When I started college I knew sometime during my four years at Pitt I was going to go abroad. I'm a language major and I love to travel and see new places so it just made sense. As a freshman I really wanted to go somewhere where they speak Arabic (the other language I study) but alas sophomore year came and so did the Arab Spring. It just looked like studying in the Middle East wasn't in my future....
At the end of sophomore year things changed. It was like I knew what I wanted from my college experience. Already a declared Linguistics major I added an Arabic Language certificate, a minor in Administration of Justice, and--much to my surprise--a Spanish major. I loved Spanish in high school but mostly because I had such an amazing teacher (shout-out to Señor Keller). Studying the Spanish language in college wasn't as awesome. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the language--it's my heritage (yes I know you couldn't tell but I'm half Puerto Rican). Not only that though it's a beautiful language and quickly becoming a very, very important one living in today's world. I just didn't feel myself connecting with the college professors I had. Classes were easy but I just couldn't see myself working towards a 38-credit major along with another 30-credit one--no way was I giving up Linguistics. Eventually though after some tears, talking with my parents and friends, and some major planning I decided I could do it. My dad was even okay with me staying in college for an extra semester so I could finish studying everything I wanted to.
So with my new Spanish major declared I knew I had to get down to work crossing off the classes I needed to take in order to graduate--let me tell you that's been a process. I still had study abroad in the back of my mind but now I knew I needed to go somewhere that I could take Spanish courses that would count towards my major. I also really wanted to go somewhere I could maybe take an Arabic course as well. So logically I chose Spain...
Where in Spain though? I knew Barcelona, Madrid, and Sevilla but besides those I barely remembered the geography from high school Spanish. Thankfully an older girl in one of my Arabic classes--who also happened to be a Spanish major--was about to head to Granada, Spain for a semester. She was talking about how the University of Granada had Arabic classes that international students could take.
That cinched it for me. I was going to go to Granada.
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