Home stay

Ah, finally I catch up on posting! The jet lag has really been bringing me down. I always want to sleep, and I feel pretty cranky sometimes. I think it is for the best that I am not yet able to express sarcasm in Spanish.

I am in a home stay now with my señora, Charo, and my friend Annie. We each have our own rooms next to each other, and I think it’s fair to say that I have comfortably moved in now. Charo is an excellent cook (thank goodness!), and she also told us to take as long as we want in the shower. As some of you know, that is very exciting news for me. I usually try to keep it short anyway just out of respect for the high energy costs and the water shortage in Spain.

Charo has hosted many students before, and she told Annie and me that we have the best level of Spanish skills of any of the students that have lived here. An exact translation of her words is, “I thought, were these girls sent from heaven?!” So, I think she likes us well enough. The three of us chat and watch the news while we eat dinner together, and so far Annie and I have discovered two of Charo’s loves: Rafael Nadal and one of the news anchors on Channel 3. “Ay, mi Rafael!” is her response to news of Nadal, and pertaining to the anchor she tells us, “All day I wait for him, and he never fails me. He is always there. And he is always looking straight at me! Only eyes for me!” I have to believe that she is in love with at least one footballer, too. I’ll have to stick around after dinner for the nightly news sports segment to figure it out.

Charo has made it clear to Annie and me that speaking anything but Spanish to each other is strictly forbidden. Our punishment would be missing a meal, and for a second offense we would have to clean the house. (Mom, don’t freak out; the lady is joking! She just really wants us to stick to the program and learn the language!) That’s all the better to Annie and me, though, because we didn’t come all the way to Spain just to hang out like we could in Madison. And let me tell you, it is extremely difficult to keep your eyes on studying and learning Spanish when you get into a big group of Americans. Some people here could care less about how much they learn, and it is tempting to go down that path of vacation mentality. I am so thankful to have Annie here with me for a multitude of reasons, and the fact that we can feed off of each other’s discipline and strength is the best benefit of all.

By the way, if you ever happen to run into Charo, I am an FC Sevilla fan. Got that? FC SEVILLA.