What a week it’s been! Today feels like a complete turn-around in comparison to the last couple of days. For one thing, my cold is continually fading, so I feel the best I’ve felt in a while today. In addition, I bought “café con helado” (a shot of espresso with soft-serve ice cream in in) after class today at the McDonalds right below our school. It was amazingly delicious…easily my new favorite drink ever, and the caffeine in it really gave me a boost of positive energy. While I was drinking that cup of bliss, I sat in the park and studied for a while again, which was wonderful, and then I walked home and listened to some awesome music because Corinne wanted to take the metro and I wanted to spend some more time outside.
I’ve discovered that alone time like that…when I’m doing something and have happy thoughts to dwell on is a really healthy thing for me. I was filled with awe as I walked home, remembering how amazing it is that God has brought me here and that He has big plans for my life here and for how I will use what I learn here in the future. I’m so grateful to be in such capable hands every day J
My classes are going progressively better, and today I feel much more confident about my schedule. I talked with my grammar teacher, and she doesn’t think the class will be too much for me, which was reassuring after the difficult placement test we took yesterday. I didn’t really get enough sleep last night, and we watched a movie in a hot room during my first class, which was a killer, but the homework assigned was really easy, and that time of tiredness is what convinced me to buy some coffee later, so I guess it paid off. I love my literature classes so far, and the professor who teaches them both is excellent and very gracious…he didn’t assign any homework today!
When I arrived home, I talked to Rosa a little bit about my wonderful day and then Corinne got home and we ate lunch. Rosa made pallea, a very typical Spanish dish, for us. Pallea is essentially a saucy stir-fry, and it’s delicious! It’s typically served with lots of seafood in it, but Rosa made it with chicken for us because she wasn’t sure if we liked seafood. I’ve been trying to convince her to let us at least try some, and hopefully our eagerness at lunch today will lead to more seafood in the future. Rosa served the pallea with a wonderful salad, and it was probably my favorite meal here so far. I asked if she would teach me how to make it next time we have it, so I hope I can catch on and bring some of that goodness home with me!
Lunch was followed by some busy work for me…I’m trying to plan a trip to the beach this Saturday in order to avoid being cooped up too much, so I talked to Rosa about good places to visit, and she gave me the name of a nearby beach and some other cities we should see while we’re here. I looked up the places and bus schedules, so hopefully I’ll be able to find some people to go swimming this weekend! I also worked on a little bit of planning for fall break, when I hope to visit my friend Emily during her weekend stay in Portugal. I don’t have much information about that yet, but I really hope it works out because it would be so much fun to see her!
I worked on a little bit of homework on my own and then met some other girls from my grammar class to work on our homework before heading to “Encuentro,” a Wednesday night worship service organized by our school. Studying as a group was a really good idea for my grammar homework because it was helpful to talk though the concepts as I was working on the homework, and I enjoyed talking with the other girls in Spanish a lot!
The church where encuentro is held is incredibly tiny, but I liked it a lot. Worship was amazing, and the student ministries coordinator who spoke gave a great message about being ambassadors of Christ everyday and in every aspect of our lives. What a challenging exhortation! We talked about our semester so far and our spiritual journeys a little bit on the way home, and we made a quick stop at a supermarket to pick up some odds and ends. After that it was a pretty relaxed evening. During dinner we watched TV, and it was fun to see how much I could understand. The process of learning a language is an interesting thing, and everyday my hunger for being fluent in Spanish grows more and more.
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