Hello from Oviedo!

My good friend Erika did something similar to this when she got to Oviedo, and I thought it was a good way to introduce you all to my experience thus far in my new hometown:

Thoughts as I get acquainted with Oviedo:

1. It’s definitely not McDonald’s:
I realized when I got here that Americans have hamburgers all wrong. Here in Spain, hamburgers are prepared in the literal sense of the word: using ham. A Spanish hamburger looks exactly like its American counterpart, except it’s made of ham instead of beef and doesn’t have a bun. A little saltier, maybe, but still edible. And I’m sure you can imagine what their manifestation of a cheeseburger is. It just makes me miss America a little.

2. I am now prepared for the Arctic:
I’m not really sure whether Spaniards just like to be economical or whether they really love the sensation of being numb from head to toe. Since I’ve been living in my new house, I’ve slept every night wearing the following: two pairs of socks, thick tights, pajama pants, a thermal shirt and a hoodie. I tried to wear more, but it wouldn’t fit on my body. It’s pretty cold in the houses here, and all of my American colleagues would also agree. Apparently, something really popular for bedtime here is to buy these contraptions from the Chinese shop that allow you to fill them with hot water and put them in your bed when you sleep at night. They stay warm and so do you. I should look into getting some.

3. American dogs might as well be wolves:
The first night I got here, my host mother and I went walking around town with our black cocker spaniel, Tina. Within two blocks of our journey, I realized that 95% of the people we encountered also had a dog. Dogs are common here. But what I didn’t realize until I got back was that they are all so unbelievably GOOD. Every time Tina saw another dog, my mom would walk her up to it and they would hang out and sniff for a while. Never once did we hear or see a bark or attempted attack. Furthermore, when we approached a certain park, my mom bent down and simply took Tina off of her leash. Mind you, we had a park on one side and a street on the other. Tina went straight to the park, did her business and immediately came back to Mom to be tied back up. No temptations of running in the road existed.

4. Any lazy teenager would love this place:
My host mom is a nice woman. Not only does she repeat every sentence at least 4 times for me, which probably gets redundant (no pun intended), but she waits on me – hand and foot. She won’t let me help her prepare lunch, clean up or even go 5 minutes after waking up without asking me if I want my morning coffee. And I doubt it’s because I’m her guest, either – I think that’s just the way it works here. The mothers enjoy serving their kids, and the kids enjoy being served. I could live with that.

That’s it for now, I think. I’m sure I’ll come across some more oddities before the week’s over. I’ll get some pictures up soon, too! I’m sure you all want to see what Oviedo looks like. It’s almost like the cleanest, busiest part of Philadelphia that you can imagine if it was placed on a steep hill. It’s beautiful.
Other than that, I started classes yesterday! It’s great, they don’t start until 2 p.m. at the earliest every day, so I could sleep as long as I want. And on Mondays, I don’t start ‘til 6. That means that if I ever travel, I can have an extra day to arrive. So exciting!

Hasta luego,
Carlene