Sorry, sorry!

Hola a todos!! I'm sorry that I've let this slide for a few days... there has been lots going on! I've officially started my "intensive month" of Spanish classes. It's a little strange, but the structure of my school and the schedule is a lot like high school. It probably seems especially weird to me because Ohio State is SO huge. The school is quite small, there is only one classroom building on this campus, and then there a few residence halls, but they are not occupied right now, since the semester for regular students doesn't start until February. We either have two or three classes, depending on the day, and they are all in the same classroom. So on Mondays and Wednesdays we have one morning class, a 20 minute break for "second breakfast" (which I will explain later), then two afternoon classes back to back. Since you never have to leave the building, between classes people pretty much just stand around in the halls and chat, and most people go to the cafeteria during "second breakfast" time, so it is very reminiscent of high school.

On to the most important part: the food. I am eating so well here! The first difference is the meal schedule. Typical Spaniards eat 5 meals per day. Shops and  businesses open very early, usually around 8 or 8:30 and most people commute between 7 and 8. So you would have a small something before you leave for work, like a yogurt or a piece of sweet bread. Then comes what we now call "second breakfast" but they call "el tentempie", where you may have a light sandwich, or some fruit, or a croissant. For us at school that is at 11:20, so it feels much more like lunch. Then the main meal of the day is during the "siesta" which is not mainly used for sleeping, but for family time. Most shops and businesses close down from roughly 2-5 and families all eat together. This is the largest meal of the day, usually with salad, chicken or ham (people in Madrid go CRAZY for ham!), some form of potatoes, soup, bread, and fruit for dessert. Fruit is a very common dessert in Spain, chocolate is less common. Then a light snack is eaten around 6:30, and dinner is served anywhere between 9 and 11, and is usually lighter. All in all, it's a lot of food,  but it's all delicious. Angelina is happier with me now because I am eating most of my food at each meal, but she's always trying to get me to eat more!

My living situation is great. My room is large for a Spanish apartment, and I live closest to the school out of everyone in my program, it's about 1.5 km away. I didn't realize how close it was at first, so I took the metro the first two days, which took about 40 minutes and included one train transfer and a million stairs. When I realized I could walk, It made much more sense, as it only took about 16 minutes to get there! I live in a very hilly part of the city however, and my walk is very very hilly, ending with a set of steep stairs set into the hillside to reach the school. Here are some pics of my room and view (I just found out that if you click on the pictures they will enlarge!)

View of my bedroom from the door.

My desk and dresser.

View of the room from the window (the closet is built in).

Left half of the view out my window.

Right half of the view out my window.

I am meeting so so many new people, and we are all connected by somebody knowing someone at some random school in a sorority or something. So we have all become fast friends. In addition to the 50 or so people in my program, there are other organizations just like ISA that send students to Madrid, so we have met most of them at this point as well. We are all trying to explore the city and find authentic local hangouts that aren't as expensive as the tourist areas around the city center (although the center is still super cool, or "superguay" as they say here!) 

In general the weather here is beautiful. I don't think I ever realized how gray the weather is in Michigan and Ohio in the winter until I came somewhere where the sun is almost always shining! Today was the first overcast day we've had since I've been here, and all of the Madrilenos (native dwellers of Madrid) were complaining about how ugly of a day it was (que dia tan feo!).

Today we took a tour of the Teatro Real (Royal Theatre) which was beautiful. I will upload some pictures in my next post. I get to visit the Royal Palace on Tuesday, so I'm very excited for that! As far as plans for this weekend, we are celebrating a friend's birthday tonight, and tomorrow we are planning on trying to explore some of Madrid's parks, even though it will be a little bit chilly. Then on Sunday we're going back to the flea marked, and maybe out for some tapas, which I still haven't had since I've been here!

Ok, so that was a nice long post to make up for my long absence! I promise it won't be so long until the next post! Love you all, ciao!