Chegada

Well I arrived here in Portugal two days ago, and it has been great so far. I am learning a lot better the dialect here, and more often than not. I am laughing because of the words, more than I am confused by it, which is a grand blessing. this picture above is of a praia called Praia da Rocha, me and some of some friends from Institute here in Portimão went to a club here last night and got home at 3am after taking some people home. it was pretty fun. Wish i would have been here at daytime though. (it has been really cold here by the way, apparently it was 90 degrees here last week, but now a big cold front has passed through. haha just my luck.) but it is really great here, I am staying with the family Khaled, such great people. They are friends of Butch Hatch´s when he passed through here on his mission. What a great help they have been with helping me get accustomed to the country. Well I will tell more later! PEACE

Stars

Since Christmas, I have been obsessed with the movie Les Miserables. Many wish to critique that it's musical qualities are sub-par, but I will always beg to differ as I find it an incredible job of capturing so many emotions and scenes in a spectacular way.
I frequently listen to the soundtrack, and one of the songs that strikes me the most is Stars by Javert (Russell Crowe). His passion in this song is very striking to me. Javert, who is a firm believer of "the letter of the law" sings about his desire to bring criminals to justice. In the movie, as well as the song, he sings to the stars, almost if he feels a common tie between him and them. He refers to them as Sentinels, solid and sure. Interesting to note that any of us, and any time and any place can look to the stars and each of us seem to receive some sort of guidance from them. For Javert he finds a solitude and reassurance to continue with his goal, although he pursues due to a biased judgement, accusation, and charge for Jean Valjean. To me, this communication with us and the stars provides an environment with which we are lifted and released from our little worlds and cares, and we are elevated to higher thinking, motivation and resolve.
Stars can offer us an escape from our little one minded world, and allow us to 'step up' and view our problems in a different way, so much that they can be solved, if not more patiently dealt with.
I feel that the stars offer us a blueprint in the sky, that if we look up for only a moment among the 'city lights' we will not see the full plan. although if we remove ourselves from our distractions, and the rush and hustle of daily life, we will be privileged to find ourselves in the plan and see where our destination lies and how we will arrive there.

For we may think that our plans, as a city night sky, only contain a few steps to reach our goal. Yet, as each of us comes to realize, there are steps in between those bigger objectives that we must reach first, and those remain hidden to us unless we take the time to go and search after them.
When I find myself coming short of my goals, getting frustrated, or have the feeling of being lost; I can look to the stars for direction, and I realize that I already knew the answer. I just lost track of it for a moment.

Movin' on up!

Well even though things have been crazy and stressful with school. I had a little peace of mind when I bought my plane ticket to Spain yesterday. Even though it cost $915, I got really happy and excited because I knew that soon before too long I would be seeing real beautiful places and getting a huge leg up on my future Spanish pursuits. The feeling I had after buying that ticket wasn't one of grief, but one of relief. I knew that I was making a good choice to receive good training, education, and secular knowledge/experience in my life and towards my career.

I will upload some of my most anticipated places so that you can enjoy them too. In this order,
if all goes well, Rabat-Morocco.
Barcelona
the Algarve, in Portugual,
Granada and the Alhambra.
a picture of Lisbon,
 Malaga.
one of Porto.
Valencia.
Seville.
Madrid,

Madness

Some of you may have seen me before, when I look exactly as this man. Going crazy, passing many nights with few hours of sleep, BECOMING LOCO!!! 

This week at school has just been a culmination of bad days for me. After taking tests on consecutive days to start off the week, I get the results back and see that on both of them I got an 84%. Generally a good grade, but not to me because that is what I have gotten on all my tests so far this semester and I have not been able to make those scores go up, no matter how much I try or study. It is not happening. 

This has been very depressing to me, and stressful as well because I cannot seem to get any better. It doesn't help that I am unofficially taking 21 credits this semester, and 17 officially. (I am auditing Spanish 2020.) 

I didn't think that 17 credits would be too tough. and in reality, it isn't. but what is hard is having a easy math class each day that you cannot manage to master. and having to do that homework each day-usually at 11pm- and having little time to study for your 5 classes. 

Having to deal with all this, and not seeing any improvement, knowing that my scholarship is in real risk of being removed after this semester's performance, and trying to deal with Study Abroad travel plans is really driving me nuts. I am quitting my night job at 6-8pm of cleaning at the school so I can devote more time to studying, but that won't happen until next friday. So until then, (or after spring break) I will have to wait until I can really make a bigger push towards attaining satisfaction with my grades. Wish me luck

Start of many things

I am starting this blog so that others can follow me and my endeavors to wherever and whatever they take me. I believe that our dreams are not merely fantasies, but the desires of our hearts made manifest to our conscience. I seek to be an example to all those who have ambitions and want to see them fulfilled. I hope you enjoy