Let's start of by saying I'm probably not gonna be good at this blogging thing, and will no doubt forget about writing these - Infact the only reason I'm writing one is because I've seen a couple of other people writing them and thought I'd join in with the fun. I doubt anyone will even read them, but it's more for my benefit to remind me of what is happening during my year abroad.
Anyway, I've been living here in Valdepenas a little over a week now and knowing that it's only 10 weeks until Christmas makes me think that the time will fly by. In some ways I'm happy about this - I get to see my family again and friends back in England, amongst other things (such as my own bed!) - but whilst I'm over here I want to travel to a lot of places, take a lot of pictures and meet a whole bunch of new and interesting people.
It was last Tuesday when I arrived, the 28th September. My piso (flat) over here had already been sorted out, it was just a case of how to get there. I landed in Madrid in the afternoon and then had to catch a taxi to the train station, find the train to Valdepenas, make sure I was on it and then make sure I got off at the right stop 2 hours later. Luckily all this happened without much fuss and my contact from the school where I would be working this year (Marisa) was waiting for me there to take me to my piso.
Marisa is a very nice woman. She was the one who helped me sort out a piso before I arrived here. I would be sharing with another teacher from the school - a new postgraduate Philosophy teacher called Miguel. I was happy about this was one of the main things I wanted - to share a flat with a native Spanish speaker, and he is actually a very nice man. He's married and his wife lives in Malaga, so he goes home every weekend to see her, but when he is here he cooks food for us all, helps me with any Spanish I don't understand, and we generally have a laugh together.
At a cost of only 150 euros per month, this is a great price (my Erasmus grant even covers my bills too!). So hopefully with the 'beca' from the Ministry I will be able to travel lots. The flat is quite large actually, it has 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, a kichen and a massive living room. It's a bit old fashioned furniture-wise, but I can deal with that. We could have more people rent the flat with us, which would decrease the rent even more, but we're happy with our own bathrooms and it's nice and peaceful here so for now we're going to stick with just the 2 of us.
I was absolutely knackered from all the travelling - waking up at 6am in England and getting to my piso at 10pm that night - so I had a lie-in in the morning. But during my first real day here, Marisa took me round the town and showed me the way I needed to go to get to the school. Fairly easy really, just a 20 minute walk down 2 roads. The town itself seems very friendly - everyone seems to conjugate in the main Plaza in the centre of the town almost every night (of which my piso is literally around the corner from) so I can see many fiestas will be taking place there at weekends - something I'm going to have to get myself involved in during the weekends that I'm not travelling in.
Anyway, that's enough to read for one blog...first impressions of my school and other auxiliares in the area will be up soon. Until then, hasta luego.
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