Escuela

(The Spanish Flag at El Alcázar in Segovia, Spain)

Today I had only Spanish and Economics. My Spanish class moves very quickly, and up to now it hasn't been a problem as I've studied the material in prior classes. But today we started moving into some new topics, and unfortunately, I'm going to have to start spending more quality time with my grammar book. I find it is very difficult to understand Spanish grammar points when they are taught in Spanish (which I don't understand in the first place - you see the dilemma). Luckily, Lilia and I meet up after class and do the homework. She explains the lessons to me in English (they make so much more sense that way!) and I provide her the use of my dictionary and the pleasantries of my company.

Every Monday in Economics, we have a quiz on the readings we were assigned for the weekend. As today was our first quiz and I always get nervous about such things, I spent quite a bit of time studying the reading (upwards of four hours). Turns out, I studied the wrong thing, and I realized this when I looked at the first question on the quiz. What had happened was that we were told to pick up a packet in the library which had all the readings for the next three weeks. I assumed that the first reading would be for the first week, but they don't seem to follow that same logic in Spain. Turns out, the first reading was for the third week, the second reading was for the first week, and the third reading was for the second week. Many of the other kids made the same mistake, but I was peeved, seeing as I spent so much time studying. Luckily, my over-achieving mannerisms saved me a bit, as to get ahead, I had read the second article, as well (but all the same, I would have preferred a quiz on the first article - thank you very much).

After our quiz, the professor made the announcement that he couldn't figure out how to get his powerpoint to work and that because of the technical difficulties, class would have to be rescheduled. So far, this class has been pretty scattered, but I think it will start to shape up soon. . .

I do like the students in Economics, though. I sit next to a girl from Germany (who sounds Australian because studied abroad for a year in Australia), and I took the train back to Madrid with three other girls from the class, two from Great Britain and one from Sweden. Interesting tidbit: when speaking English, most Europeans have British accents, because they learn British-English, not American-English. This makes it all the more difficult for me to resist the urge to imitate them (I actually slipped up today and said "hello" with a British accent, but I don't think anyone noticed. . .)

Instead of taking the metro home from Nuevos Ministerios, I walked to get some exercise. It took me much longer than expected, but I didn't mind, seeing as the weather was nice and I had on my spiffy new shoes. Julia and I had a dinner of calamari and artichokes (not as bad as it sounds) and I have been reading Economics articles ever since. Hopefully the right ones.