Hannah’s Epic Euro Summer 🌄🐚🌻

Hello hello! It’s your favorite time of the week again! Welcome back to ​The Guitarrón Chronicles hosted by your fellow guitarrónes, Danielle and Hannah! This week, we’ll hear from none other than the legend herself, our very own guitarrón Hannah!

‧₊˚❀‧₊˚. Hannah’s Summer Update 7-12-26 ‧₊˚❀‧₊˚.

For my update, I wanted to show you all what I’ve been doing during study abroad! I just got back from about two months in Europe 🤯 It was my first time out of the country (except for Toronto, I love you Toronto) so there was definitely a lot of culture shock. But I am so extremely grateful I had the opportunity to explore and learn about other cultures outside of the US! I hope to go back with my family one day so we can share the same incredible experiences I had.

Paris

I spent a week in Paris on a solo trip before my study abroad program started. On top of never having been out of the country, I have also never gone on a solo trip, so there were many new experiences. I was a bit apprehensive…but also very cautious so everything was fine 👍

I got to visit some AMAZING museums, including the Claude Monet House and Gardens (wow), as well as the Musée d’Orsay which I think was one of my favorite experiences of the whole trip.

I also tried escargot, which was much more tolerable than I had expected. In general, the French brasseries were okay; but most of my  nutrition came from ham and cheese croissants or quiches from local bakeries 😋 I just couldn’t resist the myriad of patisseries and boulangeries, they were too good and too cheap.

Spain

The purpose of my program was to study medical Spanish and practice basic clinical skills like suturing and patient evaluations. I went to Pamplona, Spain with other Rice students, where we worked on a research project while learning and speaking only in Spanish to study intercultural differences between the US and Spain. I learned so much about gastronomy in Navarra, including how to make a tortilla de patatas, as well as lots of Spanish medieval history. As a linguistics major, I was also particularly interested in Euskera (Basque), which is an official language in northern Navarra. The only phrase I picked up was maite zaitut ("I love you"), but that could be pretty useful, no?

My favorite part about the experience were the excursions. I went with my friends to neighboring cities like San Sebastian, Bilbao, and Barcelona where we tried many pintxos (tapas), visited the beach, and explored famous markets. I also hiked part of the Camino de Santiago with my class, where we were dropped off in a small town in the mountains and told to find our way back to Pamplona 💀 there were signs so there was no way we were going to get lost, but the nature of the situation was pretty funny. I walked almost 40k steps that day. Very cool!

While Pamplona is world famous for the Running of the Bulls, I decided to go back to the US before it

started. I was a little sad about missing such a huge cultural phenomenon, but luckily I got a small taste of it in my host family’s neighborhood, Mutilva, where there was a carnival with a miniature version of the encierro. I’m not sure if I agree with the ethics of the practice, but I’m glad I could learn more about it.

Home

While I had a lot of fun in Spain, I’m glad to be back home now. I’ve been spending time with my parents as well as driving downtown to see my brother in Chicago where he’s been staying for his summer internship.

I’m also currently my dog’s caretaker, since she just had surgery on one of her hind legs :( Everyone wish Dixie a speedy recovery 🫵

The rest of my summer will be spent studying for Organic Chemistry II, preparing for O-Week as a Peer Academic Advisor, and planning the greatest year for mariachi of all time 🔥 We have big things planned guys, big things 😈

Thanks for reading! See ya next week!!!

Un abrazo,

Hannah

What a beautiful summer you've had so far, Hannah. It sounds like you did quite a lot of exploring, I hope you saved some of those yummy treats for the rest of us back home~~ Maite zaitut and we are wishing Dixie a very speedy recovery (she's rocking the shaved leg)!

Ciao until next time,

Hannah & Danielle