had my first dream in spanish today. . .come to think of it, it might be the first dream that i actually have a recollection of since i've been here. it was during a 20 minute, unintentional siesta, which makes is that much stranger. i dont think it necessarily means anything on a psychological level, but i just thought it was kind of an interesting milestone. and i definitely am now getting fairly comfortable with spaniards on the street, meaning all those outside the house i live in and classes i take. the sad but expected part is. . . im leaving in 2 weeks. . .perfect. back to square one

so whats on my mind. . . the music here. . .in a word, frustrating. all the clubs or bars or pretty much anywhere else ive been seem to be completely and utterly devoid of any music sense. its not even that its all house, cause i like house music, but even the house they play is questionable. whats worse is the other stuff they play, while spanish pop or dance music is actually catchy and fun (a definite highlight), the american music they play is the worst.. . .the worst. there's about 3 or 4 main, huge popular discotecas here: joy, kapital, palacio are the biggest. . . ive been to joy and palacio, but not kapital (which ive heard plays good music and i wanna check it out) anyway, in both joy and palacio, the most popular american songs i heard were: 1. wake me up before you go-go by, you guessed it, wham. 2. YMCA. 3. its raining men. now not to take anything away from george michael and his hotpants of the 80´s, but it was really hard to get into the laser, fog, and dancers on stage scene in a huge club when thats what music youre hearin. . .just a gripe of mine. i did go to one great bar the other night, playing some decent hip hop, although it was kinda old.. . my mission is to find a place with new, good music, i just haven´t been looking hard enough, i know it. ..

ok i've devised a new system, so get ready: seeing as how i have two beautiful blogs up and running (the other being ) , i've come to the decision that this blog will be for my actual thoughts and/or reactions to all that goes on here, while vivaespana will serve as more of an update as to what i´m doing to pass the time. we'll see how well this plan works out in practice, but in theory, its nice. . .on that note, check out the other site to hear about my day in Toledo. (españa, not ohio. . .thank god)

couple things i've noticed since ive been here (a few thoughts and observations if youll excuse the reference to my description of this page): while europe may indeed be more "progressive" in the sense of their collectivist mentality or affinity to extensive social welfare systems than exists in the united states, in my opinion they have miles to go before they can truly call themselves a progressive society. to me, progress implies tolerance, tolerance implies an absence of ignorance. while violent hate crimes may not be so common here, ignorance is certainly prevalent. ive noticed many billboards that are straight up ignorant in their illustrations of people of color, and even more commercials that im actually offended by. when i was in sevilla, i saw a poster that i really liked, it had a non-caricature illustration of a black man and a white man, with their hands linked in front. it read: "Gracias por aceptarme" (Thank you for accepting me). that was the first real evidence i noticed that there is a developing social conscience in spain today. it was refreshing

wow, quite a pleasant surprise, i was checking to see if my last blog was posted, and my page looked completely different. . . for those of you who wonder who made it look so nice, jon yang, thanks so much, u never cease to amaze me. so i promised a blog about sevilla and i haven't delivered yet. from the beginning: we (our whole group of about 40 students) took the train from the madrid atocha train station at 9am friday morning (may 31). it was early, but amazingly almost all of us made it on time. we took the AVE (alta velocidad something) which is basically the same thing as the TGV, a high speed, really smooth, train. it only took 2.5 hours to get there, most of which was spent sleeping, although the moments in and out of consciousness were made pleasant by the view of mountains and olive orchards. once in sevilla, we dropped our stuff at the hotel and walked to the old part of town where the huge cathedral is. i normally dont like seeing churches, temples and the like but la catedral blew me away. it was just so big and intricate and overwhelming. . .impossible to imagine it being built. while fairly dirty on the outside, inside its clean and airy and really beautiful. there are 50 chapels i think, a couple are stunning (pretty much all gold), many others are just plain old impressive, haha. christopher columbus' tomb is also inside, hoisted on the shoulders of four statues crushing a pomegranate with their spears (pomegranate is granada in spanish, which was the last muslim city that was reconquered by the christians in spain, hence the symbolism, interesting i know. later, we went to the real alcazar, a palace and gardens with a wide mixture of architectural styles, so that was nice too. i really liked the actual city of sevilla, the older part is unique, narrow streets dividing shops, bars, restaurants, etc. they also have these huge tent-like pieces of cloth hung between buildings and in open spaces, to shield everything from the heat. its hot, really hot. and its right on the river too, which makes it much more humid than here in madrid, so it was exhausting walking around all day. after eating and walking and resting for awhile, i went down to the newer part of the city, down by the river, and saw the sun set behind this modern bridge that was built for the expo in 1992. i doubt my pictures came out cause i was using a cheap disposable camera. . . i was pissed. apparently the night life in sevilla is rumored to be crazier than madrid, but im not so sure, we went to a couple nice places along the water, and to some other nice bars, nothing remarkable, but i didnt go to that many places to really pass judgment. the next day i woke up early for no reason (i thought we all had to) and walked ALL OVER the city, saw all the major sights: torre del oro, plaza de toros, plaza de espana--my favorite, etc. it was sooo hot and i was thoroughly exhausted by about 3pm. we werent leaving til 7, so a few others and i sat and chilled in a coffee shop, talked about travelling, i think i may have found people to travel with, which is definitely good. we got back to madrid at 10 and i came home, took a nap, then went out for one of my friend's 21st birthday, not quite as exciting in spain than in the US, but still. that was a decent time, but i cannot reiterate enough how much emborrachadas (drunken girls) can annoy me. everything back in madrid is good, saloni got here yesterday, i ran into her on the street, random, but she lives right near me which is nice. ok thats all for updates . . .