travel

I am not a fan of flying, so I was pretty nervous about flying by myself, flying into a different country on a different continent, and flying on such a long trip.  My flight from Chicago to Madrid was about 8 hours, followed by a 3 hour layover in Madrid before a 55 minute flight from MAD to Sevilla.  Then I had a piece of paper with an address on it that I was told to give to a taxi driver in order to get to my host family’s home.

The first obstacle of the trip involved something about my suitcase being 19 pounds over the weight limit... But the lovely ladies of Iberia Airlines waived the baggage fee and excused it for my outgoing flight.

Then came saying goodbye to Mom and Dad, which was terrible and probably the hardest part of the whole trip- just going.

Courtney and I had plenty of time to get through security and navigate our way around O’Hare and find our gate before we took off.

The long trip to Madrid was much better than I had anticipated.  I have never flown internationally, so I didn’t know what to expect about food, space, or bathrooms.  The food was decent.  We had supper and breakfast.  The space was pretty awful.  My knees were in the back of the seat in front of me.  The plane was huge, so there were 2 aisles with 4 seats in the middle section and 2 sections of 2 seats on either side of the aisle.  Thankfully, I was in an aisle seat so I could stretch out my legs and get up and down easily when I needed to.  There were 4 bathrooms on the plane, and I made myself use it just once.  On the back of each seat was a touch screen TV that had dozens of movies and TV shows to watch for free on the flight, and you could also track the plane (altitude, distance traveled, etc.).  That helped pass some time.  I slept reasonably well, but only for a few hours.

Customs at Madrid was much easier that I expected.  We showed our passports, got stamped, and went through security again, but even security was more lax than when flying in the US.

The Madrid-Barajas Airport is HUGE.  We and to take a train from our inbound terminal to our terminal for our flight to Seville.  Navigating through that airport was complicated- the gate for our flight wasn’t determined until about 45 minutes prior to boarding time, and the numbering/lettering of the gates didn’t make sense to us.  Even though Spanish is the first spoken language in the airport, all of the signs were still labeled first in English and then in Spanish.  I joked several times that the airport, even if all in Spanish, would be the easiest part of the trip because of all of the chapters “en el aeropuerto” or “viajar” in all of my Spanish classes :)

My flight from Madrid to Seville was over half empty, but it was still what I would call a normal sized plane (3 seats on either side of the aisle).  I was able to sleep for that entire flight (55 minutes), which was short but very nice.  Take off and landing on the other flight had been so smooth- I hardly even noticed when we got off the ground and landed.  However, landing in Seville was a little rough. I felt really sick after we landed, which was probably due in part to dehydration and exhaustion too.

After landing, we headed to baggage claim and found the 5 other Semester in Spain students who we were recommended to share a taxi with to get to our host homes.  I found another heading to Los Remedios, we loaded up our luggage, and took off.  The driver knew exactly where to take me from my little slip of paper with an address.  We got to drive through most of Seville on the way to my neighborhood, and it was fun to see the city a little bit.  The taxi driver was very friendly and helped me understand a little about where I was.  He unloaded my bags and showed me a picture of his grandson, and I headed off for my hosts' home.

This was where I started to freak out a little- I was completely on my own, and obviously not from the area because of my 2 suitcases.  I started off in one apartment building and went up to the 11th floor.  I rang the doorbell that I thought was my hosts’, and a man came to the door.  When I asked for Marta, he pointed upstairs and told me 12th floor.  I went up to the 12th floor, but that wasn’t her either.  I found a group of younger boys and they pointed to the door next to their apartment, and again, no Marta.  At this point, I was on the verge of tears.  My phone didn't work because I’m out of range and had no wifi, so I had no way of contacting anyone, even if they could’ve helped me.  Finally, I realized that I was in building 11 and needed to be in building 9.  I’m not sure how I figured that one out, but thankfully I did.  And finally, I found Marta’s apartment.

Right now, I’m keeping up with the Spanish.  I do miss home a lot, but I know that will get easier and better as the days pass.  After all, I already have 1 day down!