Tag Archives: Reflections

Guest Post: If you don’t speak Castellano you won’t truly understand Spain

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Jessica is a third year Modern Languages student coming to the end of her year abroad in Spain. This guest post considers the Spanish language and its relationship with Spanish national identity and culture…

It’s safe to say that my Spanish has undergone a profound transformation in the last 8 months. From my first day arriving in Madrid when I quite confidently thanked the taxi driver in impeccable Thai, ‘khob Khun kaa’, for taking us to the train station, I knew I had a long road ahead of me. After five weeks in Thailand I had unconsciously memorized a few local phrases, and I wondered how living in Spain would do the same on a much larger scale. Living in a foreign country is vital to truly surround yourself in the language, perfect the pronunciation of words, and obtain a variety of idiomatic expressions and fantastic swear words from first hand sources. But as you start to notice
the subtle nuances a language holds, you notice the hidden linguistic messages through which the Spaniards individually and collectively project their culture and identity. There are some things that just can’t be translated. Continue reading

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words: My Year Abroad in Pictures

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I’m back in London!! It’s fab being home but god, I forgot how grey it is over here. I’m definitely missing that gorgeous Canadian sky.

I wasn’t quite ready to write my last ever year abroad blog post, so I thought I’d make a collection of all my favourite photos from my time in Canada.

So here you go!

Song Credit- “Everywhere” Fleetwood Mac (Just for you Anna xx)

 

Hope everyone is awesome!

To all you fab folks in Durham, I’ll be visiting super soon and can’t wait to see you!

To my Canada fam, I miss you so much already!!

Lots of love,

Sonia xx

 

Enough from me, who else is loving their year abroad?

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16179437_1328911833798104_4017035432068824843_oWhy hello there you fabulous readers! Only one more month to go until I’m back in England. Honestly, can’t believe I just wrote that sentence, it’s insane how quickly the past few months have gone! Everyone is slowly realising that this awesome year is coming to an end and there are a lot of mixed emotions about it. I’m sure you’re all aware of how much I’ve loved this year abroad experience, so I thought I’d dedicate this blog post to a few of my fellow year abroaders living with me over here in Canada. Continue reading

Top 5 Moments in Salamanca

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As my time in Salamanca comes to an end, it’s time to look back on the blissful highs and hilariously tragic lows of my first semester abroad in Spain. Exams, losing just a few of my personal belongings, frustration at Spanish bureaucracy, language barriers and homesickness aside, the innumerable highlights by far outweigh the lows. Since there were so many memories to choose from, I decided to pick moments and trips I hadn’t mentioned in previous posts! Continue reading

Top 10 Moments (so far)

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15000762_1170867532969204_8375154948438180072_o-1Hello again fabulous readers!

As the semester is coming to a close (it’s the last week, where has the time gone?!) I thought it would be nice to go through my highlights of the semester. There is an unreal amount of great moments but I miraculously managed to narrow it down to 10 so you won’t get overwhelmed by how much fun I’ve had. Here goes…don’t forget to scroll over images! Continue reading

Blog #12: Don’t Just Take My Word For It!

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Having been back in England now for about a month I’m slowly getting back into the swing of English life. It seems surreal that I spent an entire year not being able to read anything in English! Maybe it means I don’t take it for granted anymore!

Anyway, I thought I should round off with some bits and pieces about where you can get more information! Continue reading