HOLA!

It has been quite a busy week for me, and I feel like there are so many updates. First of all, I will put pictures up as soon as I can, I have SO many new ones! These pics are from my friend Anna, because I can´t find an internet cafe that has a slot for my memory card, and my computer is still broken! Oh and sorry if my writing does not flow very well, as I get better at Spanish, it´s harder to focus on my English writing!


I had a blast this weekend, it was the first weekend I really tried to (not in a mean way) get away from my American friends. On Thursday night I went over to my friend Vicky´s apartment. I met ten of her friends, and they had made tapas, and we ordered pizzas. Half of the girls are English majors, so we talked in sort of a mixture of English and Spanish, but I tried to use my Spanish whenever possible. The pizza was weird, it had cream cheese, mushrooms, and crushed tomatoes on it... I actually liked it. I am starting to really like a lot of foods I used to hate, here I am all about trying new things! I now like mushrooms, tomatoes, salmon, a LOT of other seafood, and still hate mayonaise. But anyways, we all sat around, talked, and laughed a lot. At 2 in the morning or so, we all hopped in a taxi and headed to the city to go dancing! I am learning a lot about the Spanish culture, and one thing is for sure, they sleep a lot less than we do, at least the people I have met. We danced until 4 or so; I liked going out with them because we went to all the local places verses the touristy places I have gone with my American friends. It was a really fun night, and I am so happy I have found a good group of Spanish friends!

Friday I slept in and took it easy, because Saturday I climbed a mountain!! I got up at 6:30 AM and headed to meet the group so we could head inland towards the mountains. The hike was organized through the University, and a lot of different people from different countries went. It was considered an easy climb, but it was still a bit difficult. It took us about 5 hours to go up and down, and we stopped to eat lunch at the top. The view was breathtaking, and we could see Alicante city from the top, although it was about a centimeter wide from our view. The whole way up it was freezing, and there was even snow at the top... probably was not the best thing since i was starting to feel sick.


I took a long siesta (nap) when I got home, figuring that I would feel better by the time I woke up. I woke up two hours later with a fever, plus I was windburnt. But, I decided that Alicante is one awesome place to be sick in, because I drank 2 glasses of Valencia Orange juice and sat on our sun porch for the rest of the afternoon, and already felt better.

The next morning I was feeling fine so I decided to once again join my extended family for lunch at one of their country houses. This week we ate at mi abuelas (my grandmas) house, and there were about 20 people there. We walked down the road to mi tios (my uncles) house and we talked with the family for awhile. At the end of our conversation, the uncle handed us two rabbits. Two minutes earlier we had just looked at all the bunnies and I had commented on how cute they were, and that they sure had a lot of pets! Once mi madre was holding two rabbits by their legs while they tried to squirm free, I realized that this was our lunch. Sure enough, by the time we arrived at mi abuelas house, the rabbits were a little less squirmy and everyone was running to help. Two cousins ran and got tupperwear, while my brother got some newspaper to lay on the ground. An aunt went to get a knife, while another couple cousins held one rabbit down on the table. This part is pretty graffic, just warning everybody... mi madre started cutting off the pour rabbits´head and my aunt held the feet while she literally pulled off all of it´s fur. I didn´t watch much of what happened after that, but I do know that they were cutting all the meat off and throwing it in one pile, and all the stuff they didnt want was getting thrown in another pile, for the dog to eat. I didn´t know that rabbits made noises, but they were screaming a lot right before they died. It all happened so fast, and none of them thought twice. I explained to them that I had never seen an animal being skinned, and they were shocked, and said, " Just wait until we have a chicken, or better yet a pig." It was quite a different experience. I am really starting to love just hanging out with mi familia. I feel very comfortable with them, and look forward to their ordinary experiences.