Study Abroad Programs Blog

Chichen Itza & Xel-Ha

By Dana Heffernan – Guest Blogger

When my husband and I chose the Riviera Maya for our honeymoon, we were looking for a place to get away to and relax after a hectic year of wedding planning. We were pleasantly surprised by the interesting day trips available to those staying in the Riviera Maya and Cancun. We chose to take two day trips: Chichen Itza and Xel-Ha.

Chichen Itza is an ancient Mayan city about 2 hours west of the Riviera Maya. You get there by tour bus and the day's activities will vary with each tour company. On our tour, we spent the morning at Chichen Itza, stopped for an authentic Mexican lunch and swim and then headed back to the Riviera Maya. You can take a guided tour of the main ruins of Chichen Itza or walk around on your own. I recommend the guided tour as there is now information posted at any of the ruins. However, do take time to explore as much of the ruins as you can. The city is actually several square miles and the ruins give you a picture of life during the height of the Mayan empire. The big attraction at Chichen Itza is the main temple. Usually, you are allowed to climb to the top. The view from the top of the temple is fantastic, but it is not for those afraid of heights. There is no railing at the top platform, so you do have to watch your step. During the spring and fall equinox, a celebration is held at Chichen Itza and the temple is closed to climbers. However, visitors during the equinox can stay until dusk for the celebration and to see the sun cast a "serpent" on the temple. The "serpent" only appears during the equinox due to the position of the sun and the geometry of the temple stairs. It gets very hot at the ruins and there is very little shade, so be sure to bring sunscreen, some type of protection for your head and water.

Xel-Ha is an ecological water park that is south of Cancun and the Riviera Maya. You can spend the day at Xel-Ha or have a combined tour that visits the Mayan ruins at Tulum in the morning and the Xel-Ha in the afternoon. Xel-Ha offers a variety of activities from tubing and snorkeling down the river into the inlet to kayaking, scuba diving and snorkeling in the inlet to swimming with dolphins. There are also rope swings and cliff jumping spots. Since we had been to Chichen Itza, my husband and I did not go to Tulum but spent the entire day at Xel-Ha. If you like the water and enjoy snorkeling I would recommend spending the entire day at the water park. We had a wonderful day there. The fish are friendly and have the most beautiful colors I have seen outside of the Great Barrier Reef. I would highly recommend Xel-Ha and Chichen Itza if you have the time while you stay in either Cancun or the Riviera Maya. They are both worth the trip!

Bordeaux Facts

By Beth Klemick

Did you know...that there are 10,000 chateaux in Bordeaux?! Bordeaux wine is named for the city and has been produced there since the 8th century. This city is known as the wine capital of the world. But did you also know that Bordeaux is one of Europe's military space and aeronautics research and construction centers? It is also a university town, with four universities devoted to natural science, medicine, liberal arts, and political sciences and law. Quite a city to check out!

Machu Picchu

By Elizabeth Gregory

The ruins at Machu Picchu in Peru has been on my "must see" list since I was little and first saw the pictures of it. A few years ago, I had the opportunity to finally see them. In all honesty, pictures do not do them justice. Going from Cusco, it is about a 3-4 hour train ride. Why so long? You're actually going around the bases of the huge mountains in the Andes. There are different classes of trains which range in price and comfort. My train was the "backpacker train" and was pretty basic. Although I must admit it reminded me of an old version of what the orient express train must have looked like in its heyday (complete with small crystal chandeliers overhead and drapes on the windows).

After exiting the train, you walk a little ways to a bus that takes you up the mountain where the ruins are. Up steep switchbacks you climb until you reach the top. There you will depart from the bus and hike to the entrance. When I went, it was rainy out and we were up in the clouds practically.

Once inside, the views were spectacular. The grass was so green and alpacas were sitting on the lawn just enjoying the peacefulness. Although the tour group itself was rather large, the leader was very informative and kept the tour interesting. The ruins are quite extensive and it's hard to believe that this was once an entire city perched on a mountain.

I absolutely loved this experience. It was one of the most magical, breathtaking combinations of natural and man-made beauty I have ever seen.

The European Union

By Beth Klemick

The European Union, formerly known as the European Communities (EC) or the European Economic Community (EEC), was founded on November 1, 1993 to enhance political, economic and social cooperation amongst 25 democratic countries known as member states. The Union today has a common single market, consisting of a customs union, a single currency (the euro) managed by the European Central Bank (adopted by 12 of the 25 member states), a Common Agricultural Policy, a common trade policy, a Common Fisheries Policy, and a Common Foreign and Security Policy.

There are four important EU institutions which are comprised of the Council of the European Union, the European Commission, the European Court of Justice and the European Parliament. Althought the European Parliament origins date back to the 1950s, it was not until 1979 that its members were elected by the citizens of the European Union to represent their interest. Since 1979, elections into the European Parliament have taken place in five year intervals with the last election held in 2004 which returned 732 Members from the 25 European Union countries.

The European Union's activities cover all areas of public policy, from health and economic policy to foreign affairs and defense, the extent of the EU powers differs between many countries. As an example, take the United States - it will always be categorized and function as a constitution-based federal republic. The EU on the other hand can be categorized as a federation, a confederation, or an international organization depending on the area of interest. Probably the most important current issue of the EU today is establishing the European Constitution. To date, the future of a consitution is unknown. Countries like France and the Netherlands have failed to win popular support which has caused many other member countries to delay their own ratifications procedures.

The European Union has been extending its influence east; Romania and Bulgaria are scheduled to become members in 2007. Supporters of the European Union argue that the growth of the EU is a force for peace and democracy. With that said, there is much controversy as the EU continues to grow eastward and the candidate countries' accessions are more difficult. Attempts to unite the nations of Europe precede modern times. Given Europe's collections of languages and cultures, these attempts usually involved military subjugation of unwilling nations, leading to instability. Today, however, with the establishment of European Union, things like passport customs checks have been abolished at most of the EU's internal borders, thus creating a single space of mobility for EU citizens to live, travel, work and invest.

Check out Wikipedia for more information on the EU.

Polish Dress

In present-day Poland about sixty folkloristic regions are recognized, each with their own specific traditional costumes. In some areas, like Podhale, Kurpie, Opoczno and Sieradz, the tradition still lives and the costumes are still made and worn at holidays. Many other regions don't have a living tradition. The costumes are still made, but mostly for dance-ensembles and choirs. In some regions the traditional costumes had to be reconstructed from paintings, museum collections and written accounts.

The Polish traditional costumes are characterized by a very colorful presentation and a great diversity. Every costume has variations (sometimes very small), often containing information about for instance the town of origin, being married or not and wealth. Nowadays it not always clearwhat function certain details have (had).

Some properties of the costumes are more or less common. In Mazowsze and central Poland the lines and color stripes of the womens' costumes are running vertically. In the south-east these are running horizontally. In the west of Poland the men wear their shirts in their trousers, while the men from the east wear their wide shirts over their trousers with a certain belt. The size of this belt is tells how high from the mountains the man originates.

The most famous costume is that of Krakow. Therefore it is often seen as a national costume. Almost every beginning folk ensemble starts with this costume. Unfortunately it is no longer part of the living folklore. Source

If you're interested in other traditional or historical dress or costumes from all over the world, check out The Costumer's Manifesto.

The Pantheon in Rome

My Art History class is currently covering the art and architecture of the Roman Empire, and I was blown away by what I learned about the Pantheon.

First of all, the Pantheon we now know isn't the original. The original, much smaller Pantheon was built by Marcus Agrippa (close friend and son-in-law of Augustus) between 27 and 25 BC, and you can see Agrippa's name on the newer Pantheon, which was built by the Roman emperor Hadrian between 118 and 125 AD.

The Pantheon is the realization of the full potential of Roman engineering. Their development of the arch gave us the dome, and the dome atop the Pantheon, at 142 feet in diameter, is larger than the one on the White House. The Romans, who were the first to use concrete, really mastered the craft in the Pantheon, which we can witness just by looking at how well it's been preserved over the thousands of years it's been standing.

Las Fallas

By Anne-Marie Dingemans

One of the best known festivals in Spain, after the Fiestas de Abril in Seville and the Fiestas de San Fermin in Pamplona (running with the bulls), are the Fallas of Valencia. Fallas are gigantic creations of paper mache, wood and wax, and are build by neighborhood groups, taking months, often close to a year, to complete. The Fallas depict current events and political figures, often in a satirical way. There are more than 300 of them, all proudly displayed in the streets starting March 15th. They are beautiful to see, and every Fallera celebrates pretty much around the clock with open bars and music in the streets and everyone is welcome to join. A good Falla-celebrator will go round the city (on foot, hopefully) to visit the various fallas and have a drink at each of them. With hundreds of Fallas, this can take a while, depending on your stamina and tolerance for alchohol!

Las Fallas is essentially a celebration of fire; firecrackers (the noisy kind, not the beautiful displays of fireworks) are lit 24/7 from March 13th-19th, and on the night of March 19th, the day of St. Joseph, homage is paid to this Saint by lighting all Fallas on fire! At midnight, the work of months, hundreds of people and millions of Euros (a Falla can cost up to 300,000 Euros – and there are 300 of them) go up in flames, surrounded by a deafening display of fire crackers – spectacular!

As you can imagine, many tourists from Spain and all over the world come to Valencia to celebrate with the Valencians. About as many Valencianos, however, actually escape the city during Las Fallas. If you're not a Fallera yourself, it's actually not a lot of fun to not be able to sleep because of the firecrackers (you won't believe it unless you experience it, but seriously, I'm talking actual 24/7 and trembling windows here) and to have half the city blocked off. So far I've tried to avoid all of it but I may pop out on Saturday night to see the Fallas as they are so beautiful and funny. Then I'll also have my yearly treat of porras (you can also have churros or bunuelos, but I prefer the porra); thumb-thick sticks of deep-friend dough with sugar :). Yummy and makes it almost worth the suffering!

Oh, and you don't want to confuse porra with porro or puro (watch your rolling "r" there)… but that's a topic for a different blog!

Telenovelas

By Anne-Marie Dingemans

A fundamental part of Latin American culture is watching telenovelas. A telenovela is similar to a soap series, but they usually have a predetermined set of episodes (the producers write the entire plot before starting to film). Telenovelas are the most-watched shows in Latin America and are the top-rated shows in all Latin-American countries. And there are so many of them! I found this awesome website, to give you an idea of what's out there: 100 Telenovelas

To my taste and I dare guess to most tastes, they are incredibly cheesy! These are the two basic plots on which all telenovelas are based - forgive me if there are exceptions but I haven't found them yet...Either, a poor, beautiful girl meets a rich and handsome guy who breaks up with his rich, evil and frivolous girlfriend to be with the heroine (but really just to annoy his family). The evil ex-girlfriend, helped by the family, tries to sabotage their romance. Or, the poor heroine discovers her real father or mother, who almost always turns out to be incredibly wealthy. Both plots ends with the bad guys dead and the two heroes getting married and having babies. However, I watched my fair share of telenovelas back in the day when I was learning Spanish in Antigua (have since moved on to CSI and the like, now that's a challenge!) because they are so simple that you can focus your attention on trying to pick out words you understand without having to be afraid you're losing track of the story line :). Telenovelas are also good in learning to recognize accents. As they are produced in almost all Latin American countries, and they use local actors, you can practice your understanding of the Venezuelan, Peruvian and Mexican accents all in one afternoon. Every country prefers its own telenovelas but the most successful ones are aired all over the continent.

Who said watching TV could not be educational? So next time you're going on a total immersion course, by all means hop on the couch with your host family when it's telenovela time, and immerse yourself in the culture!

Mediterranean Coasts

By Beth Klemick

The Mediterranean Sea separates Europe from Africa and forms the boundary for more than a dozen nations (22 to be exact!), including Spain, France, Italy and Greece. The Mediterranean was the cradle of modern civilization, and much of that past is still preserved today. The mild climate makes for perfect beach weather, and the sky blue water is most inviting. The best time to visit is in the fall and spring. Beware in August; there are many vacationing Europeans and crowds galore. In my travels to date, I have explored, relaxed and indulged in some of Spain's and France's Mediterranean cities. Here are some brief facts and impressions.

Spain's Costa del Sol is one of the most popular haunts for vacationing tourist. What I enjoy most about this coastline are the miles of sandy beaches. Marbella is southern Spain's answer to St Tropez, but nothing beats Puerto Banus, just west of the town. This is the place to be pampered yacht-side, watch the world go by or window shop at one of many fashion boutiques or the El Corte Ingles. For nightlight there are many alfresco bars, clubs and discos to party at until dawn!

The French Rivieria became a fashionable resort in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and was particularly popular with the British upper class. Initially it was a winter resort, valued for its mild winter (but is never warm) and later became a summer resort. Nothing exudes glitz and glamour better than the French Riviera: Cannes, Monaco, Nice, but the beaches are less than desirable; instead of sandy the beaches are mostly pebbles and are more or less forced to rent chaise lounges.

Flamenco Dance Show

By Elizabeth Gregory

Speaking from my own personal experience, I can tell you that even though dinner shows can be touristy or cheesy, they can also be amazing. One particular dinner show that comes to mind is a Flamenco dinner show that my husband and I attended in Madrid. This was the first time he had been to Spain. We had walked past the place that declared the inside was a replica of "La Alhambra" in Granada and there was a lot of advertising proclaiming the "best flamenco show in Spain". Although I had been to the real Alhambra, I had a sneaking suspicion that the inside of the venue wouldn't really be an exact replica, (just like the castle in Disney World isn't an "exact replica" of the Neuschwanstein castle in Germany) rather something loosely based on the Alhambra. I thought it would be something fun to do one night and so talked him into it. (Not an easy task since my husband is not one for musical extravaganzas). I didn't mention it to him, but I had my doubts that it would be too touristy or unauthentic. However, we were pleasantly surprised and enjoyed a wonderful cultural evening of music, dance and food.

The meal was several courses and consisted of traditional Spanish food like paella. The costumes were amazing and featured several styles of Sevillana dress. The music was varied in emotion from peppy, to sad, to seductive. The audience surprisingly was pretty varied from locals to tourists, families, couples, pretty much everyone. By the end of the show, the performers and musicians received a standing ovation and came back for 2 encores. We did not leave until almost 2 hours past when the show was supposed to end. It was great!!

I found a great website that allows you to book flamenco shows in Spain on-line: Spanish Fiestas. We attended the show at Torres Bermejas in Madrid. I highly recommend it!

St. Patricks Day Celebrations

I always thought of St. Patrick's Day as a traditional Irish celebration, so I was surprised when I learned that the first St. Patrick's Day Parade was held in New York in 1762. (I have to point out that Philadelphia's was second, in 1771.)

What is perhaps even more surprising is where St. Patrick's celebrations are held throughout the world. There will be a parade on March 18 in Quebec, Canada and on March 19 in Montreal, Canada and Tokyo, Japan, and there were celebrations over the past weekend in all over the world, including Munich, Germany. You can even find Irish celebrations in Taipei, Taiwan and in Rome, Italy.

So I guess we're going to hear, "Kiss Me. I'm Irish." in a lot of different languages this week...