Primero Dia

2 short hops and one long jump later, I have arrived safe and sound at my new home. I arrived at the airport around 11:00 AM and ended up going to bed around Midnight, with a brief 15 minute siesta earlier that afternoon. Needless to say, it was a looooong day. It was however, a fairly great day too :)

My host family is very welcoming and have already shown me the basic areas of the city and all areas of the house. The house I am living in seems narrow from the street, but is actually quite large and has a really awesome staircase winding from the bottom to the top. My family has a daughter, Marta, who is in Canada right now (also with Rotary), and it is her room I am staying in. I have already managed to unpack most of what I crammed into my bags, but I believe it will take a couple of more days before I feel truly settled.

 I knew from the beginning of this exchange that I would have to learn a new language and adapt to a different culture. What I didn´t know was that I would also need to learn how to eat. At 2:00 PM, my family went over to eat at la casa de su abuela, which they do every weekend. The food was not too different there, and I ate goat for the first time in my life. My apologies to Beatrix, but I really liked it. That evening, around 9:30, is where the confusion with food came in. In Catalá, a common dish is to take bread, smear it with a tomato half, and pour olive oil over the top of it. As it was, by that time my translating comprehension was nearly annihilated, so my host brother Marc ended up smearing the tomato half on my bread for me as a demonstration. I felt a little bit childish, but it was funny. The end result was also incredibly delicious :) I also tried the famous Vic sausage, and it was pretty darn tasty as well.

The initial mindset of my first day was: what the heck is going on? However, communication is still manageable and I´ll catch on soon enough. I will post about the city of Vic later this week when I have explored a bit more, and also more about mi familia.

Another sidenote: the expressions of airport personell as they open a cello case and discover an instrument surrounded by underwear while the whole family is watching is, in fact, priceless.