And 10 minutes later I’m back to finish my update. April 26th we returned back to school after 2 and a half weeks. I spent the first 3 days writing my final paper (hallelujah no more!!) and oops, missed an assignment in the meantime. Thursday my German friend and I went to the last Inquiro concert of my time here. They were great, like always, and before them played a band called Exit that was really good as well. Friday I met with the same girl and we went to the beach for a while, but the clouds came and within 2 hours it went from hot and sunny to a downpour. Luckily I had just gotten home when the rain started.

My scuba diving ‘class’ was supposed to meet that afternoon at 4:30 and me and the other girl sat in the sun (which came back out stronger than ever) at the meeting place for over an hour and a half while the instructor dealt with his broken down vehicle. When they finally came, we did the lesson then afterwards had a good long chat about lots of different stuff. That night I went out despite the early 8am wake up call. The next morning, though, I was up and ready to go when I got a phonecall saying the excursion was canceled due to the car problems. When I told my madre, she said “Well, I don’t believe it—he probably went partying last night and just doesn’t want to get up! Oh, he’s an older fellow? Well, in that case it might be true…” Haha, oh madre, you make me laugh except that you’re not kidding. Anyway it turned out really well because FINALLY the weather was beach worthy and I spent from 10:30 to 5pm on the beach and finally got the tan I was supposed to get 3 months ago! I stopped by a mall, Plaza Mar on the way back to look for another witch doll (long story) and upon entering I saw Luis my bartender friend—oh man I love that guy. He walked me to the store I was looking for and when we found out it had closed down, he offered me a ride home (because it was a 30 min. walk back) and so I followed him and helped him pick out an outfit for his little cousin’s birthday. XD

So Friday night I met an interesting guy from Sweden who speaks perfect English and has also lived in Spain for almost 2 years now. I introduced him to all my Spanish friends and he hung out with us 2 nights in a row. One of the nights he turned to me and said “Ya know, I know why you like this place so much—it’s unique. The only place that doesn’t play annoying loud music and you can actually talk to people and learn Spanish.” FINALLY someone who actually understands why I’m there for 6 hours at a time!!! Anyway he’s pretty cool.

Sunday morning we ended up doing the scuba diving and….I had gone to bed 6am that morning :o but I’m willing to sacrifice a little sleep if it means I get to spend time with my dear friends. (and I hope some people can understand that *hint hint*). Anyways, there were 8 of us: me, another American student, the instructor, the translator [for the other girl ;-) ], another Spanish girl, her Mexican husband, and their baby, but only 4 of us actually went under water. Oh man, with my sunburn getting that wetsuit on was a tad painful. Then we put on the weight belt, and the float jacket with the airtank attached. Once in the water we put the flippers on. Ugh, try reaching your feet gracefully floating in the water with 30+ pounds strapped to your body and an unforgiving wetsuit limiting your movement…not fun.
As far as the actual underwater part goes: a destroyed fantasy. First of all, the unnatural flippers were hard to adjust to. Second, I couldn’t figure out how to adjust my floatability. Everyone else was kneeling on the bottom of the ocean and I kept on floating up, just shrugging my shoulders when the instructor signaled me to come down, haha. After I finally was able to stay kneeled on the bottom, I couldn’t keep myself balanced! I would teeter to the left and to the right and by the end of the day my knees were in pain from being so tensed up the entire time. We did exercises such as signal to our companions for emergency air if we ran out, and fill up our mask with water and then empty it underwater. When it came time to take the mask off completely and put it on, I panicked a little. There’s just something about having my nose surrounded by water. I wanted to hold my breath even though I had an air source in my mouth but rule #1 of scuba diving is NEVER hold your breath (or your lungs can explode and whatnot) but anyway I started hyperventilating during that whole ordeal and when I finally had my mask back on, my eyes were still stinging and all I wanted to do was float up to the surface, but I stayed there and soon we were back on land. There we talked about what we could do to improve it the next time. We changed air tanks and went under again.

This time was much better except I was preoccupied with my ears! Before I had some trouble but this time as we went deeper I couldn’t pop my ears to relieve the pressure. One ear popped but the other hurt like mad! The rule is to go up a little, pop them, and then go back down, and I should’ve done that more, but I was so conscious that they were waiting for me to come down that I kinda just ignored the pain—it wasn’t that deep anyway—5 meters. Anyway, for next time I know that it is definitely NOT okay to ignore the pain. The exercises this time included pivoting using your breath, which this time being used to the floating thing, I got kinda quickly. I inflated the jacket a little bit (so I didn’t sink all the way) and breathed in to go up a little and out to sink a little. We also “found” our neutral floatability were we could just chill out between the surface and the floor without having to make any physical exertion. Sometimes when I actually got my ears to cooperate I could look around and realize that I was underwater. I remember seeing a fish and thinking “Oh look a fish!!...Oh, duh, Laura, you’re underwater, there are lots of fish here….” Haha. But hopefully next week when we finalize the course I can actually forget about my physical ailments and equipment and enjoy the clear water. It really was beautiful down there! So many colors :-) Afterwards when we had all the equipment packed up we drove back to the storage place, sat on the terrace and ate lunch. Apparently when you scuba dive Nitrogen enters the blood and the result is fatigue, so In addition to the lack of sleep I was also tired due to unnatural levels of nitrogen…alrighty then! I got back to my place around 6pm—wow, all day! At dinner last night my left ear was still blocked up and hurt a little (that's where the hypochondriac comment came from) but this morning it's all good.

Today = school. Next week exams start so this week we are wrapping things up and my teacher bought our class coffee & snacks as a closing gift since the next day is review. My day was made when I got off the bus this morning and saw my dear friend Joseda heading to the library. Really, just by seeing him those 5 minutes as we walked together made me happy. Any day with a Spaniard involved is complete. Tomorrow I have plans to go to my friend Abram’s apartment (in the picture) and have lunch with him and Wednesday we have chorus practice and afterwards everyone is going out for dinner. Next week in addition to the scuba diving, I have a bunch of exams, a bunch of chorus concerts, and the closing ceremony of the CIEE program and all the Americans start to leave—which really doesn’t bother me except that it reminds me that I too am leaving. On Saturday I told everyone to come to my goodbye weekend—the 22nd & 23rd. Joseda said he would be studying from now on but he would come to say goodbye, and others also said that they wouldn’t be here next weekend but they would come those dates. Omg, that word: “goodbye”--I hate it right now.

Anyway, consider yourselves updated. I have a busy 4 weeks ahead of me. Madre mia, it’s May 5th. In exactly one month I will be in my own bed, in my own home, in my own country…but where will my heart be?