Hello America & Spain! And my two viewers who always manage to pop up from Russia...привет! (I Googled that...it means "hello" in Russian...feel special you two creeps).
I know I haven't written for a little while, but if we all take into consideration how often I wrote last year (due to emotional roller coasters and lack of will power) this is pretty good, right?
The good news is that so far everything seems to be going really well. Last year I ended up in the wrong apartment, far away from Madrid, with the wrong roommate...and to top that off she was never even home, so it was like I lived alone. I think that started the year off on the wrong foot....so I'm looking to really make up for it this year.
As you all should know, I have a gay roommate. Sometimes I feel like it's wrong to single him out as the gay roommate...he's also the only male roommate...but it seriously is the best way to describe him. I swear I'm not marginalizing...if anything I love him more for it. You should all be gay and maybe I'd love you more too, haha. Kidding...mostly.
Anyways I'm in love with Paco. We've only been living together for a week now and it's already a very strong relationship. He's very sassy and very effeminate....not drag queen effeminate, just...normal effeminate. He's also very quirky...for example he's in love with Toy Story. Yesterday he introduced me to his Toy Story dolls...he has Buzz, Woody, Bullseye (the horse), and Jessie (the cowgirl)...if you turn them on and put them together, they talk to each other. Just to clarify, this is where the gay-roommate clarification comes in. Let's all imagine that my roommate last year, Manuel, the one-man star of Carrie in our apartment, had these toys. Coupled with his chronic schizophrenia and talking to his other personalities in the shower (that he was completely unaware of), the addition of Buzz and Woody would probably send me screaming for a straight jacket from the nearest loony bin. And to be completely honest with you, if he DID have those dolls, I wouldn't be one bit surprised. He was a very nice guy but also very unfortunate to live with (especially near the end). Paco also has Toy Story shower gel, Toy Story posters, and tends to leave the empty boxes from his dolls around the house as decorations. Clearly he's going to be a breeze to shop for at Christmas.
Paco also comes in a two-part package. There's Paco...and then there's his boyfriend, Beto. They are polar opposites...Paco is sassy and outgoing and Beto is quieter and relaxed. My first night in the apartment Beto came over and rummaged through all of the stuff I brought from America....including but not limited to my nail polish, my muffin mixes (don't judge, they're cheap and easier to make than muffins from scratch), my stickers for the kids, my Halloween paraphernalia, and my hair spray. He's nosey but in a loving way. Last week I made muffins and they spent a good 5 minutes picking out which cupcake papers they wanted me to make them in. They gave me shit for awhile too because Paco says that I have brought "all kinds of vices and corruption into this apartment"...for the past week we've been battling on Mario Kart until at least 1-1:30 in the morning. I told them I didn't have to make the muffins, I was just doing it to show them, and they freaked out. "NO NO NO, you are GOING to make them, we're just gonna get fat, that's all... But yes, make them.... Now. Please."
Another fun dynamic to the apartment is that Paco speaks pretty good English. Every once in awhile he'll come bursting into a room (he has to make an entrance) and shout "Eets time for da Eengleesh hour!!! From now, we must espeak en only da Eengleesh!" Unfortunately Beto does not speak any English, and they tend to get in very huffy fights when Paco declares Da Eengleesh Hour and Beto doesn't want to participate. I tried to tell Beto he could start slowly and practice with me to get better (he's taken at least 5 years of it in school) but he gets very flustered and just tries to absorb into the wall, usually. Paco started screaming at him one time "Come on now, Beto!!! Jew know da Eengleesh!! Jew can espeak weet Chelsea, ees berry easy!" I tried to talk to him with the most simplest question I could think of, so that he could appease Paco and feel accomplished...so I asked him slowly and caring "How was your day?" Beto stops, thinks a second, and says, "My name ees Beto." That threw Paco into a bit of rage, haha, and lead to a pretty intense fight where Paco started yelling at him in English about how he wasn't thinking and should know more and Beto ended up cleaning to relieve his stress. I don't exactly understand how the two resolve their problems because magically, 20 minutes later, they were fine again. I was really kinda worried that my English Hour could be the straw that broke the camels back for the couple of 3 years...but apparently that's normal for them, haha. Paco then told me, "Beto wans, when he ees growing, to be working een a laundry becos he loff clean...he loff to take away de dust an do da vacuum." The fun thing about Paco is that he understands me most of the time and I also understand him...but he also makes a lot of hilarious mistakes. For example one night, after I made the muffins and we were cleaning up, Beto said in Spanish "A mi me encanta mojar las magdalenas en la leche." But it was English Hour so Paco clarifies and says, "Beto say dat he loff to wet da moofeens een da meelk." I thought I was going to die from laughing. I tried to explain the numerous things wrong with this sentence but that only armed Paco with more inappropriate vocabulary than he already knows. Another time I was doing the dishes and Paco asks me, "Do jew see da paper here on da freedge?" I had noticed it, actually, the first day I went to the apartment. They have a collection of magnets on the fridge and one little flyer for Latin escorts who do "all services". I hoped, and figured, it was just a joke but I did think it was pretty funny considering the tenants. "Een dees apartment we loff da prostitutation. I saw dees paper, on a car, and I say to Irene 'we HAVE to take da paper, ees so funny!! Because jew know, I am a prostitute too." And then he ran off and had a dance party to Ke$ha.
Basically, my room is tiny but I love the relaxed environment of the new apartment. Irene, the girl, is hardly ever home because she is into every hobby under the sun. She loves kayaking, repelling, climbing, playing guitar, playing piano....and one night she came out of her room super proud because she had written and recorded a song she wrote about kayaking (she's doing a great job of combining her hobbies, haha). I'm pretty sure she has ADHD but she's quite fun too. Besides the fact that they both talk at the speed of light (and Paco is from Sevilla so he has a lisp with every S he says...he already told me "Chelsea, from now on I'm going to call you ShellThee, because that's how I'd say it in Sevilla.") I think my Spanish is also vastly improving because our television doesn't have a remote control right now and everything is stuck in Spanish (I usually cheat when I'm watching programs I love because the dubbing is so awful). So for now I feel like I'm exactly where I should be. School doesn't start until Monday, so this week I need to actually start unpacking and make a concerted effort to really settle in and stop procrastinating. I'll try to update one more time before we start school, because Lord knows that will bring a whole slew of new adventures. Ta ta for now!
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