Anyways. As you all know, a little over two weeks ago, the whole United States shut down so that everyone could stuff their faces with turkey and express their gratitude for their lives (at least that's what thanksgiving is to me). Here in Spain, Thanksgiving is not celebrated (some of my friends back home were actually surprised to hear that), so my friend Ethan and I decided to bring Thanksgiving to this beautiful country. We organized the dinner ourselves, invited our host families and I invited a few of my friends and their parents, and we held it in my host dad's local (it's pretty much a pimped out basement, it has banquet tables which fit up to fourty people, a large tv and a pretty big kitchen). Ethan and I did grocery shopping throughout the week (which was extremely stressful because way too many of the ingredients we needed were unavailable), and on Friday (actual thanksgiving wouldn't work), we cooked all afternoon. We served dinner the true Spanish style, about an hour late, but we made up for it with an authentic American football game we'd found on YouTube playing on the tv and a little prayer before we started our food (in English and then translated to Spanish). The food was fairly mediocre, but to the people who had never had a true thanksgiving dinner, it was fine. The group favorites were the biscuits (which I made), and also the pumpkin pie (which I also made, not to toot my own horn or anything...). Dinner went til about 12, and it was really nice to spend the evening with another American eating American food and at the same time sharing a tiny bit of our culture with the people who have so willingly showed us their culture. 
The week passed uneventfully. I was sick one day so my host mom took me to the doctor, and I was fairly proud of myself, as I was able to answer all of his questions on the first try (most times I need people to repeat themselves at least once in a conversation but with him I didn't!). The diagnosis was that my body isn't used to the food yet, and also that it could have something to do with the stress of being in a new place.
Friday I was completely exhausted, I slept all afternoon, and went to bed right after dinner. On Saturday I got up around 10, and at eleven I went to Jaca to spend the day with Ethan. In Spain this weekend was a three day weekend because Saturday was a holiday, so in Jaca the main square had a merry go round and cool little artisan tents. We walked around there for a while, ate a late breakfast at mcdonalds, and eventually went back to Ethan's house. It was his older host brothers birthday, so his host dad made paella for lunch, and I got to meet Ethan's host uncle and aunt and cousins. After lunch, Ethan and I joined his host brothers and cousins in a poker game, which I lost. I think. I'm pretty bad at poker to be completely honest.
I went home around 6, and at 8:30, I went out with my Spanish friends. We had dinner in my host dad's local, and afterwards went to a club type place and danced and played foosball for hours. It was really fun, and I got to meet up with a couple of Rotex (one from my town and the other from Madrid).
Sunday I slept in, and then had lunch at my host grandparents house. It was delicious, but I was exhausted and when we got home I took a five hour siesta (it's possible that it didn't count as a siesta, I need to take a look at the rule book to see what the maximum time limit is). I watched a movie with my host family and then went back to bed.
Yesterday we had no school, so my host parents invited Ethan to join us for lunch in my host grandparents tiny village in the hills near Jaca. Lunch was fun, and afterwards while my host parents were siestaing Ethan and I walked around a bit and then found Spanish playing cards and made up our own games with them (they're very different from American playing cards). Around 6:30 we dropped Ethan back home, and that's pretty much it. Had dinner and went to bed.
Thanks for reading this somewhat boring post! Going to Logroño this weekend with exchange students to do the Holi run and hang out with their rotary club a bit! So I'll for sure write about that!
