Uggggghhhhhh.

I think I shall start this blog out by complaining about everything that I can possibly complain about, even if it is not true and I am just being psycho. Then I will feel better and manage to get on with my life and this experience.

1. I put my keyboard in Spanish and I am having quite a time figuring it out. I know this is an element completely within my control, so I should not be complaining about it, but it is still difficult to deal with. I feel like if I ever get to writing excessive essays in Spanish I want to have tildes and accents and all of that when I write, instead of faking it or just looking like a total moron when I am trying to type mañana or maté or something. I feel like once I figure out where everything is, I will be ok, but for now it is really frustrating to type a question mark and end up typing _. And, since I ask a ton of questions, I look even more like a retard because all I do is type _ when I try and ask questions. And it takes me about 9 hours to write a smiley face. I need to just write myself a post-it note to remind myself where things are. It will be ok. Also, I cannot type contractions. I might be able to once I figure out where everything is. But for now, please deal with my exponentially formal style.

2. I am officialy hating on the Spanish language as of late. First of all, my internet is in Spanish. Come on, Uruguay, I do not know spanish that well. I cannot read websites in Spanish. I can barely read pamphlets in Spanish, let alone entire websites. I do not know what anything means! It makes me want to cry. Second, I have about a billion hours of Spanish on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which basically makes me want to cry. I have an hour and a half Spanish Conversation class, and then after that, I have a literature class. All in Spanish. THERE IS NO ENGLISH. I REPEAT, NO ENGLISH. It is super tragic. The class in itself is not super difficult, but there is no English! My native tongue got kicked out on its butt, into the halways of the deserted University. I know he is very lonely out there, but my teacher will not let him in. Sorry, English.

Plus. NO one speaks it! Except the people in Casa. I have to go out there and get my Spanish on when all I want to do is talk in English, and my English is weird because I say lots of weird crap that will not translate into Spanish, or into anything, for that matter. So, when I do speak, it is a weird translation of my random idiosyncratic English. So I make no sense half the time. I feel as though I am in a catch-22; no one understands me in English or in Spanish. Sad day. I might just become a mime.

3. I feel like a moron in most of my classes. Along with that Spanish rant above, I feel like I am just dumb. It is as if everyone has something correct or interesting to say but me. And it is frustrating. Because I feel like I am moderately intelligent. Yet when I am in class, no es el caso. And in my freaking Latin American studies class, I read the freakin chapter twice. TWICE. And I still did poorly on a quiz. I do not know if that makes you angry, but it makes me angry. Because, really...I read the thing twice. Whatever. I am beasting that next quiz. Beasting it with a capital B. Which was a capital B, in that case, because it started the sentence. Needless to say I am slightly stressed out and overwhelmed with all of the reading and work that I have to do.

4. Oh, yea. It is basically hotter than the Dickens here. When we went into the classroom today I thought I was going to melt away until someone decided to open the windows. It was harrowing. I thought I was going to die. It is lovely in the late afternoon and the evening, but 11-2 is basically horrible. Just saying.

5. I have an itch I can't scratch. Not a literal one, but I want to go do something, but I do not know what or how or when, but I know I want to do something. I do not know if it is me getting pushed out of my comfort zone because I am desiring my own sense of "normalcy" that I had at home (Texas and California), and now I'm sort of afraid I will never be able to achieve that. Maybe I will when Uruguay becomes my home. That is a scary thought. Because I will eventually be leaving and I feel like a huge part of my heart will get ripped out. And that ish hurts. A lot. But really. I want to scratch this non-literal itch.

yessss I just found the apostrophe button! Winnnn.

I think that's all I really have to complain about. Now for the good stuff:

1. I finally turned in those blasted art papers. Describing my feelings and all sorts of nonsense. Who wants to talk about feelings? Not me. Because I lack emotion of any kind.
But really. They're pretty bad. I have a terribly time articulating how a piece of art makes me feel. I can feel, but I cannot write how I feel well. At least not well.

2. Day 1 out of two days of torture are done. Win. Tomorrow I don't have class until three. And class means I am going to a museum. Double win.

3. We had a Candombe workshop yesterday. So. Awesome. It's a super fun dance. It is relatively easy to do, and it was absolutely hysterical to see everyone dance like old women and old men. I literally fell over several times from laughter. If all the rest of y'all could see it...
I wish I could explain Candombe better. It is basically an African-Uruguayan tradition that was created by slaves from back in the day. They use three types of drums and don't read music, each of the drum players just go off of one aother and listen to the different sounds of the drums and if their tones and keys change. From what I have seen of it it looks fascinating. I really cannot describe a lot of this stuff very well, but I will be able to give a full report after the parade on Thursaday. I am terribly excited for it. There will be lots of pictures and maybe even a video if I can manage to get a good enough one. Drums are probably one of my favorite things in this entire universe. Besides owls. And Greek Yogurt.

K. This is too long. I might post more later. I have lots of thoughts swirling around in my brain. Sort of like tie-dye. Minus the weirdo hippie implications.

paz.