i haven't had internet... this is from tuesday!

Since I don’t have internet access at my house, I haven’t really been able to update you guys for a few days! I’m so jealous of my classmates who have internet at home; you have no idea how much I wish I had some way of communicating with people back home. I did finally get a cell phone yesterday, but it costs quite a bit for me to call the U.S. which means I’ll mostly be using that only to get in touch with my classmates here – we all got the same phone service (Yoigo!) from the same store, and it’s kind of funny that we all have the same little Nokia phones, too.
So, today was our first day of actual classes at the Centro de Lenguas Modernas after taking our placement exams yesterday. I have eight people in my first two classes, and two of them are from the George Mason group, Anand and Bland, James Bland… the latter is QUITE a character… anyway, classes are very informal here and mis profesoras are really nice. The first one, Carmen, is really funny – we spent the entire class (from 9-11am) just talking and joking around. One of our activities was that we each wrote down two questions for someone else in the class to answer, then she randomly handed out the questions and we took turns answering. My second class, from 11am-1pm is with Ana, who is from Salamanca, which is located further north in between Portugal and Madrid. The accents there are harder to understand, so I’ll have to get used to the way she speaks, but it was OK overall. We talked about different types of language/culture: formal, informal and “la kultura de la calle” (meaning culture of the street, so basically the internet lingo, graffiti, etc). We talked about different people and things that come from Spain, like political figures, actors, artists and also monuments and fiestas from Spain. Then we did an activity that was somewhat familiar, where we had to imagine we were in a forest and describe what it was like, then we see a key and imagine what it looks like and what we would do with it, then we see a house and have to decide if anyone lives in it, and so on. And each scenario is supposed to give insight as to how content you are with your life, how adventurous you are, how you value friendships, that sort of thing. It was interesting and actually pretty spot-on for me.
Our last class of the day is Cultura from 1:15-2:15pm, and our whole group is in one class with Maria Jose. She is very nice and super easy to understand – actually, she said that this is pretty much the first time where she has been able to conduct that class entirely in Spanish, because this is the first time that everyone in the class actually knows Spanish. I guess usually that class is taught in English at first and they gradually introduce Spanish. Today we just did a fun quiz on facts about Spanish culture to test our knowledge and we went over the syllabus. We’re going to have a project in that class, which is a 3-5 page paper about anything having to do with Spanish culture, and I think I’m going to write about either music or movies… maybe even about Pedro Almodóvar, since I have seen several of his movies, including Todo sobre mi madre y Volver.
Let’s see, what else? Oh, last night we had sort of a welcome party (“un snack”) at the Albayzin, which was super close to La Alhambra – we could actually see it from the patio where we hung out all evening, so of course we took pictures, but we’ll have a lot more once we go to visit it! It was so pretty, even from a distance. The little party we had was nice, too. They served cañas, which is beer in a smaller glass than is typically served at home, and tintos del verano, which is pretty much red wine with soda, kind of like a wine cooler. They also served plates of little appetizers, similar to tapas, like little pieces of white fish wrapped in a thin piece of zucchini and fried, a meat plate (yuck), tomato, basil and mozzarella sticks and my personal favorites, these squash and spinach casserole bites (which have a Spanish name, I’m sure) that were soooooooooooooooooooo good! We stayed there until probably a little after 11pm, then walked home with Mark, a classmate who we found out lives one street over from Lorianne and me. It was good to have a guy to walk with, since we live further south than most of our classmates, it was late and we don’t know the area very well yet. It also helps that he is a former Marine and could kick some booty if anyone tried to mess with us! I felt terrible though, because I accidentally rang the buzzer at the apartment when we finally got home after midnight, instead of turning on the light in the hall. I totally woke up our host mom by mistake!!! She didn’t seem to be angry, but I felt really bad anyway.
Well, we’re getting ready to go to the mall now… it looks like I’m going to have to buy a flat iron, hair dryer and a few other little things that I need, and we also have to get some photos copied for our student ID’s or something, then I’m going to look for an Internet Café where I can post this blog (which I’m currently writing at home in a Word document) and hopefully, I can email or chat with some of you later, too…
Besos!!!
- LC