Semana Santa

Ah, it's Semana Santa (Holy Week), which means I don't have class and Santiago is filled with tourists. My travel plans fell through, so I've been in Santiago all week, but it has been a wonderful experience. The only other people not traveling are my friend from Switzerland and my newest friends from Saudi Arabia. I have spent the majority of my week with the 8 guys from Saudi Arabia, who are constantly making me laugh. The one drawback is that when it's just me and them they speak a lot of Arabic. That's not all bad though because I'm learning a little (and by a little I mean very little, but it's a start), and I can always ask whoever is sitting beside me to translate and tell me what's going on. Maybe after Spanish I'll tackle Arabic.

I've enjoyed watching the city celebrate this week with lots of processions and special events for Semana Santa, and I've also gotten to know a different part of the city by spending some time alone here. The weather has been fairly awful, but the sun finally came out today and I'm getting to be outside a little more.

I also made a new friend. I was reading in a cafe and heard a girl ordering in English. It was obvious that she spoke zero Spanish and was not a native English-speaker, so I asked her where she was from. We ended up talking for a couple hours and she spent the rest of the day with my friend Natascia and I. She is from Germany and just finished the Camino de Santiago, starting from Portugal and walking for 12 days. She's here in Santiago until Saturday, so yesterday she went with my friends and I to A Coruña, and she's planning to go out with us tonight. I'm still amazed how much I'm learning about the rest of the world by being in Spain.

It's so hard to believe I have less than 2 months left of my Spanish adventure!