Mucha fiesta no mucho siesta

Oh my, the past couple of days have been an absolute whirl wind. I woke up on September 4th at 5:55 to watch the sunset from the west end of the Atlantic for the last time in a year. It might of been the poet inside of me, but the view gave me a strange sort of peace that last the entirety of the day. I said goodbye to my pets and got in the car to drive to New York with my family. Saying good bye was hard but I didn't completely realize it would be for 10 months...I still don't. Just like that, I was on my way to Espana and started this incredible journey. Leading up to my departure I skyped with a couple of other people, Sean and Katie from the AFS Spain group often. It was so strange to finally meet them in person considering we already knew each other so well and I enjoyed already having good friends.

The skype amigos about to take off

Orientation was fine, more an opportunity to hammer general information about cultural awareness and safety into us than anything else. I would have wished for more time to get to know the other AFSers but we found time for that later. 

The next morning we all put on our blue shirts and hauled our impossibly heavy (yet not nearly filled enough) suitcases down stairs for the end of orientation and to catch the bus to the hotel. Since every AFSer ever advocates for underpacked suitcases above all and a good half of us never listen, I have some advice for people who have already decided to over pack:

1. Get a light suitcase. My first suitcase weighed 13lbs and with a weight limitation of 44lbs thats way too much to spare. I had to run to TJ Maxx to grab a new suitcase so I could at least try to fit everything I needed.

2. Get light host family presents. I brought two jars of homemade jam, autocrat and two impossibly heavy sweatshirts...weighing all together probably a little under 10 pounds. My host family liked the gifts but there were definately other presents I could have given with less weight.

3. This might go without saying but buy a bag scale (working!) and bring it. My bag scale didn't really work all the time but when it did it proved incredibly useful, which leads into numero cuatro.....

4. Most importantly- BEFFRIEND SOMEONE WHO UNDERPACKED. Katie somehow managed to bring a small suitcase and two backpacks....contrasting my stuffed massive suitcase carry on suitcase and backpack. I gave her my heavy things to get through security originally but my bag ended up being fine in the end.

As expected, the flight proved gruesome on the whole sleep front. Starving and tired, we landed in Zurich with four hours to kill however we wanted. People bought Swiss chocolate as well as other souvenirs before we boarded to fly to Madrid. We landed two hours later, during one of which I luckily slept. 

The host country orientation took place in Europe's largest hotel, which did not disappoint. I wish I took a photo of the place because the size of it was overwhelming. I actually got lost in it several times.  AFS Spain interviewed Katie, Lucia and I about how we felt finally being in Spain. Katie showed us all up with her Spanish since she had competed every level on Duolingo and I hardly remembered how to say "hola" but the volunteer running it assured me that my accent was funny, he could edit out all of my pauses and "como se dice"s and that it would be great to see my improvement.....if that says anything to you about my language skills.

It was really chill to meet everyone from all over and generally our roommates were from other countries.  Por ejemplo, I roomed with a girl from the Czech Republic and a girl from Thailand. AFS Spain was really cool about rules, curfews and bed assignments though so we were able to hang out long after the orientation ended and switch rooms if we wanted (although I didn't). Unfortunately I only went to bed at 4:30 and had to get up at 6 with the ten other students going to Galicia the next day so its safe to say I was very tired meeting my host family.

the exchange students de Galicia

All in all it had been about three days with maybe 6 hours of sleep when I finally saw mi familia. After a five hour train ride, I got off at the train station to see them. We are in the far right, I am next to my mom Maribel and my brother Pablo. After saying hello to them we then walked to lunch with the other exchange students in this monastery turned hotel. I was extremely tired to right after I went home to take my first fiesta.

So far Spain has been great and although I miss my fellow AFSers I'm looking forward to spending time with my host family and getting to know the community. Since school doesn't start until the 17th I'm sure I'll have plenty of opportunity.