What a week it has been! For Spanish culture being famous for a relaxed lifestyle complete with "siestas" everyday, these past few weeks have been anything but that! It feels as if we have been going non stop and taking in everything as we can already tell that these next 4 months are going to fly by! But today (my Saturday), I finally stopped to take a breath, sleep in, get some homework done, and sit in a café to enjoy a frappé caliente de chocolate...it's as amazing as it sounds! As I sit here in this cute little coffee shop, I look back on the great highlights of this past week to share with you all back home:
1. Domingo (Sunday):
My roommate and I went to Catholic mass with our señora and her husband and were amazed to find ourselves in and out of the service in under 30 minutes! This was shocking compared to last week's service at the Spanish evangelical church which lasted more like 2.5 hours. It felt as if we had just gone through "iglesia rápida"-like fast food, but for churches! It was an awesome experience though to be able to see where our host parents, Chari and Walter go every week.
2. Lunes (Monday):
I attended my first flamenco class! Yes, you heard right, I am taking a flamenco class at my school every Monday night now. It was so much fun and I had a blast as I always love to learn new dances. It will be so fun to be able to learn the cultural dances everyone knows here so I can join in with the people in the streets during Feria-a huge week-long festival in April where the whole city is overtaken with parties and celebrating, dancing the nights away.
3. Martes (Tuesday):
I met up with my "intercambio" (where I am paired up with a Spaniard so that we can practice and teach each other Spanish and English), Marta who is actually a really good friend of my sister's from when she was living here! We had an amazing time together at this amazing Moroccan tea place as well as walking around the city together, her showing me the hidden gems of the city that only a true Spaniard would know about. I am so excited to be able to start meeting up with her every week! I am also so thankful to her for taking me in under her wing and allowing me the opportunity to make Spanish friends!
Later that night our school treated us to a "Noche de Tapas" by assigning us groups to be taken out by Spaniards to different restaurants around the city. We ate sooo many tapas (a Spanish custom of sharing tons of different trays of appetizers around the table for dinner...which is usually at 9 or 10 here) and were stuffed with delicious food to last us a whole week! I don't even know what most of the food was but I do know that it was absolutely amazing! You realize what you're missing out on when you're taken out by real Spaniards!
4. Jueves (Thursday):
My school went to play Bingo at the old folks home near our school. This is actually the place where I will also be volunteering every week with two other girls. Every Tuesday, I will visit "Hospital de la Caridad" to hang out with the old men that reside there, playing games with them to help them do mental exercises and of course to just chat with them and listen to them chatter on for a few hours. My friend, Kate and I actually made a new special friend whose name is Juan. He is 75 years old and has the sweetest personality and smile-two front teeth and all. He is very excited to have us come back every week and we can't wait to bring him a little joy for a few hours every Tuesday.
As you can see, I have been getting really involved in so many different activities and cannot wait to continue living and thriving in this beautiful city that I get to call home for the next 4 months.
Happy Saturday from Sevilla!
No comments:
Post a Comment