Last days in Madrid :(

Last Thursday, Suffolk had the Farewell ceremony and dinner. I finished my last final that afternoon, then rushed home to get ready for the ceremony. All my finals went really well, and my final grades reflected it! The ceremony was very nice; it honors all the students who have been at Suffolk Madrid - especially the ones who have been there for two years (such as myself). It was held at the Spanish University next door. Dean Royo was our commencement speaker, and he gave an emotional, but great speech. There were also three student speakers who thanked the faculty and staff and spoke about what Suffolk Madrid meant to them. There were some tears in the audience. Everyone agreed that their time at Suffolk Madrid was amazing - lifelong friends, great professors, and a great city. After the ceremony, everyone went to the Farewell Dinner. Dinner was great! The building and atmosphere was beautiful - a very large spacious room filled with tables for 10 people each. There were three choices of meals (vegetarian paella, pork, or fish). Everyone seemed to be very satisfied with their meals, but most of the dinner was spent walking around talking and taking pictures with everyone. The dinner was followed by a dance, where almost everyone was up dancing (even the staff)! One student even did some stand up comedy about Madrid and Suffolk, and it was hilarious!

After the school dance, almost everyone decided to go to the same nightclub to celebrate one of their final nights in Madrid. I had a great last night with everyone, and the Farewell dinner and ceremony was a perfect way to say goodbye. However, I wish I never had to say goodbye. For me, the two years I spent at Suffolk were two of the best of my life. I wish that I could continue at Suffolk Madrid; I would not hesitate to stay in Madrid if I could. Saying goodbye to my two best friends in Madrid was very sad, but I know I will see them hopefully very soon. Saying goodbye to the small campus that I love and the amazing teachers and staff at Suffolk Madrid was awful. I have never heard of a college campus where the professors know all their students personally, or where the students are so sad to say goodbye to them.

The study abroad students will be returning to their home campuses next semester (primarily Suffolk Boston). Many two year students will be transferring to the Boston Campus. However, I am going to the University of Montana to finish my last two years. I am now home in Montana, but I already miss Madrid. I will always treasure my time spent at Suffolk Madrid Campus, and I was so lucky to spend two fantastic years there. Hasta luego Madrid :(

Hasta el final, vamos Real!

Last Tuesday, my parents and boyfriend arrived in Madrid to visit me. I was very excited to see them all and to show them where I live, the school, and Madrid. While I was at school during the day, they visited all the sites (the Royal Palace, Retiro Park, Plaza Mayor, Puerta del Sol, the Prado museum). They also came to school with me one day to meet some of my teachers and the SUMC staff. Since I have been here for four semesters, I have had many of the same teachers more than once. I love being at a small school where the teachers know your name after a couple weeks, and it is obvious that they care about their students. My parents loved the school, and kept mentioning how lucky I was to be at a small school with great teachers and friendly staff. I am very lucky!

Sunday night was el Clasico soccer game, which is a famous soccer match in Spain. Real Madrid and Barcelona compete in the rivalry. The atmosphere in Madrid during a soccer game is amazing. The bars and cafes are PACKED with people of all ages watching the games. Last year, Madrid lost to Barcelona 0 to 5. But Sunday, they tied 1 to 1. Since I live in Madrid, I obviously have to be a Real Madrid fan!! I went to watch the game at a cafe in my new Real Madrid Casillas (the goalie) jersey. Hasta el final, vamos Real!

My boyfriend left yesterday, and my parents will be here for one more week. I have been very busy finishing papers and projects for school, and have a microeconomics paper due tomorrow. However, this week is Semana Santa (Holy Week) in Spain so we have Thursday off from school. I am going to Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain this weekend, so I am looking forward to that.

One month left :(

There is only about a month left before I go home! I can´t believe how fast this semester has gone by. I will be very sad to leave Madrid. :( My school workload has not been as much as I expected so far, but these last few weeks I have a lot of homework, tests, and projects due. I have a marketing test this Wednesday, so I have to study for that today because tomorrow night (Tuesday) I am going to the Justin Bieber concert(my friend really wanted to go). I have a Spanish paper, microeconomics paper, an accounting quiz, a marketing project, and MORE due in the next few weeks. It seems like all my papers and projects are due at the same time. I am going to be very busy! My parents and boyfriend are visiting next week, so that will just add to the chaos! But I am very excited for them to come and see my school and Spain. I am already thinking of what places and restaurants I want to take them to when they come. This weekend I am going on the school trip to Santander, a city in northern Spain. The school trips are always very fun so I am looking forward to it. :)

Classes

The last few weeks have been pretty busy! I went to a Taylor Swift concert, which I was very excited for because she is my favorite! It was so much fun. Then this last weekend, I went to Dublin with two of my friends. Dublin is a very nice city - very clean and the people are extremely friendly. We also went on a tour of a castle and a fishing town on the coast, so it was nice to see more than just the city.

My classes are going very well. I was prepared for all my midterms, and I think all my midterm grades were "A"s! I am very happy with that because I study quite a bit and I never miss classes. We only have about a month left of classes, so the workload is starting to pick up. I am taking 5 classes for 18 credits (more than normal), so I have a lot of final projects and papers. My marketing teacher assigned us a final project that counts for 25% of our overall grade. Each group of four has to create a product/service and apply all the concepts we have learned this semester to our new product. We have to describe the product, explain the target market, create the marketing mix, etc. We have to present our product to the class and also turn in a paper (no more than 20 pages) to our professor. My group has decided on creating a cruise targeted at American high school seniors. The cruise would be all-inclusive and travel to five cities in Europe. It should be a fun project to work on, but it will demand a lot of time.

More Canary Islands

Spring Break 2011 Islas Canarias :)

Last week was spring break, and two of my friends and I went to the Canary Islands. I went to the same island last year for spring break and loved it so much that we decided to go back again this year. And this year was even better! We had so much fun. The islands are part of Spain, but they are located to the west of Africa, so the weather is really nice. My friend and I went through almost three bottles of sunscreen!

Our hotel was very nice. Breakfast and dinner were included, and they were great! My friends and I always looked forward to the meals. They were buffet style, but there were 5 or 6 buffet bars with all different types of food. The people who vacation there are mostly from northern Europe (Norway, England, Germany, Sweden), and the ones in our hotel were all very old. We were definitely the youngest ones staying at the hotel. However, when we went out at night they were our age (thankfully).

We spent the days at the beach or pool, and then went out at night. Our hotel was about a 15 minute walk from the beach, and all the bars/clubs were about 10 minutes away. We paid 25 euros at the beginning of the week, and that allowed us to go out every night for the whole week. Each night, we met the group at Pacha (a very famous Spanish club that is in a lot of cities) and then we went to 3 small clubs/bars after that. It was like a pub crawl, but really fun! They had different kinds of games, it was a typical "spring break."

We also went on a boat for a day with the same pub crawl group. We rode on banana boats and jumped off the high boat into the ocean. We had a fantastic time! We decided it would be fun to ride camels, so on the second to last day, we did. It was so funny because there was a basket on each side of the camel so my friend and I rode at the same time (one of us in each basket). We also saw the sand dunes! Now I am back at school, but missing the Canary Islands SO MUCH!

Club Dalai

This last weekend, I went to a club with the Spanish girl who lived with me in the U.S. senior year. She studies about 45 minutes outside of Madrid. On Friday night, she came with some of her friends to Madrid to go out for the night. I met her with a few of my friends at a club called Dalai. It was really fun! And it was great to see her; it is like seeing family since she is basically my sister! :)

Today is the last day of classes before spring break! I only have one midterm left – statistics. I think it should go well. I got the grades back from my other midterms, all As! Tomorrow morning, my two friends and I have to be at the airport very early for our 8 am flight! I can´t believe that at this time tomorrow I will be laying out on the beach in the Canary Islands. I can hardly wait!!