Hace mucho tiempo

It's been a while

Sorry everyone! Things have been moving so quickly with visits from my parents and trips and piles of projects, on top of being endlessly sick with a bad cough. Some summaries of the last few weeks:

Africa was amazing! I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that we were actually IN AFRICA. We rode camels along the other side of the Atlantic (I waved at you all!). We went to an Arab bath and had our skin rubbed off. Every meal I was sure was the best thing I'd ever eaten. We stayed with host families in Rabat, and our host mom dressed us up in all her fine robes...for an hour. We had lunch with a family in a village in the Rif mountains with the cutest little boy on the planet. It's only a matter of time before Angelina Jolie finds him. I spent the whole four days gazing around open-mouthed because everything was so beautiful and colorful and so different from anything I've seen before. I've thought things in Spain seemed third-world sometimes, like when I find the entire spine of a pig in the street, or the fact the Granada is crawling with stray cats and dogs, but seeing these things in Morocco, to a much greater degree, was really shocking to me. Kids were playing soccer with a dead rat, there was a cat giving birth under a shoe stand, and the highways were lined with donkeys and sheep and skinny horses. In America we always hear about how lucky we are to have shoes and running water and basic luxuries we take for granted. I believe(d) it, but I had sorted it to the file in my mind of things I know, logically, are true, but don't ever think about as reality. I don't know if that makes sense. And I wasn't even in a very poor or rural part of Africa. It's taken me a few weeks to process the experience and I think (I hope) I take it with me for a long time.

Amanda, Liz, and I in our host mom's gowns.
There are more than 120 of these pictures. Niiice.

Camels on the other side of the Atlantic!
Look at the baby one!

Just a few days after we got back home, my mommy arrived in Granada!! Despite the volcano, which had me worried for a little while. It was so nice to see her and share this city with her. We went to a great fondue place in the Albaicin and watched the sky darken around the Alhambra as the flood lights came up around the base. Moms are the best.

In the Alhambra

And then the next day my dad flew in and we wandered around Granada. We did little watercolors and ate more delicious food, and then off to Madrid for a weekend of art. Unfortunately we were both a little under the weather so we spent a lot of time in the hotel. I'm so glad I'm in Granada instead of Madrid. It was so nice to see him, I wish I got to spend more time with both my parents.

Statue of Don Quixote in Madrid

The whole time I've been coughing. I haven't been able to run because I'd have to stop every few feet, so I've been feeling so restless and antsy. I hope it goes away by the time I go to PARIS on Thursday!

As the end sneaks closer I'm finding myself so torn between wanting to go back to the states and wanting to stay in Granada forever. I'm trying to appreciate every second I have here, knowing I'll be in Lancaster all summer and all next year, missing Granada. I don't have to wish to be there because I will be, before I know it.