escuela oficial de idiomas

That's the name of my school. Today I went to get my bus pass with my roommate Yoli and she went with me to the school - we kinda got lost. She is from Granada and doesn't know her way around Almeria very well either as she just moved here to go to the University. She is so hard to understand!! Everything is slurred together and here in Andalucia, they drop the "s" off the end of words and the "d" between vowels. So instead of hearing Granada, you hear Grana, or hablado becomes hablao. It's going to take some getting used to. I've started using the zeta (or theta as I like to write it) again, but I have yet to make it consistent in my speech since I'm not used to it yet. That'll come quickly though.

So the school that I thought where I was going to work ended up being a different school all the way on the other side of the city. So much for walking...Apparently it just moved in the last couple weeks and it used to be in the same neighborhood where I live. Fancy that! That would have been perfect. Pero está bien, no pasa nada. It was funny cause I was looking all over for a pay phone to call my school. I ended up walking pretty far and what do you know?! There's one right outside my apartment building! It took me a while to finally get a hold of them, but I finally did and planned to go later to meet with them about my job. Well, turns out that today was actually the first day they were open, so it wouldn't have done me any good to have come 2 weeks ago anyway! I already can't start working til next Monday since they already have the schedule made for this week. Fine with me - more time at the beach! I am going in again on Thursday, though, to get the run down and see how things are done. In the meanwhile, they gave me the textbooks to start looking through. I am going to be the only American teaching at the school - the first American they have ever had! I guess the students are all really excited to have an American, but nervous about not understanding me. Funny, cause I'm always afraid that I'm not going to understand the Spanish/Mexican people when they talk to me - I've never had it the other way around. Should be interesting...I'm excited to finally start teaching! I'm going to have anyone from the ages of 14 and up.

Well, I plan to do some more exploring this week since I'll have such a busy schedule once I start working next week. Maybe I'll even go to a bullfight...