the basics

Duke-In-Madrid Courses:
Spain in the 21st Century
Recent Spanish Cinema
Communication Skills

Universidad San Pablo Course:
Trastornos del Desarrollo y Dificultades de Aprendizaje
[Development & Learning Disabilities I]

This is the second week of class. It's not bad so far. I always miss something because the classes are taught in Spanish. My USP class is really interesting, probably my favorite out of all my classes. Although my professor speaks very quickly, he lectures with powerpoint, which helps a lot. The only thing about taking a psychology class is that it's offered on a different campus from the main one. If I take the metro, I have to pay 1 euro because it's not a part of central Madrid (not to mention that it takes about an hour on the metro). They have free shuttle buses (20 minutes) to and from Montepríncipe (campus where psych classes are offered). BUT, the hours are horrible. They have buses running early afternoon and then evening time. So, on Tues/Thurs I'm stuck on this campus for 3 hours after my class ends. Wednesdays, I have to take the metro back (sad face for what it's going to cost me; I wish Duke would cover it) because I have class back on the main campus at 6 pm (shuttle buses leave at 6:30pm). I'm actually at Montepríncipe now. una hora más!

Beatriz Diaz

is my host mom. :) She is pretty much wonderful. It's just us two in her apartment. Most of the other DIM students have roommates. At first, I really wanted one, but I think I enjoy being by myself. I don't speak English as much as I would if I had a roommate. Also, I'm not overwhelmed by a Spanish family because it's just Beatriz in the house. I feel really lucky too: I don't do my own laundry and also Beatriz is a great cook. We barely have breakfast, lunch is served at around 2pm and is the biggest meal of the day (people go back home for lunch), and dinner is at around 9pm. There isn't much snacking so I'm always super-hungry before meals.

Puerta del Angel

is my metro stop. I really like the metro system here. I haven't figured out the buses though-they confuse me. They have C1's and C2's here! :D It's different seeing small cute cars everywhere (I'm from South Carolina where people drive trucks!). I enjoy walking around. I actually haven't been in Madrid that long because we have been traveling a lot (Andalucía & Galicia! Barcelona next week!). I'm going to make an effort to go on walks often to see what's around~

Amigos

Luckily, I've gotten close to a few of the other DIM kids. There's a group of us who go out together. This I'm thankful for. :) Last week, in my USP class (about 10 kids, which is nice), I forced myself to turn around and introduce myself to some other Spanish students. Haha. There is a girl in the class who can speak English, and she's been really nice. We're partners for projects we have to do for the class (err, I don't know what kind of projects yet because I didn't catch that part while our Professor was explaining). Also, today, I met a girl on the busride here. She studied in Ohio for a year before so she empathized with me. Yay for Spanish friends. :)

Tomorrow

will mark my one-month stay here. It's weird to think that I've already been away for a month! I'm slowly adjusting to everything. I'm thankful that I get to be on a routine now that classes have started. Thanks for the prayers lovelies. I've been praying a lot more as well. Although, I haven't found a church yet, I've been listening to sermons online~ Hopefully, coming Sunday, I'll check out a church. :) I hope you peeps are doing great back at Duke. I miss you!