WW Around the World - Madrid, Spain

Hi everyone! I hope finals went well or are going well! It seems like the semester flew by for all of us. I've had such an unbelievable time in these past 3 months and I have such mixed feelings about going back. We're just in the midst of our finals season, which means a lot of papers, presentations, and exams but before I get back to writing my literature paper I just wanted to catch you all up on my abroad experience.

I have been living in Madrid since the 3rd week of September. I live with the most unbelievable house mom who has honestly made my live in experience perfect. She is an unbelievable cook and has an amazing sense of humor. She has very liberal opinions about just about everything. My friends that have met her absolutely adore her. Not only has she helped me learn Spanish, but also taught me a lot about Spanish history, culture, and society.

Though we don't live in the center of the city with a lively night life around us, we have great shopping areas and metro/bus stops that can bring us to just about anywhere in the city. My travel to school is about 30 minutes with walking and metro, which is totally not bad, unless you compare it to rolling out of bed and walking 4 minutes to class at Penn.

I haven't gone to too many restaurants in Madrid, just because meals are included in our homestay, my schedule isn't entirely conducive for it during school days, and on the weekends I end up traveling a lot. However, I have found that Madrid has barrios that reflect neighborhoods in New York (my hometown). There are endless local restaurants serving bocadillos and typical Spanish food, but Madrid's trendy and ethnic eating is definitely up and coming! I have been able to eat decent sushi, great pad thai, and amazing kebab.

Finding places to go out in Madrid on most days of the week, but especially on Wednesday through Sunday morning is not at all difficult. In addition to the big 3- Kapital (read: 7 floor discoteca with different music on each floor), Pacha (in Chueca, a young and trendy barrio), and Joy (in Sol, the center of the city)- there are a lot of discotecas with different themes and crowds. However, going to these discotecas is definitely not the only thing you can do on the weekends, in fact it's not that traditional to go everyday of the weekend either. We have found a ton of local bars and lounges, especially around those areas I mentioned. We have been able to find some places that have made our nights really fun :)

Like I said, I'm usually out of the city on the weekends. This semester I have been to a lot of cities in Spain (Barcelona, Sevilla, Grenada, Cordoba, Salamanca, San Sebastian, Pamplona, Bilbao... the list goes on...). There is so much to see in Spain and I feel that I have really gotten to know the country and its history a TON this semester, which I am really grateful for. I would have to choose between Barcelona and San Sebastian for my favorite Spanish city (other than Madrid, obviously). I can't even make recommendations for people that come to Spain though, because I would honestly say you would have to see all of them. They each had remarkable features that made them distinct from the others.

In addition to my traveling in Spain, I visited Paris, Amsterdam, and Lisbon. I had an AMAZINGGGGGGGG time in all of these cities. They are all filled with culture unlike anything we can identify with back in the states. It was especially nice to see something different from the traditional churches/monastery scene in Spain. Not a ton of international traveling, but I would recommend you do that before arriving in Madrid or after. As for me, I will make coming back to Europe a priority. Specifically, I want to visit UK, Ireland, Italy, and Germany.

So, in the midst of all of this traveling and fun in Madrid, I actually have school! Each class has 4 hours of class a week and I am in 5 classes, so 20 hours a week, but only Monday through Thursday. Our classes are conducted in Spanish and all our work is obviously done in Spanish. Our school really reminds me of high school in the states. Our university has a couple of buildings, but almost all the professor’s offices, administrators, auditoriums, and classrooms are in the main building we are in. We stay with the same kids throughout the day and the teachers are the ones that come to our classroom. Our semester has been relatively short, but the work has definitely not been consistent. In most of our classes, the work piled on for the end and now all of us are working on our final papers, presentations, and studying for exams. I had four presentations in the past two days and handed in three papers. Next week, I have two more papers (6 pages max. each) for history and economics, as well as three exams, two of which are traditional writing/case style for language and management and a group oral exam for economics.

Well I hope you enjoyed reading this summary of my abroad experience. If you are considering going to Madrid next semester, feel free to email me (cuesta@wharton.upenn.edu) with any questions or concerns you have! Enjoy the rest of your semester and I look forward to seeing you next semester!