September 10, 2009

Ah… Madrid. It is truly amazing.

I arrived in Madrid and found the guy who was to take Peter and I to our new apartment. He was holding a sign which said “Peter Roth”. He kept saying something about manaña, and I kept telling him I couldn’t find my husband. He eventually found someone on the other end of his cell phone that spoke enough English to tell me Peter wouldn’t be arriving until the next day. Ok, I headed to our new home.

We share a house with people from Venezuela, Peru, Jamaica, Colombia, and Spain. It is a crazy, multicultural home. They are all very nice and somehow we all try to figure out what we’re saying to each other. All of us are students and attend at least 4 different colleges in Madrid.

And, if I thought that was “multicultural,” my experience with varying countries got more diverse as my first week progressed. In orientation, we were assigned to groups by the first letter of our last name. In my group of about 30 students, there were over 10 different countries represented. At lunch, I ate with students from Switzerland, Japan, China and New York. The school itself has students from over 65 different countries.

Multicultural experience was a part of my objective in going to school abroad. My living environment and school setting will offer great chances for me to get to learn about many different places and the people who live there. I am looking forward to it.