San Sebastian, Halloween, School Stuff, *pant pant... so busy

So I have been very busy doing a variety of things. Some of these things include relaxing, watching television, cooking suppers, going out with friends, and not writing too much.

I just started a famous Spanish children's book today called Manolito Gafotas. Manolito is a little boy (the main character) and gafotas refers to his glasses--it's also his nickname. I just started the book, but already I can tell that the reading is a little above my level of Spanish--which is perfect. I need to look up a lot of words in the dictionary to understand all the sentences. But that's what you have to do when you're learning a foreign language.

I went to a class tonight to learn to play a sport called Paddle. Paddle is like tennis (it's played with tennis balls and it follows many of the same rules and scoring) but the raquets are more like wooden padels with holes built into them to act like the strings (and help with wind resistance and whatnot). There are four walls that are used, and so it is a little bit of a mix of both tennis and racquetball (no ceilings, and you only play doubles). I won't get too specific right now, but practice was very fun. My Spanish friend Juan invited me to play, as the courts are located in his residence area. I learned about the rules and the technique of the sport and practiced drills with the instructor, and then played some games with Juan and a few other people who were there for the lessons. Juan and I did very well. I'm very excited about going back next week.

I posted my pictures from San Sebastian on My Pictures page. Again, you can find the link on the left side of my blog-page. I describe a little bit our adventure there and what the pictures are. I need to describe more though, because it was a crazy weekend. I was sicker than a dog, and the weather was not very helpful for my cold. I'll write more about it soon.

What else: my school wants me to write an article for their bi-annual magazine. I have just started to write it now, and you will all be informed about how it goes. I wrote a brief description of myself for the school webpage also. Here is the link for you to see: http://www.iesbatalladeclavijo.com/departamentos/dein.swf. You should be able to find a scroll bar to the right of my picture so you can move down and see what I wrote. If you look around the website and get lost or simply want to return, you can find my section in "Departamentos" (departments) and then "Ingles" (English) and then "Auxiliar de conversacion" (Assistant conversation specialist, aka super qualified expert, aka The Man) you'll find me.

The Halloween play that my sixth graders put on for their school was very very cute. They were all dressed as zombies, zombie killers, mad sisters, mad servants, and one Queen of the Dead. All the students from the school dressed up also and came to see this Halloween play in English (the teachers help to translate a little bit for them!). They gave away candy and sang a Halloween song. It was actually hilarious: some of the very young children were soooo scared! A few boys started crying, and a few other children wouldn't go in! The teachers and I just laughed! (we're very cruel).

Cute, huh? They're just like sixth graders in the U.S., with some cultural differences of course. They still like to pretend they're zombies and cut each other up and they like professional wrestling and soccer and television and music and cell phones and friends. And they're very loud and obnoxious at times and very quiet and shy other times. Ahh to be young again.

I need to go to sleep. I'll write again soon. It will likely be another busy weekend... even though we're staying in Logrono this time. It's my birthday on Saturday. I'll be 24 years young. Yes, I still consider myself a young man... and hopefully when I get back from Spain I will be a young man with a lot of good experiences under my belt and a lot of knowledge to pull out of those! That didn't come out right... I'm tired... going to bed. Buenas noches amigos!