a trip to the beach and a proper Sunday lunch

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It's a cold and grey Sunday afternoon, quite a change from the last few weeks of beautiful summer weather, but nevertheless we've been having a lovely day. We all find that Sundays can be 'dead' days - because nothing's open, nothing's going on and we don't always get together leaving Sundays for boring things like work and cleaning - essential things, but not necessarily fun ones. And even when you've done those jobs the hours can still stretch out before you endlessly. So we decided to change things, and yesterday, we went to the supermarket to get things to make a roast dinner so that we could have a lovely meal together today. It all went pretty smoothly - we started cooking at 1pm after a nice lie-in, and had a lovely meal with plenty of wine, before we all slumped on the sofas, full to bursting and watched a film. Not a hugely exciting day, but a very lovely one, as we all miss the family meals, the home-cooking from Britain.

In two days' time, however, we will get as much of that as we can bear, because on Wednesday, we're all flying home for the Easter holidays, where I've got lots of plans and lots of people to see so I can't wait! We've nicknamed the flight home the 'party flight' because there are at least 8 of us all going on the same plane back home! Once I'm there, it'll be visiting family, trips with friends, and hopefully another jaunt up to Sheffield and a couple of days in Loughborough with the girls from Perpignan before flying back to Spain. It's going to be a busy two weeks!

I don't think the weather there is going to be nice enough to sunbathe on the beach however; up until the weekend here we kept the warm weather, and on Thursday afternoon, after our lectures, Rosy, Caroline, Becky and I got a bus out to Gijon, a neighbouring city on the coast, and spent a wonderful few hours lying on the beach, listening to the sound of the sea. It was only a small beach, surrounded by city buildings but it was quiet and restful. We took a picnic and spent a happy while muching our way through that before spending the rest of the time horizontal. We did dip our toes into the sea, but the Atlantic along northern Spain at this time of the year is still freezing, so after chilling our toes, we admitted defeat and returned to warm ourselves under the afternoon sun.

In the evening, beach-tired and happy, we returned to Oviedo, where we shook the sand out of everything, had long and luxurious showers and got dressed up for the evening. We had a brilliant night; after some drinks at ours, we went into the old town, to a small club called Radio 8, which plays ok music to start with, that rapidly degenerates into early nineties bubblegum pop, but which is good fun and where lots of the erasmus students go. We met one of Caroline's flatmates there, Cris, a lovely Spanish girl who sings along to everything and makes us repeatedly say 'oh...my...god' because she loves it! Finally, at 4am, we stumbled back home and fell into bed, where i stayed for some time.

We were very concerned by the news that the buses had gone on strike; we hardly ever use them, but we need to in order to get to the airport on Wednesday, and with memories of French public services grinding to a halt at every possible opportunity, we were understandably worried. However, the Spanish characteristic for being too laid back to ever take anything to extremes was proved again here: apparently the buses were on strike on Thursday when we went to and from Gijon, and the only difference was that they ran every three-quarters of an hour rather than every twenty minutes. If that is typical of a Spanish strike, it bodes well for Wednesday; we're keeping our fingers crossed because we'd rather not shell out 60 euros for a taxi if at all possible.

It is this sort of thing that makes Spanish life so pleasing and enjoyable, and I really like the pace of life here. But I am looking forward to the holidays, to going back to Britain, to seeing my friends and family. Not much could beat that at the moment.

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