Estoy acasa

Well, it's been a jam packed two days of orientation stuff, but I'm glad to say that I'm finally home! (In my homestay, that is.) We met our families today at the hotel. SO INTENSE haha! Basically they called our name, and all the moms were standing there, and then they called the mom's name and matched us up! I was so nervous but after I met my mom I think I relaxed a little. We met her son, Jorge, who then drove us back to the house. Okay I have to describe this place - I'm basically in LOVE with everything about it. First of all, the house from the outside is beautiful. Inside it's even more nice! My room is bigger than my room at home and I have my OWN bathroom! I'll post pictures soon - but I'd rather not have my family walk in to my room while their exchange kid is taking pictures of their house. Awkward? My family is SO nice too. My host mom is Maribel, my host dad is Eduardo, and my host brother is obviously Jorge and he's 28! It's already been great. I got here, moved in, and then Maribel cooked me some type of beans, and some patatas con huevos which was really good! They are all about lunch here, it's their biggest meal, and so far I like it! After that, Jorge and I watched soccer news for a while! They are big fans here which is PERFECT! Betis is the team they love. He went to a game last night (he has SEASON TICKETS -- jealous) - and Betis beat Barcelona which is like a HUGE deal because Barcelona is the best team in the world, Eduardo told me. I really hope I can go to games this semester, that would be AMAZING! They are really patient with my Spanish too - I can understand them pretty well but I feel like I take 948029384 years to form a sentence. But I think this will be really good for me and I really like practicing!!

Right now I'm just in my gorgeous room hanging out, I might try to sleep a little because I'm exhausted! I still have to tell you about yesterday and today! My bad. Just had to tell you about the family first! Anyway - yesterday was full of orientation-like stuff. We got up, had breakfast in the hotel, and then took the metro over to the Universidad de Pablo-Olavide where we learned about our classes and so on. We spent the day there and then came back to our rooms. After that we all had interviews with the program directors as part of our exam to see what classes we got into. We find that out tomorrow I think. I have no idea what to expect but I'm sure I got into wherever I need to be! After that, my friend Kylene, Adrienne, and I walked over to the mall for a little bit. Found a Starbucks which was a HUGE fail for two reasons - 1. Can't use my $100 gift card here - apparently it won't work. 2. Asked for an iced coffee and apparently Spain's version of iced coffee is pouring hot coffee into a cup, dumping ice in, and calling it good. Yeah, not gonna work for me. I was so maddd. But whatevs, you live you learn I guess. Coffee is the one thing that's KILLING me here. They have it in SUCH small doses and like only at breakfast! I've had two cups every day but the cups are the smallest things EVER! Ahhh. Might die. Already miss my Dunks. 6 more months! Haha.

After that, we all went out for Tapas! I got Pisto con Verduras y Pollo Altamira! Aka, amazing blend of vegetables and a piece of chicken. It was really good! Then we went to a Flamenco show. Impressive dancing, but I was pretty tired at that point! But I still loved it. After that, people still had enough energy to go to bars. I didn't want to miss out, so I rallied. My group ended up finding a discoteca! So we went in and danced until like two in the morning. Pretty fun and met some interesting Spaniards haha! So we got in at like 3AM which is SO not me, and then we got up early this morning -- 8ish -- for breakfast and then had to be moved out by 930! Then we went on a Scavenger Hunt around Sevilla, I definitely have no idea where anything is or how to navigate at all still, but seeing the city was SO sick and it's just a huge place, so beautiful and I can't wait to continue exploring! When we got back, we met our host moms and yadda-yadda. So here I am now. Sitting in my room for the next 6 months! I'm pretty exhausted, so I might try a little siesta -- try to make myself accustomed to the Spanish way! Haha, but we'll see how that goes. I've never been one to nap so..should be somewhat interesting. I have to meet my group later on for more TAPAS! I'm excited. But need some energy -- let's hope I can sleep for a bit!

Sorry this was so long -- feel free to skim, but lots of stuff going on here, and so far, SOOO good! :)

Escribiré más cuando puedo!