Study Abroad 2017: ~Semana Dos (Week 2)~

Well it’s Viernes (Friday)! I made it through another week. Tomorrow, I am halfway through my first program already...boy, does time fly. Last week felt like a vacation and then this week felt more permanent. I guess I am more settled in you could say. I am more used to the eating habits of Spaniards now and the type of food that they eat. In fact, my host mom has a cook come in at least once a week to cook and the food is delicious! She makes a plate called Paella which is very common here in Spain. It’s rice and a whole bunch of seafood. I do not like seafood but here, I’ve made an exception. And I’m so happy I have because it is so very delicious. I am also figuring out what times work for me to workout or nap or go to bed or do homework. Everything is one big change, but in the end, it’s the same result. I still do everything I did in America--it’s just all scrambled up here. I’m convinced Spaniards’ clocks are just wrong. It doesn’t get dark until about 10:30/11pm here and then the sun doesn’t rise until about 7:30. Change all the clocks two hours earlier and--bam--problem solved. But I guess that’s just not how things work here.

It has rained a lot here the past week but I’ve enjoyed it. I was able to wear my rain boots and raincoat and use my umbrella. I took a picture in front of the UIMP sign, which is the University I am going to here in Santander. (See below) UIMP stands for Universidad Internacional Menéndez Pelayo. Oh, another highlight this week is that I really like the supermercados (grocery stores) here. The main one is called Lupa and they are everywhere. There’s one every few blocks. I have one five minutes from my house that I go to almost every day.

So, as far as classes go--I am really enjoying learning. Not that I hate being taught, but if you know me well, you know I have the patience of a lightning bolt (as my dad likes to say). Here in Spain though, I find it interesting. I have a two and a half hour class about Iberian Culture in Spanish and, even though it’s super hard, I really enjoy it. I enjoy my language and composition class, as well. The only thing is, sometimes my brain is on overload because I am in class a lot and it’s all in Spanish and I have to really focus to comprehend everything and then I still don’t understand a lot of the time. It’s getting easier everyday, though. I find it definitely helps when I get more sleep. Last night, I finally got eight hours of sleep for the first time since I’ve been here. It was glorious.

Yesterday we had an excursion downtown where we toured the cathedral and then went to a museum--but I don’t remember the name of it. I find I have that problem a lot here...where I go to some place cool but when someone asks me “where?” I literally have no idea. I should start writing it down. I am learning a lot of new words and meeting/getting to know some really cool people. I also am purposely trying to take some time for myself where I am not constantly spending time with other people. I think by doing that, it is helping me fuel this passion to learn and it also gives me more time to do the things that I want to do. I turned off all notifications for snapchat, facebook, instagram, messages, and email. I only check social media when I want to/every once in awhile for something important and it is so nice to be in control of that. I know this sounds silly, but I think my notifications were in charge of me because I would just answer whenever one popped up but now I get to choose when to respond. I have Whatsapp to communicate with friends and family and that is the only application where I keep the notifications turned on. So if you want to reach me, download Whatsapp--it's free. :-) I do check my email once a day to make sure there’s nothing important I need to check, so that works too!

Well, I don’t have as much to tell this week but I do have more pictures to share this week. I’m grateful it’s the weekend and am excited for what’s to come. Thanks for reading and I’ll talk to you all very soon! Adios!