Una semana ocupada

(A view of the Atlantic Coast in Asilah, Morocco)

So now I will tell you about the rest of my week, because I'm sure you're not sick of me yet.

Monday involved catching up on work and sleep that were ignored in Morocco. I actually woke up Tuesday morning, opened my eyes, and saw that my lights were on. I figured I must have fallen asleep before turning them off, and then I wondered whether I set my alarm or not. I rolled over to check, and saw the my phone was in my hand on the alarm screen, but that I had not pressed "set." Yes, I fell asleep setting my alarm. I had to skip a shower and breakfast, but made it to my class on time, despite being awfully peeved about being deprived of food.

Because I get home from class by 5 on Tuesdays, (and because I had just eaten for 4 days straight) I decided to go for a run. This is a rare and unexpected occurrence for me and usually results in some kind of story. This run didn't disappoint. In preparation, I checked google maps and planned a loop that would take me about 45 minutes. I even made myself a little Post-It note map to stick in my Ipod case. So I was running, feeling good, and loving that there was a stoplight on every corner. Suddenly, the road that was supposed to be there wasn't. I even checked my Post-It map. But I figured that since I was heading in the right direction, I'd intersect the next road eventually, so I kept going. Things started to look familiar and I was running downhill, so things were going well. But then everything started looking less familiar and it seemed like I had been running for an awfully long time. I stopped to look at the first map I saw, and realized I had run about 20 minutes in the wrong direction. So I had to run back up the hill (since when are there hills in cities, anyway?) to the plaza where I had made the wrong turn. I was supposed to make a left, but of course, the road I needed was not there. But I kept going, figuring it must be somewhere around there. I ran into a sketchy neighborhood and then, more quickly, out of the sketchy neighborhood, and then started asking for directions. It took three people before anyone knew my street. After stopping several more times for directions and after running for about another 20 minutes, I made it back to Julia's. I had been gone for more than 2 hours. I think this is one of the reasons why I always swam instead of ran - it's hard to get lost in a pool (although there was that time I ended up two lanes over. . .)

On Wednesday, I had lunch with Lizzie and Guillermo, who popped up out of nowhere (maybe he's stalking me. . .) We chatted for an hour and half about holiday traditions in our designated countries, and I sat there jealous that I don't have a guy's metabolism (he had a plate of pasta, a steak, a plate of fries, a footlong sandwich, and a bowl of rice pudding). Then I went to the Carlos III library, determined to come out with some movies (so that I can watch them in Spanish with subtitles). I have been searching the online catalog for two weeks now, and have not figured out where they are hiding these movies. So I wandered through the whole library to no avail, and then worked up the courage to ask a librarian, in Spanish. Of course, she pointed at the door right behind me and gave me a look that I did not appreciate, but as soon as I walked into the room, I didn't care. Behind this door (which looks like it is to an office and is why I didn't check there in the first place) is a wonderful room full of movies and books in English! I was really excited and spent quite a bit of time there. I loaned three movies and a book (a process which involves a lot of Spanish) and interlibrary loaned two more books. I was pretty proud of myself. Of course, now I have to figure out how to play these movies on my computer, because the discs in Europe are a different format than in the US. You can change the language on your disc drive only 5 times, so I don't want to do that, but I heard talk of some media player you can download. I tried that and have successfully gotten one of three discs to work. Hmpf.

Today I had lunch with my intercambio student, Jennifer. The intercambio program assigns you a Spanish student who wants to learn English, and you meet once a week to practice the two languages. It went really well, and she seems nice. I'm meeting with her again next week, so hopefully my Spanish magically improves. I have one other intercambio I haven't met yet, and I'm still debating whether I should take Guillermo up on his offer to do an intercambio. I'm also considering instigating Spanish-only days for myself. I considered a week, but that seemed daunting, so I decided to start off smaller.

I also got my Spanish test back today - 93.25! This is a solid A at Carlos III and is one of the highest grades in the class. Other people broke down in tears upon getting their tests, so I had to hide my excitement until I excused myself to the bathroom to do a happy-dance.

And yay! I am finally caught up on my blog entries, and about time. I have a class trip to Toledo tomorrow, so I'll probably have plenty more to talk about then. Now, I'm going to go work on getting my 273 pictures of Morocco posted. Fun!