11 March 2008

meanwhile in Oaxaca

This morning my fast five-minute pitch on who I was and where I was from got me into level 1B of Spanish classes. I joined the class in its second week, so I have to study simple past tense by myself. Three hours of grammar and one hour of conversation were pretty intense as I seem to know the least amount of words in my 5-student group. After the lunch break (long one as for Mexicans lunch is the main meal of the day), I signed up for conversational class for advance students. Since I am not advanced, I almost had to fight for it. For beginners they offer cooking and salsa, but I don’t believe in cooking next to English speaking folks as means to learn Spanish. Starting tomorrow I plan to eat lunch with my host family (so more Spanish) and to do intercambio (1 hour of conversation with a local student in Spanish and English). So in total I will have classes from 9 am to 6 pm with hardly any breaks from Spanish. After 6 I will do my homework and catch up on my vocabulary. I already feel the results and I am very excited about trying to learn my 6th language! (Six sounds cool, but in reality I am only fluent in two)

I think I am still adjusting to higher altitudes of Mexico City and Oaxaca. I am sleepy and exhausted by 6 pm. With 8 hours of sleep I am tired when I wake up. I really hope 'it' will go away in a day or two. I am planning on waking up early and taking pictures of the sunrise in this beautiful city.

[Day 3 in Mexico City is in the works!]

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i am not sure whether it's just the higher altitudes or the class as well. i remember that i was quite exhausted after four hours a day + homework of four days intensive hebrew class and the altitudes had nothing to do with it... now i am debating whether i should try this experiment again over the summer, combined with a regular work schedule.