Hi everyone!
First of all I'd just like to say that my main reason for writing this blog is so that my family and friends can keep up to date with what’s going on in my life here in Spain, but I also hope that future exchange students may find it useful to help them prepare before they leave and give them a bit of insight into how everything works. Just remember that if you are reading this for that purpose, my experiences are most likely going to be completely different to yours!
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| My Plane |
I cannot believe that I have been in Spain for a whole 2 weeks already - it honestly feels like I just got here... After a car trip to the airport, 3 long flights, a bus ride and plenty of waiting in between (around 44 hours in total), I finally reached Las Arenas, the suburb in which I'm going to be living for the next 3 months. As some of you will already know, I was originally going to be staying with a family in the city of Zaragoza, but the day before I left I found out that the host father was sick in hospital and so I needed to change. Thus I only ended up finding out where I was going a few hours before heading to airport, and I only received my host family details when I landed in Madrid! But it just goes to show how easily things can change in any moment, and to be honest it wasn't a very big deal to me at the time because I hadn't known much about the previous arrangement anyway. The journey was LONG - much longer than I had actually prepared myself for - but everything went smoothly apart from a 2 hour delay on my flight from Dubai to Madrid, which resulted in me missing my bus to Bilbao.
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| Some Random Islands in Europe |
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| Dubai |
However, when I finally made it, I was greeted by my amazing host family with hugs and kisses on both cheeks. I have host parents and four younger host sisters! They were honestly so nice and welcoming and have been there for me ever since. While I have no idea what my exchange would have been like in Zaragoza, I'm totally content that this is where I ended up, and I truly feel very fortunate to have been placed with this beautiful family. I live in an apartment at the edge of Las Arenas, with a gorgeous view of the port on one side, and the river on the other. All the old buildings and scenery are so pretty. The apartment is located behind a large church and is also close by to the famous Puente Colgante - basically a massive bridge that uses a hanging carriage to transport people to the other side of the river.
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| View from the Terrace |
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| El Puente Colgante |
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| "La Ría" |
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| La Iglesia |
I didn't have school for a few days after I arrived due to the last minute change, so I had a bit of time to sleep off the jet lag and do some exploring. However, I only built up the courage to venture out once or twice on my own for fear of getting lost and not being able to contact anybody (I didn't have a Spanish sim card at the time), but I soon came to realise that I pretty much live in the easiest building to locate in the whole of Las Arenas, and now I feel pretty confident to navigate my way around without any worries. In that time I also met my local coordinator who took me to lunch at her house and introduced me to her whole family! She is really lovely and even took me to the local shopping mall to have a look around. My host family showed me the old side of the port, which is full of little old-fashioned bars where you can by a drink and pinchos (small portions of food), and also took me to a couple of the beaches that are close by. They are pretty spectacular with severe cliffs followed by normal sandy beach areas.
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| One of the Beaches |
The school I go to is called Colegio Las Irlandesas (the school of the Irish). I've actually only been there 6 days in total due to the fact that there have been quite a few public holidays and festivals taking place since I arrived. It is technically a private school, but by no means any where near the standard of a private school in New Zealand. The way it works is VERY different here in Spain. Most students take the bus to school, but they are actual school buses rather than public transport. I arrive at my bus stop at 8:00am in the morning so that I can get to school before 8:30 when class starts. Students stay in the same classroom for the entire day while the teachers move around, so you are always with the same people for every class. You also don't choose your subjects individually, but instead opt for either the "Sciences" or "Latin"course. I am in the sciences one, and have - wait for it - 11 subjects!!!!!! These include physics/chemistry, biology, maths, language (Spanish), English, COI (interactive English), Euskera (the Basque language spoken in the north of Spain), philosophy, religion, cultural sciences and gym. From 8:30am to 11:30am we have 3 classes which are each an hour long, followed by a 30 minute break. Then from 12:00pm to 2:00pm we have 2 more classes, again each an hour long, and then half an hour to eat lunch in the cafeteria. Finally, from 2:30pm to 4:30pm we have 2 more classes, before catching the bus back home. The main thing that struck me about school here is that there are no extra curricular activities, sports, assemblies, competitions or school spirit. It is literally just 7 hours worth of classes each day. But it's not like people don't do any of those things, they're just all outside of school in their own time using public services. For example, my host sisters play a variety of sports in a massive sports centre and take music lessons. Also, while the school day is longer, there does not seem to be quite as much homework as I'm used to back in NZ.
On my first day it was quite overwhelming with everyone talking to me at once and constantly asking questions, but all the people in my class are really nice and always try to help me out by speaking slowly and explaining things. I have already noticed a huge improvement in my Spanish; now I can understand the majority of what people are telling me/what my teachers are saying, and am able to carry out comfortable conversations. I don't think I had actually realised my capabilities in the language before I arrived - everyone keeps telling me how well I speak and how good my pronunciation is, which has really boosted my confidence and encouraged me to speak more. Everyone can speak English in my school due to the fact that they have at least one, if not two classes of English every day, and they have been learning it since they were 3 years old. They seem really shocked when they find out that I have only been learning Spanish for just over 2 years! They generally speak it quite well (though we pretty much only ever talk in Spanish), but everyone, even the teachers and students at an extremely high level, have a strong accent and find it really hard to pronounce words properly. After talking about it quite a lot I have come to the conclusion that English's grammar is pretty easy to learn for them, but because we have so many more vowel sounds and variations of spelling they find it incredibly difficult to pronounce. Whereas Spanish's grammar and conjugations are far more complicated and tricky for English speakers, but it only takes a bit of effort to learn the pronunciation. Overall I think school isn't particularly amazing, especially thinking about the fact that it's holidays in NZ at the moment haha, but I'm starting to enjoy it a bit more now that I have made a few friends and I think that all the different subjects are going to be quite interesting :) (Oh and I forgot to say that it goes right from preschool all the way to the end of high school, and has around 1500 pupils)
Another thing that I feel quite lucky about having come here is that another exchange student from NZ is living nearby as well, and she has been really helpful and supportive. She showed me how to use the metro and so now I can go into Bilbao (it's about 20 mins away by train) whenever I want to, which is really pretty this time of year with all the Christmas lights! She also introduced me to one of her friends from her school who I ended up going out with again another day to buy shoes, so I'm super grateful to be able to make connections in different cities/towns.
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| The Other Exchange Student, Her Friend and Me |
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| The Massive Christmas Tree in Bilbao |
This weekend I got to go to France!! We went to the city of Bordeaux (it was about a 3 and a half hour drive travelling preeeety quickly haha - the speed limit is 120km per hour but everyone goes a lot faster). It's honestly so pretty, I love the French architecture, but I don't think I have ever been that cold in my entire life! I hadn't realised quite how significant the difference in temperature was going to be, and so didn't really pack enough warm clothing... But it was totally worth it! We were there with 4 other families staying in a massive traditional and beautiful house, with 8 or so children under the age of 9 running around and screaming all day (and night) haha, but they were so adorable :)))))). The first 2 days were spent in the city looking at all the old buildings and sights, but on Sunday we actually decided to visit a smaller town that I can't seem to remember the name of... To be honest I almost actually liked it there more than in Bordeaux because it just felt a little bit older and more traditional, and they had a huge market there as well which I really enjoyed. Unfortunately I wan't able to take many photos because we were so busy and every single thing I tried to take a picture of was always facing directly into the sun, or it was already dark by then, but I'm happy to have just been able to have enjoyed them at the time :)
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| Bordeaux |
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| Bordeaux |
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| Church in Bordeaux |
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| Bordeaux |
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| Bordeaux Monument |
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| The Other Town |
