Dinking Around

The 5 of us Oles arrived a few days before our actual orientation. We’ve been renting a nice hostel and have done little besides dink around... which I’m totally OK with because it’s been about 100 degrees every day and our air conditioning is broken. What should we do besides swim in the hostel’s pool? Well actually, I have slept away half of my Spanish life due to jetlag and a summer’s worth of little sleep ... 16 hours the first night, and 11 hours last night. My friends told me there is something wrong with me, but I feel preeeeeeetty good.

It also feels good to being speaking Spanish again. I love Spanish. I love Spanish. I love Spanish. And speaking of Spanish, what’s all this talk about getting used to the Spanish accent and the use of vosotros? I can hear it, but I haven’t had any trouble. Thank goodness because I don’t need additional languages challenges. Staying at this hostel, I’ve heard French, Italian, German, and who knows what. I’ve met people from India, England, Italy, Australia, Germany, and the U.S. which makes it hard to know who is a Spaniard! I can try to guess. I’ve heard that Spaniards are sexy. but, actually I don’t care if they’re Spaniards or not, there is still an unbelievable amount of many thin, beautiful, well-dressed men and women walking down the streets.... Oops, sir, yes, sir, I waaaaas just gawking at you, sir... **awkward turtle**



There have been a few things quite different from my experience in South America. For one, the food: there are green olives served at every meal, very little salsa, and NO TACOS. I miss cheap, delicious tacos!!! On top of that, ALL the food here is expensive; Burger King is expensive! I also miss the salsa and that burning feeling that comes with it.

It also looks a lot different here. There are few street vendors, less cars, and more mopeds. The roads are made of beautiful cobblestone, which are holeless and trashless. And tell me if I’m wrong, but I don’t remember such close roads in Mexico and Costa Rica as here. There are many one-ways with no more than a foot on each side for walking and random walkways where you can reach both sides. They're called kissing streets because if you wanted to, you could lean outside and kiss your neighbor!

The strangest of all for me is the siesta. From 4- 8 PM restaurants and bars are closed and 2-5 PM businesses and stores are closed. There is hardly anyone on the streets walking or driving. Besides being pretty eerie for us, us poor North Americans are hungry and have no where to eat...