School and Food Differences

This week I met the other exchange student in the grade above me named Taylor. He is from China, but lived in Hawaii for awhile so is fluent in English. During break I went to the pastry shop by my school with him. He was very nice, and told me he wanted me to come hang out and meet his friends! He also told me he was only supposed to stay for the first semester, but loved Spain so much he is staying for the second! I am still working on feeling completely settled and comfortable. I don’t think this will happen until I can converse more easily though. I can tell my ability to understand and speak is getting better, but I still have awhile to go to reach where I want to be. I thought dancing here was non existent, but I finally met a girl that dances! She is very nice and told me where she danced. I think I might try and take some ballet and modern classes there. I am a little nervous to try and take classes though because of my lack Spanish, but I know it will actually help my Spanish and help me meet more people. I think I will go and watch a class first though, just to see what it’s like.

I am understanding more in Chemistry and Math because what they learn is the same in the U.S. I have realized though they teach things differently. In math I go crazy because the teacher NEVER factors any equation(which is faster) and instead goes straight to the quadratic formula. In my school in the U.S. we use the quadratic formula only when it can’t be factored or has larger numbers that would take a while to figure out how it factors. Also in Chemistry we are doing Lewis structures. The teacher always goes through all these steps I think are unnecessary, but the way I learned involves very few steps and is much faster. A concept I haven’t figured out in school is substitute teachers. I think when a teacher isn’t here they just don’t have class and instead it’s a free period. The other day my Chem teacher didn’t come to class, but I saw him in another class earlier and at lunch after. This confused me. 2 other different things I’ve noticed in school is all notebooks are graph paper, and I think notecards are barely used for studying. I wanted notecards to study Spanish and we went to a lot of different stores before finally finding these odd large ones that were lined on both sides. 

Today during lunch the gym teacher sat at a table with us because the teacher’s table was full. We ended up staying in the cafeteria the whole lunch talking with him. He spoke to us in English to practice, and we spoke back in Spanish. We discovered most sports in Spain are played through outside clubs and not through the schools. When I told him my school has a bowling team, he laughed and said “Typical americans” which I thought was pretty funny (my friend John on the bowling team wasn't so happy when I told him that comment though hehe). Also, sports in college isn’t like the U.S. you can play sports in college, but college sports aren’t very popular and shown on TV like in the U.S. There’s no such thing as scholarships for athletes to play at a college either. The gym teacher then told us about his opinions of the U.S. when he went to Orlando when he was younger. He explained how he thought it was cool that you could wear anything anywhere and no one cared. He said there were also more fat people and they didn’t seem embarrassed of their clothing, like when they wear tight clothes and short shorts. I thought this was hilarious! 

FOOD!!!! So I haven’t talked much about meals here. Breakfast is much smaller, and eggs are NOT a breakfast food here! Lunch is the largest meal of the day and is eaten around 2 or 3. Dinner is eaten veryyyyy late. We typically eat dinner around 9:30. When we eat dinner at my house here, we all eat dinner together every night. After dinner, we almost always have some type of dessert. I have discovered fruit is considered a dessert here. Dinner is longer too, for we spend a lot of time talking about our day and usually wait for everyone to finish eating before we leave the table. When we have hamburgers for dinner we use toast instead of buns, and sometimes use one piece of toast on the bottom and pile everything on top. If they use it like a bun, on the top and bottom, they cut it with a knife. I still eat mine with my hands though. Pancakes(my favorite food) are non existent here, but my family has maple syrup, which their exchange student last year gave them, so one day they said we will make pancakes, eggs, toast, and bacon, a “typical american breakfast”:) Since dinner is later everyone stays up later too, I think I am always the first one to go to sleep. Dinner may last until 10:30-11 so I usually go to sleep right after dinner even though I wake up much later for school (8 but in the U.S. I woke up at 6:45). 

After some complications I am officially going to Cadiz for Carnival! I am sooooooo excited, and also excited to see my friend Nirmala:) The weekend after Cadiz  I go to Paris, and it seems like almost everyone in my grade is also going!