The news are: found wifi at the apartment yesterday (...) and, a salsa class - 3 times a week it is, dancing with the locals for a few hours....... Muy bonita!!! :) 

Malaga cont.

On Wednesday morning, day 3 at school, I managed to explain my landlady what I wanted for breakfast – I took it as quite a big achievement; the progress I made in a week would make you all very proud of me... J

Struggling with a nasty cold though for a few days I was my most antisocial self during almost the whole week, and still squeezing in 7-8 hours of studying every day it just got to me on Thursday night. I went for the first run on the playa – what shall I say, 20C, sunset, sea breeze and all those beautiful people, great music on the iPod and my salad and a mango waiting for me at home…. – I had a great exercise and finally slept like a baby afterwards. Then the mission for Friday was, to take down everyone's numbers and convince my lil' classmates to take me out dancing later that night. It took me about 3 minutes – and by the time the A1 group paella started cooking, we had a plan in place: cook the paella, eat the paella, don't go back to school in the afternoon, start drinking latest at 1.30 pm, vamos a la playa, drink some more there, go home to shower and change, meet at 8 for some tapas, go downtown around 10 and don't stop causing trouble until Saturday morning. J It worked out quite well I have to say.  The paella was awesome, I was drunk by 1.49pm – for the first time –; got a bit more drunk by the sun was down, had some not so smart conversations, then a bit of food and was downtown as agreed, in an Irish pub (but of course, where else) drinking Guinness and having tequila shots just because, and then went dancing…….. thank god the drinks there were not the cheapest so in the end nothing horribly outrageous happened. The hangover yesterday was a more than painful of course – I haven't been drinking since the leavingparty in Prague, so all the wine and beer and shots were a wee bit harsh on the system. Oh well. Today is run-on-the-beach and go-to-see-Picasso day, with some icecream and sunshine – if only I wasn't alone in bed, it could easily be one of those perfect days..

Malaga day 1

The first half an hour at my hostess', Paqui's villa in Malaga was a wee bit painful after the previous mess in Morocco and the 40 hours without any sleep, I have to admit. Paqui is a 60 year old sweet lady, a mindblowingly excellent cook, who refuses to cooperate in English at all, no matter how hard you try... Now, with me having absolutely no way to express what I want in Spanish, there were some interesting moments me trying to explain that the reason I needed a washingmachine was not because I didn't have one in Hungary and only managed to bring dirty clothes with me, but that I spent the last week and a half in the air, on the road, on a camel, airport, tent, desert, bus etc……. J But, managed in the end, god bless the hands, with which you can tell whole stories without speaking any common language. So, for 20 eur per day, I get accomodation, breakfast and lunch - needless to say, the food is so good, that one of my newest cuests is to understand whatever Paqui says so that I can take her recipes with me when I leave.

 

The casa I am staying at is on a street that ends at the beach, 200m from the school (sooo bloody far…), and it is more a villa than a house, beautiful and HUGE! Today while I got lost on the way to school (to be very specific, I had no idea which way I was supposed to go so decided to try my luck and bump into it eventually… it worked!) I saw all kinds of shops nearby, post office, banks, restaurants, amazing parks and gardens, and of course the sea, all of it within 10 mins walking away. One challenge I have with the home: it is rather cold with the single windows and no heating whatsoever. Even though the weather is beautiful: 16-18C, sunshine, blue skies during the day, the 12-14C during the nights is a wee bit cold without any heating or a proper pajama.. Oh well. The center is half an hour walk away and – forgot to say - I have a Japanese flatmate among others (the rest I don't have an inventory of, yet..), and so far I saw two poodles around, too...

 

First day at school was FUN! I got giggles when I left in the morning with my backpack, a sandwich packed in serviettes, already half an hour late from the official starting time when I got out of the door….  Ooooooooooh good old times – and they are back!

 

To start the studies, all new students had a shorter or longer conversation with a teacher depending on the level of Spanish each of us had. Then a written test followed, and, guess what! Since I understood almost everything that was said and knew the basics of the grammar, I got a level higher than an absolute beginner! Yaaaaaaaaaay! I was so proud of myself… :D The agreement is, that I do my best to catch up with the others in my class and see in a week if I manage… There are 7 of us on the same Spanish adventure, a Swedish, a Belgian, another Hungarian lady, an American, an Austrian and a French, an interesting mix I have to say. The others all have been learning Spanish for a while, a few months to a year they said – yep, there is a wee bit of catching up to do on my end. There is free wifi in the school and a little café, lessons start at 8.30 and go until 2pm – after which I am back home just in time for lunch..

 

Next up is a hunt for a pre-paid simcard, then a walk on the beach before it gets dark, and a few hours study before bedtime – I seriously love the fact that I don't have anything else to do than sleep, eat, go to school and study…. Life is still awesome dear friends. J

Morocco

Ending in a proper clusterfuck with my (god damned) easyjet flight and no sleep for 28 hours, the Morocco-trip became almost twice as expensive as expected and I left the country with a rather bitter than sweet taste in my mouth. Apart from the horrible exit, naturally there are some really sweet memories I wouldn't change for anything. The (public) highlights were the desert with the hotel of 1000 stars (I think we saw most of the shining spots and dots, along with half-a-dozen shootingstar-per-hour); the camel ride among endless sand dunes that I only saw on the national geographic before; breathtaking sunsets; the annoying millions of flies; the sweetest pots of tea on earth; the excitement before and the refreshing feeling after the hammam (it's the local spa experience, a must do in Morocco!!), the tasty tajine meals; madness on the main square of Marrakesh; a 15 hour overnight busride that was not at all something I would be missing; the craziest reasons for excessive taxi fares; riad owner with 7 kids; no Rick's in Casablanca; illiterate locals speaking 4-5-6 languages – all in all, an absolutely crazy experience!