"Spanish time"

In Spain, everyone is always really, really late. Always.

One of the "monitores" once kept his group waiting for about an hour before they went out to tapas or something. Other times, they've/we've had to wait at least 15 minutes. Even classes tend to start about 5 minutes later than scheduled. They are definitely never "early" here.

Yesterday, Aimee and I went to look at an apartment. We were supposed to meet up "just after 5" which turned into "just after 8" and when we met up with him around 8:30, we had to wait about a half hour to get the keys from his friend. Naturally, we missed dinner which ended at 9:30, but we went out last night for food so it was okay, but I remember being REALLY frustrated with the guys there because dinner here on weekdays is already paid for, so I don't like paying for food when I have some available to me here.

But you know, it probably was one of the better things that could have happened to me, especially this early in the program, mostly because of how the landlords handled us. They weren't all business. They wanted to talk about all sorts of things, like the differences between Spanish and Catalán (which at the time was extremely irritating because I knew I was missing dinner to hear about the things they wanted to talk about). In the US, business is business and play is play. Rarely do the two meet and mix. But here, everything is relaxed, no one is on a schedule, and whenever you can mix the two, they do.

I don't know.. I just feel like there are some up-tight people in LA that could learn a thing or two from the Spanish. Take a siesta every once in a while. Don't be irritated at running late. Sometimes your schedule will get messed up and you know what? Sometimes, that ends up being for the better.

Perhaps I have a few things I can learn from them, too.
------------------------------
Last night, while waiting for the landlord's friend to come, he lit up a cigarette and I noticed it bothering me more than cigarette smoke usually does. My nose got stuffy later last night and it hasn't gone away yet. I don't know if that cigarette in particular is to blame, but part of me thinks it is. I don't feel sick, just stuffy, but it is annoying. Hopefully it goes away...

Yesterday, I bought a Spanish chocolate bar called "Milka Triolade". It's a layer of milk chocolate topped with a layer of white chocolate topped with chunks of "darker milk" chocolate.

Today, churros con chocolate for breakfast =D. I've heard they are different than Mexican churros though. We will see.