On my way to Spain

[3:15pm, Sojourner’s café in the Atlanta airport]

Today is the start of my seven-month study abroad trip to Madrid, Spain.  I depart Atlanta at 6:45pm and arrive in Madrid at 2am central time, 9am Madrid time.  If I can’t get some good sleep on the plane, tomorrow could be a very long day.  But I’ve got an aisle seat, and apparently we’ll be watching “Moneyball” and “The Smurfs” movies on the way there so things are looking good.

I will be enrolling in Universidad Complutense de Madrid (http://portal.ucm.es/en/web/en-ucm), which is Spain’s oldest, largest, and most prestigious public university (check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complutense_University_of_Madrid for a review of its history, academic offerings, and famous alumni, such as Albert Einstein).  At the university I plan to take courses which count towards my Psychology and Hispanic Studies majors, as well as one or two additional courses to augment my immersion in foreign culture or just for fun.  However, this being a “Boston College Program”, I must still complete the same amount of work as I would at BC: I must take a full 5-course workload, and my semester grades will affect my cumulative GPA.  But I have 4 weeks before classes begin, so I’ve got some time to drink in the streets, coquetear con algunas españolas, and explore Madrid before getting back to cognitive dissonance theories and the subjunctive tense.

I’ll be 4,000 miles from most of my friends and family in the U.S., but I won’t be lonely. Over 100 other BC students are going to be studying abroad in Spain this semester, most of them in Madrid, and about 30 are in the same university as me.  (Nearly 50% of all BC students study abroad; 8 of the 12 people I shared a house with in the fall will be abroad this spring: 5 of them at other universities in Madrid).  And I’m sure I’ll run into a familiar American more than once along the way. 

I plan to update this blog frequently with posts and pictures. Please comment below or email me with any comments or questions; I’d love to hear from y’all.

Email: charliemegaman@yahoo.com