Dia Diez y seis – Semana Tres Commences

June 1, 2009

Well, today is the official start of my third week of school. According the the syllabus that I got when I emailed earlier this spring, I should be out of “basic survivor Spanish” and into “Spanish I” proper. Our classmate Atsu left for Monteverde this week so Benjamin, Adonis, and I moved into the same class as Noah. :-) It’s fun being in the same class but I must admit is confuses me because Noah is a much more advanced Spanish speaker.

So far, our class has been mostly review. We went over pronunciation, nouns and adjectives. It is all very basic, but I am just glad to be adding some meat around all the verbs I know now. The first two weeks we had some random noun/adjective vocabulary, but nothing structured or comprehensive, the primary focus was on verbs. So now that we have all these verbs, it is nice to start adding some properly structured nouns into the mix. In starting from the beginning, however, we are going over what most Americans already know about Spanish like the “o” and “a” endings, the masculine/feminine nouns, and the different ways to say “the” (el/la/los/las). From a learning standpoint, it has so far been all review, but at least I am learning the “why” and being taught in a structured way what I knew before only by general knowledge.

The class is slow though, and for some reason I have been really tired this week. Noah is feeling a bit sick. :-( I feel fine but am just tired.

A whole bunch of new students began classes this week. It seems like the campus doubled in size. All these new people! From what we can gather, they are all mostly in the same group, we think they are traveling together as part of a high school program.

This weekend, when I made the rum cake, it turned out only so-so. I put too much glaze on too fast and so the cake got soggy rather than glazed. My family was polite and said it tasted fine but I am going to try again next week and make them a real rum cake. It’s not to expensive to buy ingredients here and the local “Megasuper” has all the supplies I need.

There are two supermarkets in town. The first, Pali, has the feel of a more local store. It’s “theme color” is orange so it kinda looks like a home depot for food. More local people shop there and it is closer to our house. The second supermarket, Megasuper, has a much more American feel. It’s feels like a Target or Wal-Mart in atmosphere and has a lot more selection. It’s a little more “yuppie” in the Costa Rican sense of the term (if there is such a sense of the term) but I actually like the Pali better. Pali is cheaper and just feels more authentic. Both are nice though. When I have day to day shopping needs, I go to Pali. If I have something special I need, I go to Megasuper. Megasuper is a little out of the way, but it is in a nicer part of town and there is also a Gym and a movie store nearby.

Well, that is all I have for today. I am working on taking more pictures and posting them. Maybe I’ll do a photo-blog post soon...I’ll work on that.

Until next time, adios!