Living costs

How much does it cost to live in Alcalá de Henares? In the beginning of the month I took 800€ from the ATM and expected it to be enough to live one month. On the last day of the month I have 150€ left. I Spent all the money in cash expect the 25€ monthly payment of Floorball and I have to also include the electricity and water costs which I did not pay this month. This means that living one month costs 700 euros for me. What does this sum of money include? I have not made list of my spending but I am going to tell what I can remember. 300€ for rent, 25€ for costs, 45€ for la liga match entrance, 25€ monthly payment of floorball, 50€ public transportation, 12€ haircut and the rest 243€ mostly for eating.

City of storks

Storks in their nests

I have not really presented the city of Alcalá de Henares and now I am going to write something about it. The population of Alcalá is about 200 000 habitants and here is especially a lot of Romanian immigrants about 20% of the population. The city is known of the storks which nests you can see on the roofs. The second longest covered street in Europe is in Alcalá. There are many historical buildings but I have not yet visited maybe the most famous one the house of Cervantes. The university Alcalá was founded in 1499 and faculties in the center are still situated in the historical buildings.

Hairy legs

After I mentioned that it has not been hot in Spain since that day it has been actually hot. Because of the weather I have discovered that some men remove the hair from their legs. At least it seems to be much more popular among Spanish men than among Finnish men. Football players are showing example by removing hair from their legs. Then I asked from one woman who prefers legs without hair what she thinks about my legs. She said that my legs look fine because I do not have dark and thigh hair like Spanish men.

Finals

Silver medal

Picture from the first final match

This weekend we played the finals of the floorball. Two victories was needed to win the championship of Spain. Our opponent Leganes have won the title many years in row. We lost the first match 8-0 so there was a lot improve for the second match. The second match we played mucch better and we were fighting for the victory. We had great audience which supported us for the whole match. In the last minutes Leganes offered us chance to win by taking two penalties when the game was 6-4 but we were not able to use our opportunity. Finally we lost the match 8-4 and received silver medals and a trophy.

Exams of the second semester

Lessons have ended and exams are coming up. I am going to have six exams during the following four weeks. In the second semester group work was required in all the subjects. I do not find the content what make in the group works very useful and the listening mostly boring presentations about those. I think that group work is good way to get to know some new people in the class if you do not form the group with the friends you already know.

Hole on the wall

The hole

There is construction work going on right next to my flat which causes sometimes pretty loud noise. When they are hammering the wall on the other side it sounds they might be coming through. Finally they came through by making a small hole which you can see in the picture. Next day they covered the hole and they will come to paint it later on. Destroying of the wall on the other side will still continue. The damage was made by EIC Construcciones.

It is not hot in Spain

Library of the law faculty

The weather in Spain have been disappointment this year. Lots of rainy days, not many hot days and at the moment it is more hot in Finland than Spain. I thought it was not even possible to have warmer weather in Finland than in Spain. My friends have said that this year it have rained exceptionally lot. There is Spanish saying "nueve meces invierno, tres meces infierno" which means "nine months winter, three months hell".

Yesterday night I went to the library of the law faculty. The library is open now 24/7 because exams are coming up. The photo is taken in the mid night as you can see from the photo, people like to study during the night.

Hello hottie!

Yesterday Atlético Madrid won the Europe league and you were able to here some people celebrating in the streets of Alcalá. Some singing and horns of the cars but it did not disturb too much my sleeping.

People tend to greet in Spain by greeting "Hola guapo/a". The greeting translated to English means "Hello beautiful/handsome". I have heard this greeting in the streets when people greet their friends and in the market when salespersons are greeting their clients. I wanted to point this out because it is said to the people even they are not good looking. I just think that the compliment loses its meaning if you shout it out to the everyone. Well it is not good idea to shout all the good looking people that they are good looking if you do not know them.

Sports week

Beach volley
Floorball

Students of physical education have organized an even called sports week where students for a team and play five different sports. I joined one with Spanish students who chose Floorball, beach volley, beach hand ball, beach football and prisoner ball unfortunately I could participate playing only beach volley and floorball. The team which collects the most points from all the different sports wins the competition.

Yesterday our team lost all the three matches in beach football, beach handball and prisoner ball. I brought my own stick to play floorball but the organizers did not let me play with my stick because it was not the same color as the stick of my team mates. Then I asked what if I bring a stick with the same color then they said that it is not still equal with the others sticks. They really wanted prevent me playing with better stick and made me angry. Then when the game started I could notice the strange rules they had created for floorball. There was not rink and corner shots were given. As you can see from the photo goals were really small but goalkeepers were still allowed. Goalkeepers were prohibited to touch the ground with knees or hands. Finally I played with bad borrowed stick of the university and we won the match 2-1. I have to say that playing with these sticks and rules was something unexpected. Tomorrow we will have a next match.

We also played beach volley today and won the first match. The next match we lost so we are only continuing in the floorball.

Playoff matches

Floorball field in El escorial

This weekend we had two playoff matches against Fuengirola. With two victories other team could qualify to the final. On Saturday we won the match 5-4 by maintaining the lead what we got for the first time in the match. On Sunday we had one player less because of one injury. In the second game we were leading almost the whole time but the opponent were able to draw even our three goal lead. Finally we won the match 9-7 and scored the last goal to the empty net and reached the place in the final.

Tortilla

I am going to introduce you one typical Spanish dish which is called tortilla. Tortilla is very simple to make and you need only four ingredients to prepare it. The ingredients are eggs, oil, potatoes and salt. Finding these ingredients is not hard therefore you can prepare it almost anywhere. Different versions of tortilla can be made by adding sausage, onion or other ingredients.

La liga Match

Inside the Stadium

Santiago Bernabeu from the Outside

Finally I saw a match of the Spanish League and reached a goal which I had set to myself before starting the exchange year. I went to see the match of Real Madrid against Osasuna with JoseCa and Alex. We paid 45 euros for our tickets. The match was very exciting and entertaining but the atmosphere was not as high as in the match of Spain against Argentina. In the stadium is screen but replays are not shown. It would be good to see replays also at the stadium.