Hi everyone, it’s me again. I can’t believe it’s been a whole two months since I last wrote a blog entry. You’ve probably been wondering what’s happened to me. Or maybe you haven’t, but let’s not go there. I feel the need to apologize, although some of you may say I don’t have to, but when writing for a school newspaper, I sometimes forget I have an actual audience, which I feel is very unfair to school newspapers, and very unfair to the audience. I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions, but if I could make one on January 19, I’d resolve to write more blogs.

I can just see you all at your computers right now saying, “we get it, get on with it!” Oh, how you guys make me laugh. Buena gente (good people), as we say here, I?ll get started before I lose myself.

I suppose I should start from where I left off: the end of school before the winter break. With respect to school, there’s not much to tell, except that I passed all my classes for the trimester – something of which I’m very proud. This is because before I started, I wasn’t expecting to pass any of my classes. I just hope that I haven’t put off anyone in my classes, especially since my economy teacher likes to go off on the class about how I make less spelling errors than they do. I really wish she wouldn’t do that.

Winter break was a wonderful breath of fresh air after the stress of all the end-of-term tests. We had three entire weeks of sleeping in and lunches with the whole family (including aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents). I found it amusing that everyone kept saying “it must be very odd celebrating Christmas here. It must be completely different from how you celebrate in California.” The funny thing about it is that it was hardly different, with a few exceptions. One change was that we saw more family, more often. The biggest disparity was the lack of gifts on Christmas, but that’s because they separate Christmas and what we might consider “the gift holiday.” Here, that holiday would be Reyes, which is, according to tradition, the day that the three wise men visited the stable where Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus were staying. It all sounds very religious, but it’s done in the same way that Christmas in the United States has become very secularized and commercialized; the religious traditions don’t have the same weight on the holiday as they used to. In Spain, the three wise men are depicted in television commercials and billboards as three well dressed, friendly types, who selflessly ride off on their camels to bring toys to all the little boys and girls around the world on January 6. Compared to these guys, Santa looks a little like a ponchy dude in red PJs with an affinity for hoofed mammals (no offence, Santa, if you’re reading this).

The best part of Reyes, besides the presents, and of course seeing family, is the cabalgata, which is a big parade in which the three kings ride into town on floats, throwing candies. The smaller towns logically hold smaller parades, but larger cities like Madrid or Barcelona throw gi-normous parades. These are almost on the scale of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, but without a giant Scooby-Doo floating down Main Street. Another detail worth mentioning about the cabalgatas is that the logical point of interest – seeing the wise men – is not the focus at all. No, it’s all about diving for candy among the crowd. My family, as did most families that night, took home an entire grocery bag full of little hard candies, of which we have probably eaten a grand total of 12.

Just a little side note: if you’re ever lucky enough to get to go see a cabalgata, don’t make the mistake I made. Make sure to bring some kind of head gear. A bicycle helmet would do just fine. The little kids who sit on the floats and throw candies are slightly “over enthusiastic” with the candy throwing, and the wise men are the worst of all. If you want to see any of the floats at all, be prepared to get a couple of hard candies lobbed in the face.

That’s all I really have to say about the holidays, except that I missed going to my friend’s Hanukkah party and hearing about how friends enjoyed their non-Christmas holidays.

I’m going to dedicate the rest of this blog to talking a little about my host brother and sister. I feel they’re worth mentioning, since I’m an only child in California, and it’s been a very – educational – experience.

I’m going to use made up names for my host siblings, because I like the idea of keeping their privacy. I do want to keep it personal, however, and be able to call them something besides “Sis” and “Bro.” Sonia, as I will call my host sister, is 13 and Juan, the name by which I will refer to my host brother, is 7. Unless you have a very soap opera-esque life and happened to find out during your mid-teens that you had a sibling you’d never met, then you have no idea how odd my life has been these last few months. I suppose what’s most odd about it is that it’s taken almost no effort to become like actual siblings. This point has been rather frustrating for me at times, because I have not grown up with the resources for dealing with siblings, whereas both Sonia and Juan have had each other their whole lives.

One of the things I first learned through my dealings with them is what a curmudgeon I could be if I wanted to. A big source of tension in the house is always meal time, because both Juan and Sonia are fairly picky when it comes to food. So when Juan would start to throw a fit about not wanting to eat whatever was for dinner, I would get the urge deep down to turn to Juan and say:

“Look, this is what there is. You’re gonna eat it, and you know what else? You’re gonna to like it, too!” I suppose that gives you a pretty good idea of how often there are problems when it comes time to eat. I’m slowly getting used to it.

It makes sense that it would be a lot easier to relate to Sonia since she’s 13, but while it is in some ways, a 13 year old is as different from an (almost) 17 year old, as a 13 year old is from a 10 year old. All the same, it’s fun having a sister. We tell each other things and help each other with homework. And of course, we like to bug one another. Sonia went through a phase where she liked to take pictures of me sleeping with her camera phone. All I can say is that I’m glad I’m a light sleeper.

I guess this is it for now. Like I said at the beginning of this blog, I’ll try and write more often in the coming months. If you can believe it or not, I only have 5 more months here, and then I’ll be on a plane back to “sunny” California (I saw the crazy weather you guys are having on the news here). Time flies when you’re speaking Spanish (I know some of you who may be sitting in a Paly computer lab after a block period of Spanish will disagree with me). I hope you all passed your finals with flying colors!

Hasta ahora, colegas!!! (See you later, dudes!)