Portfolio 2.

So right before Christmas break I went to a party for one of UGA’s campus ministries and at one point during the night a bunch of people ran over the the windows and onto the back porch. At first I thought maybe the bonfire had started catching on stuff around it…but this is what I saw.

My portfolio from Journalism 3610

So this past semester I took a Photojournalism class and found some really interesting people and events. My portfolio was the ten photos that I felt like represented my work. So here they are…

A core dance performer rehearses on the single trapeze on Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2010 for the Core dance performance on Thursday and Friday, Dec. 2 and 3, 2010. Dance majors are required to choreography a dance in one of the performances in order to graduate. (Photo/Melanie Turner, melaniet@uga.edu)

the adventure didn’t stop there

First I need to apologize for my lack of energy put forward towards this blog after Germany. To give you a quick run down since then, My mom came to travel around Spain with me and it couldn’t have been better. Then of course I had some more airfare problems coming back from Spain and ended up sprinting through the Amsterdam airport to catch my transfer flight to Atlanta because the French (one more mark against France) air traffic control decided to go on strike, delaying my first flight by about 2 hours. Then I went to Peru, where I have worked on construction for a boys’ home for a few summers. Now that I have been back in Athens for several months am just taking the time to write another update.

So the semester would not have begun on the right foot without something ridiculous happening, the guinea pig or as Kati Braswell decided to call it: geneva pig. So we walked in our house and found a geneva pig in our kitchen, problem was it didn’t belong to anyone that was living with us. It belonged to a girl that had lived there over the summer and she left it while traveling. So promptly we started plotting what kinds of things we could do to it if she didn’t get it soon. Ideas included: freeing it into the wild and frying it like they do in Peru.

As far as classes all but my photojournalism class have beyond failed my expectations. But my photo journalism has allowed me to meet and photograph some interesting people. So in honor of these people I will start logging the pictures and the stories behind them.

Since Spain…

So I left Madrid on june 26 for Dublin and here are my thoughts:
-Ryan air is the most ridiculous airline ever, complete free for all.
- Dublin the city doesn’t have much to offer except the Guinness factory- it is so much like james joyce’s “the dubliners” that it is even more depressing!
-The countryside is AMAZING, it makes the country! If i ever go back i will just skip anytime in Dublin and go straight to the countryside- now i have to watch “The Princess Bride” and “Braveheart” again because we were in the areas they were filmed.
-Old people here still go out to discos and stuff at night and the bouncers/general public are not really particular about who they are dancing with. I saw several 30ish year olds dancing with probably a 60year old- so odd…

Germany:
Berlin is a huge improvement on Dublin. Basically it is the European equivalent of the states. The general dress/apperance/atmosphere is really similar to the states plus everyone speaks english which makes it easy to get around. We have seen checkpoint charlie and the concentration camp Sachsenhausen- both of which blew my mind. It was crazy reading about the cold war and the Berlin wall because it was so recent in history but the country doesn’t seem like it has held them back at all. The concentration camp was just intense- it apparently was the model for all the others and it was just really sad to walk through and learn everything that happened there.

Generally what i have learned on this leg of the trip:
-Sleep is important- i’ve been getting about 8hours every night here and i have loved it! My attitude and body just feel so refreshed and renewed.
- Try different parts of the country (city vs countryside)- one is probably better than the other.
- Ryan air should only be taken when you are a poor college student- it’s not worth it otherwise.
-Try to learn something new in each new place- it grows you as a person.
- When you travel you realize how important your family and friends are to you!

What I have learned so far (may 25)

1. In Spain people don’t smile much at strangers. You know how in the states, esp. Georgia, you might smile and say hi as you walk by someone- Yeah don’t do that here. Our teacher told us that basically if you are a girl you shouldn’t smile at any guy you don’t know- apparently it means you’re easy. This has been a really funny thing to learn because one of the girls will be laughing about something, accidentally smile at a guy and suddenly realize he thinks she’s coming onto him.

2. You can tell who is an American here by looking to see if they have their nails done or painted. Getting them done here is really expensive so no one does.

3. Guys here are really metro and many are guidos. Our teacher told us that the men here get full body waxes.

4. People really do sunbath here topless, whether they should or not (even the grandmothers).

5. There is zero modesty on PDA here with couples- be prepared to see couples making out everywhere.

6. The time schedule is very different. They start their day more at about 9 or 10am, they don’t eat lunch till 2:30ish and have siesta from 2-5ish. The stores are closed from 2-6ish and then they reopen. They eat dinner some time between 9:00-10:30. And the Spaniards could give the athens downtown kids a run for their money. If you want to go out here you have to wait till after 12 and if you are Spanish you don’t go back home till sunrise.

7. They use mayonnaise a lot here. Also a TON of soup. They don’t really drink soda, just a lot of water. They eat a lot of seafood in this area. The biggest difference is the times they eat, like I mentioned earlier. Lunch is also the biggest meal of the day and dinner is more like the size of our lunch. So far the new things I have tried are: A. shark, which tastes like fish, B. Pea soup with an egg cooked in the pea juice. C. tortilla espanola, which is potatoes and really good. D. the icecream here is to die for…

8. Spaniards can be loud. Especially when you are trying to sleep at 2 am and they are just going out for the night.

9. All the guys here with dogs have little lap dogs, it’s kind of funny…

10. The bachata is not the dance for me…

11. Rallies attract all the same people no matter what country you are in…

12. The daytime t.v. here is really funny- I have seen way too many episodes of a combo of Judge joe brown and Maury.

13. The word here for being picky is: tinky sminky… no joke

more to come….

The Paris “Adventure”

So we had left the house headed to pick up Anna and my mom and go to the airport when Anna’s dad calls me about the standby ticket. Apparently, the ashcloud had killed my flight and the flight to Madrid the next day was oversold. So after looking at all the other flights going to Europe that I might possibly be able to get a seat, we found one that was leaving that night to Paris. From there we decided I should be able to catch a train or another flight to Madrid. Well, it wouldn’t be my life if something ridiculous wasn’t going to happen with that flight as well.
It was delayed two hours. In the mean time though, I made a “friend” who after a couple minutes decided that I was the right person to tell about his drama with his girl friend and then follow up with how he thought my name was pretty and that my eyes were pretty. (Alicia that part was for you, Enjoy.) He then invited me to stay with him and his friends in Paris, if I couldn’t get a train or flight out the next day. (Has he seen the movie Taken? No, thanks.) So I was really glad when I saw that his seat was in another part of the plane.

So I get to Paris and when I finally find the train ticket office they tell me that I won’t be able to get on a train direct to Madrid until the coming Monday. Not good, I need to be in Madrid on Thursday and it is Wednesday. I learn that it is basically the same way with going to Barcelona and the closest the train could take me was to some border town where I would have to wait for another opening. Ok, so on to plan B, trying to find a flight. After wandering around the CDG maze, I finally find the Delta/Air France ticket office and when I ask how much a flight is from Paris to Madrid, I get a response that literally made my jaw drop. Over 1000 Euros, which basically means about $1500.

Definitely not happening. At this time I start getting a little nervous (big understatement). By this time it is probably 5 p.m. in Paris- I didn’t sleep well on the plane and all I have had to eat is a croissant and a banana (oh p.s. I don’t do well with low blood sugar, my dad can attest to that). So I wander back and forth around the Paris airport, which is the worst planned airport of all time, trying to find wifi so I can e-mail my dad and try to figure out what to do. Finally, I find it and see that my dad is on facebook, which maybe one of the only times I have been grateful for this fact. So we start researching flights and trains on the short battery life my computer has, while skyping each other.

I must here say thank you to my dad for being my lifeline that day. I honestly do not know that I would have had any sanity if it wasn’t for his encouragement and help. He brought a logical mind to the situation when I was really scared.

I found a Ryan air flight leaving out of another airport in Paris the next morning at 9 that would go to Barcelona. While not ideal, it is still closer than Paris, so we decided to give it a try and booked the flight thinking that I could get there semi easily. So then somehow I ended up back in the train ticket line trying to get something to work and once again I got road blocked. With no battery life left on my computer, I found a phone that I could make international calls on, swiped my card preparing for a huge bill and called my dad. By that time I am basically leaning on the phone booth because I have no energy, have the beginning of a headache and I feel like I could throw up any minute from the stress/fear. Graphic, I know, but I’m just trying to give you an idea of the situation so you can see what I learned later. After having him look up where the town and airport are we decide that the flight will still be the best idea so I go back down, buy a train ticket to go to downtown Paris, where the main train hub is so that I can take a train to this smaller town outside Paris. Here’s where it gets worse and kind of cool.

So on the train to Paris I pull out my Bible and start reading every passage I know relating to peace. When I finished those I just started flipping through and reading passages that caught my eye and one that I landed on was Ephesians 2 (AKA God is really cool). While I have read it before it isn’t one I think of when I need or am searching for peace, but I got it in a huge way.

“For he himself is our peace who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we have access to the Father by one Spirit. Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.” (Eph. 2:4-20)

Ok, exactly what I needed plus some. The coolest thing about this passage in that moment was not necessarily that he gave me a sense of peace because I was honestly still freaked out, but that all day after I arrived in Paris I was aware of my identity. It cames into play with the sometimes subtle but also huge difference between a tourist and a foreigner and I was a foreigner. People typically put up with and are semi nice to tourists because of the money coming from them, but foreigners have not so much to offer and usually are more of an annoyance than anything and the difference in the way they are treated, while subtle, also has a huge impact on the person.

When I got to Paris I got in another long train ticket line and found out that the train that I need had already left for the night and the one the next morning would not get me to the airport in time. Great. After I had called my dad from the pay phone, my dad turned my cell phone onto the international plan so that I could call him as needed, which brought up another cool thing God did.

The whole day while I am calling and texting my dad from my cell phone, I only have one bar of battery life left (which is huge because my battery dies really fast once it hits one bar left- I’m talking maybe 5 min of life) and it lasted all the rest of that day, through the night and till lunch the next day.

So by this time we are almost out of options- it is 10 p.m., I have barely eaten all day, had little sleep and more stress than I have face in years, so my dad tells me to take a break. In his wonderful wisdom he knows when I need to just stop, sit, rest and relax. So he tells me (I’m not capable of making decisions at this point) to go find something to eat and then we would find me a hotel for the night. The problem with this is that I’m really scared and kind of scared to leave the train station and go into a random restaurant, however ridiculous it sounds it was very true.

Then I saw them- those beautiful glowing golden arches. McDonalds. While I will not by choice eat there at home I was starving and it was something familiar. So like a bug to the light, without hesitation, I crossed the street and wandered inside. While there, my dad sent me a message saying that a travel agent he knows found me a flight from Paris to Madrid for the next day so now all I needed to do was find a hotel for the night and get to the airport in time for my 5 p.m. flight. And the same thing happened with the hotel, I walked out of the McDonalds glancing at the prices posted on the doors of the hotels and then saw a Best Western down the street. Once again I made a b-line for that beautiful familiar place and nearly cried when I got into my room and saw a clean white bed waiting for me.

The next day went a lot easier because I knew the subway system and was able to get to the airport easily. My phone had still not run out of battery but I needed to charge it or it would definitely die, so I wandered around the shops near my hotel trying to find a converter and ran back to my hotel when I did find one and charged it as long as I could. On the plane my mood dramatically changed and I was basically smiling the whole time because I knew that in two hours I would be in Madrid and able to go to my hotel and find my group. Just knowing that I somewhat know the language and could get around was such a comfort. I made it to my hotel relatively quickly and dove onto my TA, giving her the biggest hug and just repeating how great it was to see her face.

Although it was a difficult experience I’m really glad it happened because I learned a lot and the Lord just really used it to grow me in my faith and closer to him. One of my friends told me before I left that I was going to Paris for a reason and to cling to that fact. It was true, even though I did not know it while wandering around the maze that is the Paris airport, that a little later on the worn out train he would open my eyes to his glory once again.

Prayers Answered

So in keeping everyone updated about my summer, I feel like I need to give some background on how I have seen God move over the past few months preparing me for these trips.

On Nov. 4 of this past year I wrote in my prayer journal that I desired for God to give me the ability and the confidence to speak in Spanish and over the past few months he has granted this by giving me an amazing teacher and a wonderful class where I felt comfortable. It floored me at the Peru Yard Sale when I would start speaking to someone in Spanish and it would surprise them and when they would ask if I speak spanish I could say yes.

I also started praying around the same time that the Lord would grant me community and spiritual companionship in Spain, even if it was just one person in a different town. I just wanted someone there to talk with and grow with. And he more than blessed this request: he has given me several believers in my town and other towns in addition to contacts to missionaries and churches in Cadiz and Madrid.

Then, this past week he answer my prayers about Peru. Because I am using my savings to fund Spain I needed to raise all or the majority of the money for the mission trip to Peru. I was worrying and praying for weeks about this because I was not raising money as fast as I was needed. One day I was in my ADPR class messing around on my computer because I was bored and I opened an e-mail from one of our trip leaders that said that Andy (the youth pastor) found a deal on tickets that would reduce the price of each person’s plane ticket by $700! What?! This kind of thing never happens, even if an airline does have a discount on a ticket it is not by that much. Needless to say I was floored and it is a good thing class was ending about the time I read it because I threw my stuff in my bag and ran out of the door of the slc laughing and crying with joy. I called my mom to tell her and she could barely understand what I was saying because I was laughing and choked up at the same time. I am sure the people that walked by me thought I must be crazy because of how I was acting and I know I got some looks.

I have again and again been reminded over these past few weeks how the Lord provides in ways we expect and majorly in ways we don’t think about. I have dramatically seen how prayers can be answered in small ways and in large but each time, no matter the size, it is still a wonderful blessing.

If you want to read Andy’s account of the airline deal here is something he wrote about it:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/anelson1050?v=app_2347471856&ref=ts

The man behind it all.

On a sparsely filled bookcase sit two travel guides, one on Madrid and the other on Andalusia. His desk one can tell typically remains very tidy but with only a few weeks left before the program starts, information sheets scatter the desk under a single softball size grapefruit and an empty coffee cup approximately the same size.

Originally a theater major for his undergrad Dr. Gary Baker now heads up the University of Georgia en España program, which leaves for its summer term on May 12. The change in career direction occurred when Baker lived in Paris for a year after completing his undergrad. He returned to the United States and decided to pursue his graduate work in Romance Languages.

Once again his career direction changed from a trip abroad when he moved to Spain in 1993 to work as an English professor at a small private university outside of Madrid. He only intended to stay for a year but ended up staying five. “The country was very welcoming, I liked the Spanish people. I liked their worldview; they seem very open minded, very open in general and very welcoming,” Baker said.

So when the position of Program Director opened up for him to start last year, it was the perfect fit for Baker. His love for the country helps him to encourage students to push themselves and try new things. He said that even though he believes that the change in students from before and after their program is subtle it is still impactful and opens the student’s horizons.

Studying abroad remains popular even in recession

The economy has been in the tank for about two years, The University System of Georgia proposed about $300 million in budget cuts and the Business Cycling Dating Committee can not agree on whether the country is still in a recession or not.

Probably not the best time to dish out anywhere from $2,000 to $10,000 for a study abroad program, but maybe it is.
These things though were not enough to deter the students that showed up for the UGA en España maymester and summer programs orientation on April 10. The summer and maymester programs, which regularly host total about 120 students will host a little over 100 students this summer- a decline from years past.

Students that still desire to study abroad but feel that money could prove an issue can take solace. With the right research and work any student can find a way to join the students around the country that are planning out their summers’ abroad.
To start you need to do some research and thinking. First, the student needs to decide how much they can spend on this experience- this will determine a lot of the choices of where and for how long. Second, they should to decide what kind of classes they would want to take abroad and see how these line up with what classes needed for their major. Now this is a very important step, if students do not study abroad through their college or university, they should check with their advisors to make sure that their classes with transfer for credit BEFORE signing up for the program. No one wants to spend thousands of dollars and not get everything out of it.

When thinking through the options of whether to study abroad through a student’s school or another program they might consider these things:

- Some colleges count part or all of one’s scholarship or grant money towards the program fees. Like I mentioned before, the University of Georgia if you study abroad and you have the HOPE grant, it will contribute towards your tuition costs. Also for out of state students, UGA will give them in-state tuition for any semester that they study abroad, which equals thousands in savings, essentially making it cheaper for out-of-state students to study abroad than at the actual campus.
- Also many schools have study abroad scholarships but students should be sure and ask about the typical number of scholarships given and the amount, so as to no expect to receive more than they do.
- Studying abroad through an independent program might be cheaper than your school even for the same city.
- There are numerous national study abroad scholarships, especially for students planning to study in less frequented destinations.

Cruise and Diaz to save Spain’s travel industry

As the summer heat in Spain is ramping up, Spanish officials are hoping that the number of tourists visiting this summer with rise too. In efforts to draw crowds, the cities of Cadiz and Sevilla Spain hosted the filmmakers for this summer’s action comedy “Knight and Day”. The movie staring Cameron Diaz and Tom Cruise is set to be released on June 25.

As Spain lost its spot as the second most visited country, Cruise and Diaz filmed scenes portraying the Running of the Bulls race on the cobbled streets of Cadiz. The actual race takes place in Pamplona, a town about 800 kilometers north east of Cadiz during the San Fermín Festival, July 6-14 this year. Cadiz’s municipal government relaxed filming regulations for the makers and helped them find offices to work out of and police to monitor onlookers.

Although still filmed during the tourism high, Cadiz’s La Caleta beach was also featured in the James Bond film “Die Another Day” when Halle Berry made her famous walk out of the ocean and strutted onto the beach.

The government is hoping that the scenes of the whitewashed, historic city will reverse the effects that the recession has had on Spain’s tourism. Over the past year inflation hit Spain and its prices rose to that of France, one of the most expensive countries in the European Union. Because of this, many would be tourists to the area instead diverted their trip to Mediterranean destinations farther east.