Last week

I can’t believe the last week of classes has come already. I knew it would all fly by though. I’m excited to be done with the class part and then have fun for the next week or so with Jordan and friends. Here’s an update.

Friday was a tough day. My body knew that it was Friday, and I was having a hard time concentrating in class. After my last class of the day had finished I realized that I hadn’t heard a single word that the professor said after our break. Like, I really couldn’t tell you what we talked about. I had been daydreaming the whole time. But I at least pretended that I was paying attention by looking at her and nodding my head. Anyway, that night we went to this place where a bunch of the students were going for karaoke. Only two songs were sung because it was a playstation karaoke thing, and the bartender was the only one who knew how to run it, but he was really busy. That stunk, but we had fun just talking and playing darts. Anyway, a neighbor that lives above the bar ended up calling the police because it was too “noisy”. Apparently he does that all the time. The cops came and didn’t do anything. They just stood and talked to some people and smoked. But it’s like, if you don’t want it to be noisy where you live, don’t choose to live above a bar, duh. It’s not like it was really noisy anyway. It was just the normal noise that happens when there are 35 people talking at once. There wasn’t even any music. Esther and I left earlier than the rest because they had the doors closed, and most of the people in there were smoking. It hurt our eyes and lungs. You should have seen the place. You would have thought it was on fire. My hair actually still smells like stale smoke after three showers. Oh, and we took a taxi there and back and it cost 5 Euros (like $7-ish). We only went 1.5 kilometers, which is just under a mile. What a rip-off.

Saturday I went with a small group of girls to a Gitano market nearby. Wow, it was crazy. It kind of reminded me of the Mexican market in downtown LA, but with an even narrower pathway. The vendors were all yelling about their amazing prices and clapping their hands. “Brand name, only 4 euros, high quality!” Wow, isn’t that unbelievable for a REAL Coach purse?! Why go to a Coach store when you can get it for 99% less at a Gitano market? Besides the fake stuff they sell, there are some vendors that actually sell some real brand-name things. And you can tell who those people are because they only have like 10 items at their stand. Everybody here thinks/knows that they steal things from boutiques and re-sell them. How sad. The Gitano culture is pretty interesting. I was watching a tv show about them the other week. They get married extremely young (like between 13 and 16) and the weddings are crazy. Many don’t work but they have lots of money (can we say drugs?). You should research them in your spare time.

After the market I went to the “beach” here with some friends. The beach is by the icky river. It was hotttttt. I was soaking wet without going in the water. I came home early. Then I was bored. I didn’t feel like studying, so I went to the park by the school to use the internet. Of course, it didn’t work. And it still doesn’t work. I don’t know what happened.
Sunday, Esther went to Santander up north, and I was all alone. I went for a long walk and then I stopped at this hamburger place because I just really wanted a hamburger. I had one and some decaf. coffee. The dude asked me if I wanted milk with my coffee and I said yes. So he filled my cup up completely with warm milk and gave me an instant coffee pack. Wow, I thought he was asking if I wanted a little milk with my coffee, not a little coffee with my milk. It was actually really good though.

Ok, my little “rant” for the day…not an angry one though. Don’t you hate it when you know that you’re right about something for a fact, but the person you’re talking to thinks that they are right? It’s really awkward and it’s usually about little things that I don’t want to argue about. Many times it’s about grammar points. It’s happened a few times to me since I’ve been here. Like, I really feel like I know that I’m right…I even go online to verify to myself that I’m right, but I would never go back to that person and say, “Well, I just looked online, and it turns out that I was right after all.” But let me just make it clear that I don’t think that I’m always right…but I usually am :).

Last thing. A little random poll: When you hear the words “France” or “French” what are the first things that come to your mind? (like culture, food, historical things).