The new and improved

Well, the first blog post I made for this blog was a rather philosophical and non-traditional post where I just explained what I was thinking.  Most of the posts will be about school and other things happening in my life, especially my upcoming trip to Valencia, Spain with the SDSU Modern Languages Department.  I am very excited and I actually have a class meeting for this trip in about an hour.

This post I would like to actually give some insight on the trip and what I have done so far to lead up to the trip.  There are 13 of us traveling to Valencia, and this trip will be from May 12- June 15, 2011, so exactly one month from now, we will be leaving.  We are doing home-stay while we are there, and my host-mother's name is Sefa, a somewhat elderly woman that has seven children and from what I've read and heard, has grandchildren as well.  She lives in the center of Spain so that should be an awesome location for getting around.  The plan is that we will be studying Spanish in groups with the company called EUROACE.  We will be in classes from 8am-noon or 1pm I believe, so this trip is not completely a vacation.  Also, we have many events, tours, and visits planned, including trips to Madrid and Barcelona, and wednesday night activities in Valencia.

We have been meeting for our orientation class on Tuesday nights at 8pm and Saturday mornings at 8am since Spring Break.  We only have three more class meetings.  We have to make a presentation on a topic we choose at the beginning of orientation class and also write a 5-page research paper on our topic.  My topic is the physical, political, and economic geography of Spain, and I have already given my presentation, but I still have to write the paper.

The trip is going to be a blast.  Every week I get more anxious and excited about the trip.  I have never been out of the country, so this should be a unique experience.  Until then, I have tons of work coming up for my classes before finals.  Finals week is May 2-6, but I'm done with my finals May 4, Wednesday morning.  However, I still have a 2-page reaction paper, 5-page independent study, 15-minute final research project with statistics, an 8-10 minute presentation in Spanish about a hispanic artist (musician, painter, architect, etc), a GIS final module, 5-page paper for Spain, and 3 finals.  It was exhausting making that list, but it will be more exhausting doing all that work. Wish me luck! Nos vemos!

Campus at Midnight

Watching cars roll in and out of campus on a Friday night is fairly entertaining.  I watch from the third floor day (study) room in Caldwell Hall and see the same white car drive by 4 or 5 times.  Either an under cover cop or someone bored driving around.  Seeing late-nighters walking around. A guy riding a bike with someone holding on to the back while on rollerblades; maybe upd will find them.  Its just a still frame, a view of the world that is different from where I am currently.  How I once was in this picture, walking along that sidewalk, driving on that street.  I am watching from a higher perspective, a lookout view of sorts.  I don’t really see me in the scene from the window, its just me observing, my view only.  I would say three-fourths of the time its nothing.  Just the street lights, streets, tree branches, parking lot.  Nothing too exciting.  But distancing myself from where I was once, a person walking around at night, trying not to be pulled over by upd.  Trying to go hang out with my friends in a different hall with a backpack on.  Trying not to get any unwanted attention from a known authority.  Just wanted to enjoy the night, have a leisurely walk  I was not doing anything wrong.  I was not drunk or high or stoned.  But I panicked, as if I was doing something or did something illegal.  I see the cyclical nature of the midnight hour on campus from my vantage point.  I now understand that even being not guilty of something and just minding your own business can result in unwanted attention.  That being said, is it really worth it to go out of your way to ‘walk the night’?  Of course I did run.  I saw the UPD car from a distance and stopped in my tracks.  They were turning. I was walking straight towards the vehicle over 50 meters away.  I turned and ran back to Caldwell.  In that moment, I realized that even just existing in a scene or situation that looks unfavorable to you in any way, where a person or authority can jump to conclusions, probably will not go in your favor.  You will get attention, wanted or unwanted, and pay the consequence for choosing to do what you did, in this case walk around a college campus with a backpack on.  So as I watch from above the calm yet repetitive scene of midnight campus I look onward to future events where maybe someone else will be watching me, and maybe see what I’m doing as nothing more than just walking, just as they are only watching.