Settling In...

Oh boy. I’m not sure where to start. On the one hand, I feel like all I have been doing is going to classes, downing a few cafés, eating mediocre food, and studying. On the other hand, it has been such a sensory overload that I really don’t know where to start with explaining some of the details.

I’ve heard that when babies are learning something new (like making certain sounds or rolling over), that they keep themselves awake for hours practicing their new skill. I feel like I’m in that stage. I still haven’t been able to sleep much and now that things have cooled off quite a bit, I can’t blame it on the heat. I just can’t turn my brain off. I lie awake processing all the different things I’ve learned throughout the day, talk to myself in Spanish while analyzing the grammar and try to make sense of all the fragments of information spinning haphazardly around my brain. I’ve got both languages going full time mentally, which is really exhausting, but exciting at the same time.

Roses:

• By far my favorite part about the program is my classes. The teachers are wonderful (and I’m fairly critical of teachers when I’m playing the role of the student, so this is saying a lot!). The classes are overlapping beautifully and things that I’m learning in one class are being reinforced in another class. All the teachers are great lecturers. There’s something really exhilarating about sitting there and being totally enraptured for 50 minutes by an amazing lecturer/storyteller!! There’s only one class that is a bit of a struggle for me to stay focused in and follow along with: The Evolution of Spanish. But I’m definitely not the only one, so at least I know it’s not just me having a hard time comprehending things.

• I’m so grateful that Angi is here with me. I think I would definitely be feeling pretty lonely if I were flying sola. It’s so nice to have a study-budy that gets me and that I can be totally honest and real with.

Angi and I in the Plaza Mayor.

Thorns:

• The other students: Academically, this program is what I was hoping for. Culturally, it’s been really hard for me. I would say that at least 85% of the students are native Spanish speakers, and they’ve made it pretty apparent that they think that the non-native speakers don’t know anything (Although, I do have to say that we’ve been kicking booty in our grammar class; don’t mess with us and our grammar rules!). It’s a very intimidating learning environment. Teachers have got to be the hardest people to teach; we’re all used to being in control all day long and it’s hard to relinquish that sense of control. I think there are a number of “students” who would really like to get up in front of the class and teach it. Also, most of the students cannot stop talking. Like, they’re holding full-on conversations in the middle of a lecture. I’m doing just fine understanding the teachers and the content, but not when there’s a ton of noise and talking around me. It’s affecting my learning, but I also think it’s SO rude to the teachers. An example of the appalling student behavior: during our cultural class that visits different sites, we have a professor that gives us the history and explains the art & architecture. The entire time he was leading us around, people would just wander off and do their own photoshoot of the place, completely ignoring the teacher. It’s frustrating.

• The food. It’s terrible. I could go on about it, but what’s the point? I love to eat and they’re robbing me of a very simple pleasure (and I’m too cheap to keep going out every meal). Angi and I have been going to a café for breakfast, simply out of necessity because the breakfast line is too long to make it to class on time.

In front of Cursos Internacionales (our program)