I think it’s important to address an important topic: my teeth.  I know.  It’s super weird.  Everyone in my class knows the story.  But I think it would be really helpful to share with people who plan on studying abroad.  You never know what could happen.  It could be your teeth too.

So this past summer I studied in Salamanca.  It was a fantastic experience, and I wouldn’t trade it for another.  However, I had a little accident.  You see, we were in Spain for the 4th of July.  Everyone was super excited to go out that night, and the bars and clubs knew to accommodate us Americans.  I mean, whatever gets their business going.  Almost everyone in our program went to this one club called CVM LAVDE.  They had a special on drinks, a dance contest, great music, all our friends…  It was a great time.

Towards the end of the night, some of my friends had left and I decided to walk back with three other people.  None of us were super intoxicated.  We were all of age and knew our limit.  Anywho, the walk back to our dorm is about ten minutes long.  It was really not that bad.  But we were all fooling around and doing cartwheels, front flips, running around.  You know: the usual stuff.

It wasn’t until one of us bumped into a car that we decided to run as fast as we could.  I still don’t know why we did.  It just happened.  And that’s when I fell forward on the pavement and smashed my teeth.

The whole thing was unreal.  I’ve never had issues with my teeth before.  In fact, not to toot my own horn, but I always prided myself in having a nice smile.  It’s a frequent compliment.  Toot toot!  But as soon as it happened, our initial instinct was to find my teeth.  I have zero clue as to why we were doing that.  It’s not like we could glue them back in place.  Scavenging for teeth at three in the morning is actually a lot funnier than it sounds.  I kept going back and forth between freaking out and making jokes about it.  I still think it makes a great story.

After about an hour of searching and bleeding all over my hands, we called it a night.  Which by the way, I didn’t get any blood on my clothes.  I was pretty excited about that.  I looked cute that night.  The next morning, after checking up on me, Fiona knocks on my door with news about how to go about things.  I thought it was a bad dream until that knock that woke me up.  I looked awful.  My nose, forehead, elbows, hands and chin were scraped.  And I had a really nasty scab on my upper lip.

I was scared to say the least.  I thought I let Carol down.  I thought I let my mom down.  But more importantly I let myself down.  Instead, I was received with open arms.  Everyone was more concerned with my wellbeing than I could have possibly imagined.  I received so much support and I am eternally grateful.

What I wanted to get to though was the way my teeth got fixed.  People assume the worst about getting any sort of medical procedure done in a foreign country.  I was also a sceptic.  But since I broke my teeth on a Friday night, I had to wait until Monday to make any sort of appointment anyway.  It gave me enough time to research.

What I learned was that Spanish clinics, hospitals, dentists are very much qualified, and do an excellent job.  They don’t get their degrees in a shack.  What I also learned was that anything medical will be a fraction of the cost in America.  That was what really sold me.

I ended up going to my first appointment, and they were so extremely helpful and comprehensive.  They laid out my options in a way that was easy to understand, but they were also super friendly.  It took about three weeks of various excruciating appointments to get my new teeth, and low and behold.  You wouldn’t know I have two fake teeth at all.  They match my other teeth to the last detail.  Needless to say, I am extremely happy with the final product and how I was treated by their staff.  If you ever smash your teeth, do so in Spain.