GOLLLLLL!!!!!!

That's right. I went to a soccer game! Manuel surprised me with tickets to the Spain v. Sweden game at Bernabeu stadium in Madrid. SOOO COOOL! We went to the game with double socks on, beanies and scarves, all ready for the freezing cold stadium. To our surprise there were a few heat lamps in the rafters, which just helped enough so you can still feel your toes.

Spain 3
Sweden 0

It was so cool to be at the game and see what the Spanish crowd is like. They did the wave about 5 times around the entire stadium - pretty impressive although a bit tiring after the 4th time! And the coolest thing to hear was that at every break they put traditional Spanish songs "Que viiiiiva Espana". Oh man, it almost brought tears to my eyes. It reminded me of all my Spanish classes in high school! I didn't even think I could remember that far back! Really funny, but it makes sense since it is the national selection.

If you want to see a really awesome sports page where you can keep up to date on statistics of pretty much any sport (ALL IN SPANISH THOUGH), you can check out 20minuto's multimarcador.

KFC Spanish style

The Rey de las Tortillas is a place where you can eat well and cheaply. Of course, that's what their signs say all over the place. It's basically fast food in Spanish cuisine. You can order tortillas, chorizo, morcilla de Burgos (blood sausage mixed with rice), french fries, etc. I can see how this place can be popular, given that you can get a lot of food for a cheap price. But in my case it didn't come at a cheap price. My body gave me some nice hints that I should never go back again. DOH!

Cookin Spanish food

I forgot to mention that a few weeks ago I made my first tortilla (de patatas y cebolla) and paella! I was told by the most important food critic in all of Madrid that they both came out really well! WOOHOO! Of course, this means I have to keep making them more often. I'm excited to learn how to cook more Spanish and Celiac-friendly food while I'm here! Pictures soon to be posted.

Tortilla
This is usually translated as a Spanish Omelette and usually is a tortilla made of thinly sliced potatoes (and egg of course). I made mine with potatoes and a little bit of onion.

Paella
Basically a huge rice dish that is very typical in Spain and each area has a different way of making it. Apparently in Valencia they tend to have rabbit meat and chicken in it, others tend to have a lot of seafood, etc. We like veggies so we focus on more veggies and for meat it's chicken and tuna.

:-)

It´s cold.

It´s cold and this isn´t even the beginning of Madrid´s winter. There have only been a few days where I couldn´t feel my toes, so I´m guessing that is what I should expect in Dec, Jan, and Feb. Let me give you an idea...

I go walking to school about 20 minutes. In the morning it is really cold (dry air). I leave the house wearing:

Bottom: Jeans, long knee high socks or double up on the socks, and shoes
Top: tanktop, sweater --or--- tanktop, short sleeved shirt, blazer of some sort
Outerwear: Jacket, gloves, and if I´m really cold, i put on my beanie and scarf
Underwear: not for you to know.

I usually time my walk so that I will get to school 5 minutes before class starts. Sometimes my timing is off and I really have to walk fast. Either way, I get to school sweating but with a freezing cold face. Once you get into the classroom, you are reminded that central heating exists and you take off all outerwear. Then 5 mins later you realize you are cold. Then after 30 minutes, the simple fact that we are 54 people in one classroom = heat!!! So it´s a constant battle. But no matter what, you know that your walk home will be nice and chilly.

EEK HOMEWORK

School has officially started. Here's a synopsis of my week:

Monday
Opening Ceremony in Segovia, Spain. We were bussed out to Segovia to a university that IE just bought (that is in a 15th century monastery). We did a quick walking tour of Segovia that wasn't nearly enough to see all of Segovia. We return back to Madrid by 9pm and some of us already have homework.

Tuesday - Friday schedule
9am - 2pm: 3 sessions of classes (depends on the day- Strategic Communication, Organizational Behaviors, Quantitative Analysis, Financial Accounting, Entrepeneurship, Marketing)
2pm - 3pm: Workgroup session
After 3pm -- study on my own

Now that it's Friday, I am realizing that I better study a good 8 hours this weekend. I already studied about 4 hours today and tomorrow will be another 4 hours, and then Sunday I will cram whatever else I need to prepare for Monday. Next week will be a "real" week in the sense that all 5 days will be devoted to class and I will have homework for every day. I won't have the luxury of a Segovia tour on a Monday so I'm preparing myself mentally for less sleep. OLE.

MotoGP

I went to my first MotoGP event ever, and the best part of all of it was we got to go with Media access. VIP treatment the whole way. We were in the "paddock section", which is the area for media and there are hospitality tents from each MotoGP driver where you can get free food and drinks. I couldn't believe it. At first I thought they were just for the pit crew but most of them were open for anyone (in the paddock section that is).

In my mind, this event was representative of Spain vs. Italy. The top two contenders were Dani Pedrosa from Spain and Valentino Rossi from Italy. Everywhere you see people with clothing with the colors of their favorite racer or with the Spanish or Italian flag colors. I saw this one group of guys who all were wearing wigs that were spray painted red/white/green for the Italian flag, which should be the pic above. Some guys even had their flags hanging from their shoulders like a cape. Reminds me of Tyler on St. Patty's Day.

Valentino Rossi has been the champion for many years now and unfortunately in the practice run, he fell down and fractured his hand in 3 places. He still raced the next day, trying to stay in the championship because he is so good that all he needed to do was just finish with minimum points on that race and he would still be 2nd place world championship. Well, once I knew the poor little guy was hurt, I wanted him to win. And he really is little - all of these guys are like half of my size, literally.

During the race Dani Pedrosa was pretty much always in first place (booooring) but the interesting part was that Rossi was holding his own and still not the last person in the race. How embarassing is that? A guy with a broken hand is still beating someone? In the last few laps of the race Rossi finally couldn't deal with the pain anymore and had to leave the race, putting him automatically in 3rd place of the world championship.