San Sebastian

So we're starting to get used to the city. We're working on finding our way around & learning where the important things are (banks, etc.).

My Room

Monday we had orientation in the morning & then I moved into my new house in the afternoon. We had to take a written & oral placement test for spanish. The written was 85 questions - like 45mins. all in spanish so that was a little rough but I guess my oral went fine cause I'm in the track for spanish I was hoping for. My host mom doesn't speak english so we have rough conversation - it will definitely help my spanish though. As of now I can understand about half of what she says to me & my sentences are pretty rough. So Monday I just moved in, we ate dinner together, and I went to bed early. Oh! And I watched a little Gilmore Girls in Spanish, it was pretty interesting.

Tuesday we had more orientation - we found out our classes and had to listen to this Basque history lecture which was super boring & we were supposed to have a walking tour in the afternoon but it was cold & rainy so we decided against that. Instead we changed into warmer clothes, came back to school so they could make the wifi on campus work on our computers & wandered around a little bit - Kelly bought a blanket & some friends needed bathroom stuff. I ate dinner at my house last night and then met up with friends later at a cafe just to hang out. We also got information - there's a local hiking club, ski trips sometimes, two excursions to little towns, gyms, pilates/yoga classes, we can get intercambios - students at our university that are around our age just to practice our spanish & so they can practice their english. Oh, and our director said they want to try "speed dating" (kelly & i wanna call it speed greet or speed friendship, haha) - which would be a good way to meet locals & make friends but we'll see.

My First Day of School!

Kelly just loves my weird thing for palm trees. This is my annual first day of school picture for my family.

Today was the first day of class. It was finally nice & sunny! Kelly & I don't have class until 2 so we met up this morning to buy cell phones finally (my number is 626845879) & that was a very interesting experience. I am so proud of us for that accomplishment. I feel like its kind of big. It was pretty confusing with our broken Spanish but we got it. Then Kelly had to buy some groceries & I ate with my host mom. She made some nasty beans (I can't remember the name of them) and pescado (seafood) - but it was some fish that was good and then shrimp that still had their eyes! I couldn't really handle it so I had to go buy a diet coke to get rid of the taste...ew! Maybe we should just stick to chicken, bread & pasta, haha.

But we had class for a couple hours this afternoon - there's only 7 in my class & two might switch to another but its going to be alot of spanish (15 hours a week - grammar-type classes, like what it is at home but more intense). I'm going to be such a spanish pro come may. And I'm going to start a basque folkdance class in a couple weeks & a popular class called de elvis al rap (sara - kinda like your from rock to bach one) in february. But now Kelly & I are just sitting in this cafe type thing near school so we can have wifi. We still need to buy bus passes which is alot more complicated than it sounds! And we'll get books tomorrow.

Something interesting...my name doesn't really translate well into Spanish because of the J and the two L's (geeze parents what were you thinking?). It makes them really confused - especially my host mom & her two daughters I've met. They can't make the J sound (Sara - you could have a job here!). So my host mom has been trying to say my name & she just doesn't understand. Today I met her daughter & they asked me how you say my name in spanish so i just had them pronounce it like hill which kind of worked for them - easier than jill. And then today I wrote down my name for my host mom so maybe she'd get it & she asked me where my name came from if it was like a saint or something. And I was like nope, just jill. And she asked if it was short for something & kept putting these weird endings on it like jillario, haha. And I tried to explain that its a nursery rhyme but i do not know enough vocab & just told her it was in a book for kids. So if anyone has any suggestions for how to explain my name to the spaniards just let me know & until then i am "hill" :)

I'm finally down to my last euros so I'll have to find a good bank in San Sebastian - but I'm doing pretty good on spending - so be proud parents. Oh, and of course I have to add I saw KU beat K-State :)

More later.
Miss you all!
Love, Jill