Dia Numero Dos

Sitting in my comfy, squishy Spain bed, about to start my travel blog...Here goes!

Lunchtime!

I got a much-needed, sleep-like-a-baby, cuddling-myself-all-night sort of sleep last night; just completely glorious after such a long and sleepless Thursday traveling here. I woke up at 7:55 AM, after snoozing a few times, for our 9AM orientation. Campus la Merced (Humanities/Liberal Arts) is literally no more than a four-minute walk from my flat. Too bad I probably won't even have classes there. Next came our "intensive language course test" to determine our proficiency levels for the course. The oral-test proctor told me I did a pretty great job, so as long as my written exam went well, I should be good. Waiting for my turn, I spoke to a girl studying abroad from Finland. She spoke 5 languages: Finnish, Swedish, English, French, and Spanish, in that order. Holy crap, that is awesome and I wish I were that cool, hah. Erasmus students apparently receive much less of an orientation, according to my German flatmate, Anica. 

In front of Campus la Merced

After the exams, Kayla, Brad (both from Iowa), Katie, and * (*can't remember her name at the moment), Natalia (from NCSU) and I went to a cute restaurant for lunch. We shared two salads--vinegar/olive oil (?) dressing on lettuce, tomatoes, olives, raisins, nuts, mini-corns, and mini-pickles. We each had platas combinadas of patatas fritas, pollo (YUM), and a sort of tuna/potato salad cake mixture thing. The chicken was sabrosísimo! Natalia, Kayla and Brad came to see my apartment for a little bit before we returned to part II of orientation.

We learned of the benefits of being international students, along with some of the differences between our academic systems.

1. Students start studying for their future careers in high school. If they don't have sufficient knowledge of the subject before entering college, they can't choose that major. 
2. Minors don't exist
3. General education and electives also don't exist. Class schedules are pretty much all planned out for students once they are accepted into their Facultades (like College of Education, Design, Engineering, etc) 

Natalia & Kayla in the fun seats

Eventually, we made it out to do some exploring with El Corte Ingles as our destination. Robeto, our ISEP coordinator recommended we visit there in order to purchase or charge cell phones with minutes. We saw a few stores I recognized from previous Europe visits: Calzedonia (swimsuits), Sfera (clothes), etc. El Corte Ingles is fancy department store like Macy's. The city was totally bustling at 9:00 at night! Most of the shops were open, the restaurants had just opened up, and the city was completely alive. I can't wait to go back out exploring tomorrow!

After a pretty emotional first night in my new flat, today served as a very important reminder of why I am here: to explore! And as our ISEP coordinator cheesily put it: "Get lost, then find yourself."