Since we (I) last spoke, Lauren and I have returned from our second trip out of Spain (we are jet-setters now). We spent last weekend gallivanting around in london where they speak ENGLISH (shocking!!!!). Immediately after deplaning, we were baffled to find that all of the directions were in english and that all the people spoke English. This was slightly unfortunate due to the fact that I am in a place right now where I speak both Spanish and English at a mediocre level with a fourth grade vocabulary (last night as I tried to explain to Lauren why something was “vital” I could not remember that word, but managed to sputter around and came up with the words “important”, “lucrative”, and “viral” in place of “vital” while trying to give my explanation. This is a daily occurrence - and yes, I just figured out what word I was looking for, 12 hours later). Nevertheless, we spent the weekend basking in the glory of the English language and enjoyed a break from violent hand motions as we try to explain ourselves in another language.
As I spent a family vacation in London 3 years ago and Lauren had never been, I let her dictate the trip and what she wanted to do. We met up with several friends from paris as well as our friends studying in London and saw the changing of the guard. Tragically I was unable to snag one of the guards’ signature furry hats. After that, we walked around to see big ben, parliament, the London eye, and the thames river, and also managed to take a token London phone booth picture. The next day, we took a tip from my favorite movie, The Parent Trap, (oh how I miss the days of LiLo’s glory) and “Spent the day getting lost in Harrods” – while we didn’t buy anything (fun fact: they sell everything at Harrods. and I mean everything…including puppies), we managed to eat our way through the famous department store, enjoying sandwiches, cupcakes, and a giant ice cream sundae. Overall, we had a fabulous trip (thanks to our wonderful, hospitable friends studying in London) and it was nice to give our brains a break from the español.
picadilly circus
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| From london |
more reunions
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| From london |
buckingham palace
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| From london |
changing of the guard
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| From london |
the most touristy but best picture of the weekend
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| From london |
london eye
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| From london |
ice cream at harrods
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| From london |
This week in Madrid was a fairly normal one, aside from the fact that on Tuesday, I had my first of two presentations in my class with Spaniards, fundamentals del sistéma jurídica. At the beginning of the semester, we were split up into discussion groups of 5, and each week, one person in the group is the “ponente,” or expert, on the week’s assigned reading, and has to explain to the group the important points and lead a discussion. It sounds fairly painless but let me remind you that a) both the 80 pages of reading and the discussion are in Spanish and b) the people listening to the presentation are native speakers (cue profanities). Needless to say, I was a little nervous. I started reading the morning of (three days before, m&d) my presentation so that the material would be fresh on my mind (because I was too lazy to start before) and was sweating profusely by the time I got to class. As my group gathered around me to listen, I realized that there were 2 people missing, and that I would be presenting to a Spanish girl and an American boy and had pumped out all of that adrenaline for nothing. I stumbled over my words but managed to get through the reading and get my point across. Thankfully I am not the ponente for another 5 weeks.
This weekend, we have friends visiting from london, paris, italy, and the grand ol’ us of a, so a big bienvenidos a Madrid to nuestros amigos y MI FAMILIA! More stories to come soon.
Cheers!
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