Estoy en Espana!!!

Hola, todos! Bienvanidos y welcome to my blog. This is my first blog, and I look forward to keeping in touch with everyone as I study in Sevilla this semester. So far I have been here 3 days, and so I will catch everyone up with a synopsis of the events leading up to my arrival in Sevilla.

Before Wednesday- pack, pack, pack, say goodbyes, pack.

Wednesday morning 12:00 am
I am double checking my passports and double checking the dates my visa is valid. Good from 1-9-08 until 1-12-08. Wait a second... something fishy. A three day visa that is valid for days that had passed before i even applied for the thing. Just kidding, I think. In Spain it is Day-Month-Year, and so my visa is valid until December 1st. Check. Wait, not check. I'm here until December 17th. Okay... a problem? Perhaps... but as they say "'tis better to have traveled and to be deported than to never have traveled at all." So first thing is first, consult dear Mommy and make sure I shouldn't freak out. After waking her up from sound sleep, she says the verdict is no, and so on with my trip.

Wednesday afternoon 2:00 pm
I said a teary goodbye to mommy and am now walking on nasty tile in my bare feet through the metal detector at the local airport. (I wonder how much microscopic dog crap and vomit linger beneath my toes? Well, at least I get to shower in 30 hours.)

Knoxville to Washington
airline hostess have the coolest dresses... should I change careers?

Washington to Frankfurt
sit next to really awesome older couple named Joy and Jimmy (i think). Jimmy likes to make jokes and they both like to laugh. Frankfurt airport is a labyrinth of dirty people, broken elevators, and my arm pits stink. I follow Joy and Jimmy to our connecting flight, and probably would have been utterly confused otherwise.

Frankfurt to Barcelona
opened my spanish grammar book and pretended to study. My seat mate didn't speak English and so I considered practicing my German with her, but decided against it because I only know how to ask her if she speaks English.
We flew parallel with the coast and it was beautiful.

Barcelona airport.
Talked with 3 Sweedish college students on holiday. They are friends with Jack Daniels from Tennessee, and I like Ikea, so the world is not so big, I don't guess.
I asked them their thoughts on Ikea, and was informed that now instead of picking up girls in discos, this Sweedish decoration and home furniture store is where they go, and it's "the shit."

Barcelona to ... where the heck am I?
So, getting into a Spanair airplane was not quite the death trap I thought it might be, considering their recent fiasco with over 150 deaths in Madrid. My only complaint is that their intercom system sucks, which is certainly the lesser of two evils.
During the flight the voice warbled in unintelligible Spanish and English, saying something about the airport esta cerrado... closed? Couldn't be. My spanish comprehension skills must be terrible. Alas, they were reaffirmed when we turned a full circle in the middle of our flight and landed in Jerez, a tiny airport in the middle of a bunch of dirt farms. We waited for 2 1/2 hours not being entirely sure what was going on, and finally a bus came to take us to Sevilla.