I got over here. Another thing to mention about their meals is that they eat at odd times. In Spain, they eat lunch at around 3:30pm and dinner at around 10pm. It was hard at first to adjust to but just like the jetlag that time change passed quickly.

I started classes about 2 weeks ago so I had about a week to get to know the city as well as get accustomed and settled in with my host family. I know the city of Sevilla pretty well now and mostly walk everywhere. Their streets here are incredibly narrow as well as disorganized. It is like trying to navigate through a spider's web, but you get the hang of it after awhile.

Classes are pretty good so far but some of them are really boring. I have a Spanish language intensive course every day, Spanish Culture, Sports Psychology, and Organic Chemistry. The only crappy part about my schedule is the lack of engineering courses. The university that I transferred to does not offer Engineering courses so I have elected to take the remainder of my general education credits including a substitution for General Chemistry 2 for Organic Chemistry. I hate chemistry, but being that it is the only science class that I am taking here, I grew to love it a lot.

Not much else to say. I haven't travelled yet but I am going to a nearby beach town for the weekend called Cadiz. Should be fun, I will update you all after the trip and let you know how it went!!!

Thanks for reading and please message me anytime because I would love to hear from each and every one of my friends and family before I get back... Love you all!

- Ryan