Orientation

Today we had our orientation of the school, our neighborhood (Pedregalejo), and downtown Malaga (el centro). Before all of this though we had to sit a placement test. After the placement test we got to meet all the students we arrived with. Basically, the way it works is a new batch of students leaves every second Monday. With only seven people our group was small in comparison to the groups that arrive when school lets out. Luckily I arrived with an awesome group of people and we all quickly became friends. Their was Camilla (Denmark), Rosanne (Belgium), Marlies (Holland), Zineb (Morocco), Denise (Hong Kong), and Stefan (Austria). All in all we were a pretty international group spanning four continents and seven countries.

After our test we took a walk around the school with Nico who was the activities coordinator for the school. It was actually pretty nice with a separate kitchen, computer lab, several different residences, and garden all within a walled compound about the size of a regular lot. It was pretty compact but very well planned out and everything was clean and modern. It's also really nice since the school is only a two minute walk away from my host family.

Now we were to leave and see the surrounding area as well as several shops, gyms, and restaurants that the school recommended. We left the school and walked into the little 'downtown' area of Pedragalejo which is basically a suburb of the city of Malaga (which is actually a surprisingly big city with a population of I believe around 500,000). It's weird since the whole city is cornered between the mountains (glorified hills) and the ocean so it's really thin but long as it winds it's way along the coast.

The actual center of our suburb was pretty nice with some restaurants, assorted shops, small businesses, gyms, and some bars. The best part though was down by the beach (four minute walk from the school) where we went to Namaste which was a really nice bar restaurant deal with really nice staff who were always friends with the EF students. We all had lunch and talked about our respective countries.

After finishing up we all headed to the bus stop which is conveniently located exactly between my host family and the school. From there we caught the N11 bus into downtown Malaga which takes about 20 minutes depending on the number of stops. Unfortunately all the buses here are on Spanish time so they show up whenever they want. The night buses are even worse and may or may not show up at all.

Downtown Malaga is a charming area which is heavily pedestrianized which is really nice. The whole area is composed of old style Spanish buildings with several highlights being the Plaza de la Constitucion, the Alcazaba (old Moorish fort), the one towered cathedral, and the Picasso museum. There's plenty of shops for no matter what you want, bars, restaurants, and of course clubs.

After our tour of all the highlights we headed back to the school where we were dismissed for the day so we all went to the beach and took in the sun (Malaga only gets about 20 days of rain per year).

No hablo Ingles... Shoot

Today I woke up ridiculously early since I didn't know how long it was going to take me to get to Luton airport. I walked, took the train, took the bus, and finally ended up Luton... three hours early. So I had the pleasure of enjoying Luton airport for three hours with nothing to do since I accidentally left my book at the hostel (thankfully Naseem and Alice are looking after it – thanks!). I was also a little skeptical about the quality of my flight since I was flying with the crazy discounter airline Easyjet and I'd heard many bad things about them. Thankfully though the flight ended up being decent but you definitely got what you paid for. I did get to talk to a nice elderly British couple beside me though who were headed to their vacation house in Marbella.

Finally we landed in Malaga and I caught a taxi to my host family. There I was received by host mother, Raphaela, who unfortunately didn't hablo any Ingles whatsoever so I had to guess what was going on. After she showed me my room she gave me some keys and went back to her television. So with nothing better to do I decided that I would try and find a supermarket; unfortunately, I didn't realize it was Sunday and that all the supermarkets would be closed. This didn't really matter since I just ended up getting terribly lost.

After asking several people in my terribly broken Spanish I ended up finding my way home. When I finally got back I met my new house mates. I directly shared a room with Stefan, an Austrian guy who is going to the same school as me (EF Malaga) and is staying here for 2 months as well so that ended up really well. Felix is the other guy and he's a German who's going to Malaga Si which is another school close to our house. Also apparently there's a British girl named Priya coming but she's in Ronda right now.

We just pretty much spent the whole night talking. Thankfully their English is really good since my German sucks and all of our Spanish is pretty rusty.

Some culture

I got lost in the British Museum. Then I got lost going home. It was a good day.

The finer points of London

Since Alice had an interview Naseem and I decided to go take in some of the finer sights in London. We ended up at Harrods instead. For those who aren't yet educated to the joys of Harrods it's basically a massive department store with the most expensive designer stuff imaginable. We just drooled on everything for awhile while the sales clerks ignored us because they could tell we didn't actually have money. One exception though was when I convinced a Dior sales clerk that I was actually going to buy sunglasses, apparently I was so convincing Naseem thought I was serious. Because 185 pounds is definitely a steal for sunglasses.... I want them.

And back to London...

Today I woke up ridiculously early to catch the bus from Ledbury back to London. I said all my goodbyes, got on the bus, sat down, passed out, drooled on myself, then woke up in London. Getting off the bus dragging all my luggage I promptly head off in the wrong direction in search of the tube station. Ten blocks later, realizing I was going the wrong direction, I turned around and went right back to the bus station and continued going in what I hoped was the right direction. Eventually I stopped and asked a policeman who promptly pointed me in the direction I'd just come from. I eventually found it; unfortunately, the tube station was massive and had a ridiculous amount of connecting trains.

I finally figured out how to get on the train and made it to my hostel with a sense of victory at having conquered the public transit system. The hostel I'm staying at is called Clinks and it's an old renovated courthouse where you sleep in the old jail cells and connect to the Internet in the actual court room. Having deposited my luggage I decided to go have a walk around Reagents Park while I waited to run into Naseem and Alice.

Finally I ran into Naseem and Alice and we (Naseem and I) decided that it was prime time to play some intense drinking games... Connect Four! So we went to the bar and played Connect Four and the loser had to buy the winner a drink (all cool people do this on Wednesday night). I destroyed Naseem but felt pity so bought her some drinks anyways.

The only two other people at the bar were two guys from Wisconsin. We all ended up going out later that night to another bar (with people actually in it) down the street called The Rocket. We sat down right beside an unfortunate British couple who we forced conversation upon. Behind us there was what appeared to be a hooker making out with some old brown guy. It was a little weird so we moved outside and had some intense philosophical and religious debates. We then returned to the hostel and I forced some French people to talk to us while Naseem devoured some Greek guy with her eyes (we probably traumatized them for life).