You Can Lead a Horse to Water...

Thursday January 24, 2008

Class went really well today because it went faster than normal, so that was good. During a class break Allison and I ran down to the supermarket and grabbed some homemade bread and Coke, and it was a delicious snack. After class we headed to the bookstore to get a few more books for our literature class when our ADD kicked in and we spotted the flowers. There was a fresh flower vender on the street near the bookstore so we decided to stop and buy Encarna and Rocio a bunch of flowers to hopefully brighten their days. When we got home we snuck the flowers in (a.k.a. stealthily snuck them in) and made a card for them and left the flowers on the table as we ran out the door to meet a few classmates at Republica cafe. We went to the café to start planning our trips for the semester. I think that I would like to go to Ireland, Paris, Prague and then a few day trips around Spain. Although in all reality I’m going to end up picking my favorite big place to travel and then probably go on a few smaller ones. It’s hard to coordinate trips that are well planned so we are starting early! We can start traveling in February, so we are starting to plan ahead of time. The prices are better that way as well. After that Sam and I left to meet up with Victor, one of our teachers from school, to find the pool where we are volunteering. We walked about 3 miles down the river to meet up with Victor. We arrived about 15-20 minutes early so we sat on a bench by the main road to keep a lookout for Victor. In the first 10 minutes we got 8 catcalls and one thumbs up, my personal favorite. It’s ridiculous how Don Juan-esk these guys are here. When Victor arrived we left on foot and then had to run, yes Emily had to run, about five blocks to catch the bus in time. We got there winded just as the bus was shutting its doors but Victor knocked and got us on (thank God). It was my first time on real public transportation in Spain, what an adventure. Oh and I forgot to mention that Sam and I bought bus passes for 10 trips before meeting up with Victor and they were actually the right ones. After getting off the bus we headed to the pool and Victor headed inside to find David, the director of the program that we are volunteering with, at the pool. About two seconds after Victor went it, David showed up. Then we had to try and tell David that Victor was inside looking for him, but I may have accidentally said that he was “on top” of the building instead of “inside” of the building. At this point David looked more worried than anything and after a game of charades he finally learned that I meant inside and laughed hysterically at my poor attempt at his native language. At least I provide comedy for the people of Seville. We got into the changing rooms and I had never seen so many Spanish children in my life. Imagine this: 50 English speaking children running around naked or half naked. Nightmare, right? Now imaging 50 Spanish speaking children with the same attire (or un-attire) running around with overbearing Spanish mothers chasing after them, and that’s what you had. Needless to say it was a little overwhelming at first…and then the second trauma happened. We had to wear swim caps. One word: hideous, it wasn’t a pretty sight. We met the owner of the pool and some of the life guards/swim teachers and then met the kids that we were working with. Their ages ranged from about 7-16 and there were 2 children that we actually worked closely with, and then another two that David worked with. These children were handicapped children and we had a lot of fun getting to know them but they didn’t tell us one little detail. Theses children are apparently Olympic swimmers. We started out swimming laps and I was winded while they kept pushing me to go and swim more laps. It was a great sight to see, I’m sure of it. We played a few games and swam some more with them and then we were done after about an hour. After drying off one of the guys at the pool came up to me and started talking to me in Spanish and asking me if I was from America (ok, Christopher Columbus) and questioning why I was in Spain. I told him I was here for the semester to study Spanish. He asked how often I was coming to the pool (every Thursday) and said that if I taught him English he could teach me Spanish. This only meant one of two things: 1. He was our typical Spanish Don Juan, or 2. My Spanish really is that bad that he wanted to help a sister out! Either way it was pretty funny. Regardless, I’m sure that we will see him again next Thursday.  After leaving the pool looking like wet dogs we went to catch the bus. I think we took the wrong one, so that was an adventure in itself. We ended up in the wrong place and had to walk back a ways but at least we got home and are alive to tell the story. (Don’t worry mom.) After dinner and showers we decided that we were too worn out to go to the originally planned Flamenco show and opted for our beds instead. I think we’ll just have to catch the next show on Thursday. Tomorrow we are meeting up at 11am to go through a museum in El Parque de Maria Luisa, so that will be nice to experience some culture. As I look back on the day only one cliché comes to mind, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” This quote pretty much sums up our entire bus riding experience. We got the tickets alright, but as far as understanding how the busses go…we need to work on that one. An hour on a “bono” isn’t as much fun as it sounds like, especially when your driver is doing a Sudoko from the paper while driving.