Mi Familia Espanola y La Comida Mas Rica!

It's 3:15 and I just finished eating a delicious lunch prepared by my madre! First I had a salad with tomatoes, olive oil, and vinegar, then some little empanadas with tuna and some tasty red sauce, then this delicious stew-like soup with a thick brown broth, beans, potatoes, and I'm not sure what else. And of course fresh bread! We have it with every meal, and it's delicious and fresh.

I ate with my host brother and he's really nice and helpful. My madre lives by herself and works in a hospital. She has three children, a son who is 31, another son about 26, and a daughter in her 20's too. I think the sons work in construction, but because of the "la crisis" that has hit Spain so hard, they have not had much work. It's pretty sad, and I know they are thinking about looking for work in Ireland or England. My madre is really nice and relatively easy to talk to. She told me I speak Spanish very well and fluidly without an American accent. Yay!

Yesterday she made me paella which might be my new favorite food. I was also really hungry, because I didn't eat anything until that lunch at 4:00pm! We were up early to be picked up by our parents and to take our placement test. I'm in Intermedio III which is pretty much right in the middle. I'm excited to learn a lot!

I came back to my house after the test and we ate, talked, watched some weird Spanish TV (The Simpsons, the news, and a travel show), and took the dogs for a walk. Oh yes! She has two dogs, a golden retriever and a boxer! They are big and bark, but they are really sweet and it's nice to have pets around.

Today I only had one class, but I did some shopping and talking with my friends and people who have been here before. It's been fun and relaxed so far, but we're in kind of a weird stage of not completely knowing what's going on...We'll figure it out soon! Everyone has been very helpful and I think our Spanish is already improving!

I think I might take a siesta in a bit (it's wonderful! I slept 2 hours yesterday!) and then some people in our class are going to meet up by La Gorda to walk around and get phones. Hope everything is well at home! The crazy amount of snow has been all over the news here, they don't know what to do! I hope things are warming up a bit at home...Unlikely I'm sure!

PS- the airport called to say my suitcase would be here today, but it's not here yet...I'm getting a little tired of my two shirts! Why we packed 10 pairs of underwear in my carry on and only one shirt, I don't know. Anyway, I'm still hopeful!

Adios!