6 Things To Know About Spain

1. El Cid is the national hero of Spain. 

Born as Ruy Diz de Vivar, El Cid was an "opportunistic warrior" (Kohen and Elias 61). His goal was to rule the Kingdom of Valencia, so he fought against both Moors and his Christian allies to further his agenda (Fuentes). After his death, this military leader's exploits were lauded in the epic poem "El Cantar de Mio Cid" ("The Song of the Cid"), which made him a legend (El Cid). Many people have even questioned his existence, but he is, in fact, an actual person. He looks pretty intimidating (pictured right), doesn't he?



2. The Spanish people love their art.

Spanish people are "an artistic people, who place great value on creativity and self-expression" (Kohen and Elias 89). Many famous artists, architects, writers, and musicians hail from Spain. For example, Pablo Picasso, born in Malaga, Spain, is considered the "world's most prolific painter," creating 147,800 works of art including paintings, prints, engravings, book illustrations, and sculptures ("Pablo Picasso Biography"). The Weeping Woman, shown left, is an example of cubism, which Picasso pioneered. 



3. Spain is one of the most visited countries in the world.


In fact, Spain is the third most visited country in the world with over 60 million arrivals (Delgado). One of the most visited destinations in Spain is the city of Barcelona. When visiting Barcelona, tourists might explore the Picasso museum, the Sagrada Familia cathedral (pictured right), Playa de la Barceloneta, and Casa Batllo ("Barcelona Travel Guide"). Barcelona is situated “by the Mediterranean Sea and next to the Pyrenees mountains, enjoying the benefits of the sea and the mountain” (“Barcelona Travel Guide”). Pack your bags!


Etc. 
Students, you will have 3 more "Things."

Works Cited 

"Barcelona travel guide." Spain Travel Guides. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.

Delgado, Cristina. "Spain has the world's most competitive tourism industry." EL PAÍS. Síguenos, 07 
      May 2015. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.

El Cid. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.

Kohen, Elizabeth, and Marie Louise. Elias. Spain. New York: Benchmark , 2003. Print.

"Pablo Picasso Biography." Pablo Picasso Paintings, Quotes, and Biography. N.p., 2009. Web. 21 
        Apr. 2017.

Plot Twist!

If you recall, one of the reasons I chose to learn Spanish was that I was likely going to be traveling to a Spanish-speaking country this summer.  Well, that has since changed! We are going to Jamaica and Grand Cayman, both of which are English-speaking countries. However, I will probably be going to a Spanish-speaking country the following summer. This is good news because it gives me more time to learn the language because this is going slowly!

In my last blog, I had the following plan:

1. Continue doing lessons in Duolingo to include finishing Past Tense Verbs, Present Tense 

Verbs 3, Infinitive Verbs 1, and Future Tense Verbs. (That's a lot of verbs!) ✔ Partially 
Completed: I've been slacking! I only completed Past Tense Verbs and part of Present Tense
Verbs. I still feel as though Duolingo is advancing too quickly.  

2. Continue doing lessons in Learn Spanish Step by Step on YouTube. I want to at least 
complete Lesson 5: Days of the Week, Lesson 6: Months of the Year, and Lesson 7: Seasons. 
✔ Completed: I complete all three of these on March 22, 2017. I like these lessons a lot now.
They are short and to the point.  

3. Finally, I will read the chapter on Spanish Lifestyle in the book I checked out from the library.

X Incomplete: I did not read this chapter in the book, but I will!

Looking ahead, I will be attempting to complete the following:

1. Continue Duolingo lessons including finishing Present Tense Verbs, Infinitive Verbs 1, and
Future Tense Verbs

2. I will read the chapter on Spanish Lifestyle in the library book.

3. I will complete lessons 7 (Telling Time), 8 (Subject Pronouns in Spanish), 9 (Ser vs. 
Estar), and 10 (Haber and Tener) on the Spanish Step-By-Step YouTube channel.

I have about a month to go! Hopefully I'll see some progress over the next two weeks! 

I Cooked! (Sort of...)

Progress on Previous Plan

Below is the three-part plan I created in my last blog entry along with the progress I made 
on each one.

1. Since I have read about Spanish cuisine but didn't get a chance to cook anything, I will be 
doing that over the next two weeks. One of my mentors will be in town for Spring Break from 
college, and she offered to cook with me. If you knew anything about my cooking skills, you'd 
know that this will be quite an undertaking. ✔ Completed!  After quite a bit of research on
recipes, my mentor (Lindsey) and I decided to make Carne Asada. We made it on 3/9/17. In
reality, my mentor did pretty much all of the work, so it really turned into me TASTING authentic
Mexican (rather than Spanish) cuisine. Here is the recipe from the website Simply Recipes 
that we used:

Carne Asada Recipe

Print

• Prep time: 10 minutes
• Cook time: 20 minutes
• Marinating time: 2 hours
• Yield: Serves 4-6

If you don't have a grill you can use a well-seasoned grill pan or a large cast iron pan on the stove-top. Heat on high to sear and then lower the heat to finish cooking. Make sure to use your stove vent, searing the steak this way can smoke up the kitchen! If you want, before adding the steak to the marinade, reserve a couple tablespoons of the marinade to drizzle over the finished carne asada to serve.

Ingredients

Steak:

• 1 1/2 to 2 pounds flank or skirt steak
• Olive oil
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Marinade:

• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 2 limes, juiced (about 2 Tbsp)
• 2 Tbsp cider vinegar
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin seed (if have whole, toast and then grind)
• 4 garlic cloves, minced (4 teaspoons)
• 1 jalapeño chile pepper, seeded and minced
• 1/2 bunch fresh cilantro, leaves and stems, finely chopped (great flavor in the stems!), about 1/2 cup

Fixings (optional):

• Chopped avocado
• Lime wedges
• Corn or flour tortillas
• Thinly sliced radishes
• Thinly sliced lettuce
• Pico de gallo salsa

Method

1 Marinate the steak: Whisk to combine the olive oil, soy sauce, lime juice, vinegar, sugar, black pepper, and cumin in a large, non-reactive bowl or baking dish. Stir in the minced garlic, jalapeño, and cilantro. Place the steak in the marinade and turn over a couple of times to coat thoroughly.

Cover in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1-4 hours or overnight (if using flank steak marinate at least 3 hours).

2 Preheat grill: Preheat your grill for high direct heat, with part of the grill reserved with fewer coals (or gas flame) for low, indirect heat. You'll know the grill is hot enough when you can hold your hand above the grill grates for no more than one second. (You can also use a cast iron grill pan on high heat if cooking on the stovetop.)

3 Sear steak on hot side of grill: Remove the steak from the marinade. Lightly brush off most of the bits of cilantro and garlic (do not brush off the oil). Place on the hot side of the grill. Grill the steak for a few minutes only, until well seared on one side (the browning and the searing makes for great flavor), then turn the steak over and sear on the other side. 

4 Move steak to cool side of grill: Once both sides are well seared, move the steak to the cool side of the grill, with any thicker end of the steak nearer to the hot side of the grill. Test with a meat thermometer into the thickest part of the steak, or use your fingers (see The Finger Test to Check the Doneness of Meat). Pull the meat off the grill at 115°F to 120°F for rare, 125°F medium rare, 140°F for medium. The meat will continue to cook in its residual heat. Note that lean flank steak is best cooked rare, while skirt steak can be cooked well without losing moisture or flavor because it has more fat marbling.

5 Tent with foil and let rest: Place the steak on a cutting board, tent with foil and let rest for 10 minutes.

6 Slice steak across the grain of the meat: Use a sharp, long bladed knife (a bread knife works great for slicing meat) to cut the meat. Notice the direction of the grain of the meat and cut perpendicular to the grain. Angle your knife so that your slices are wide and thin.

7 (Optional) Serve with grill toasted tortillas: Warm the tortillas (corn or flour) for 30 seconds on each side in a dry skillet or on the grill, until toasty and pliable. Alternatively, you can warm tortillas in a microwave: heating just one or two at a time, place tortillas on a paper towel and microwave them for 15 to 20 seconds each on high.

(Optional) Serve with pico de gallo (fresh tomato salsa) and chopped avocados.

Read more: http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/carne_asada/#ixzz4ba7kXGvx

Here is the flank steak being cooked. We are fans of cilantro, so we probably went a little overboard with that. 

So I know I said I was going to do the cooking, but at some point my mentor took over. Based on my history in the kitchen (yes, there has been a fire...), this was probably a wise move for her.

Final product! This was absolutely delicious!

2. I will continue with Duolingo. The next categories I will work on are more pronouns, 
numbers (I feel like that should have been done sooner in the program...), and past tense 
verbs. ✔ Completed! I completed object pronouns (3/7/17), numbers (3/8/17), and started 
past tense verbs (3/16/17). Duolingo is getting more difficult. I guess that's the idea, but I'm 
finding that I can go through lessons quickly but not retain much. For example, I'm not sure I 
truly understand past tense verbs. I can answer the questions and complete the lesson, but I 
don't think I could construct sentences properly on my own. Here is a screen shot of part of 
the past tense verb lesson.

See, this is too easy. First of all, Duolingo capitalizes the word that is supposed to be first, so sometimes I don't even think about what the word is. Then for the rest of the sentence, I have a 25% chance of getting it right if I simply guess. I feel like it's too easy to complete the lessons. 

3. I will use the flash cards I received from Ms. Jessup as a supplement to Duolingo. 
✘ INCOMPLETE. I have not yet used the notecards from Miss Jessup. There are so many that
I'm overwhelmed by them! I hope to get to them over the next two weeks.  

Progress on Items Not on Previous Plan

In addition to the above, I also did 3 more lessons on the YouTube channel Learn

Spanish Step by Step. I completed Numbers 0-20, Colors, and Greetings and Goodbyes on 
3/10/17. I'm actually enjoying it. The lessons are short - just a couple minutes long. The 
progression of the lessons makes more sense to me than it does on Duolingo. I plan to use this 
more moving forward.

This is a screenshot of the Greetings and Goodbyes lesson. The lesson was a minute and a half.

I also did some research on 3/6/17 and learned that I will never get to 100% fluency on 
Duolingo! It's not a thing. Most sources I read said to basically ignore the fluency percentage 
because it can be discouraging. My fluency hasn't changed significantly according to Duolingo, 
but I've accomplished quite a bit. 

As I mentioned, I did quite a bit of research on 3/3/17 to determine which recipe we would 
make. Due to my lack of experience in the kitchen, I needed something pretty easy. Many 
of the recipes were very complex and time-consuming. Carne Asada was an easy and tasty 
option!

New Plan

My plan for the next two weeks is as follows:

1. Continue doing lessons in Duolingo to include finishing Past Tense Verbs, Present Tense 

Verbs 3, Infinitive Verbs 1, and Future Tense Verbs. (That's a lot of verbs!)

2. Continue doing lessons in Learn Spanish Step by Step on YouTube. I want to at complete
Lesson 5: Days of the Week, Lesson 6: Months of the Year, and Lesson 7: Seasons. 

3. Finally, I will read the chapter on Spanish Lifestyle in the book I checked out from the library.

I'm looking forward to continuing to learn Spanish. I'm about 
90% certain I'll be heading to Mexico this summer, so I will be 
putting it to good use!