Well today is the day. It was officially my last full day in Spain. In about 24 hours from now I will be home. I am starting to feel like a broken record because for the last couple of times I have talked about how I'm ready to go home. But I am really excited to come back and not ready to say goodbye yet. I wish I could have the best of both places. But I am so happy I got this opportunity to come and do all of this. I would highly recommend this if you have the chance. I have met so many people in different places and went to so many different places, Morocco, Germany, Austria, UK, Scotland, France, Portugal, Greece, Italy, and Ireland. I have loved every place I went and wish I had more time to go more places... oh well guess I'll have to come back. Darn. 

Well as of right now I am done with this semester. I took my last test this morning. All I have left to do is come home. I have a day and a half to finish packing and do some last minute things like get shawarma and gelato one more time. It is all surreal because some people are leaving tomorrow. So that is nuts. I'm ready to be home. I don't want to have to sit through a 9 hour flight. It will be the longest flight of my life... like seriously it will. It will be longer than the one coming here. I wish I could just fast forward until I get home. But it will be here fast enough. I am just not good at waiting and that is all I will be doing... so this will be fun.

Finals are underway and as of right now I have two finals left to take. So I am very excited right now. Well not really just ready for them to be over. So funny story, I wore some of those slip on shoes to school yesterday and they weren't broken in very well and I got the blister to end all blisters. It was basically covering my pinky toe. I had never seen a blister that big. It hurt so instead of suffering through a 30 minute walk back, I decided to walk home barefoot. I know in hindsight this might have ended up badly but it was fine and I watched where I was walking so I didn't step on anything. My feet were BLACK by the time I got home. Maria saw me when I came back and she was like what are you doing? Where are your shoes? Did you walk all the way home like that?? But it was fine. Nothing happened, I did get a couple weird looks but I didn't look up much so I could watch where I was stepping. Then today during lunch she was talking about it and they were making fun of me, I think. Juama has such a thick accent I can barely understand him. But I believe that they were making fun of me. And in case anyone was wondering that after today I only have 3 days left in Spain. This is crazy. I can count the days left on one hand. Its all getting so real. I'm pretty excited to eat some food... I mean see everyone...

So I come home the other day and I see Sorida in the kitchen with a box. Which I didn't think anything of until she told me to look and there were birds in the box. She said she bought them. They are very young and I have no idea what kind they are, they appear to be a greenish color but thats it. They have been feeding them some sort of formula. It looks really gross, it looks like a wheat smoothie. It has the color and appearance of anything wheat, that light brown with specks and its a thick consistency. 

Wednesday we had our last activity as a group before people started to leave. We had dinner together. 

It was pretty sad because lots of people were talking about leaving and stuff. But it was really nice to get together and talk about the semester and reminisce. 

This is José. He is awesome. Probably one of my favorite people I've met this semester. He is really funny when he tries to pronounce English word or use sayings. I guess he laughs just as much at us when we try and speak Spanish so we are even. 

We finished classes on Friday so that was exciting but then we have our finals next week. I am so not looking forward to these tests. But exactly one week from today and at this time I am writing this (at 9:20) I will be getting off the plane in Chicago so I will officially be back in the US. So thats exciting.

Well this week has been a bit stressful since I have 3 presentation and finals to study for. It is also crazy because half of the program leaves this week. It is weird that things are finally starting to end. Our last days of class. Tomorrow is the last day of half my classes and Friday is the last day of the rest. I only have 11 days left... So thats weird. 

I want to go on record saying this is the best photobomb ever. I am the Queen of photobombs. No doubt about it, if you want to argue just look at this picture and rethink. Not only is the placement perfect the face is priceless. I seriously laughed so hard I was crying when I saw this picture. I remember trying to photobomb but I thought I was behind a head. Turns out to be the best picture of the entire semester. I cannot describe the happiness I feel when I look at this picture. 

Saturday morning we went to the beach, Almuñécar. It was about an hour or so away. It was just beside Salobreña, which we went to several weeks ago. But we get there and this is another rock beach so it wasn't as comfortable to lay down and some others have been but it was still nice. It was really sunny and basically a perfect beach day. The water was cool so when you got hot you could cool down in the water. It was almost too cold to stay in very long. So we lay there basically all day. And then come back around 5. So we get back just after 6. It was at this time that I realize I am fried. And yes I did use sunscreen but obviously not enough. The sunscreen really works because you can tell the places you put it on and the others that you didn't. I almost have finger outlines from the sunscreen. I laid on my stomach most of the day so my back and butt got the worst of it. I have a very crisp line on my cheeks from my suit. It hurts to sit down. I don't think I've ever had my butt burn so bad before. So I'm pretty sore right now but I will heal. 

We had decided before hand that we wanted to try and do as the Spaniards do and stay out all night and come back really late/early the next morning. So we decided that this weekend would have to be it since we didn't want to do it the weekend before finals. So we went out and it was a lot of fun. I didn't get back until 6 am. But it was so worth it. We went to a discoteca and danced, yes I did dance. So today has been a fairly lazy day. I did pack my suitcase. I have left out clothes for the rest of the days so I have basically everything else pack and it is looking like I won't have any problems getting all to fit. So I mean, I might as well go shopping! I started to pack because I only have 13 days left!! This is crazy. About half the program leaves this weekend and then the next weekend I will leave. On Thursday I will be in the single digits. This is nuts. It seemed like I would never leave and now its almost time and I want to go home but at the same time I want to stay here. 

So all last week was uneventful. Friday we decided to go to the Albayzín to watch the sunset over the Alhambra. The Albayzín is a very nice, old neighborhood in Granada. It happens to have this very nice platform/lookout that has an amazing view of the Alhambra.  So we walked up there and just hung out for a while and watched the sun set. Although we didn't stay until it got dark. It was kind of cloudy so we just guessed when it had gone down because we couldn't see it. 

But we stayed up there for almost an hour taking pictures and just sitting down. 

After we decided the sun went down we headed down the mountain. Then we hunted down some shawarma, which was delicious as always. Then we finally decided it was late enough to call it quits since we were going to the beach in the morning. 

So we met at 5:15 on Sunday to go to the bull fight. We get there and find our seats. We were way up high but I don't think I would have wanted to be much closer. This is the arena before it started.

It starts by all the bull fighters come out and walk around with their helpers. Normally there are 3 fighters and 6 bulls but this one was for charity, all the proceeds would go to helping children with Down Syndrome. So there was 6 fighters and 6 bulls. The guy on the horse and the row of 5 guys behind him are the bull fighters. They 3 guys behind each fighter are their helpers, that one day want to be a real, regular bull fighter. 

So it started off with the guy on the horse. It was different. I'm not sure that I hate but I know I don't like it. It almost didn't seem real. 

Then it was time for the second one and it came out but it was back to a regular bull fight. There are 2 horses that come out and there are guys with long spears and they wait for the bull to ram them and then they stab the bull in the neck. 

There are the 3 guys that come out and they each have 2 spears. The stab them into the neck. Its kind of fuzzy but that is what they do. They try to get it right in the neck where all the big veins are. 

Then they make the bull run around so it will bleed and make it weaker. 

As you can see there is quite a bit of blood on his neck. 

Then they go and get a long sword. It is with this that they actually kill the bull. You can see the sword in his hand and he is waiting for the right time. Then there is a spot in the neck that they aim for that, I think, severs a main artery and then he dies. Because after the bull is stabbed with the sword the helpers come in and they wave the pink and yellow capes in his face and it makes him keep turning his head and I think they do this to keep the blood moving and so he will bleed out faster because if he doesn't die with in a certain amount of time he has to get another sword and try again. Obviously its better to get it done the first time. There was only one fighter that had to try again. It was the last one and he was only 20 years old. 

Spaniard are very superstitious. The bull fighters toss their hat before each fight and if it lands right side up the will be lucky but if its upside down, it means bad luck. The guy that had to try again, his hat landed upside down, twice. They don't normally throw it twice but I think he did it again to try and give him good luck. But it didn't work. But at least he didn't get stabbed by the bull. There was one guy that side swiped and almost impaled him. So that was a little terrifying. But other than that there wasn't too many close calls. 

 Once you can see the bull is dead everyone waves a white cloth at him as a symbol that they liked the show. Then they cut the spinal cord and then people with horses come out and hook the bull up and they drag it out. Before it leaves there are "judges" that come out and decide how well the bull fighter did. If he did ok he gets one ear. If it was good he gets two ears, and if he was awesome he gets both ears and the tail. There were only 2 people that got the tail. I think the last guy got only one ear but I'm not sure. After they receive the prize they walk around and people throw flowers or women will through their shawls (the people that are wearing the flamenco dresses usually have the shawls so they throw that) and they throw their hats at them. There are some of his helps that go around and help him pick up the flowers and through that hats and shawls back to the people. Then people try to get the bull fighters attention because he will throw the ear/tail into the crowd. We sat too high up to get one. Each bull fighter had to go through this process. We were there for about 3 hours. I'm not sure I would like to go again. It is one of those things that is something that you only need to see once. And I did so I'm good. 

Saturday morning we got up and put our stuff in lockers because we had to check out and then went back to the meeting point for our third tour that weekend. It was a really small tour just us 2, 6 German guys, 1 Swedish guy, and 2 Mexican guys. The Swedish guy was older and really cool. He's traveled quite a bit and was really great to talk to. The Mexican couple didn't really speak much. The German guys did, a lot but mostly in German so I have no idea what they said. So we get on a train and take a 30 minute ride to Howth, which is this little peninsula by Dublin. Our first stop was the Howth. It has been owned by the same family, for the most part I think, since it was built. 

Then we walk through some wilderness, past a gold course to the edge of some woods.  There was this very large hill in front of us. It was completely covered with plants, trees, and stuff. 

Then we went to this place called Aideen's Grave. It is said that Aideen was the wife to a great king Oscar and he died in battle and she was said to have died from grief and his father buried her in honor of his son. Oh did I mention that they were giants? Yeah, I think they were said to be giants.

Then we start to go up this very large hill. It was almost as bad as the hike in Portugal but not quite. Once we got closer to the top, the ground kind of got to be bouncy. The tour guide said it gives so much because we were only on roots. I was like... come again???? So we were literally off the side of a cliff walking on some roots. It all looked like the same ground. It would go back and forth between real ground and the roots. But I don't think there was a whole lot of just roots because I only noticed it in spots. 

We stay at the top for a while to catch our breaths and then we walk through some woods. It really reminded me of Iowa for some reason. But we walked a ways before we came to the restaurant we were going to eat lunch at. So we eat and then we head towards the edge and we walked on the lower cliff path. So we had a better view of the cliffs and this was good since it was kind of foggy. He said if it was much foggier we would have tone on the upper path. But we walk by the edge. 

You can't tell very well but there is a car in that picture. The weeds go all the way up to the roof so you can only see part of the roof. He said that some people stole the car and they tried to get rid of it by sending it over the cliff, only it didn't make it all the way to the bottom. The sides are quite steep so I don't think they can get it out or at least don't want to. Before we got to the cliffs he was telling us that these are the kinds of cliffs you don't come back from and warned us about falling. Yes, the sides are steep but it don't just drop off like the cliffs of Moher, there is land that you can get yourself to stop on before you reach the water. Not saying it would be the nicest ride since the shrubbery was very thorny so it would hurt and you would get all cut up but you would live. 

Then we head toward the pier. It was nice, there were several big boats and nice ones. He said that sometimes there are seals but that day there wasn't any swimming around. After this we head back into Dublin and the we all go our separate ways. We go back to the hostel and get our stuff and then kind of wander around and kill some time because we didn't need to leave just yet it was only 7:00 ish and I didn't want to leave really early and spend more time than necessary in the airport. But we finally get on the bus and go there. We find some pretty nice and comfortable chairs and sit down and try and get comfy. The bright side was they had unlimited free wifi so I could surf the net all night. I did sleep for a while but I really wasn't that comfortable so I kept waking up and trying to find a comfy spot. But finally it was time we could get up and get checked in and go through security. We do this and find our gate. Then we get on the plane and come back. Once we are back in Malaga we go to the bus station and get on our bus. It was about 3:00 by the time I got to my room. 

So we get to Dublin early Thursday morning and we find our hostel, very easily and try to check in but we couldn't until 2pm. So we put our stuff in a storage locker and head out. We go and find the meeting spot for one of the free walking tours in Dublin. We get there and soon after we all head off. It was starting to rain when we left and once we started walking it rained pretty good. So we make it to the first spot and there was a plaza with a porch type thing all the way around it and we stand under this and he gives us a brief (a 10 minute) summary of the history of Ireland. After that we walked to the Dublin Castle. Which the old tower is really old, like 60 years old... just kidding I think it was built in the 13th century. 

This is the front view of the castle. It is now a place where important people come and stay and have meetings. Obama was there and so was the Queen. 

Then we walk around town some more and we stop at a cafe for a break and it was then when the torrential down pour started. It lasted for quite some time too. But it started to lighten up and he asked us if we wanted to finish and we all wanted too so we did and so we headed off to Trinity College. On the way we passed this building, I think it used to be a parliament building but is now a bank. 

This is inside the Trinity campus. There is a sort of plaza area and they have this big bell tower. 

Then we walked to this park. It has this statue that was in memory of all the people that died during the Potato famine. This is still a very sore subject in Ireland. They believe that it should have been avoided in the first place, which after hearing all that happened, I agree. It wasn't that there was a lack of food, it was that all the food was leaving to go to other parts mainly England. They don't have a very good view of the English. The tour guide said that exports of food actually increased during this time period. They had armed guards escorting the food out. The English didn't believe that it was really that bad and Ireland had no parliament so they had no power to do anything to make it better. So lets just say that if you go to Ireland, I wouldn't bring this up. After this we went to a bar and had some great food. I had some fish and chips which was pretty good since I'm not the biggest fan of fish. But then we went back to the hostel and I was in bed by 8:30. It was FANTASTIC. I was in bed so early because we had to get up early the next day.