I've been going back and forth a bit, trying to decide whether or not I want to do this whole blogging business as I reach the age and era of independent travel. Currently, I'm sitting on a low twin-sized bed with an endearing rose and cream striped floral bedding in the second floor of a condo in the heart of Madrid that happens to have the most gorgeous view of the gardens of the Spanish Palacia Real, the Rio Manzanares, and the bridge connecting it all La Puente de Segovia. And (the previous run-on sentence aside) I decided that life is pretty good right about now so why not go ahead and write, well ok, gush about it. I'm going to ask you to forgive me now for any grammatical or linguistic mistakes I may incur as I go - I'm posting for your curiosity and entertainment, not your judgment. On the topic of apologies, I'd also like to offer one up on the off chance that any of you find this blog to be particularly too verbose. I've recently finished reading Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice with the unfortunate consequence that my writing and even my thoughts seem to have taken on her prolonged and lilting cadence. Flying British Airways and connecting through Heathrow doesn't seem to have helped things much. Hopefully it doesn't nag you too much. Furthermore, let's hope that as I spend more time in Madrid I don't forget how to write in English.
So I suppose I should start at the beginning. It's now 7:54p, local time, which my computer, still set to central time, tells me is not quite 1:00p at home. My younger brother should just be about wrapping up his lunch and getting bored in class in his post-AP test haze while I sit here, having barely slept since waking up around 10a Chicago time yesterday, resting legs exhausted from miles of walking around Madrid in a constant state of marvel, waiting for my host family to call me to dinner and wired as could be over my excitement to be here.
Lo siento, I'm getting ahead of myself - where was I? Oh right, the beginning. Well I suppose I should start by introducing both myself and the program in which I'm partaking. For those who may not know me (though I should hope I am acquainted with the majority of my readers), you can just call me KCG. I'm a short-ish, thin-ish, athletic, half-Asian, almost-twenty young lady from a suburb just north of Chicago. With finals having ended about a week and a half ago, I'm spending the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college on a Duke (yep, that's my school!) sponsored and organized program to attend two classes at CEU San Pablo University in Madrid. Though they don't tell us much about the classes, I can tell you right now that one will focus on history while the other on the modern culture of Madrid. It will feature organized excursions to other sites in this most gorgeous agricultural country, about which I'll elaborate as each runs its course. My host family is to escort my companera de cuarto and I to the university tomorrow at 10:30a for our official orientation to the program tomorrow.
Oh yea, did I mention I have a host family? What about the fact that they speak ninguna palabra of English? Introducing Emilo and Angeles, my gracious host-parents. They're very sweet, and understanding them really isn't all as bad as I had thought it might be. As I type, I can hear them bickering slightly, in that cute way that functional older married couples do, about what to make for dinner. To be honest, we haven't had any communication breakdowns yet (excuse the fact that I arrived on their doorstep barely seven hours ago and spent a great deal of time exploring and reacquainting myself with this magnificent city in the company of a couple of other students from the program). So far, I've effectively come to understand that Emilio is a military veteran, retired now, and I'm not quite sure what his wife does, if she works at all. I plan on using this as a topic of conversation during our cena in about an hour. They've got five kids, all grown, or at least mostly grown. In some order, they are four sons and a daughter, three of whom live elsewhere. The other two I'll apparently have the chance to get to know fairly well as they still reside with their parents. I can also happily report already that Angeles is a fantastic cook, and I'm hoping to learn a thing or two from her during my six week stay here. When I arrived, unexpectedly famished, I might mention, she had ready for me a small portion of penne pasta in a light tomato, not quite sauce, but coating almost, prepared for me. It was adorned with a grilled slice of ham and a dollop of cheese. Yes, I know, I. Ate. Cheese. For those of you who don't know, I'm not a picky eater growing up in a family that frequented China-town, with a close friend of Brasilian and Indian descent, and having hosted a myriad of au pairs, picky was never an option. That being said, the three foods that I consistently find myself disliking are as follows: 1) most forms of cheese, 2) raw tomatoes, and 3) mangoes. I won't go into detail now - I doubt I could even explain to myself why I tend not to favor these three in particular. The queso that topped off my pasta wasn't like a Kraft single, nor did it remind me of any cheese of the shredded variety. The closest way that I can describe it is as having a consistency somewhere between those of yogurt and New England clam chowder, and a flavor lighter and less rich but similar to the cheese in a quesadilla from The Dillo (it's a Duke thing). The penne was accompanied by a similarly portioned rice salad that was more or less cabbage, onions, peas, carrots and cherry tomatoes (which I ate all of for fear of disrespecting, though I only really managed this by following up each bite of tomato quickly with a nibble of bread to wash it down) in some sort of a vinaigrette that was neither as dark as, nor quite as biting as, a balsamic. Needless to say, I'm excited to see what dinner brings tonight.
So I suppose I should introduce a few more characters - the other students from my program that I've met so far. Let's see...the first I met up with was Madison, who I know from club soccer. She's a year below me and though we're on the same team at school, I can't really say we know each other well. At least not yet. Madison and I actually shared the same flight from Chicago to London in addition to our connection to Madrid but the flight was so big, and I think we were both so preoccupied with making sure we were travelling safely with all of our belongings in tow, that we didn't realize this until we were both in a slight panic in London. The departure board had our flight posted as "Gate will open at 8:20a" and it was 8:35a. Apparently though, this was pretty typical of the way that Heathrow's terminal 5 functions, and I'm pretty sure that the customer service rep we accosted laughed at us as we hustled down to the gate he told us, only to discover that we were by far the first ones to arrive. The flight would leave in less than half an hour at that point.
While waiting to board, we became acquainted with Tracie, a rising senior double majoring in Anthropology and Spanish. She's petite, Black, and sports a kick-ass bob hair-cut. As luck would have it, Tracie and I had opposite window seats for the same row of the short flight. What is more, we ended up sharing a delightful cab because, again as luck played out, she and I are now being hosted in the same building - just six floors apart. Our cab driver was awesome and patient, eagerly dishing us the places he thought we should shop and different local events that would be going on that we "simplemente tendran que visitar". He even seemed mildly impressed by our Spanish! Though, come to think of it, that could have just been him trying to be nice to the jet-lagged American girls. Regardless, we made it to our building quickly and easily. (M, you'll appreciate this little parenthetical anecdote, I think. Remember those silly concrete poles that lined all of the curbs in Madrid when we came that summer after graduation? They were about knee-high and not a day of our trip went by that I didn't trip over one of them? Well, I hope you'll get amusement out of the fact that trip over one of those was the very first thing I did upon exiting my cab. Now wasn't that a nice welcome-back from the city to me??)
It's funny, really, because the only time I actually grew concerned, or rather, felt myself less than confident throughout my travels was not when I forgot about the chapstick I'd tossed in a side pocket that caused security in London to have to comb through my bag. Nor was it when the pregnant Italian lady sitting next to me on the flight from Chicago to London lashed out in her sleep as she dreamed (though I might have jumped about a foot in the air if I hadn't responsibly been strapped in by my seatbelt). It wasn't even as Madison and I puzzled over Heathrow's departure boards, nor when my checked bag was THE LAST ONE to hit the conveyor belt. No, my one true moment of panic happened after I'd already entered my edificio. The doorman chuckled to himself as Tracie and I squeezed our two petite bodies, her two rolling suitcases (the ones with the fancy wheels that swivel so you can pull the bag with ease in literally any direction - yea they actually seem to have a mind of their own (or it could just be that Madrid is built on hills comparable to San Francisco) and so we've nicknamed them Los Corredores, or the runners because they kept rolling away from her), my one rolling bag and my enormous backpack into the elevator. We barely fit, and no, we did not get stuck in the elevator. No, what made me panic was that we didn't realize just how old the elevator was. After pressing the 2 and the 8, I promptly got out on the first floor the elevator stopped at, assuming it to be the 2nd since there was no convenient display inside the elevator (incidentally, there is one on the outside though...). What I didn't know was that the elevator in our building does not change directions to expedite its way to the next floor it is called to. Instead, it carries on all of the way to the 17th floor, or all of the way to the lowest of the three basement levels, only opening at the very bottom, the very top and the floors it has been called to along the way. So when I exited the elevator, I was not on the 2nd floor, but in a very dark corner of the lowest level of the basement, surrounded by locked doors and signs for utility rooms hung on yellow concrete walls. I lugged my bags up two flights of stairs, still confused by the musty scent (that I should clarify is confined to the subterranean levels - the other floors all carry a faint and comforting scent of whatever has most recently been cooking). Don't worry though - I eventually figured out that I needed to get back on the elevator, and after a brief, and looking back on it, quite comical conversation with another tenant (who looked to be about twelve). I finally made it to the 2nd floor, where my host family was quite confused by my delay after they had rung me into the building. Needless to say, after I explained my brief ordeal to them in the broken Spanish of my flustered state, both of my host parents nearly split their sides with laughter.
The last two characters of the day to introduce are Caitlin and Max. Caitlin is also staying with Emilio and Angeles, making her my companera de cuarto, and we were actually in the same Spanish class fall of freshman year. It's kind of funny because even though we look and sound absolutely nothing alike, our host parents keep mixing up our names. I think it must be the alliteration or something. For the time being, as they speak to each other they call me the lively one and Caitlin la primera, as in the first who arrived. I'm not sure if they know I know this or not, but I find it amusing. And Caitlin introduced me to her friend Max. I guess they went to high school together or something.
Ok. dinner time. I'll talk more about them later!
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