I don't feel like I have any amazing stories or any real in depth culture analysis's to share right now. But I feel obligated to write a blog today. I've pretty much just been settling in over the last couple of weeks.
At my home, I've been spending a lot of time with my youngest host sister. She basically never lets me out of her slight. She's been very interested in learning to play cards. I've taught her Go Fish, Old Maid, War, Slap Jack, and Crazy 8's. Unfortunately, she's not the best at following the rules and I'm kinda getting bored of the same childish games. Can anyone recommend any other games to me? I'd be veryy grateful.
I also spend a lot of time talking to my host mom. She's the best at figuring out what I'm trying to say in my pidgin Spanish. After dinner, which is in itself a 30 minute affair, we usually sit around talking for at least 20 more minutes.
Also, I started school on 10th of August. That's going alright.
My classmates are all super nice, which is very good since I'm with them the entire day. Here, the students all stay in one classroom, and the teachers come to us. Our schedule is really confusing to me. We have 10 periods of 40 minutes everyday. However, we usually only have 7 or 8 different classes, since we will occasionally have the same class for two hours in a row, or will have it for one hour in the morning and one later in the day.
As for the classes themselves, they're not so bad. Except that there are about 20 of them. I actually have four different math classes (geometry, trig, arithmetic and mathematical reasoning), two different sciences (biology and physics) and myriad communications (literature, linguistics, etc.) and electives.
The teachers at my school are surprisingly lenient. They don't seem to expect me to do anything. So that's nice. Also, most of them don't care what we all do during class. A lot of girls text or even talk on their cell phones during class. A lot of people also spend most of class writing notes or drawing pictures. Everyone here seems to like to draw/design things/write pretty. Every single girl in my class has the exact same handwriting. Exactly the same. And it is, of course, very neat. And everyone keeps their notebooks perfectly organized. All their notes have perfectly re-drawn diagrams and everything. However, their desks and lockers are generally messy. Anyone who knows me, knows that I am exactly the opposite. I have Horrible handwriting, but am very organized otherwise. So, that'll be fun to get used to.
That's about all I have to say for now. I fixed the comments, so you can leave one without being signed up for blogger. So everyone should do that =D.
Also, everybody should get skype. It's this awesome program that you can download for free that lets you talk, as though on a phone, through the internet. Check it out! And add me: ijacqui
mucho amor,
~ Jacqui
