Estoy en Madrid! (GAh!?)

It's been three days since the "sleepless flight" to Madrid and I'm only JUST feeling sane enough to record anything at all. So, I suppose its only polite to welcome everyone to my blog.

Normally I would just skip the airplane experience, which tends to be to common and universal of an experience to comment on, but this one was actually decent.

I arrived at the check-in counter to find that my bag read "36 pounds" on the scale. "Hooray!", I thought, "And we thought it was going to be too heavy!" David adjusted the bag, about to pull it off the scale, when the metal weighing station evened out and the scale suddenly read a new number "70". Crap. I had overpacked-so unlike me! What ensued was panicked scrambling, transferring of clothing and arguments regarding the varying opinions of "what one NEEDS to travel". "Do you REALLY need 3 pairs of boots Sarah?" my mom would ask. "um, YES...?". We sat on the floor, like 3rd graders in a classroom, while my Dad kindly documented the tragedy with his camera. Ultimately, I ended up with two checked items. One bag and another cardboard BOX wrapped with tape and fragile stickers containing several heavy pairs of boots and my $8 duffel bag which had unfortunately ripped from all the excitement. "Great" I thought as I walked from the check-in counter 20 minutes later, sticky with sweat, "Now I'm going to have to manage this awkward box in my groggy state when I land in Madrid".

On my flight from Boston to Philly, I sat next to this woman who lived in Amsterdamm. She grew up in Newton, attended Harvard (majoring in SOCIOLOGY!), sings, loves languages, moved to Holland to sing classically, etc. We talked and laughed for the entire 1:30 minutes of the flight, and by the end I felt like she was a family friend I'd known all my life. She gave me her email and told me that I seemed like a very nice girl and could come stay with her and her husband and son in Amsterdamm if I wanted to visit. I think I'll take her up on that offer.

The NEXT flight, I was seated next to a girl my age from UNC. She was going to Granada to study spanish until May and we also laughed and spoke the whole time. I ended up feeling very comfortable with her as well. "This is fabulous..." I thought as I left the plane, hoping that this would become the THEME of my trip.

We were picked up from the airport by the Tandem program and driven to the hotel in a bus by the man Pablo. He was very handsome, but probably thought that I was VERY high matenience with my goddamn "BOX". It honestly looked ridiculous, so I decided to just embrace it and tell everyone that I had bought a china-set for my Señora.

The rest of my day was groggy/sleep in the hotel. We wandered out once at night to have delicious tapas, but then went to bed.

The next day we had a delicious hotel breakfast of meats and fruits and churros, etc. Muy deliciosa. We then took a tour of the city with an entertaining and kind man named "Felix". A homosexual man from Peru with the most amazing affect. VERY personable. I enjoyed him immensly, partially because he laughed at all my jokes, but also because I found him incredibly easy and interesting to speak with.

This morning we woke up and met up with Felix again to learn how to use the metro and visit everyones houses. We didnt go inside but just saw the areas of the city we'd all be living in. I particularly love mine. It's right next to the Opera house, and in a "she she" busy neighborhood. =). As we were walking around, Felix kept asking me if I was interested in acting. I said, yes, very much. He then said that I had to, and if I didn't it would be the greatest mistake and waste of talant. "You're a star", he kept saying. I loved that, but also was a bit embaressed by the attention in front of the other girls for fear that I would look conceded. Later on in the day, Felix asked me if I would consider auditioning for casting in Spain. I said I would definitely be interested, but didn't know how, and didn't speak Spanish. He suddenly called up his friend, who was the head of some television agency in Spain and began trying to set it up for me. When he got off the phone he said that I would need to prepare a monologue and several photos and gave me her contact information. I'm seriously considering it. Wouldn't that be hilarious/fantastic? So excited by this, and only my second full day!

Tomorrow we get dropped off at our host families. It's "Three King's Day", a sort of christmas celebration in which the whole family gets together and exchanges gifts. Terribly overwhelming to be launched in to that, particularly since I am DEFINIETLY the least proficient of my whole group. Oh well, I'm also more outgoing then many of them, so perhaps I'll grow at a faster rate. We'll see.

Leaving for tapas in 20 minutos. Have to do something with my hair.....