Intercambio

Last night we went to our first intercambio event. Intercambios are an exchange between Spanish speaking and English speaking individuals. So people in Granada who are learning English sign up to meet people, like us, who are here studying Spanish. The idea is you go out for tapas or a walk, or whatever it is you like to do and both of you get to practice your Spanish and English skills.

I was pretty nervous about going, but I am very glad I did. My Spanish is no where near the levels of a large majority of the students in our program, and I feared that I would feel overwhelmed and intimidated, but it turned out to be a great experience. I am so glad I went. David, one of our directors, arranged for a group of 80 of us, 40 americans and 40 spaniards, to go out for Arabic tea at a Teteria and mingle for the evening and hopefully make contacts to meet up with in the future. We had "pakistani" tea, which tastes a bit like chai and is very spicey, and arabic, sweet pastries. It was a very cool atmosphere.

Ellen and I sat down with two of the Spanish men in the group that were in their mid twenties, Fernando and Alejandro, and clicked right away. They are friends from English classes they have taken over the past 7 years and speak English very well, I was truly impressed. Everyone else in the group appeared to be on a blind date with young Spaniards hoping to meet American women, but Fern and Alejandro genuinely just wanted to practice their English... we were so thankful!

After tea we went out for tapas with a smaller group of Spaniards and other students from our group and had a great time getting to know them and practicing our Spanish. Fern actually lives near us and loves to run along the river, which is perfect. We decided we could have "walk and talk" meetings to practice. He even showed us a shortcut on the way home that takes half the amount of time! It was great :) Alejandro lives up by the old moorish portion of the city and happens to know a lot of really great Flamenco bars, so he is going to take Ellen and I to see something authentic Flamenco! Yay! By the end of the night, I was proud of myself for going and putting myself out there, not knowing a large amount of Spanish. They were excellent people to practice with. Because they too are trying to understand your language, it made the whole experience so much more relaxing and comfortable. It helped knowing they would make mistakes too and want to learn more about what we had to say. Overall a great experience and I can't wait to meet more people. This is a picture of me and Ellen with Fernando at the Tapas bar we went to, Alejandro had already left by this point.