Is it too late to declare myself insane? I think it may be. I'm sure you all have other words for it, but spending the first night alone somewhere foreign always makes you question your sanity just bit. If the notion wasn't based on the move itself, then I begin to consider it based on the amount of crap I decided to schlep here. You would have either felt pity for me, or laughed and pointed as I hauled close to 100 pounds of luggage across Malaga this morning after a 5:40 a.m. flight and only 2 hours of sleep, cursing myself the entire way. Why did I bring so much stuff!?!
I had good fortune until arriving in Malaga. Brooke and Jake took me to the train station in London and then these two wacky Brits escorted me to my terminal at the airport (you make a lot of fast friends being a solo female traveler). After arriving here, however, it was just painful. The airport resides in a less than friendly Malaga landscape, where the arid and industrial backdrop paints a grim, albeit inaccurate, picture of the rest of the city. After making my way to the city center I walked a good 45 minutes (a lot of it meandering) to find the main strip of buses and caught the number 11 to my hostel. I definitely got my exercise for the day and everyone around me knew it, seeing as I was dripping in sweat by the time I got on the bus. At the hostel I was greeted by a congenial trilingual Frenchman who hauled my 70 lb. suitcase up four flights of stairs to the hostel entrance. He pulled out a map to orient me with the city and gave me the friendly tongue in cheek suggestion that I stay away from the shopping areas.
I had an appointment to meet with someone about an apartment later in the afternoon so I decided to explore until then. The picture was taken just a couple of blocks from where my hostel is and reminds me of Waikiki, Honolulu. Actually, a lot of my exploration today reminded me of my life in Hawai'i, which I take to be a good omen. What I've seen of Malaga is beautiful. It definitely caters to tourists, and is a bit more raw than some of the other European cities I've traveled in, but that just adds to its character. My efforts to navigate, buy a cell phone, and a purchase a bus card reinforced my growing concern that my spanish really does suck. The accent here is also really difficult to understand. They speak very fast and leave the ends off some of their words. I have quite the challenge ahead of me on that front.
I did find an apartment living with international students. Our common language is spanish, so hopefully proficiency is on the horizon. The place is a bit more than I wanted to spend, and is a really small room with big common space, but after talking with some people here it sounds like a great deal. The deposit is next to nothing and I only had to 'commit' to three months. Apparently a bus goes right by the apartment and takes me to Rincon de la Victoria, which is where I'm teaching. Needless to say, I'm glad I don't have the stress of looking for something else right now on top of everything else. Not having your own space in a situation like this is the worst!
Tomorrow I am headed to the school and will hopefully get to meet the teacher I'm working with. It will be nice to have some kind of routine. That's all for now. Hasta luego.
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