General Reflections

I chose this opportunity to study Spanish in Spain because I feel that it's important to be exposed to other ideas, cultures, and languages. Since I've been at Vanderbilt I haven't had the opportunity to take a foreign language class and I felt that it would be a good idea to refresh my Spanish skills. In my opinion, there's no better way to learn a language than actually being in a country that speaks the language with a host family, so that was part of my reasoning for choosing Spain. If this program had only been a Spanish class it would have been great program and I'm sure I would have enjoyed my time here but the opportunity to look at engineering issues in a global context really appealed to me as well. Being able to learn engineering vocabulary and how to communicate in an engineering mindset are tools that can be helpful to me no matter where I'm at and I'm glad that this program gave me the opportunity to learn this as well.

I learned so much about myself from being on this trip. One thing that might not seem like much but that I was really glad about was the fact that I can still remember Spanish after not taking it for a couple of years. There were a couple of times where I was in tough situations and really needed to be able to communicate with people, especially early on in my trip, and I was surprised that I was actually being understood. I also learned to be more willing to try things that I thought were weird and strange. I remember being eating dinner my hostess's host one night and she asked my roommate and I to try a blood sausage. It happened to be not so good and one of the few things she made that I really disliked but it brought all of us together so much because it sparked a conversation about foods we liked and didn't like here, foods in the U.S., our lives back home compared to Pamplona, etc.

I enjoyed my time so much in Spain that I really hope that back at Vanderbilt I will have opportunities to speak Spanish with people so that I don't get rusty. This experience has definitely made me want to explore renewable energies more and due to the flexibility that I have with my Engineering Science major I'm very hopeful that I will be able to take classes on this subject when I get back to Vandy. Some other goals that I have are to maybe go back to Pamplona next year and do this program again so that I can improve my Spanish even more.