The halfway point...
Trip Start
Jun 17, 2007
1
7
26
Trip End
Aug 01, 2007
Granada,
Spain
Friday, June 29, 2007
On Monday, as with every Monday, each class gets some new students depending on how they fared in their Monday morning ītestī. This week, my beginnersī class welcomed two new students: Lou, is a Texan in his mid 50s/early 60s, who is here for a month with his daughter and stays in the same hostel place as I do; and Laura, who is from Holland and probably in her thirties. Both really nice people. Lou is completely new to Spanish and Laura knows a bit more than he does - this meant that our lessons on Monday and Tuesday were a bit repetitive and it took the class (which now numbered 5) a little while to pick up the new concepts that we were learning. By the first class on Tuesday afternoon, I was definitely feeling very bored and wondering what to do about it. Turned out I didnīt need to do anything about it - either the teachers had been particularly observant, or I had been particularly bad at hiding the fact that I was bored and the administrator came and asked me whether I wanted to move to the next beginnersī level class, which was about a week and a half ahead of my original class. Felt a little bad about leaving my classmates, but not so bad that I was going to refuse the offer!!
So, on Wednesday, I reverted to morning classes and went to my new class. Strangely enough, it turns out that I knew most of my new class...but just for the record, my new class was made up of:
Ina - one of the Icelandic women who started classes last week;
Michael - one of the guys from the hostel (residence) whoīs from Sweden;
Philip - English guy who also started classes last week;
Jolande - a Dutch woman who has been here for a while and who came on the day trip I did to Cordoba (blog entry on that trip is in course of being drafted!);
Aziz - who I hadnīt met before, but heīs from Saudi Arabia;
Kristina - the Danish woman from my original class who does her extra 2 hours of lessons per day in my new class.
The new class is much better - it means Iīm learning a lot more and also practising my spoken Spanish a lot more. But, Monday is coming and the class is going to change quite a bit as Aziz, Philip and Ina are all leaving Granada this weekend, and Kristina is going to be in the class all of the time.
But enough about lessons, what else have I been up to this week...
* Iīve seen a couple of free concerts outside the Cathedral - the International Music and Film Festival is on in Granada at the moment and there are lots of events on. The first night I went I saw some flamenco dancing, and on the second night I saw some African dance.
* Iīve walked around the Moorish quarter of Granada, the Albaicin, which involved climbing (and descending) a lot of stairs, but the view of the Alhambra from mirador St Nicholas was definitely worth the effort.
* Have been out to dinner several times, with the Icelandic women and also with Philip and Natalie (the Brits). Have sampled more tapas, and actually had Moroccan food for dinner last night.
* As for the sights in Granada (aside from the insides of restaurants and tapas bars!), Iīve been to visit the Capilla Real which houses the tombs of the first Catholic monarchs after the Catholic Reconquest of Spain, Ferdinand & Isabel. Iīve also been to see the St Jerome Monastery which has a really beautiful church in it - much nicer in my opinion than the Cathedral itself.
* And tonight, after going for dinner with some of my departing classmates, we are going to try and see a film version of Carmen which is being shown for free in the main plaza here.
As for this weekend, donīt really have too many plans for tomorrow, but on Sunday Iīve signed up to go on another trip organised by the language school - a trip to the Alpujarras, which are mountains quite close to Granada, and by all accounts, a really pretty place to go. Never fear, Iīll endeavour to keep you up to date - I might even have some photos to upload......
