Ahora quisieria hablar un poquito de mi familia anfitriona. Pasé mi fin de semana completa con ellos. Estaba muy divertido - había dos fiestas para amigos y parientes y aunque yo no decía mucho, me divertí mucho.
[Hello friends (and mom and dad, without a doubt) ;)
Today I'd like to speak a little about my host family. I spent my whole weekend with them. It was really fun - we had 2 parties here for their friends and relatives and although I didn't say much, I had a lot of fun. ]
I wrote my last blog on Friday night, and unfortunately that whole night I was up every hour, sick as a dog. I woke up Saturday morning, feeling completely wiped out and barely able to get downstairs. Luckily, with the help of my host family and my friend Powers and her host mom, I was able to drink lots of Gatorade, delicious oregano tea, soup, and bread, and then last night, had THE MOST INCREDIBLE sleep of my life. Understandably. But I slept for 12 hours straight and woke up feeling amazing. I still took it easy today but I'm feeling almost as good as new now, about 48 hours later :)
I have a new idea of why I was sick, thanks to Sarah S and Powers' mom - apparently the strawberries here are dangerous to eat if not washed really well, and so there's a pretty good chance that's why I became so ill. Anyway - now I know! And now I've been sick at least once, maybe it won't happen again.
Anyway, the parties were fun this weekend. Yesterday was just friends of the family. I got to talk a little with a few girls my age; we went outside and chatted for a bit as they smoked (which is so interesting too by the way - so many people my age here smoke! I'm really not used to that.) Then we came back and ate and talked, and the kids mostly hung back and listened (and by kids I mean we were all around 20 but still jovenes) to the adults joking and laughing. We played a few party games and then everyone ate - all sorts of sausages, beef, chicken, potatoes, salads, guacamole, drinks galore, etc. I had bread and a few potatoes and water. Around 8 I escaped, exhausted, and spent a few hours here.
This morning I woke up, finished East of Eden and got ready for another party, this time with my host parents' brothers and sisters. They served all the leftovers from last night and I yet again got to stare lustfully at all the delicious food I couldn't eat. Anyway, this time I mostly did and said nothing for a long time, but laughed quite a bit at one of the cousins - she's 12 and kept going up to the parrot to get him to make noises. I've never seen Juanito so crazy about a person! She started doing her homework at one point so I got mine out too. I helped her with her math and she helped me figure out the difference between preterite and imperfect in my grammar homework! Later, one of the uncles was trying to teach me how to conjugate and he wouldn't stop talking longer enough to listen to me say that my homework wasn't about conjugating, it was about learning about the 50 millions different ways to use the verbs conocer, saber, echar, fallar, faltar, etc. As in - much more difficult than conjugating! But he was really nice at least.
So I had a good time. I was secretly relieved all weekend that I didn't have to go anywhere or that I wasn't exploring the city. My friends here are always so ready to go and do things, whereas I need time to myself to relax. So maybe being sick was a blessing in disguise?
While I was sitting at the parties, I kept looking around the room thinking - this a family, these are good friends, they've known each other forever... I don't know. It was funny comparing all of them to my own family and friends of family, of course feeling a little sad about it but also how cool it is that there are groups like this everywhere. Anyway, mostly I was just thinking about how great Christmas was and how lucky we were to spend it with everyone in Canada and how much I love my family. And how happy and grateful I'll be when I get back. It takes an afternoon or two of feeling like you really don't belong somewhere to remind you of where you do belong and where you'll always be the happiest and most comfortable.
Anyway, enough with the sappy stuff. I miss everyone a lot but my thoughts just now were less about missing everyone but more about gratefulness and being happy because I know what is waiting for me when I get back. In the meantime, I think I owe it to everyone to do as much as I can while I'm here and have a great time :)
I would like to say though - tonight, my host sister Estefy came to my room to borrow my nail polish and we talked for a good half hour! My Spanish has improved so much in two weeks. My use of the past tense has improved the most - I'm using it more and thinking about it less. It's very encouraging. My classes are great so far and are going to be very helpful, but I can't imagine my Spanish improving without living here with a host family. At school, it's too easy to speak English with my friends and come home and read my favorite English books. But forcing myself to converse has been the most helpful so far. And people - often perfect strangers keep telling me that I speak really well so I ought to not worry. When I get really discouraged, I tell myself I only started taking Spanish classes a year and a half ago. There are some people in my classes who've taken Spanish for 7 or 8 years now and we're about on the same level. There are people here even, who are here only to travel and enjoy themselves - which is great and in a way I am too - but my priority is learning Spanish. So unlike the others, I'm challenging myself through classes and homework but hopefully the reward will be great too.
Also - shhh don't tell anybody - I've been in my classes, especially grammar, evaluating exactly how I'll be teaching my own Spanish and French classes the same topics. Cue my mom rolling her eyes as she reads this ;) If anything, that sort of thinking is encouraging me to think harder about the concepts so it doesn't hurt.
Well, time to do some more homework. Chau!
Cyn
No comments:
Post a Comment