Whew!

The week just started and I feel so busy already! On Sunday afternoon, Ivan's girlfriend Francesca came over with several of her Italian friends. They are all exchange students in the university. The afternoon was spent watching three Italian girls cook in my kitchen. Normally I would've jumped in, but my kitchen is a bit on the small side (although really big compared to my friends') and there's no way I could've kept up with them. They were everything I imagined Italians in the kitchen to be, over the top with lots of loud talking, gesticulating, and intermittently pushing bread and parmigiano cheese in my mouth. 9 of us ate pasta with tomato sauce and prosciutto that simmered all day, then potato salad of mayo and tuna (kinda weird but good and they were convinced it was an American dish). Everyone spoke Italian but my roommate Adam and I (Ivan speaks a little and understands a lot; he's been learning since he is dating Francesca, an Italian), but Adam understands a lot of Italian. Here is when I was cursing being from the US where we are lucky if we get to learn one other language. Here are these people from all over Europe, casually interchanging between Spanish, English, and Italian. I was able to understand some of the Italian because it is similar to Spanish. Once we all sat down to eat they changed to Spanish so we could all be included in conversation. And by that I mean, I listened while everyone talked. My spanish is pretty good, but damn these people are fluent. We played pictionary after dinner which was good for me because I learned a lot of new vocabulary words. Monday I started the jumpstart language class for foreign students. I am called "foreigner" a lot, so I am going to be using that term a lot less when I get home talking about people who look or talk different than me. Last night I met up with another American girl who has already been here for a semester. Her mom and grandmother were visiting from Walnut, Mississippi and I thought that was really cool. Imagine Nanny at a smoky bar in Spain, ha. Class is from 9:30-3 only this week, but I am with my friends and we have two breaks so it's not bad at all. Today my alarm on my cell phone nor my actual clock went off when it was supposed to. Imagine my thoughts when I got a text message at 9:30 when class is supposed to start from a friend I was supposed to meet for a coffee before class. Needless to say my next purchase will be a watch. I threw on some clothes and was about to leave for class when my new roommate appeared. Her name is Luis and she is from Belgium. She is really cute, and looks like Katie Holmes but is cooler because she isn't possessed by Tom Cruise. She wanted to come to class with me, and we made it 30 minutes late. I thought this might be an issue. Upon my arrival, I realized only half the students were there because apparently attendance is VERY optional. The teacher looked confused when I tried to apologize. I was later advised "You are Erasmus. It doesn't matter what you do." So that's gonna take a little get used to, but definitely a good thing. Today after class Luis and I went shopping and cleaned our apartment. We get along really well so far, so I am happy to have a little more estrogen in the piso. Adam is making us dinner now, some Polish concoction that involves a lot of carrots. On Thursday I am going to pick up Andrew from the airport in Bilbao, which is a 2 hour bus ride away. We'll come back here to Pamplona and he will stay until Monday. I am really happy he's coming, because I get to share with someone how awesome this place is. I wish you were all coming to see me...but until then...besos! (Oh yeah that's another thing...you kiss everyone on both cheeks like all the time) Sorry my posts are so long, y'all know I'm long winded anyway.