School... Again

Let us not forget that in between my day to day Spanish experiences.. I still attend school on a daily basis.

This week I had my first presentation, in Spanish, in front of a room full of people. Well technically speaking it was my second presentation, however for the first one I helped with the putting together part then just stood next to the two other girls while they spoke, nodding my head to everything they said. Apparently the teacher noticed I hadn't said a word and for some strange reason asked me to actually have something to say in the next presentation. Teachers (*rolls eyes... but not really because moms a teacher as well, love you mommy!*) 

First of all I wasn't alone so that helped! I don't really have much to complain about since I probably said a total of... six sentences! But of course in that small amount of time I managed to struggle a bit and my face got all red as it does. So much so that at the end of my small part the whole class applauded as if I was actually saying an acceptance speech for the Oscars. To make you all realize just how pathetic I was... I was only saying the introduction which consisted of our names, our topic, and the name of each slide...

Moving right along, today was also the day we got our grades for the second trimester and I actually didn't do so bad!

Keep in mind a 5 is passing, and an 8 is considered pretty damn impressive!

Now today's school excitement was not over yet! I was walking out of the building today and putting on my headphones for the nice walk home when all of a sudden the wind decides to pick up. Usually... not a problem... today? PROBLEM! I was wearing a skirt, seeing as here it is warm enough to do so and it decided to go all Marilyn Monroe on me right as I was walking past a large group of people. At that point I did all ya really can to, look back, apologetically smile and KEEP MOVING! 

I'm sure I have mentioned before that Spain is currently having a problem with its educational system, and there are often school strikes, or in my schools case, days when there is a strike right in Barcelona which we get permission slips to miss school for, however all we do is get the slip signed and spend all day catching up on our sleep! 

Anyway where I am going with this is, next week my five day school week has been turned into a three day school week because we happen to have the first ever (this year at least) two day strike Wednesday and Thursday. Does it get any better than that? Yes. Yes it does. I happen to be going to a Barcelona soccer game Wednesday night, which means I get to sleep in the day after as opposed to being a tired, miserable wreck stuck in school the next day!

Life is good! Life is definitely pretty damn good! 

That's all for now, but I will be sure to tell you all about the game going down exactly one week from today when I get there! Have a nice week!

Coming Up...

Well, well, well, look who's back (and by that I mean me)!

I am very sorry I have not written in the past two weeks, however things have just been pretty normal. Lately there has been a lot of planning for the time to come and I cannot wait to share the experiences with you all, I just have to, ya know, live them first!

Well first of all March 19th marks 100 days left here in Spain... didn't see that one coming!

Then a few weeks after that, April 12th, starts spring break and there will literally not be one second wasted there. At 6:25 AM on Saturday morning my friend Victoria and I are off to the airport to fly to Santiago, Spain which is on the complete opposite side of Spain to then catch two different trains and finally meet up with come other AFSers there, roughly 40 of them, to quite literally backpack across Spain.

This backpacking experience is known here as El Camino de Santiago. It is one of the only three Christian Pilgrimage walks in the world and people from ALL over the world come to do it together! Now I do happen to be Christian, however most of the exchange students, myself included, are doing the trip solely for the experience. 

It is a pretty intense walk if I do say so myself! It is four days long (well it's longer than that but the AFS crew is only doing four days worth) and we are to walk approximately 27 km a day, which is about 17 miles a day. Then each night we will be crashing at a hostel. I am sure I am under estimating what I am in for, but hey I have to live these moments while I can!

Wednesday night we return to Barcelona at about midnight... so maybe that makes it Thursday morning? Anyway I have all of one day to rest up, then the family and I are off to Valencia from Thursday - Sunday!

Fast forward to April 30th and I am off to Milan, Italy. There I am going to reunite / meet my Italian relatives! My cousin Daniela lives in Milan so we are going sight seeing around there for a day or so and then we are traveling to Trento, Italy to meet up with the rest of the gang. I am beyond thrilled to be able to finally visit them there and I am equally excited, to say the least, to try the FOOD! 

So that is what is going to be happening in the life of Emily Thompson in the near future! Can't wait to tell you all about it! Happy March everybody!