It was a good weekend. Finally skyped my fam, which pretty much made my life, and was long overdue. (I realize there are plenty of people out there who did not understand that last sentence at all- well skype is a way to communicate with your family. It connects webcams so that you can see each other on the computer screen and hear each other too- that is, if your connection is good. So what I said was "I finally got to see the shining faces of my family on my computer screen, live, and they were doing the same with my face.")
Saturday night I went to a churchy sort of thing with an amiga. I liked it; the message for the week was about figuring out who Jesus was, which was nice because I would like to know more about Jesus. It was very intellectual; I think most of the message was taken from the Case for Christ which my friend told me is about an atheist who converts when he comes upon evidence for Jesus that he can't deny. At least I think that's what she said it was about. Anyway, it was interesting, and made even better by the fact that the man who was speaking was from somewhere in England. (The north? Maybe?)
On Sunday, those of us who had gone on the Salamanca trip were invited to a barbeque thrown by the boys we went with (their entire dorm, actually, but we didn't realize that). It was a huge party! They put glasses of sangria in our hands about as soon as we arrived and the cups were never empty but a few minutes before a first-year student was ordered to refill them. The whole thing reminded me a little of a frat party- the whole dorm sticks together, and they have their first year students do the sorts of things that pledges would do (pretty tame things generally, like get more sangria whenever asked and play drums and stuff like that).
The atmosphere was a lot friendlier than at most American college parties I've been to. Although there were tubs and tubs full of sangria, and case after case of beer, I didn't see a single drinking game, and there was no one puking in the bushes when we left. It didn't seem like they were drinking to get drunk- everyone was genuinely enjoying each other's company, and the great afternoon weather. We danced, we laughed, we took a lot of silly pictures. I maybe had a little too much sangria, but my balance is horrible all the time, so really, who's to say? And you can't blame me, because this was really, really, really good sangria.
Usually in sangria you find red wine and some soda, like 7-Up or Fanta, at a rough ratio of 1 part wine to 2 parts soda (this according to the cooking class we took last week. You can also add sugar to taste, and then of course there are chunks of fruits.
Well, this sangria was a little different. They had both red wine and white wine, plus Fanta, plus a LOT of juice, and fruit pieces. I've asked one of the boys for the ingredients so I can dazzle you all when I get home (and after my birthday, naturally). I promise you'll love it.
We were the only four Americans at this party, and there were hundreds of people there, so it was a great opportunity to meet people and practice our Spanish. Apparently sangria improves my accent exponentially- one of the boys stopped me mid-sentence and exclaimed, "Your Spanish is better than mine!" That was maybe an exaggeration, but I really am starting to pick up the different sounds, and I'm trying to remember which words they use here instead of the South and Central American words I've been learning for years. My ra told me she's noticed a big improvement too.
The party had to end sometime (around 9, because it had started at 3) and it was back to midterm studying. (I know I only have the one test this week, but it's the Prado class, and that teacher can be brutal, as I've mentioned.) Our boys have promised to alert us as soon as they plan another party, and I'm definitely looking forward to seeing them around campus (although with 100,000 students at the Complu, that may never happen). What a weekend!
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