Our Luck Continues

Well, our luck in this program continues.

When I left off last, we had just found an apartment. I knew it was perfect, Matt knew it was perfect, even Amy who had yet to set foot in Spain knew it was perfect. Little did we know HOW perfect this place was.

We went around 2 yesterday to move in. Rosa, the mother, was there, and so was her daughter, Elvira, who currently lives in the piso. I'm pretty sure it's Rosa who pays for the apartment and Elvira just lives there and works as a dental hygenist (she's 25).

From the second we walked in the door, they were the nicest people I've ever met. Asking if we needed anything, showing us all the cupboard space, bringing us hangers...

Then Rosa told us to meet her at 4:30 so we could go to the lawyer's office to sign the contact. I've never been to a lawyer in the States so I was a little apprehensive about going to one in Spain.

But we met Rosa (dressed up in the fashion only a Spanish señora can pull off, complete with purple lipstick), she paid for our bus ticket, and we went off to the lawyers.

The contract was very easily written and the lawyer made sure we understood everything, pretty basic. Make sure we pay rent and utilities, blah blah blah.

After, Rosa took us out for cafe con leches and a delicious pastry treat that I do not remember the name of.

Later last night, Amy arrived (yay) and Elvira got home from work. We all stayed up watching TV and talking til about 1:30. It's nice to have so much practice with Spanish, since I wasn't sure how much we would get teaching English. But Elvira is nice and pretty easy to understand and easy to talk to. She's young so she knows all the good places to go and what to do.

Today the wonderfulness continued. Rosa informed us that she would do our laundry, since she already comes here to do her daughter's. She also comes over at random times and cleans. Yes, it's kind of like Host Family Part II, but as long as I get to speak Spanish, I don't really care much about my independence.

We went back to the lawyer's office with Amy for her to sign and again Rosa took us out for more cafe con leches. We also got to meet Iñaki, Amy's friend who lives in Bilbao. Again, very happy to know more Spaniards.

Tomorrow we want to go to the beach, but there is a strike throughout Spain so we don't know how the transportation will be. Hopefully we'll be able to figure something out. Some people from our program who booked flights for tomorrow can't come because of the strike.

We're going to try and get appointments for our Foreigner's Identity Card on Thursday morning...yuck. Should be quite the adventure.

originally published 9.28.10