First of all, I just booked my flights to Rome and Paris. Rome this weekend with Adriana, Beau comes to Madrid next weekend, and Paris the following weekend with 6 other people from my group. Then southern Spain and Cadiz a few weeks later. THIS IS NOT REAL LIFE. Once again, thanks mom and dad, family members, ya know, anyone who is helping me to see the entire world.
We went to a bar called the Cave bar the other night, and it looks just like a cave. SO COOL. The drinks come out of the crevices in the ceiling into your glass. The drink also looked like milk which is gross but it turned out being delicious. I loved it. We might go back there tonight.
I had my first tutoring session with with Cristina yesterday. First of all, we all left school together and everyone was going to Gran Via to go to El Tigre and I was going to meet them there after my meeting. This is where the adventure starts. I had to get off at Pavones, which everyone was teasing it was the ghetto of Madrid. Someone even compared it to Oakland. Rude. Anyways, I found a friend to help me find my way to her house and Cristina was so nice. She is 14 and learning english and french, and is very very smart. Her mom doesn't speak english. Difficult. She is learning past perfect and present participle and things like that. I had to reteach myself before I taught her. And, her english teacher is teaching her wrong things. A sentence she wrote was, "I have lived in Madrid since 1996." Her teacher corrected her to "I have lived in Madrid for 1996." How dumb. Thank goodness she has me! Afterwards, I was walking back to the metro to go meet my friends at Gran Via and passed the bus stop. I've only taken the bus once, I don't know the stops, I have never been to Gran Via or Pavones, and I was all alone, and it was night, but I decided to take the bus. After waiting for 15 minutes, (the metro was another block, 3 minutes away and I thought I was taking the shortcut...), and on the bus for 45, I realized the place I was resembled Bakersfield. Not my beautiful city of Madrid. I also turned around and I was the only person on the bus. After trying to ask where we were going and why I wasn't at Gran Via, the bus driver yelled quickly in spanish and the only thing I could understand was him saying salida. Or exit. He then opened the doors and I got out, not even at a bus stop. Cool. Not. I realized I was pretty far from the heart of the city, where I needed to be. And, who likes to be anywhere that looks like Bakersfield? I saw two high school girls who knew less english than I know spanish. After 10 minutes of me trying to explain my issue, they proceeded to walk me 5 blocks to a metro, find me a map, draw out where I needed to go, and walked me down to make sure I got on the right bus. If I had any bills smaller than 50 I would've paid them. (And if I was rich.) I was so happy and grateful for these 15 year old spanish girls I almost cried. I asked where they were going, and they weren't even getting on the metro. They just went out of their way over 45 minutes to help a lost, upset American girl. There are some great people in this world. 2 hours later than expected I arrived at Gran Via. Everyone had left except 2 people. Oh well, at least I knew where I was. I need to learn more spanish. I got a Mcdonalds ice cream cone to make me feel better. It worked.
I've been drinking at least 2 cafe con leches a day. I love the taste, and I need it to get through the day. At 80 cents from my nice cafeteria friend, it's an affordable addiction.
And now we get to today. HOLY TOLEDO! I know why the phrase is so, it is the coolest place in the world. It is an ancient city surrounded by ruins of walls builts hundreds of years ago. I was in awe the entire time. We went to a Mosque, a Synagogue, and a Catedral built thousands of years ago. The catedral was by far the coolest thing I have seen since I have been here. Architecture that is unbelievable, and history to go with it. Things like that make America look like a puny baby. (I still love the states, don't worry.) But really, it was so cool. We weren't allowed to take pictures, but obviously I did so I will post them. They are blurry and through my jacket but hey, being rebellious on a class field trip is risky. It was also supposed to snow and let me tell you, I was prepared with many layers and hats and scarves. It ended up being sunny most of the day and rained while we were at lunch. Whatever Spain, whatever. Our lunch was a three course meal with a drink for 10 euros. Score! I got paella, a rice with seafood thing, and spaghetti. (I couldn't be thaaaaaaat adventurous in one meal...) Then flan for dessert, yum! And sangria of course. Toledo was a great experience. I got to say Holy Toledo! all day, how could it not be cool? The bus ride back was 45 minutes and everyone was knocked out. I'm afraid I'm going to sleep for 2 straight months when I get home. As long as I get to see everything here, that's okay.
Maria and I are cooking for my intercambio and her friend on Sunday. They made a comment about American's not knowing how to cook, so the pressure is on. It should be fun though. I am so lucky Maria is my roommate, she is great. Tonight, we were boiling hard boiled eggs and making chicken and veggies, and almost caught the apartment on fire. You have to light the stove with a lighter, but our long lighter is out and we ran out of matches. So we have to light a paper towel and put it on there. Well, there was commotion, the paper towel lit too quickly, the stove wasn't on, I threw the paper towel on the counter to not burn my hand, it landed on a real towel, the fridge was open, Maria grabbed it and while she did this I turned around quickly (we are laughing/screaming a lot at this point), and when I turned around I smacked my head into the open cupboard and fell straight to the ground. It was by far the funniest moment of my trip. Kitchen is still in tact, our dinner got made, my abs hurt from laughing and I have a small knot on my forehead, but all in all we survived.
no me gusta el frio
this is funny
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