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Today was my first day of Spanish class during Orientation... actually last Thursday was my first day of Spanish class during Orientation, today is the first day I went. I was pretty nervous because I have somehow managed, via my courses at Penn State and my online test, to be placed in the highest level of Spanish. However, my talents do not quite reflect that. I have also chosen to take the "intensive" class which is kind of scary, but honestly, if I don't leave here knowing Spanish... what am I doing??
Class was definitely fast-paced and everyone else could bang out some serious Spanish. I know I'm not as good as some of them, but I'm not terrible either and I could hold my own if I didn't get so nervous all the time. I just completely choke and can't get out any words, Spanish or otherwise, and look like a complete idiot. I think it's some subconscious thing coming back to me from the days in Madame Berry's class where even the slightest slip-up or mispronunciation bought you a good 5-minute humiliation session in front of the entire class. So I think I'll be explaining that to her and hopefully she'll take pity.
After that was over I changed one of my classes from Women in Mediterranean Literature to Mediterranean Environment because you can only go on one of the Spring Break trips if you're in that class and I really kind of want to go on it. I wanted to make my own plans for Spring Break but everyone is all over the place about it and this seems like a really unique experience. I also could have taken a Mediterranean Oceanography class which I was really interested in, but it was full. I'm sad about that but hopefully this will be a good change in my arts-related schedule anyway. And if I go through with it, I'll be spending Spring Break in the Canary Islands!
Anyway, we had a homework assignment to find a bunch of places in the city and I tried to do that, but I just couldn't find my way around. Instead I decided to do some of my own walking around and went to the outdoor market off Las Ramblas called La Boqueria Market, which I've been to before and is a really cool thing to do. They have tons and tons of fresh food and I love to grab something to eat there because it's all fresh, homemade, and cheap. Then I went to try to find Puerto Olimpico and got lost but ended up at the Old Port downtown, which is also a good place to see. For some reason I just can't figure out this city. It's really confusing and you never want to sit down and read a map for fear of being pick-pocketed. The more I get lost though the better I know my way around, so I think in a couple weeks I'll be good to go!
Class was definitely fast-paced and everyone else could bang out some serious Spanish. I know I'm not as good as some of them, but I'm not terrible either and I could hold my own if I didn't get so nervous all the time. I just completely choke and can't get out any words, Spanish or otherwise, and look like a complete idiot. I think it's some subconscious thing coming back to me from the days in Madame Berry's class where even the slightest slip-up or mispronunciation bought you a good 5-minute humiliation session in front of the entire class. So I think I'll be explaining that to her and hopefully she'll take pity.
After that was over I changed one of my classes from Women in Mediterranean Literature to Mediterranean Environment because you can only go on one of the Spring Break trips if you're in that class and I really kind of want to go on it. I wanted to make my own plans for Spring Break but everyone is all over the place about it and this seems like a really unique experience. I also could have taken a Mediterranean Oceanography class which I was really interested in, but it was full. I'm sad about that but hopefully this will be a good change in my arts-related schedule anyway. And if I go through with it, I'll be spending Spring Break in the Canary Islands!
Anyway, we had a homework assignment to find a bunch of places in the city and I tried to do that, but I just couldn't find my way around. Instead I decided to do some of my own walking around and went to the outdoor market off Las Ramblas called La Boqueria Market, which I've been to before and is a really cool thing to do. They have tons and tons of fresh food and I love to grab something to eat there because it's all fresh, homemade, and cheap. Then I went to try to find Puerto Olimpico and got lost but ended up at the Old Port downtown, which is also a good place to see. For some reason I just can't figure out this city. It's really confusing and you never want to sit down and read a map for fear of being pick-pocketed. The more I get lost though the better I know my way around, so I think in a couple weeks I'll be good to go!
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