Week 4

Week 4

This past week was all about Pilar (and a little bit about our new gym)

Pilar is a festival in the Aragon region (in which Zaragoza is located) that is celebrated in honor of the patron saint of Zaragoza. It includes a lot of concerts, street performances, traditional activities and other fun things. For the students, this basically means that we do not have any university obligations and therefore are able to honor this saint guy by going out four days in a row.

And that’s what we did. We went to two concerts of typical Spanish bands. At both venues, there were also other tents with DJs playing different styles of music. I have to admit that I am not very fond of the Spanish music.

On Friday evening, we noticed a message in the Zaragoza Erasmus Facebook group of some Italian students from Lleida (between Zaragoza and Barcelona) asking for a place to stay. We sent them a message telling them they were welcome to stay at our place! That evening we went out till 06:00 (which was, in hindsight, not a smart thing to do) and the next day we went to the city to meet up with the Italians. Alice, Laura, Sara and Francesco joined us during a Zaragoza city tour organized by Erasmus for students from Madrid, Valencia, Barcelona and other cities in Spain. That evening the Italians cooked pasta for us and we played some traditional board drinking games. A few hours later, we went to the city to go out at a small club and the pub street. I had döner kebab, which was nice.

The next day, the Italians left early because they had to take the bus back to Lleida. 

It was a great experience and I was surprised by the fact that we were the only ones that had sent them a message. I encourage other students to open your house to people from other countries/cities, because it was a great experience! Also, we will be visiting them in Lleida very soon!

Pasta, Italian pasta (does Italian thing with hand)

What follows are some pictures from our lovely gym. It's not perfect, but it's something! We have to be a bit creative with our exercises, but it feels good to be working out after some time off.

Tandem area - For real, the cross-trainers are so close to each other that you can hold hands

This area is actually just for illustration purposes. We don't do cross-fit, and neither should you. (if you ain't a girl)

Week 3

Week 3

We had three awesome days in Valencia. After a 4 hour bus trip (during which the bus driver was lost for a few minutes) we finally arrived at the bus station in Valencia where a friend of Rigbert (Carlo) welcomed us. Maria and Clara (Spanish students that visited us in The Netherlands for an exchange semester) welcomed us in the house of Maria’s aunt. Rigbert went to Carlo’s house and I had dinner with Maria, Clara and their friends. I experienced the nightlife in Valencia and the next day we had lunch together. Unfortunately, we already had to say goodbye after lunch, because Rigbert, Carlo and I went to see the football game between Valencia and Atlético Madrid; which was spectacularly won by 3-1 in favour of Valencia.

Valencia is a great city and unfortunately we only had one weekend to visit it. I will definitely visit it again!

Also, we have finally found a gym that ‘accepts’ me. All the other gyms in Zaragoza require a passport number, and I only have an ID card. The only downside of this ‘acceptance’ is that the gym is similar to a ghetto, compared to all the other gyms we have visited. (pictures will follow once I feel confident enough to bring my phone  with me to the gym)