11 February: Today for the First Time...

...I wished I understood less.

Hola! Today was the BEST day! Except for one thing and I'll start with that. Why do I wish I understood less, you ask? Because I ate worms for dinner.

Okay, technically not worms, angulas:

And okay, they didn't look quite like that, more like this:

But still. eeeeeeek. They are a traditional Basque meal ("From the land of your abuelos!" exclaimed my host dad as I looked skeptically at my meal). I ate the whole thing though.

I kept trying to convince myself that they were just strange noodles, but they kept telling me more and more about them. Hence, the wishing that I understood less. I could feel them crawling around in there all night. My friend assured me that "the wine will kill them" so that's what I'm telling myself, even though obviously they were already dead.

Otherwise, today was divine. I rose late, had hot toast for breakfast with my cafe con leche, showered, and then read my book in the sun on the porch with their birds happily chirping away next to me! In the afternoon, some of us went to a dance show at the fancy-schmancy theater between the old and new parts of town. It was free and featured dancers of all ages doing everything from ballet to hip hop to modern dance. It was forever and a half long, so we left early, but we stayed long enough to watch our host parents' granddaughter dance, which was really fun.

Around dinner I was able to skype with people from home, which was the icing on the cake! After dinner, some of us went out for a leisurely night at a gorgeous outdoor place where I split a glass of wine with a friend and comfortably chatted the night away.

Today was a perfectly lovely day!

Praises to God for:
-good weather
-good friends
-courage
-safety
-warm beds to come home to
-modern technology
-the love of my real family in MN
-the ability to live in the tranquil city of Cáceres

Hablamos pronto!