Rupert Murdoch Unleashed
15 years ago
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Sabado el 6/21
Ok ya´ll, I need to get on top of this blog think and make sure i´m posting on a regular basis because I´m starting to forget everything I´m doing. I´m so tired all the time...i feel fried. The days here are so long (it doens´t START gettin dark until 9:30) and we so so much...im going to run out of steam soon!! =(
Anyway let´s take it back and talk about last saturday. I got up at 7 freakin 30 to eat breakfast and hop on a bus bound for Granada. It was about a (sorry...just an interuption, I tried connecting to power 105 online to listen, but it doesn´t work internationally...anyway i logged on to IMEEM and í´m listening to soulja boi and it´s soooooo distracting to me while im trying to remember stuff lolz youuuuuuuu) okay..moving on, it was about an hour and 45 min drive, most of which I slept through. The first place we arrived was the ALAHAMBRA, aka the MOST beautiful thing/monument i´ve ever seen.
Histoy Lesson: way back when, the arabs invaded Spain and sultans reigned over the land for centuries. Eventually, the christian Spainards overthrew them and took the largest of the sultan´s castles (the alahambra) and built a larger christian castle around it. So this monument (which should be on the wonders of the world list) is essentially, 2 castles, a fortress, and a huge garden all wrapped up in one. We had a great tourguide named Frederico and he was so knowledgeable of all the history and little details on the walls, doors, ceilings...everything. I never realized how much stuff has come from the arabs.
He discussed the origin of the phrase "7th heaven" and we learned alot about how alchemy and algebra developed (ps. most spanish and english words beginning with "al" have arabic orgins)
Anyway when our tour ended, we had a little bit of time left and our teacher (Alajandro) said it would be worth it to go to the top of the fortress towers...and that we should just quickly follow him.....AND SO IT STARTS.
Let me explain.
Alajandro walks SOOOO FAST. He´s insane; i run and i still can´t catch up with his walking. It was a really beautiful view from the top of the towers. I caught a glimps of the highest 2 points in the sierra nevada mountain range, but by the time i speed walked/ ran back to the bus, I was lacking breath and drenched in sweat.
2 people actually got lost cause the probably couldn´t keep up and we had to wait on the bus for nearly an hour until we decided to take off for the city center without them (don´t worry, they were found later ;] )
Later on, the 20 of us ate at a fancy restaurant were I had a weird burger...definitely not like america...but i was so hungry it didn´t even matter. It could have been fish...it didn´t matter. (yea..i was that hungry). We also got ambushed again by water prices...5 euro´s a bottle!!!
After that we visited La Catedral de Granada...which, i gotta say...was gorgeous, but CREEPY!! i think cathedrals are scary! They´re always so dark and have pictures/statues of people suffering and the organ...omg the organ, such creepy/dark music. Anyway needless to say, i think i´ve seen enough cathedrals for this trip....or for a lifetime even. I´m not even religious, why do i go to them??
After the cathedral we had only just enough time to speed walk back to the bus and head home.
Saturday night was a lot of fun (or at least i think this was saturday night...they´re all mushing together in my mind)
We all went out as a huge group and TOOK OVER the same two placed we went the night before just this time it was more fun cause all of us were together. El open arms was a good time especially because there was a bachelor party of guys from England dressed up in crazy full-on costumes (like superman, a priest, marylin monroe, yoda, a mexican, the crocodile huner, etc...) they were quite funny. There was also a bachlorette party from england and they were all dressed up in grass skirts and bunny ears and such.
yaa so that wa sat...long day... and then to bed for another early day, Paroramic tour of Costa Del Sol 9:30 am...yayyyyy
Anyway let´s take it back and talk about last saturday. I got up at 7 freakin 30 to eat breakfast and hop on a bus bound for Granada. It was about a (sorry...just an interuption, I tried connecting to power 105 online to listen, but it doesn´t work internationally...anyway i logged on to IMEEM and í´m listening to soulja boi and it´s soooooo distracting to me while im trying to remember stuff lolz youuuuuuuu) okay..moving on, it was about an hour and 45 min drive, most of which I slept through. The first place we arrived was the ALAHAMBRA, aka the MOST beautiful thing/monument i´ve ever seen.
Histoy Lesson: way back when, the arabs invaded Spain and sultans reigned over the land for centuries. Eventually, the christian Spainards overthrew them and took the largest of the sultan´s castles (the alahambra) and built a larger christian castle around it. So this monument (which should be on the wonders of the world list) is essentially, 2 castles, a fortress, and a huge garden all wrapped up in one. We had a great tourguide named Frederico and he was so knowledgeable of all the history and little details on the walls, doors, ceilings...everything. I never realized how much stuff has come from the arabs.
He discussed the origin of the phrase "7th heaven" and we learned alot about how alchemy and algebra developed (ps. most spanish and english words beginning with "al" have arabic orgins)
Anyway when our tour ended, we had a little bit of time left and our teacher (Alajandro) said it would be worth it to go to the top of the fortress towers...and that we should just quickly follow him.....AND SO IT STARTS.
Let me explain.
Alajandro walks SOOOO FAST. He´s insane; i run and i still can´t catch up with his walking. It was a really beautiful view from the top of the towers. I caught a glimps of the highest 2 points in the sierra nevada mountain range, but by the time i speed walked/ ran back to the bus, I was lacking breath and drenched in sweat.
2 people actually got lost cause the probably couldn´t keep up and we had to wait on the bus for nearly an hour until we decided to take off for the city center without them (don´t worry, they were found later ;] )
Later on, the 20 of us ate at a fancy restaurant were I had a weird burger...definitely not like america...but i was so hungry it didn´t even matter. It could have been fish...it didn´t matter. (yea..i was that hungry). We also got ambushed again by water prices...5 euro´s a bottle!!!
After that we visited La Catedral de Granada...which, i gotta say...was gorgeous, but CREEPY!! i think cathedrals are scary! They´re always so dark and have pictures/statues of people suffering and the organ...omg the organ, such creepy/dark music. Anyway needless to say, i think i´ve seen enough cathedrals for this trip....or for a lifetime even. I´m not even religious, why do i go to them??
After the cathedral we had only just enough time to speed walk back to the bus and head home.
Saturday night was a lot of fun (or at least i think this was saturday night...they´re all mushing together in my mind)
We all went out as a huge group and TOOK OVER the same two placed we went the night before just this time it was more fun cause all of us were together. El open arms was a good time especially because there was a bachelor party of guys from England dressed up in crazy full-on costumes (like superman, a priest, marylin monroe, yoda, a mexican, the crocodile huner, etc...) they were quite funny. There was also a bachlorette party from england and they were all dressed up in grass skirts and bunny ears and such.
yaa so that wa sat...long day... and then to bed for another early day, Paroramic tour of Costa Del Sol 9:30 am...yayyyyy
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Agua es mas cara que vino!!!! 2
Ps- just to add to the blog directly before this one.. because I never explained the title
It is RIDICULOUS here how precious they must consider water because they charge more for it that they do some wines!!! I couldn´t believe it!
Ya kno how some people in the U.S try and save money (and calories) but just ordering a water at a meal? Well you can´t do that here! Sometimes the don´t even ask "can I start you all off with some water?" nooooo...they ask if they can start you off with the house wine, and if you order water instead 9 out of 10 times they´ll bring you out a fancy shmancy bottle of water that you end up paying 2,30 euro for.....
don´t even get me started on the price of coke/sprite/fanta here.... ughh!!
It is RIDICULOUS here how precious they must consider water because they charge more for it that they do some wines!!! I couldn´t believe it!
Ya kno how some people in the U.S try and save money (and calories) but just ordering a water at a meal? Well you can´t do that here! Sometimes the don´t even ask "can I start you all off with some water?" nooooo...they ask if they can start you off with the house wine, and if you order water instead 9 out of 10 times they´ll bring you out a fancy shmancy bottle of water that you end up paying 2,30 euro for.....
don´t even get me started on the price of coke/sprite/fanta here.... ughh!!
Agua es mas cara que vino!!!!
Question:
Why is it that accented letter seem to just pop up at random when I´m typing and don´t need them, but when I do need them, I can´t seem to press the right combination of key´s to get them? Spanish keyboard are confusing...
Ok, so here´s my recap of Friday June 20th here in TorreMolinos, Spain. I had class like usual from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm (long time huh?)
After class I decided to come here to the internet cafe to check up on my e-mail and what not, but halfway through my session I was interupted (in a good way) by some friends who invited me for and outting to un pueblo on the Costa del Sol called Mijas. Of course, I accepted.
We took a bus, which surprisingly took us about and hour away from our hotel....the last 20 minutes of this hour being up a twisty up-hill road, which I gotta admit made me quite queezy. However, when we arrived my nasuea disappear and I was smack in the middle of the cutest little town carved into the side of the Sierra Nevadas -- time for another linguistics/ lesson, Sierra is mountain range and Nevadas means snow covered, So this town is all carved in to the side of these gorgeous mountains that surround and protect all of La Andalucia (which is the southern province of Spain where I currently reside).
The town of Mijas is characterized by all of it´s white buildings...all the homes and shop are made of white stucco...it´s quite breathtaking from the side of the mountain. So yea, we walked around the shops there and took lots of pictures...which I will post once I can access internet through my own computer.
That little excursion was pretty exhausting, but despite that I still managed to get myself showered and dressed for dinner and this Mexican resaurant (I shared a fajita con amanda) next store with some of the ladies from FORSPRO (PS- that´s the name of my abroad group)..and then we went out to look for las discotecas (the clubs). We figured we´d find a bunch by the beach...which is a ridiculous downhill trek.... Also, pretty much every walking surface, including the sidewalks, in Spain are SOOO SLIPPERY!!! it doens´t matter what kind of shoes you´re wearing! Insane. Anyway, we take the trek (half of us in heeels, mind you) and don´t find anything good.
We decided to rest our feet at a bar by the beach and just get a cocktail and you wouldn´t believe hown small this world is!! I met a guy there from Queens who freakin graduated St. Francis Prep!!! (I KNOW!!!) So that was fun...
After that I blistered and cut my feet up walking back UPHILL from the beach to las plaza de San Miguel (where we should have gone in the first place). There we went to two spot....El open arms...which is run by English people and is noted for it´s kareoke...then we went to and empty place se llama crazy house...which, although it was empty, was a lot of fun because we made friend with the bartender Susana.
After that we slowly made our way home and hit the sak.....too bad we all had to be up the next day at 8:30 for our excursion to GRANADA.... =(
Why is it that accented letter seem to just pop up at random when I´m typing and don´t need them, but when I do need them, I can´t seem to press the right combination of key´s to get them? Spanish keyboard are confusing...
Ok, so here´s my recap of Friday June 20th here in TorreMolinos, Spain. I had class like usual from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm (long time huh?)
After class I decided to come here to the internet cafe to check up on my e-mail and what not, but halfway through my session I was interupted (in a good way) by some friends who invited me for and outting to un pueblo on the Costa del Sol called Mijas. Of course, I accepted.
We took a bus, which surprisingly took us about and hour away from our hotel....the last 20 minutes of this hour being up a twisty up-hill road, which I gotta admit made me quite queezy. However, when we arrived my nasuea disappear and I was smack in the middle of the cutest little town carved into the side of the Sierra Nevadas -- time for another linguistics/ lesson, Sierra is mountain range and Nevadas means snow covered, So this town is all carved in to the side of these gorgeous mountains that surround and protect all of La Andalucia (which is the southern province of Spain where I currently reside).
The town of Mijas is characterized by all of it´s white buildings...all the homes and shop are made of white stucco...it´s quite breathtaking from the side of the mountain. So yea, we walked around the shops there and took lots of pictures...which I will post once I can access internet through my own computer.
That little excursion was pretty exhausting, but despite that I still managed to get myself showered and dressed for dinner and this Mexican resaurant (I shared a fajita con amanda) next store with some of the ladies from FORSPRO (PS- that´s the name of my abroad group)..and then we went out to look for las discotecas (the clubs). We figured we´d find a bunch by the beach...which is a ridiculous downhill trek.... Also, pretty much every walking surface, including the sidewalks, in Spain are SOOO SLIPPERY!!! it doens´t matter what kind of shoes you´re wearing! Insane. Anyway, we take the trek (half of us in heeels, mind you) and don´t find anything good.
We decided to rest our feet at a bar by the beach and just get a cocktail and you wouldn´t believe hown small this world is!! I met a guy there from Queens who freakin graduated St. Francis Prep!!! (I KNOW!!!) So that was fun...
After that I blistered and cut my feet up walking back UPHILL from the beach to las plaza de San Miguel (where we should have gone in the first place). There we went to two spot....El open arms...which is run by English people and is noted for it´s kareoke...then we went to and empty place se llama crazy house...which, although it was empty, was a lot of fun because we made friend with the bartender Susana.
After that we slowly made our way home and hit the sak.....too bad we all had to be up the next day at 8:30 for our excursion to GRANADA.... =(
TORREMOLINOS
Let´s start this post off with the fact that not having wireless internet in your hotel sucks; alot. Right now i´m in an internet cafe, which are really quite popular here in Spain (I guess a lot of people don´t have internet of their own), and i don´t get a lot of opportunities to come here because I´m always out and about, and this particular cafe closes at 11:45 my time...which fyi is 5:45 U.S. time.
Anyway... that´s why I´m behind on all of my posts. So shall we go back to the begining? I think we shall.
So, I can´t remember if I said this in my last post or not, but it turns out my group and I are acutally not staying in the downtown metro-area of Malaga...instead we are in a great touristy pueblo called TorreMolinos. Fun fact: Torre means tower and Molinos means mill...so I think the town means...windmill or mill tower or something like that; but yea, the whole south coast area had all of these ruins from old towers from years past...very interesting (and beautiful) stuff.
My hotel is the Hotel Natali (it´s 3 stars) and it´s pretty okay...i mean it´s by no means a dump...but the beds could be more comfortable, the TV could be bigger and there could be more outlets...know what I´m saying?
My roomate´s name is Rachel. She´s fantastic. We have a lot in common and have a lot of fun together. She´s a Italian and Spanish major and a French minor.
Ok...so enough background info..let´s go into what I´ve been up to. Thursday the 19th was my first day of class. I´m taking intermediate conversation and class starts 9:30 every morning (blech!!!). I have a teacher who is a native of Malaga so she´s super knowledgable of the area and history and local slang and phrases. I´m doing really well in this class... I mean..not to brag, but I probably should be in advanced convo...but it´s nice to be in intermediate cause I can strengthen that which I already know, which personally, I think is the best way to go.
Anyway after class on thursday some girls from the group and I went to a Tapas bar for lunch. A tapas bar is kind of like a "snack bar"; you go to get drinks and munch on finger foods...but believe me it´s filling, not to mention, delicious!!! (another funny thing is, so far when I mention tapas bars to anyone at home..almost everyone stops and says "What!!? Topless bar???"...it´s quite humorous). Well anyway, for all you who know me well you should be so proud of me because I ate shrimp at this particular place...and if I do say so myself...it wasn´t too bad. I don´t think I´m ready for full shrimp entrees yet, but for tapas...estan bien.
After lunch I took my time walking back to the hotel down a main street called "Calle de San Miguel" (Saint Micheal´s street). This area is full of little alleys (is that how u spell that?) and plazas with shops and cafe´s and all that stuff...really nice and convienent.
Later on me and a group of chicas that i´ve been spending a lot of my time with (Rachel, Marcie, Karen, Amanda and Sabrina) went to the actually city of Malaga (about a 30 min bus ride) and met up with on of the teacher´s (Vanessa) here. Rachel and I have had her before at binghamton for our intermediate grammar classes back in sophmore year. She actually lives in malaga when she´s not teaching in bing, so she knows alot about the city and what not.
She showed us the major plazas, historic buildings (including the apartment where Picaso was born), and took us to a trendy little tea house (we all kno how much I love tea!!).
Unfortunately, in the hotel we are only allowed 2 meals in the dining room a day...one of them has to be breakfast and then we have a choice each day between lunch and dinner.... So by the time we got home from Malaga we had missed both lunch and dinner hours. So we sat and had a cheap dinner or Bocadillos (special sandwitches) and Sangria.
Over all the first real day was a success...I really got to know the area and it helped me get a handle (that´s such a weird phrase..."get a handle"....it´s weird, but I use it) on what I want to do in my short 2 weeks here
Anyway... that´s why I´m behind on all of my posts. So shall we go back to the begining? I think we shall.
So, I can´t remember if I said this in my last post or not, but it turns out my group and I are acutally not staying in the downtown metro-area of Malaga...instead we are in a great touristy pueblo called TorreMolinos. Fun fact: Torre means tower and Molinos means mill...so I think the town means...windmill or mill tower or something like that; but yea, the whole south coast area had all of these ruins from old towers from years past...very interesting (and beautiful) stuff.
My hotel is the Hotel Natali (it´s 3 stars) and it´s pretty okay...i mean it´s by no means a dump...but the beds could be more comfortable, the TV could be bigger and there could be more outlets...know what I´m saying?
My roomate´s name is Rachel. She´s fantastic. We have a lot in common and have a lot of fun together. She´s a Italian and Spanish major and a French minor.
Ok...so enough background info..let´s go into what I´ve been up to. Thursday the 19th was my first day of class. I´m taking intermediate conversation and class starts 9:30 every morning (blech!!!). I have a teacher who is a native of Malaga so she´s super knowledgable of the area and history and local slang and phrases. I´m doing really well in this class... I mean..not to brag, but I probably should be in advanced convo...but it´s nice to be in intermediate cause I can strengthen that which I already know, which personally, I think is the best way to go.
Anyway after class on thursday some girls from the group and I went to a Tapas bar for lunch. A tapas bar is kind of like a "snack bar"; you go to get drinks and munch on finger foods...but believe me it´s filling, not to mention, delicious!!! (another funny thing is, so far when I mention tapas bars to anyone at home..almost everyone stops and says "What!!? Topless bar???"...it´s quite humorous). Well anyway, for all you who know me well you should be so proud of me because I ate shrimp at this particular place...and if I do say so myself...it wasn´t too bad. I don´t think I´m ready for full shrimp entrees yet, but for tapas...estan bien.
After lunch I took my time walking back to the hotel down a main street called "Calle de San Miguel" (Saint Micheal´s street). This area is full of little alleys (is that how u spell that?) and plazas with shops and cafe´s and all that stuff...really nice and convienent.
Later on me and a group of chicas that i´ve been spending a lot of my time with (Rachel, Marcie, Karen, Amanda and Sabrina) went to the actually city of Malaga (about a 30 min bus ride) and met up with on of the teacher´s (Vanessa) here. Rachel and I have had her before at binghamton for our intermediate grammar classes back in sophmore year. She actually lives in malaga when she´s not teaching in bing, so she knows alot about the city and what not.
She showed us the major plazas, historic buildings (including the apartment where Picaso was born), and took us to a trendy little tea house (we all kno how much I love tea!!).
Unfortunately, in the hotel we are only allowed 2 meals in the dining room a day...one of them has to be breakfast and then we have a choice each day between lunch and dinner.... So by the time we got home from Malaga we had missed both lunch and dinner hours. So we sat and had a cheap dinner or Bocadillos (special sandwitches) and Sangria.
Over all the first real day was a success...I really got to know the area and it helped me get a handle (that´s such a weird phrase..."get a handle"....it´s weird, but I use it) on what I want to do in my short 2 weeks here
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Torremolinos
Hola!
so I'm up on my 9th floor balcony directly about a pretty sweet (yet child/tween-ridden) pool at the Hotel Natali on calle Hoyo in Torremolinos, Spain (aka Malaga). I'm on my new roommate, Rachel's computer because for some reason my computer decided to have a conscience and decide that it isn't right to steal internet from local wireless feeds...so it refuses to connect. boo.
Anyway, So I'm exhausted. I sleeplessly flew from NYC to Paris and drowsily caught my 3 hour connecting flight to Malaga, on which i slept the ENTIRE way. Thank god for window seats.
I met a bunch of chill people along the way...don't quite know everyone yet; but, as to be expected, i already know there are gunna be some people i like and some people i hate... i wish it wasn't that way...but u kno how it is.
We didn't even get here to the hotel until 6pm because of people who lost their luggage and passports and all this other annoying crap. My room is ok.. twin beds make me feel like dickinson all over again -- minus the comfy eggcrate =(
Got class tomorrow @ 9:30....that should be fun-- not.
im gunna go cuz im exhausted and getting eaten alive by bugs right now... im having phone card and adapter issues...so we'll see when i can next get in touch...hopefully soon.
miss u all
so I'm up on my 9th floor balcony directly about a pretty sweet (yet child/tween-ridden) pool at the Hotel Natali on calle Hoyo in Torremolinos, Spain (aka Malaga). I'm on my new roommate, Rachel's computer because for some reason my computer decided to have a conscience and decide that it isn't right to steal internet from local wireless feeds...so it refuses to connect. boo.
Anyway, So I'm exhausted. I sleeplessly flew from NYC to Paris and drowsily caught my 3 hour connecting flight to Malaga, on which i slept the ENTIRE way. Thank god for window seats.
I met a bunch of chill people along the way...don't quite know everyone yet; but, as to be expected, i already know there are gunna be some people i like and some people i hate... i wish it wasn't that way...but u kno how it is.
We didn't even get here to the hotel until 6pm because of people who lost their luggage and passports and all this other annoying crap. My room is ok.. twin beds make me feel like dickinson all over again -- minus the comfy eggcrate =(
Got class tomorrow @ 9:30....that should be fun-- not.
im gunna go cuz im exhausted and getting eaten alive by bugs right now... im having phone card and adapter issues...so we'll see when i can next get in touch...hopefully soon.
miss u all
Thursday, June 12, 2008
I just started a BLOG!
Whoa man.
Ashley has a blog.
I've never really done anything like this before -- thought about it though.
What really pushed me to do this here and now is that I'm leaving for freak'in SPAIN in 5 days (Ya. Spain.) and I thought it would be a pretty sweet way of relaying all my abroad adventures to my friends and fam back here in the states.
Well I'm sure that everyone is very excited about this much anticipated debut that is "Ashley's Blog" and you are all glued to the screen waiting to read something really fantastical...
However..I'm too tired at this present moment to be witty and fun and interesting... I just wanted to set this baby up before I go
So if you're waiting for all the Ashley-cutesy-stuff that you know and love
Stay tuned.
Ashley has a blog.
I've never really done anything like this before -- thought about it though.
What really pushed me to do this here and now is that I'm leaving for freak'in SPAIN in 5 days (Ya. Spain.) and I thought it would be a pretty sweet way of relaying all my abroad adventures to my friends and fam back here in the states.
Well I'm sure that everyone is very excited about this much anticipated debut that is "Ashley's Blog" and you are all glued to the screen waiting to read something really fantastical...
However..I'm too tired at this present moment to be witty and fun and interesting... I just wanted to set this baby up before I go
So if you're waiting for all the Ashley-cutesy-stuff that you know and love
Stay tuned.
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