PIRE II

The fifth and final week of the trip was spent in Cartagena.  The students from UB traveled with us to Cartagena and stayed in the same hotel as us for a few days.  The first day we got Tex-Mex for lunch and did some shopping.  We later went to the grocery store and...

Week 4 had the same routine as week 3, and I finished with my last 13 participants, bringing the total number to 53.  During this week we visited the high school where the e=were teachings Lengua Palenquera classes.  We attended Bernardino's class on Tuesday,...

The third week of the trip was in Palenque.  We met our host family and got settled in before it started to rain, which I did not know at the time would be  a common occurrence.  Soon after students from the University at Buffalo arrived, and would be staying with us...

To say I am grateful for this program is an understatement. I will never forget this experience and I owe Dr. Carol Miller a big thanks for recommending the Palenque location to me. I've developed my conversational and academic Spanish vocabulary in ways I could have...

Running Participants continues to run smoothly, besides thunderstorms and noises from the outside. It has been such an experience to do fieldwork in this setting. It has taken collaboration, guidance from my advisor and problem solving. Since we already had around 40...

When we arrived in Palenque, I was definitely shocked... At Penn State, we always have running water, air conditioned buildings and all the luxury. Palenque has its own kind of luxury that did take some getting used to. The water was only on every 3 or so days, so for...

To start the second week in Medellin, we went to the University of Antioquia and attended the class of a professor in the linguistics department that we had met during the previous visit.  In the class, we earned about a program called AntConc, which is a corpus...

Monday we were invited by a Linguistics professor at the University of Antioquia to participate in a class he teaches about how to build a corpus. I have only ever looked at a corpus a few times so I was very excited to participate. It was a little tough to follow...

We had quite an eventful weekend. On Friday, our driver Hernando, who is a close family friend of Marianne invited us over to meet his son and have some food cooked by his wife. The food was amazing and they fed us very well. We had pasta with a sauce similar to...

Our first full day, Tuesday, we contacted Professor Marianne Dieck at the University of Antioquia and made plans for Wednesday to get coffee and attend her class. After we made plans, we explored a little bit around our Airbnb and checked out a local grocery store. We...

I am halfway through my first week of PIRE.   After two days of flying we arrived at our first destination, the mountainous city of Medellin, Colombia. During the first day we did some exploring of our local area, the Poblado, and went shopping at a local Market,...

At this point, I've been in Colombia for about a week and a half. We started in Cartagena De Indias, a beautiful Caribbean historic city, spent a week in San Basilio de Palenque, and are now visiting the universities and schools in the city of Barranquilla. Palenque...

After a year of studying the culture and history of the Palenquero people, it was incredible to finally arrive in the village and meet the individuals whose language we will be investigating. Although we experienced a few bumps in the road, both physically and...

Our final week in Colombia was spent in yet another beautiful city--Bogotá. Not only does Bogotá have a climate very different from Medellín and especially Palenque, but also unique architecture and historical memory. We were greeted by members of our host institution...

And just like that, it was already our final week in Medellín! I can admit, it was sad to say goodbye to the beautiful city I had begun to call home. However, it was also exciting to know that there is so much more to come and more to see in our travels throughout...

Writing this last blog post seems so surreal. It seems as if just yesterday we were getting ready to leave for Colombia but now, 8 weeks later, we have all returned to our normal lives with a changed perspective. These past couple of weeks were probably my most...

After being home for over a week now, it's still hard to find the words to describe my 7 weeks in Colombia. After talking to so many people in Colombia, I realize how fortunate I was to have an experience like this one. Many of the people we talked to were surprised...

Being in colder weather was definitely a relief after Palenque, where it was at least a 100 degrees real feel every day. The altitude was also an adjustment, since we came from sea level. Yet, we still decided to go on a hike up to a church. The hike was not at all...

It is hard to sum up an 8 week trip in one blog, especially when it was filled with memories that will last a lifetime. I am sitting here back in NY reminiscing on my time spent in Colombia. And as I do, I realize just how special the two month journey throughout...

Our two weeks in Palenque have finally wrapped up, and we have returned to Bogotá to finish out the last few days of our PIRE trip. It is still hard to believe that just two weeks ago we arrived in this village, on a night when the power decided to go out for 12...

This Friday was a big holiday for the Palenque Community. It was their Saint's day, which means lots of festivities were going on. Friday night there was a procession of music and people with candles. The saint was carried out of the church and around the community....

During our first night in Palenque, we were welcomed with a power outage. Let me tell you, showering with a bucket and a headlight is very interesting. The next day we had participants come in the morning and the afternoon. It was definitely a learning experience...

For one of our last remaining days in Medellin, the professors at the University of Antioquia took us on a trip to a river. They rented a bus for us to take 2 hours away to the Melcocho river. We left early in the morning so that we could spend the day at the river....

I guess researching doesn’t exempt you from getting sick. I must have caught some sort of stomach bug and after a couple days of moaning and groaning Juaquinita took me to the local Centro de Salud to get some fluids and bring me back to life. Maybe it was the...

We arrived in Palenque after a cramped van ride winding through Cartagena for what felt like an eternity. After unloading our mountains of luggage and being sorted into various homes we were taken on a tour of the town. Afterward we dipped our toes in the arroyo...

Coming back to Bogotá almost feels as if we never left. We jumped right back into our routine by going to our favorite places and testing participants at Instituto Caro y Cuervo again. It was so heartwarming seeing everyone at the Institute and reuniting with them. We...

Going from a real feel of 104 degrees to 55 degrees takes a toll on the body (summer colds are no fun). It amazes me how incredibly different the climate is between the three places we have traveled to in Colombia. Last week I was sitting on a porch sweating, and this...

These past couple of weeks have really flown by. Our week in Medellín was absolutely phenomenal. Being able to meet up with the other PIRE students and having them live across the hall from us was such a welcoming sight. The climate in Medellín was so incredibly...

After a few weeks in Bogota, it came time to finally break out of our routine of testing and going to the Instituto Caro y Cuervo. We set off for Medellin because our PIRE partner is located in Medellin at the University of Antioquia. However, our first night was...

After a busy week in Medellin, we took off for Cartagena where 11 of us piled into a van in clown-car fashion. It took almost an hour a half to reach Palenque in scorching heat and cramped quarters. Upon our arrival, we realized that this week was going to be quite...

These past two weeks have been a blur. It all started when we traveled to Medellin to spend a week there before Palenque. On the plane, we were randomly sitting next to the UCR student, Miguel(ito), and instantly became friends. When we arrived at the Airbnb, we...

Our last week in Medellín has been incredible. Last week the other groups of students travelling to Palenque with us arrived in Medellín, so it has been a lot of fun getting to show them around & also experience new things with them! It turns out that the other...

On Sunday we went for a hike just outside the city. The tour guides were cousins of our friend from the university. They were very nice and took us on multiple trails. The first trail we went on was to a beautiful waterfall. The hike was pretty muddy and messy from...

Our phrase of the week (and basically every day) is que dia. Translation: What a day, aka something I say everyday because of how crazy busy our days have been. Sometimes I am saying this phrase by 10 in the morning. But being busy is good for us because in just over...

We are very fortunate that our host university is right down the street because we have been constantly there testing the overwhelming amount of participants. It is amazing to see the amount of interest in participating due to the conversion rate between Colombian...

When we arrived in Colombia, I never expected that just a week later, we would already have accomplished so many things. Since arriving in Medellín last Wednesday, we have had the chance to do many tourist things in addition to our regular visits to events at the...

Whether we are taking a trip to local museums or simply walking the streets of Medellín, there is art everywhere around us! I continue to be amazed by the beauty of this city. On a free afternoon of ours, we had he chance to visit el Museo de Antioquia. This is one of...

Upon arriving, my colleagues and I were given a warm welcome by members of the Hispanic Philology department at the University of Antioquia in Medellín! A member of the faculty who is our point of contact within our partner institution, Marianne Dieck, invited us to...

Medellín is truly a sprawling city. We got a glimpse of the city by cable car and had a view of the communities and barrios built up the hillside like below. Much of our time is spent running back and forth between La Universidad de Antioquia and El Poblado, the...

For those that know me, they know how much I love to travel. I center much of my identity around my travels and ability to travel smart. If I’ve learned anything, much of the initial transportation piece revolves around the idea of mitigating disaster. You have to...

What a whirlwind this past week has been! Our first week of participant testing is officially done and although it was a bit tiring carrying all our equipment back up the hill to our Airbnb, it was amazing. All of our participants have been extremely kind and so...

This week we met our contacts at the University of Antioquia. We had a casual first meeting with our professor and some of the students that work under her. On Friday, we got to sit in on a skype meeting with individuals from the University of Bogota. The discussion...

This weekend Kellie, David, and I ventured out to explore some classic attractions in Bogota. Although we were not too thrilled with waking up so early on Saturday morning, the entire-day experience was well worth it. We started with a panoramic view of the city of...

Going to a school that is as big as Penn State, I was averaging about 10,000 steps just from walking to class and home. Since I have been in Colombia, it has plummeted to around 4,500 steps a day. Which is a little bothersome because it makes me feel like we have not...

After two long days of travelling, and many flights I finally arrived in Medellín Wednesday afternoon, along with the other four PIRE students in my group. Once we settled into our Airbnb, we decided to go out to explore our neighborhood and get some groceries for the...

Yesterday was my first day running participants. It has been a long couple of days testing and re-testing my experiment to ensure it is error free. Kellie and David started to think I did not know my colors from one another, but quickly realized that there really were...

To say being in Bogotá is an experience is quite an understatement. The very first night, after only one shower, the bathroom on the second floor decided to flood. Adding to the misfortune, this bathroom is right above the bathroom on the ground floor, and all the...

I have been in Colombia for 4 days but it feels like I have been here for 4 weeks. We have packed a lot into our first couple of days here, from testing experiments, to exploring our barrio to find the best empanadas. The birds here are plentiful (and I am a tad bit...

My name is David Miller and I am going to be a junior at Penn State in the fall majoring in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and minoring in Spanish. Our research project will be focused on differences in dialect in Colombian Spanish. Specifically, the aspiration of...