February 15th, 2015: Madrid, Spain (exploring Rome with Chiara)

Anne and I in front of La Puerta de Alcala

Classes are going well; most of my classes consist of group projects which is nice. I’m working with students from a variety of backgrounds. Very much like the environment in Italy the students and professors are very relaxed and usually arrive a little late to meetings. In one of my group projects we have had some problems. The group consists of three American students and two students from the University. The main problem we are having is that the two JCU students are not rechecking their work nor are they punctuating properly or using proper citation formatting. This has resulted in the rest of the group having to rewrite their sections. We spoke to them about it this week, hopefully things get better.

El Oso y el Madrono 

This past weekend two of my roommates and I went to Madrid. So far it has been one of my favorite places. It was so nice to hear people speaking a language that I understand. Even though I speak Spanish I did encounter some minor communication barriers. The Spanish dialect spoken in Madrid is very different from the Spanish I know. Spaniard Spanish uses different words for some things compared to the Spanish spoken by Mexicans. For example the word juice in Spain is “Zumos” whereas the word I learned for juice in Spanish is “Jugos”. So minor difference like this cause minor communication barriers, but overall it was very easy to talk to everyone. Someone instantly recognized my accent and said I had an impeccable Mexican accent, which is flattering since my Spanish is not as good as it used to be.

Sitting at El Parque de El Retiro

While we were in Madrid we walked around everywhere, visited major monuments, and also visited a museum called Museo Arqueologico Nacional. While walking around Madrid we found a Mexican restaurant with amazing food. I was beyond excited, because I had been looking for a Mexican food restaurant in Rome and have not been able to find one. It was nice to have food similar to that at home.
Things that I learned this week:

1. Communication is important when working in an international group
2. Spaniards don’t have a dramatic lisp like shown on television
3. There are still communication barriers even when you know the same language due to different dialects
4. I want to explore more of Spain