Opportunities and experiences

Kaixo everyone,

Today I'm feeling sappy. Not bad sappy, but happy sappy (lol puns). As I was going to leave the classroom at 5pm, our translation class instructor told us that Bob Woodward, one of the journalists who uncovered the whole Watergate scandal in the 1970s was giving a talk at 7pm this afternoon, sponsored by the College of Law here at U of I. I decided that heck, I was gonna go hear this guy who has witnessed and has been history. I gotta say, the talk was terrific. He talked about 8 presidents (the talk is the first of a series on Abraham Lincoln and his influence) and it was truly interesting. After I left the auditorium, I started thinking to myself about how lucky I am to go to such a great school, and the opportunities and experiences that this university has given me:

- I got a Master's from a top school in the field.
- My advisor is the king of his field.
- Had my very own, movie-like American graduation.

- I presented in two different conferences and got published in the first's proceedings (fingers crossed for the second one!).

- I have now almost 3 years of teaching experience and 5 different courses under my belt, ranging from 100 to 400 level.

- I never had prom in Spain, so I got fraternity formals and semiformals. And one of them was at the Sears Tower in Chicago.

(I am NOT wearing flats)

- I have been to the place North Shore High (Mean Girls' high school) was based on. And the Walker Brothers Pancake House. And Old Orchard Mall. Mean Girls is my favorite movie ever.

- I have traveled to NYC and Oregon, and been back to Colorado.

- I have rediscovered Chicago and have fallen in love each time.

- I've seen plenty of famous people like Bob Woodward...

Major Lazer

Jeff Dunham

MCLOVIN (and okay, Dave Franco)

Piper Kerman (OITNB, anyone?) 

JOE BIDEN (and he held my hand) 

Nev Schulman (aka my future husband)

- Got into an honors society.

Phi Kappa Phi

- I am currently the president of the graduate student RSO from my department.

- I am part of a retail industry based RSO that no matter how little it has to do with my studies, I love.

- I am about to start leading conversation groups in Spanish.

- I have been able to start translating and being certified by it, and I have been offered really cool translation jobs.

- I have fallen in love and also fallen out of it (sappy alert).

- I have made lifelong friendships.

- I have had an experience I would never have imagined.

Man, I love this place.

Love,

- Ane

Winter Uniform

Kaixo lovely readers!

I hope your first (or second? third?) week of classes went well! Mine was a whirlwind with teaching, classes and getting back on track, but I am happy to report that I have felt rejuvenated after Christmas and that I am very excited about the classes that I'm taking and the classes that I'm teaching. I am taking two translation courses (yay certification!) and a course with my advisor on L2 phonology, which is my thang. I'm teaching a course on the sounds of Spanish (23 students, 3 hours a week, scary but exciting! And they seem not to be confused!) and BASQUE! At first I thought I would have 4 students but it turns out I'll have 7! All the effort sending e-mails to promote it paid off!

Today I wanted to make a brief post of something that has happened to me that I had never noticed here before (maybe I wasn't paying attention, but it's strange because it's fashion related). A revelation. It happened today when I walked to the ARC, the kick-ass gym (one of two!) we have at UIUC. I stopped for a minute at the entrance to get my student card out of my wallet, when I looked up, and I saw all the girls in front of me (ALL OF THEM), wearing the same thing. A long black parka, an infinity scarf, winter boots, a head wrap and a Longchamp bag. OK did I miss the memo? At first I thought, is this a sorority girl thing? (Not trying to disrespect sorority women here by generalizing, believe me, if there were sororities in Spain I'd have joined one in a heartbeat and I would've been the president because #power) But when ALL girls are wearing that, that cannot be possible. UIUC has a large Greek population but I don't think it reaches 30%...

Basically, everyone was wearing a winter uniform. THE winter uniform. And I don't blame them, who wouldn't bundle up in this cold (it's bad but not as bad as the 2013-2014 end of the world #neverforget) in those cozy garments?

Clockwise from left: Parka: The North Face // Le Pliage Large Tote: Longchamp // Head wrap: BLOM // Infinity Scarf: J. Crew Factory // Boots: Sorel

I gotta admit I do have an infinity scarf, and an almost identical tote to that Longchamp. But seriously, that view of all the girls in front of me wearing the same things struck me. Oh life.

Now, how about you? Is this your winter uniform? What is your winter uniform, if you have any?

Love,

- Ane

Missing In Action

Kaixo my dear friends,

It's been... too long. And a shame. I honestly have no other excuse than being swarmed with work. At least, I gotta say, this semester feels better than the last. I have recently started a certificate in translation at the university that makes me feel very confident about jobs outside academia! Not that I don't love teaching, I do (my students are still absolutely HILARIOUS), but I get tired of doing work ALL day EVERY day. So let me recap what has happened in the last month in my life.

Halloween:
Whenever Halloween is coming, I get very worried about my costume. Is it gonna be good enough? Will I have an original idea? This year I had SO MANY ideas that would be great for Halloween back home, like culturally relevant stuff, but I know for a fact that no one would get it in Champaign if I dressed up in those. These last two years I think I've done a killer good job with my choices:

Regina George: 2013 Halloween was one for the (burn) books. My dear friend A, who works for a major engineering company, was sent to Milwaukee for some training for 3 weeks, so she drove all the way to Champaign to visit me! It was 4 days of debauchery fun, showing her around the U of I campus and shopping. My costume was SO EASY to make. I had the black tube skirt and shoes from a long while ago, so all I did was to go to Forever 21, get a cheap tank top and a simple JC Penney cardigan, a purple bra, and I was golden. If I had a dollar for every time someone in the street shouted "MEAN GIRLS!" at me that weekend, I wouldn't be in grad school. And I got plenty of secrets signatures in my Burn Book.

French Kiss: 2014 was "punny." And VERY COLD too. Thank goodness I came up with this awesome idea. I bought the beret and handkerchief at Ragstock, and spent some money in makeup. And that was it. Because honestly, what girl on earth doesn't own a bateau shirt? My biggest fear was how to take off all that make up after the night, considering I had worn make up from 9am (taught in disguise y'all) till the early AM of the next day... But I was very lucky and I enjoyed it SO MUCH!

So this year, I had to make sure my costume was as awesome or even better than the previous two. Honestly though, they were hard to beat. But suddenly, I had an epiphany. I had thought of this costume many times but I always ended up choosing something else. In any case, this year was the year. I become my childhood idol, BRITNEY SPEARS in "Baby One More Time":

Needless to say, they played the song at every place I went to, and I got multiple compliments. I really did feel on top of the world wearing this, so I think my mission was accomplished. I am planning on a post on how to make this costume, which honestly, was the easiest thing ever! Hopefully it doesn't take me another full month...

My Birthday!!
That's right, I turned 24 ten days ago! I think it's a hideous number myself, but there's nothing I can do about it so #suckitup Ane. Birthdays have always been a huge thing in my family. My parents used to wake me up that day and hug me with a warm "Zorionak!" (happy birthday in Basque), and I loved starting the day like that. Every year my mom would say "OMG you were so tiny when you were born, and look at you now!" I've been celebrating my birthdays abroad for the last 3 years (funny that my 21st was in Spain while all the rest birthdays in my 20s have been in the US... Shitty destiny I know), which make me a little gloomy the days before. However, as usual, my friends here make me feel very special.

I started my day off at the gym at 7:30 (#fitnessgoals, although it's still a struggle for my night owl self), and when I got home, my roommate had a huge teddy bear and breakfast for me in my bed with the sweetest note. I LOVE HER SO MUCH! <3 After that, I stayed home talking to family and friends back home on Skype and went to class, where my 3 classmates and professor (#gradschool) wished me a happy birthday. After that, I went out to dinner with some friends, and honestly, the turn out was fantastic, I felt very special. :)

Since my birthday was on a Tuesday, I couldn't do much partying, so we celebrated that Saturday with another November friend at my apartment. It was PACKED. And I had SO MUCH FUN!! I wish I could express my overall satisfaction and delight about the party, but alcohol ran like rivers, so my memory is basically a turmoil of party songs, selfies, twerking and gossip. In any case, I am proud to say my roommate and I are the best party hosts in da worlddddd #bragging #wakeupflawless.

Ma people!

I love these girls!

Meet my awesome roommie <3

After that, my days have consisted of library hours, sugar and caffeine, but I am extremely excited because a) it's finally THANKSGIVING BREAK, and b) I'm going somewhere on holidays... It's green, with mountains, and one of my BFFs lives there. It's also a very hipster place. Any ideas os where I'm going? ;)
Love,

- Ane

Current happenings

Kaixo!

Ok guys, I know I have not written much about my life lately (or the articles I lose time with), but I briefly wanted to tell you about two things that have happened to me last week:

1) I met Nev Schulman!
Guys, grad school is not eventful. Nothing out of the ordinary happens. EXCEPT IT HAPPENED. Last Thursday, Nev Schulman, the host of Catfish (you've all seen it, don't lie), came to U of I for a talk. At first I was not gonna go because I was nervous about thing 2 below, but Michaela from The Monogrammed Midwesterner convinced me to go. Also, we finally met in person, and I'm so glad! Shout out to you lady! :)

We need more pictures

When Nev came in the room, we all lost our shit minds. He started the talk by posing for us so that we could make our friends jealous, and then introducing us to Bonnie, the lady who was interpreting him in American Sign Language. So sweet. The way he talked was impressive, I wish I had that charisma and that savoir faire, seriously. His talk was not about the show, but about his road to starting it, his life path. It definitely clicked. I always struggled with the idea of getting attention from people, being the most likable person, and with being myself. I always thought that who I was inside was not enough. Through his story, he reminded me that being myself was the best choice, and if somebody doesn't like me... Well haters gonna hate. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.

After the talk was over, Nev had a meet and greet with some people who were chosen at random (not us, ugh) in another hall, but Michaela and I, and 30 other crazy psycho fans, followed him. They would not let us in , but Nev came out and said he would meet us after. We waited, and waited and waited. I was losing faith, but eventually, HE DID MEET US AFTER! In fact, he took selfies with everyone there!

And also, this gem for my students (and for everyone in general, I'm cool you guys!):

He said my name, and he pronounced it right! My nerves for thing 2 below were gone, and I went to bed ecstatic. Although I didn't sleep much because...

2) I presented in a conference!
This summer, my MA thesis was accepted to a huge conference in my field, the Hispanic Linguistics Symposium, which turns out, was held at U of I! That meant not spending any money for traveling (seriously, I walked from my apartment to the venue) and having a lot of my friends show up! I woke up at 6am all nervous last Friday, and got there at around 8am for breakfast. Many of my friends were there, and many were presenting. But I was the first one to present at 10am. If I think about it, it's the best to be done with it soon, but at the same time it was terrifying. Luckily, many of my friends, my roommate, and many professors from my MA degree showed up. I felt so loved and supported, seriously. If these people take 30 minutes of their time to come see me present about a topic that's totally foreign to them but so dear to me, they are definitely keepers. Thank you guys, LOVE YOU!

#Profesh

I felt like a rockstar after it. I was wearing an outfit that I picked out right when I was accepted, I taught in it (the amount of confidence heels give you while teaching is astounding), went to other presentations and had Chipotle because I deserved it. After that, I basically died and went to sleep for the entire weekend (#worthit).

It was a great weekend and I hope it gets repeated soon. Now you tell me! Have you ever met anyone famous? Have you ever presented in a conference?
Love,

- Ane

What to wear: Library

Kaixo everyone!

School just started! While undergraduates in Yik Yak rejoice over syllabus week and getting drunk seeing old and new friends, grad schoolers like me are thinking about ways to survive boost our productivity. For some odd reason, I have never been able to study in my own apartment since I started college. Seriously, until high school, my room was the greatest place to study ever, but since I started college, I spend my study hours at the library. Or the libraries, because the University of Illinois has a ton of them!

I usually go from class to the library, so that means I wear the same outfit I wear to class, which is usually put-together because as a TA, teaching in sweats is a huge no-no (like really, it's against the rules). However, when the weekend comes and I just feel lazy, I like to dress comfortably when I go to the library. Here's what I wear to the library:

In the morning:

Shorts: Nike // T-Shirt: Lauren James // Sneakers: Nike

I'm not a morning person AT ALL and I'd rather sleep in till 10am. But when there's work to do, you just have to, so I put on an oversized tee, norts and sneakers and I'm good to go. The less amount I spend getting ready for the library, the better.


In the afternoon/evening:

Jersey: Spirit Jersey // Yoga pants: Lululemon // Flip flops: Havaianas

Sometimes, I just can't get off bed, or I'd rather do laundry, cleaning and general housekeeping in the morning, so I study in the afternoon. For some weird reason, the library gets chillier in the afternoon (and no doubt in the evening) and I can't concentrate if I'm cold, so I wear my spirit jersey (if you don't have one, please get one. I thought it was some sorority girl uniform nonsense but OMG it's so comfy and perfect! Plus, it makes you look skinnier ;)), my Lululemon yoga pants (get a pair, I wear them all the time, and you can have them hemmed for free, which I did) and the sturdiest flip flops ever, my Havaianas Top.


With friends:

Jeans: Uniqlo // Top: Lush // Sneakers: Converse // Scarf: Tory Burch

I usually study alone, but if my friends and I meet up to study, or if I have some group work assignment, I like to look a little more polished, but I still keep it as simple as possible. White v-neck tee, jeans and converse, and a scarf to spice it up (plus if you are cold you can wrap it around. Win-win).

So this is basically what I wear to the library around this time of the year. How about you? Anything you recommend wearing?

Love,

- Ane