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Published: October 17th 2007
Well, I am now in El Puerto de Santa Maria which is south Spain near the water. I am getting a crash course in Spanish. Muy dificil! I took a bus from Avignon, France to the Marseilles airport to catch a 2100 flight to Madrid. From there I had to find my way to the hotel. Once I did find it, it was worth it! The hotel was a TRUE 4 star, with the biggest king size bed I have even seen and a bathtub!! Mind you all, I have been staying in places with small showers, so this was nice. The TV had FIVE channels in English. After being in France and nothing outside of Merci, and Au Revoir, could I understand. So, I am also happy to be in Spain, where I comprendo un poco Español!
After relunctantly leaving my king-sized hotel room, I ventured out to find the subway which would take me to the train station, so I could make my destination on to Santa Maria. I found it after a ten minute walk and figured out I needed to go to four subway exchanges to make it to the train. Then the train was
Standing on the palm tree
this was the ONLY time I saw rain in El Puertonot leaving until 1600, and I still had no idea where I was going exactly. I called the school which was closed and located an emergency number. I found out the name of the family I was staying with and a phone number. I don´t think the director of the school was too happy since she called my "loco" the first day I arrived. Oh, there is no other language to be spoken in the escuela except Español. No English...good thing I know a little bit of Spanish. Actually more than I thought since I have been having converstions only in that language. In Puerto de Santa Maria there is not too much to see, it is a small NON-tourist town. So I took the ferry to Cadiz yesterday and today. It is muy bonita there. Nice beaches and a long pier. Plus, beautiful gardens. There is actually a university there.
I have been speaking Español solamente. The professors are nice enough, but the director is a bit hard on the edges. I am picking up more, but speaking is the hardest. So I just listen mostly, which you may or may not know can be difficult for
me to do. Funny how you have to go back to basics. In English, do we even have a feminine and masculine forms of nouns or more than one way to say "you" depending on who you are speaking to?? What about past perfect and present perfect and imperative?? I am sure we do, but I may have learned that hace mucho tiempo!! Anyhow, I will be leaving Sabado (saturday for the non-Spanish speakers) to go to Barcelona, where the roles will be reversed and I will be teaching English to Spanish personas. Muy facil!! 😊 Excuse the occassional Spanish words, pero I am starting to even dream in Spanish...so I hope you can comprendeis!! Mucho gracias!
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Melissa
non-member comment
Ha! Espanol!
Hola Senorita Julies! I am so proud of you! I can only imagine how difficult this part is going to be...especially the listening and not talking thing, lol! J/K! You are going to learn as you already have, more about yourself than you probably ever needed to know through this experience. If only some other people could ever grow up and experience these things then their world wouldn't be so small and insignificant after all. You are going to have no problems getting into teaching after all this if its still what you want to do...I can't wait for your return!