Bringing the 4th of July to Spain

Happy Independence Day everyone! Hope everyone back in the states is having a blast, because for some reason the Spanish people just really don't appreciate the holiday. haha

I suppose I'll get to our celebrations in just a minute. Time for a quick update on things since we got back from Portugal.

I guess the first, and most important, change that has happened in my life here is that my roommate John decided to go home. He was supposed to be here for the entire summer like I am, but for some reason (and he has lots of reasons, none of which really make much sense to me) he decided to call it quits and head back to the states. So as soon as we got back from Portugal, John hopped on a plane and flew back to Oklahoma.

When I found out that I was going to be living alone with Tony and the kids, I was a little worried. John's a big talker and I've always let him do most of the talking at lunch, dinner, and any other time we've been with the family. So to actually have to start talking more, well, it was going to be an adjustment. And I just was afraid it was going to be weird living alone. It had been nice so far to have another American in the house that I could speak English to, or to have someone who I could talk about all of Tony's weird Spanish quirks with.

Regardless of everything, my worries were all fairly unneccesary. So far living alone has worked out really great and I've actually become a lot closer to Tony, Mario, and Guille. The kids hang all over me now like I'm their real big brother, which I actually kind of like. I've never had little brothers before, so it's nice to have someone look up to me. And Tony and I have had some real conversations lately about school, Oklahoma, and life in general. It's been nice.

And I got to move down to John's room, which was a MAJOR upgrade. My room is partially underground, so it's so much cooler down there it's insane. My room upstairs was getting to be so hot during the days that it was getting tough to fall asleep at night. Don't get me wrong, I've gotten fairly used to this no air-conditioning thing, but it's been nice to have a darker, cooler room. Plus, the room is almost three times the size of my previous room, it has two beds, and it has a tv. I really lucked out with this move.

So in addition to John leaving, my July classes have started. Both of them seem fairly easy so far, and I have one of my same teachers from last month again. For my Spanish civilization and culture class I have a guy named Carlos, who seems to be really cool, but he gets stuck lecturing on an awfully boring subject. I fall asleep in American history classes, so there is no hope for me in this one. And I get to have Mar again this month for my business spanish class. I can definitely tell that I'm one of her favorites because she gives me tons of attention. And I'm not really a gloryhound, but I like that she likes me. It proves that I'm not a total failure at the Spanish language/culture.

So on to our 4th of July celebrations!

There really aren't many Oklahomans left for the month of July, so those of us who are still here have become even closer than we were last month, which is almost hard to believe. There are about 7 of us and we've all been hanging together fairly non-stop. So today we all decided that we wanted to have a big 4th of July celebration, Spanish style. So we started off our day by meeting at noon (American lunchtime rather than the 2 o'clock Spanish lunchtime) at McDonalds for some good old American hamburgers. I had a Big Mac and a Coke, which was glorious. haha The Spanish part of our meal was a huge Spanish tortilla (not at all like Mexican tortillas. Spanish tortillas are made with egg, potatoes, onions, and tons of olive oil) and a huge Apple Tart, which tasted just like apple pie. Mmmmmmmm, delicious!

So after our big meal we all went to the city pool and laid out and swam all day long. We figured that would take the place of going to the lake. And it was perfect. It has been a beautiful sunny day (which is pretty standard in Spain) and the water was the perfect temperature to swim in. It has been a fantastic 4th, almost as good as being in America!

Tonight a big group of us are getting together because one of the local bars and one of the discotecas are getting together and having a big cookout for all the Americans and we definitely don't want to miss out on that. I'm wearing a white t-shirt tonight, my friend Ashley is wearing red, and my friend Evie is wearing blue. We're going to represent America with style.

And as for my other upcoming plans, I couldn't be more excited about them! On Sunday we're all going up to Pamplona for the Running of the Bulls at the Festival de San Fermin, which is going to be incredible. I can't believe that I'm actually going to be able to say I've been to the Running of the Bulls. And then next weekend I'm going to Paris with another group of friends! What a fantastic couple of weeks this is going to be!

So that's really all I have for now. So far July has been a LOT different than June, just because so many people left and it's been such a different dynamic. It's been a big adjustment all over again, but it seems to be shaping up to be another great month in España!