Classes

Well, I guess I am in Spain to "study" so I should probably tell you all a bit about my classes. I can only tell you about three out of the five I'll be taking because classes at the UofG don't start until February 11th or something. We have our first information meeting tonight, hopefully there will be more encouraging news than the last time we talked with the powers that be about them! They pretty much said that we're all doomed...or at least, I am because I haven't taken as much Spanish. They're probably right. I'm going to do everything in my power to not take these classes by myself. Since I don't have to fulfill any requirements, I can take whatever I want or whatever anyone else wants/has to take. Anyhow, the classes I'm taking at the center (very cool old building by the way, it has a courtyard and a fountain!) are Literature and Cinema in Contemporary Spain, Culture of Spain, and Grammar. Surprisingly, perhaps, I like the grammar class best so far. The teacher is tough, but very helpful. Yesterday we spent most of the time swapping ghost stories...yeah, fun times. The culture class is okay, I like the teacher, but it's early (9:00) and I am not a fan of morning classes...or mornings in general to be honest. Basically we take turns reading articles and then chat about the differences between US and Spain. It passes the time fairly well. Then there's the cinema class. Worthy of a new paragraph, this class is. The first day we watched a movie called "El Espiritu de la Colmena" which translates "The Spirit/Ghost of the Beehive." In case you couldn't tell from the title, it was kind of an odd movie. Not a lot of talking (lucky for me, 'cause it's pretty hard to understand little girls whispering in spanish on a low quality sound system) or action, just a lot of symbolism and metaphors. Frankenstein has a part. Yeah. So, the first day of class we watched this movie (went half an hour later than we were supposed to, which meant being really, really late for lunch) and then had a three page sheet of questions to answer and a one page response paper to do. Yeesh. Then yesterday we talked about it, and apparently I didn't get most of the symbolism, my answers were pretty off most of the time. Anyhow, it's going to be a toughie. I don't have much practice reading in Spanish and we're not reading kids books or something easy. So, it will be a tough one. Well, that's all I feel like posting right now, I can't say I have the muse upon me, but now you are all up to date on what I do during the mornings four days a week.