Thursday January 31, 2008
Today was like any other day. After our first two classes we headed to “Casa del Libro,” a large bookstore, in search for a book to buy for our Literature class. For class we have to read a novel throughout the semester and then towards the end of the semester we have to write a paper analyzing the book. We could pick whatever kind of literature that interested us; the only catch is that it has to be a book by a Spanish author. As I wandered around the bookstore I quickly noticed that this wasn’t going to be easy to find a book. I have trouble picking out books in English, let alone in Spanish. After some suggestions and about an hour later, I finally found a book that sounded interesting (from what I could understand of the back cover). The book is entitled, “El Maldito Amor”- “The Cursed Love.” It is about 330 pages, so now I have something to do to fill any downtime that I may have. We left the bookstore frustrated and hungry and headed home for lunch. After lunch we worked on a little bit of homework and took a siesta before Sam and I headed to our ONG, where we volunteer doing physical therapy in a pool for disabled children. We left our house about an hour before our ONG started and we took bus number 5 to get where we needed to be. We were still a little iffy about this whole process since last time we ended up getting lost. Our professors had told us to take bus numbers 5 or 6 and it should get us close to the pool. With a leap of faith we hopped on bus number 5 and began our ride. We got dropped off somewhere near the pool and I ended up asking a lady for directions. We found like pool just before we were supposed to arrive. It was a rocky start, but at least we found our destination. Today we worked with Maria and there were 3 of us volunteering. I’m pretty sure that we swam laps for at least 30 minutes straight. Needless to say I wasn’t thirsty on our way home because I think that I drank a good three-fourths of the pool. The other challenge in the pool was keeping my swim cap on. Every time we go to volunteer they give us swim caps to use and I got an infant sized one this time. Every time I went underwater, the thing fell off. I think I spent more time actually trying to put the cap back on than anything. Just as we were about to leave, Antonio, the lifeguard/swim lesson teacher, showed up. Just as I had expected, except this time he was clad in a Speedo. I couldn’t help but bust out laughing and point him out to Sam. I think he was trying to show off, but I’m sure that we killed his self-esteem laughing at him. But we weren’t the only ones because the other lifeguards had taken notice to his fashion show and secretly made fun of him as well. We got out of the pool and headed to the showers. There is nothing better than fighting off 7 year olds who are running around half naked for a shower. We waited a while, finally showered and then found a plug for the hair dryer. The place had significantly cleared out and a lady came in and started mopping the floor. She impolitely informed us that the pool closed at 8:30pm and that we needed to leave. So we threw all of our things in the bag, finished getting dressed and basically ran from the lady with the mop. We were walking to the bus stop when we saw bus number 6 approaching. “CRAP-that’s our bus, we need to book it.” After sprinting across the street to our bus we finally got on at 8:20ish and sat down with a sigh of relief. We started riding around and after about an hour had passed we still had no idea where we were. Sweet, we were completely lost at 10pm at night, no phone, no map, no numbers, and no money. We sat for a while and plotted what we should do; to us the bus seemed like the safest option. We rode around for about another half hour and finally went up to the bus driver (the only other person on the bus) to tell him where we thought we were going and where we wanted to be. The conversation went as follows:
Sam: Hi, sorry but I have a question. Our Spanish teacher said that we should take bus 5 or 6 to get to the Alameda de Hercules, are we close to there?
Driver: No, this is the wrong bus.
Sam: Ok, well...do you know what bus we should take?
(Silence)
Sam: Hello?
Driver: (more annoyed this time) No.
And that was the “helpful” conversation with the driver.
So image us: stranded on this bus that we’d already gone in circles on for about an hour and a half, we are late for dinner, we are cold and hungry, without any way of knowing how to get home, and no one is on the bus to ask for help except our driver, but he is a complete jerk. It was a really pleasant situation. I was freaking out, I wanted to scream and cry at the same time. Then the bus driver’s shift ended and another drivers shift began. I don’t know if that gives you any perspective of how long we were actually on that bus or not? But it was a while. We decided to keep riding, what else could we have done? I finally saw a fountain that I thought that I knew, so we got off. I ended up knowing exactly where we were when we got off…but we still had a 35-minute walk home. We finally arrived home at 10:45pm and threw our stuff down and went to the kitchen. Remember how I said I wanted to cry and scream early, insert those emotions now. I just went off explaining the story to Allison, who thought we were dead, and I think my host mom look scared. Allison was trying to listen and to translate and it was a horrible mess of tears and Spanglish. I didn’t eat dinner because I couldn’t even think about eating at this point. Rocio came up to me and gave me a big hug and they collectively tried to calm us down. The said that tomorrow they would get a bus map for us and show us how to use it and gave us their numbers to always have with us. I think I’m going to get it tattooed to my arm after what happened tonight. The first thing that Encarna said when she figured out all that happened was, “Oh my poor daughters! I would have come and gotten you in my car. I think Emily needs chocolate and Coke. Where’s the Coke? Do I need to buy some?” I couldn’t tell at this point if I was laughing more than I was crying or if I was crying more than I was laughing. After talking for a little while we decided that we needed some American food tonight and Sam went to go get her jar of peanut butter so we could make PB and banana toast. They don’t have PB here so it was fun sharing it with Encarna and Rocio. Encarna even got out chocolate and cookies to eat the PB with. After a long, frustrating, stressful night, somehow everything seemed to be all right thanks to our host family and peanut butter. After looking back on the day I have learned a few things:
1. I completely dislike public transportation.
2. Peanut butter is not only a delicious snack but can inter-culturally bind people.
3. Our host family is amazing.
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