San Sebastián

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Hola!

I must admit that I have been terrible with updating my blog, sorry!

Nothing terribly exciting has been happening lately, just the normal routine: school, homework, hanging with friends, etc. Last weekend I mainly just hung out in Getxo/Bilbao and explored around here. The main area of exploration has been Santurzi which is on the other side of the river in comparison to Getxo, another area that I have been exploring has been Casco Viejo, basically just the old part of Bilbao. It's cool the stuff that you find just walking around here. As far as weekdays go I stay in most of the time because of homework.

TABC is a teaching program (I don't know if I mentioned it in any past blogs) through USAC that allows the study abroad students to go into local private schools and teach English for 12€ an hour to kids anywhere from five years to high school. My first class of TABC was two weeks ago and, at least for the first class, was not anything special. When I first met the teacher I would be working with she told me that I didn't need to have anything prepared for the first class...that was a fail. I went in to my fourth grade class and started talking about myself but that took only about 15 minutes and then for the rest of the class they just colored, my fifth grade class was a little better because there was an English lesson that the teacher wanted me to help out with so things went a little more smoothly.
This past week went MUCH better than last, for one I actually had a plan set so that I wouldn't be standing there awkwardly. With my fourth graders I went over articles of clothing and colors, I had them draw out a snowman that wore at least three articles of clothing (a snowman because it snowed last weekend), and then played a game involving clothes. With my fifth graders I went over different food types and we played the game "I'm going on a picnic" which took up about half the class time and then I helped the teacher out with the English lesson again. So needless to say, this week was MUCH better than last week for TABC.

Last weekend a few friends and I took a day trip to San Sebastián, it was absolutely gorgeous there BUT it was snowing. 😞 Because of the cold weather we couldn't do all that we wanted to in San Sebastián, it was unfortunate but not the end of the world because it is only an hour away by bus and we want to go back when it is warmer. We went to the beach and did some window shopping there, Natalie had a few friends studying there so we met up with them for a little bit and just hung out. For dinner we went to "La Vaca" for hamburgers, when I told my host mom she got upset and called us all silly Americans because we didn't get pintxos and wine, it was pretty funny! That evening we got back to Bilbao around eleven at night and just crashed, we were so exhausted.

This weekend we all stayed in Bilbao and just have been hanging out, exploring, shopping, and going out. Nothing special, however I do want to go hiking tomorrow but based on the weather reports I don't know if that will happen or not, I am hoping for some sun because I am getting tired of the cold and rain (going to school in Arizona has spoiled me! haha). I will include pictures of our hiking adventure next blog if we end up going on one! Anyway, I am off to shower and get ready for the evening excursions!

Love and miss you all!

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