Life in Segovia, Spain: February 2012

Last weekend we had a day trip to Toledo, España. We traveled there by bus and only stayed in the town for about 6 hours. While there we toured two churches and a synagogue. There was a museum on the list of our places to visit but unfortunately it was closed when we got to the front doors. ;) The whole group was pretty bummed... actually we were all happy since one, we were tired and two, none of us wanted to have to walk through another museum. Toledo was a very small and old medieval town. People were told not to wander from the group since the streets were so confusing and anyone could be get lost easily. Cool fact: the swords that are used in the Lord of the Rings movies were made in Toledo. A few people in my group bought some swords even!

Sorry it has taken me so long to update my blog! I have just been really busy with school, homework, and other things going on here in Segovia. A few days before leaving for Barcelona I kept waking up at night with itchy hands, feet, and eyes. It was so weird and I did not know what was causing the itching. I went to the nurse at school and she said I was having an allergic reaction to something. At first we thought it was the pet bird that my family has in the house, so when I was gone in Barcelona they removed the bird from the house. It was really hard to describe what was going on with my body to them so I had my teacher, Gladys, call Marisa and explain everything. Marisa even washed everything in my room with non-allergenic soap just in case it was the laundry soap that was causing me to be itchy. Gladys, Marisa, and I decided that we would see how my body reacts in Barcelona since I would be away from the bird for four days. The first night there I woke up with itchy hands and feet but then it went away for 2 days. I thought to myself then that it was most likely the bird, but then on the third day while touring the Picasso museum my entire body started to itch and hives showed up on my arms. The hives came about a half hour after eating breakfast and all I ate was a croissant and expresso with milk. I ran with a friend to a pharmacy to pick up allergy meds. I took the medicine right away and the hives began to go away. Now instead of being allergic to the bird I think that I could possible be allergic to the milk here in Spain. Their milk doesn't have to be refrigerated and can sit out all day long. To determine if milk is the culprit I am not eating anything that contains milk for 8 days and then after 8 days I am going to try something like cheese and see if I react. If I do react then we know that milk is my problem. I was hive free for 4 days until last week wednesday after dinner. I broke out in the worst of the hives yet! My entire arms had hives up them and my throat was feeling tight. I didn't eat any dairy. I had a salad and a piece of french bread. I showed my host parents the reaction since they didn't see it before when it happened. They couldn't believe it! They tried to think what could have made me react and then Jero remembered that he used the same knife, that he used to cut up cheese, to cut up my salad. The next morning I also broke out after just eating wheat bread, peanut butter, and these little mini muffins for breakfast. I found out after I returned home from school that both the bread and muffins had milk in them. The family is being very helpful and have been making all my food with things that do not contain any milk. They even bought me chocolate soy milk and two jars of peanut butter! So far I have gone four days with out bread or milk in my diet and no reactions have occurred. I am hoping that I will be able to figure out why I am having these allergic reactions within the next week or so, but if I do not my teacher Gladys will be taking me to a dermatologist. I did do a lot in Barcelona besides finding out I get hives from something that I eat.

After riding on a bus for 8 hours we arrived in Barcelona around 6pm. We all went out to eat and then took naps before going out into town to check out the night life. I did manage to get in a night run with a couple of other girls. We ran down towards the beach and then ran along the beach for a half hour. It was a chilly night but it felt good to go running after siting in a bus for 8 hours. The next day in Barca we toured the gothic part of the city. We toured gothic cathedrals and walked along a main street in barcelona to make our way towards a large outdoor market. In this market there was all different kinds of food ranging from candy, sea creatures, skinned animals, and much more. We ate at an organic food stand there. The food was delicious! I think we were outside for at least 5 hours that day and were freezing the entire time! It was unusually cold while we were in Barcelona. After the walking tour some people decided to go shopping while others went back to the hotel to nap before getting ready to try the night life of Barca one more time. On our third day there we toured the Picasso museum in the morning and then in the afternoon we went on a bus tour of Barcelona. Our first stop was Parque Quell. This park was beautiful the first time that I saw it in high school and it was amazing once again the second time! We spent about 2 hours walking thru the park before boarding the bus to be taken to Montjuic. Montjuic is where the 1992 olympics were held. We got to see from the bus the stadiums there and then the bus stopped at the top of the "hill" where we got to see a beautiful view of Barcelona and a harbor. We only spent about 15 min there since it was freezing outside. After touring Montjuic the bus driver took us by famous houses built by Gaudi. We also got to see the outside of his famous cathedral, Sagrada de Familia, that he designed. On our way to tour the houses the bus had to go down some pretty small streets. The streets here in spain are already really small and are not ment for coach buses. We were driving down a very narrow street before coming to another small street where the only direction we could go was left. This was a 90 degree left turn with two stop lights on either side of the bus and metal pilers in front of the bus. I thought the bus was never going to make the turn. We were with in less than one inch of hitting the stoplight on our left. I think it took us a good half hour to try get out of the tight spot. People watched us from inside a coffee shop that was on the corner the entire time. Our bus driver had to drive forward then back up so little by little we could angle the bus just right and not hit the stop lights or pilers or the other cars that were parked on the street and lined up behind us. Eventually we got out and everyone cheered!