Bella Bella, Molto Bene

Wow Italy was a adventure for the record books. I have always wanted to visit this interesting boot, and I`m so glad that it was able to happen with my family. My Ideas of what this place would be like were shattered and replaced with the reality that the way we perceive a culture is often inaccurate.
Seeing my family for the first time in 3 months was wonderful. Skype, emails and letters only go so far for communication. I prefer the real face to face stuff.

Our trip started out in Rome. First off I would like to say that the Sistine Chapel is far from overrated. Everyone should really make an effort to see this in their life time. it definitely didn`t disappoint. Aside from all the sights a real high light for me in Rome was the meals. The food was pretty good, authentic and what not, but just spending hours catching up with Grace and the Padres made it all the more better. We also got the chance to meet up with McCauley Bennet`s family(and Summer) who were visiting Rome as well. It was refreshing to meet up with some more South Carolinians.

After Rome we headed north to the Cinque Terre, which translates to five villages. these five fishing villeges are located on the Italian Riviera close to Genova, and the beauty of these towns rivals anything I had seen previously. We spent some time hiking and enjoying the landscape as well as a nice change in pace after Rome.

Lastly we headed to Florence where we were all reunited with Ryan, Andrew, JD, Porter, McCauley, Summer and other Clemson friends. The combination of the tuscan landscape and the history made this my favorite stop on the trip. Seeing David in the Academia was a big highlight, as well as viewing the city from Piazza di Michelangelo and Fiesole. Mom, Grace and I enjoyed haggling with the street venders, and I am perfectly okay with saying that we all purchased leather bags. Mine very masculine of course. The day trip we took through Tuscany to Siena was very memorable as well. The Duomo there, while not the biggest, is one of the most impressive churches I have ever see. This trip really revived me and I returned to Sevilla this past Saturday ready for more adventure and wonderful experience.


I also wanted to thank everyone for praying for us while in Rome. Sorry about not getting in contact with you all after the earthquake, we really had no idea how bad it was until we reached Florence 3 days later. Thanks for your concerns.


I love all of you

-rob

My Trip up North to the Land of the Frenchies

So the reason I have not written in a fairly long time is that my computer died. I know very sad, but life will go on, and lately life has been pretty sweet despite the loss of my electronic companion.

Going to Paris is not something I have dreamed about since being a little kid. I know that it has the reputatio

n for being very beautiful city among other things, but it wasn’t on the top of my list of places to visit. Luckily my friends here were looking out for me and talked me into going. What an amazing city it turned out to be. My trip up north to Paris started out swimmingly. Traveling to a new country for the first time there is always some anxieties, but those were quickly thwarted when the first view off the metro was the glowing Notre Dame (our lady) dominating the night sky.

The next morning

I hopped on a train to Brussels to meet up with some of my Belgian friends that I made last semester at Clemson. Martial Boland greeted me at the train station, and the whole time I was in Brussels, which was only about 25 hrs, he was the most hospitable/ accommodating person I’ve run into so far here in Europe. He housed my friends Porter and David as well as me for the evening, and showed us a wonderful time in his rainy city. He took us to see the EU parliament building, the Manikin piss, and to a famous pub called Delirium. I also got the chance to catch up with Dorian and Laurence some of my other friends who studied abroad in Clemson last semester. It was wonderful to switch places and be in their city.

The next day Porter, David and I caught a train back to Paris where we spent the next three days soaking in the sites and the atmosphere. We visited the Louver, the Orsey, Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, Arc de Triumph, the Eiffel tower, and more.

The highlight of the trip for me was dinner on Saturday night. My friend JD did his research and he led a perfect mix of Ole Miss and Clemson Friends to a little place close to the Luxembourg Park. The food and the atmosphere were perfect, and the combination of that and the company made it one of my all-time best meals. Seeing my friends Graham, Porter, McCauley and Summer was wonderful.

My last night in Paris JD, Porter and I wanted to save a little euro on dinner, so we purchased some baguettes and cheese and a cheap bottle of Bordeaux which we ate and drank under the Eiffel tower. Maybe a little cliché but also another experience I will remember for a long time.

El pasado fin de semana fue increíble

Around Wednesday night I realized that I had nothing planned for the weekend, so I called up a couple friends and we decided that we would rent a car and drive west the following evening. We were a bit intimidated going to a country where they speak a language that none of us speak, but we quickly found out how friendly the Portuguese are. We had to buy a map on the way and we met some nice people in the gas station who preferred speaking English over Spanish. This was actually a common theme for the weekend. We were lost then made friends with some locals and they show us the way. We ended up in Lagos, Portugal Thursday night and the next day was far greater than incredible.
Friday morning we woke up and ate Crepes prepared by the hostel owner's mother. She made us feel like family, and ever taught us some Portuguese. After Breakfast we were ready for the beach or really cliffs I should say. We enjoyed a full day of hiking around, down, on and through the cliffs down to the beautiful wall surrounded beaches. We spent 5 hours just soaking in the beauty. That night we decided to go to the owner of the hostels restaurant, which was across the street, and I had my first burger since arriving in europe. Maybe it was just my Spain goggles but this burger was one of the best burgers I’ve ever tasted. This is something that I am going to try and recreated when I get home. Our plan was to only spend one night in Lagos, but the slow pace and friendliness of the town was enticing and required more of our time, so we easily caved and spent another night before heading to Lisbon.
The next morning we pilled in to car after a wonderful breakfast of crepes and a concert consisting of banjo music. One of the guys working in the hostel played the banjo, so we convinced him we had to hear, so he played for us and even gave us his album. The drive to Lisbon was a whirl of beautiful rolling hills, good conversations, with soundtrack consisting of Banjo. Upon first arrival to Lisbon I thought I was in San Francisco due to the very large red bridge (looks freakishly similar to the Golden Gate) as well as the bay that the town is surrounding. The town is also somewhat hilly, definitely not as hilly as San Fran, but still interesting to one who is a new in using a manual transmission! I freaked out a little bit but my buddies encouraged me and kept me from losing my head, although I about lost my cool a couple times. Lisbon was incredible in a different way than Lagos. The beauty of the structures that we came across stand out in my mind. We watched the sun set from the Castillo do San Jorge, named after my father, and this was quite the view. This castle was built by the Moors around 1000 as a fortress, so strategically it was built on the highest hill around. The reason the sunset was so great was because we could see the whole bay/city in front of it.
Saturday night we met up with some friends who we study with in Sevilla at there hostel and decide to combine our group with a group of Brazilians that were staying there. Best decision we could have made. They took us to a place where live MPB (Brazilian acoustic pop) music was being played and we learned how to samba (or at least watched it) ha. At the end of the night we all invited one another to visit in our respective countries, and after exchanging information I think it may happen some day.
I hope everyone back home is enjoying their spring break! I miss you all and can’t wait to see. My time here really seems to be flying by. Already I’ve been here 2 months and I have seen so much, but I still have so much more to see and experience.


Have a wonderful week

-rob

Hermano Oso

Spain has yet to fail me when I’m looking for something exciting to get into. There seems to be endless things to see and experience here, which I think is true for everywhere. Here it just happens to be a little more apparent.
















I had my birthday a few days ago. Thanks everyone for the notes/gifts it’s been great hearing from you. For the birthday a group of us decided to scurry on down to Cadiz to experience Carnival. Come to find out Cadiz has the third largest carnival celebration in the world. Only Rio De Janeiro and Trinidad trump this crazy festival. There were upwards of a million people in costumes partying, dancing, drinking, and shouting in the streets. All of it was pretty overwhelming, and even though I’m glad I went, my first visit will also be my last to Cadiz for carnival.













The best part of turning 21 was the next night Ryan and JD took me out to eat at place that a friend suggested. We sat and ate for almost 2 hours just enjoying the food and one another’s company. After dinner we grabbed some ice cream and walked through the narrow streets. Much more my scene than Carnival.













Some Clemson friends, Korie and Annie, made their way here to Sevilla recently to see the sights and check out this baller city. Their program planned on taking them to most of the staple sights around the city, but there was one area they did not go that I had to show them before they hit the road. The Plaza de Espana and the Parque Maria Luisa are probably my favorite two places in town. The plaza de Espana, which is the building in the picture at the top of the page, is amazing for its sheer size but also some very detailed tile work. The park, which is right in front of the plaza, has turned out to be a great place to study as well as read, take naps, and people watch. I’m going to try and set up the hammock that I brought in the park here soon.

The city of Sevilla sent me a birthday gift in the form of a tarjeta de Sevici. This probably means nothing to you right? Well this city of Sevilla has a public bike system. By that I mean there are bike stations all over the city for the publics use. With this new trajeta de sevici or "bike card" that I received in the mail I can bike around town with ease, but still enjoy the awesome sights that you sometimes lose in a vehical. My buddy JD and I are excited because ridding around on a Sevici makes us look more like locals, because tourists don’t generally use them.










Recently a few of us took a day trip to Ronda. The old city of Ronda is a beautiful White town that is situated up on a cliff. It is connected back to the rest of the city with a bridge that looks like it’s out of lord of the rings. I can’t even imagine how they built these buildings and this bridge so close to the edge of the cliffs. I’m sure Ernest Hemingway wondered the same thing while he spent some time writing there. Ronda is were he wrote most of the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The oldest bull ring still in use today resides in Ronda, which we had to go see. I learned a lot more about the Spanish art of bullfighting through the museum attached to the ring.

These are just some of the main things that I've been doing. I'd love to talk to you all face to face about whatever via Skype. my skype name is robjclayton. hope to here from you!

Grace and Peace

-rob

PS. I’d love to have my little sister with me at Clemson University next year! Just sayin

Belleza!

I got a chance to hit the slopes this past weekend. Shreddin pow pow is south Spain who would've thunk it! The Sierra Nevada mountains really surprised me. Going skiing this weekend meant going back to visit Granada, and this time my high school buddy Josh Stansell was there. Granada is a pretty cool place. If you take Asheville and throw a bunch of college students at it and then add a couple thousand years of history and then move it to Spain you have Granada. We went to a tetreia on Friday night. A tetreia is a Moroccan/ Arab style restaurant, that specializes in Tea. We had to try the tea and hookah in this dim and rosy atmosphere. Getting to hang out with Josh reminded me of when I first moved to Greenville from Ohio. He and a few other neighborhood kids showed up at the door one day with BB guns and asked my mom if I was around because they wanted me to go hunt Sasquatch with them. ha! I was nice to grab some tapas with an old friend.
I also caught the Spin England match this past week. What a experience! Europeans are so serious about there futbol. We really have nothing that compares to it in the states. I'm so glad that I got the chance to experience this. The Spanish fans all cheered in unison, and the stadium was shaking like a Polaroid picture, but to be honest it gets louder in death valley back in tiger town. That being said it is still was quite the experience.
One really cool thing that they have in Spain and not in the states are huge light switches on the walls. These come in handy and should be adopted back home. Unfortunately I spent a few days over Christmas break changing the light switches in our house, so I don't think this would be very responsible move for the Clayton family.

Leo continues to make wonderful/large meals. I'm getter more chances to practice my spanish both at home and out and about, and I'm starting to loose the fear of messing up with the language, which I'm guessing must be necessary in getting better.

much love

-rob

Delight yourself in the Lord; and he will give you the desires of your heart

psalms 37:4

Greetings from across the pond!

So my Buddy Ryan is also sharing his Spain story with friends and family back home. The title of his blog is La Vida Dulce or “The Sweet Life”. I think that this blog title is a pretty accurate picture of my time spent here so far. The challenges of adapting to a new place are fading away rapidly, which making the small victories that much sweeter. I haven’t even been here a month, but I have experienced quite a bit, and I’m looking forward to more.

These structures, painting and works of art are stupid cool/incredible. I was talking to a friend recently about all these amazing things and how I don’t really grasp the concept of time. By that I mean I can really only imagine what 100 years might be, and anything past that it is difficult to wrap my mind around. It’s almost unfathomable thinking about what it must have been like in the 4th century when the Romans were still hanging out on this peninsula. Thoughts and conversation like this cannot help but lead to the topic of eternity. Focusing on things that will last forever is something that I’ve been convicted of lately. How often do we talk about the weather or the score of game and fail to really connect with people. I guess it’s out of ease or the desire to avoid a potential awkward situation that our conversations stick to arbitrary things. I know this last week I’ve really connected conversationally with a few new people, something that I have not been particularly comfortable with in the past.

So as you may know there is a tradition in Spain called Siesta! Siesta generally happens between 2 and 5 in the afternoon. This is a time were most businesses shut down and people go home for a long lunch and maybe a 30 min power nap. I guess I had in my head that the nap was the most important part of la siesta. After 2 days of napping for over 2 hours Leo (my spainish Madre) gave me a hard time. She told me that I couldn’t be doing that, with a sweet joking tone. Needless to say I’m learning more and more from this Culture.
I'm starting the process of planing out some trips, and I’m finding that there are a lot more details than I thought in all this mess. Fortunately I’m not going it alone. Mr. JD Stark has already trotted some of the grounds where we will be heading, and Mr. Viner is a straight ninja so I’m sure we’ll figure it out.

Miss ya'll

Paz,

-rob

p.s. If you get a chance to watch The Spain England Match tomorrow I think Its 4 O'clock eastern. I'll Be the one with Red and Yellow face paint wearing the Spainsh Flag around my Neck as a Cape.

Vale! Venga!

Sorry for the long delay. Let me fill you in on life in Sevilla.
I arrived here a little over a week ago and have not quite fully adjusted to Spanish city life, but I’m getting there. I don’t mind using public transportation, staying out late, sharing a very small room, and living with a very sweet older Spanish lady named Lenor. Actually these are some of the things I really enjoy about this place.













There is a comfort in the chaos that is public transportation. I really never know what I’m going to get when I step on the bus, but a lot of the time I have the chance to practice a little Spanish and meet new/interesting people. It has been great.

As far as going out goes, the Spanish really know what they are doing. The last two nights I’ve gone out I didn’t leave the discothèque until 5 a.m. and the places were still jam packed. It’s frowned upon big time to be intoxicated so no worries mom and dad, I’m trying to give Americans a better image over here. One last thing about going out to dance clubs, none of the Spaniards really know how to dance. Maybe I’m going to the wrong places, but this has really surprised me. That being said I’m trying to share the wealth of dance knowledge that my friend Story so graciously shared with me.













So a lot of people told me that everything is smaller in Europe, due to the large amount of people in a small area I guess, but it still has been a shock. The cars, showers, supply of hot water, and even the people (not many fat people here) are all examples. The only thing that’s a lot larger here are the sugar packets you get with your espresso/café con leche. I mean huge! So the room is a little smaller, but not bad at all, and I’m sharing it with a fun guy named Andrew who is from Virginia. We have had a good time exploring the city together.

And Lenor! Muy Amable! She is really taking care of me. The meals are very different but they have been amazing. I have liked everything except for the rice pudding, and Andrew ate the rest of mine so Leo (Lenor) wouldn’t know. This past Thursday I was enjoying all there is to enjoy with a full stomach, when I told Leo how much I enjoyed the meal. She gave my belly a little pat and said “te gusta mi cocina” you like my cooking. Si claro. Ha she is great.

















One thing that I have missed dearly is the community that comes from being around other believers in Christ. Ryan and I met yesterday in Plaza de Jerez to pray for our time here and also to listen to a pod cast. I left really challenged and refreshed. I’m stoked to have Ryan and JD along for this adventure.

Sevilla is a large City, but even here the Spanish way of life over rules the fast paced life that normally accompanies a city. At first I was somewhat frustrated with the way things were done here. Maybe frustrated isn’t a good way to describe it. Unproductive/inefficient are the words I used to describe it to a friend. But my new friend JD helped me see it from another light. It’s not really that they are inefficient they just value different things here and one happens to be not rushing. Who am I, a 20 year old America, to say the Spanish have it wrong. I think I have a lot to learn from them.

In short it’s very different than Clemson, South Carolina, but I’m really growing to love Sevilla, and I know I have a lot to learn while I am here.

Thanks for the prayers

-rob