I can tell it's almost time for me to go home. Last night I was laying in my bed in that strange limbo between thinking and dreaming when suddenly a door slammed somewhere in the dorm. It jolted me out of my thoughts but for some strange reason I thought it was the back door to my house slamming and I was in my bed at home rather than in a tiny dorm room looking out over a valley of orange groves in Spain. Soon enough I will, and until then I want to enjoy Spain for whatever it has left to offer.
Our teachers are beginning to get sentimental with us and I know it's going to be hard on them when we leave. Today Pepe told us he loves making friends with students but it's hard because May always comes and then they are gone forever. It's strange to me to think that in four weeks I'll be gone from this place I've called home for nine months and maybe never return.
On a less depressing note, the weather has been wonderful lately and we've been taking full advantage of it. After class all the girls go tanning on the roof and in the evenings we've been slacklining, hammocking, and hiking up to the quarry and the mountain behind the school. During the day the sun shines and the Mediterranean breeze blows in, keeping it cool in our non-airconditioned rooms. Still, the warm weather and stress of the end of the school year often pairs up to form a fatal combination that makes siestas so appealing.
We've been doing a lot of evaluations for ACA and the accreditation of the school in general, and it's been interesting to see the frustrations as well as admirations surface. Last week Odette, the directer of ACA, visited and had a private meeting with us. We told her the good, the bad, and the ugly. Lots of people had a lot more complaints than I do, but the meeting ended on a positive note and we applauded what ACA is doing around the world. Today the accreditation team came and held another similar meeting. This one was shorter and the response was a bit more positive. We still discussed a few issues, but at the end the main person leading the accreditation asked if we would do this again, knowing exactly what we were getting into. Probably 77 of the 80 students here raised their hands yes. Would we recommend it to a friend or other students? Absolutely. What would we rate our teachers? Everyone agreed on A+ unanimously. The accreditation team seemed happy with these results and thanked us for our time.
And now here we are, with only about 3 weeks left, finishing everything up. Our calendars are full of banquets, farewell dinners, closing ceremonies, last-minute field trips, make-up tests, and the usual classes to attend and papers to write. I want to keep posting until the very end, so stay tuned and hopefully soon I'll have some photos to show as well. But for now, ¡hasta luego!
Our teachers are beginning to get sentimental with us and I know it's going to be hard on them when we leave. Today Pepe told us he loves making friends with students but it's hard because May always comes and then they are gone forever. It's strange to me to think that in four weeks I'll be gone from this place I've called home for nine months and maybe never return.
On a less depressing note, the weather has been wonderful lately and we've been taking full advantage of it. After class all the girls go tanning on the roof and in the evenings we've been slacklining, hammocking, and hiking up to the quarry and the mountain behind the school. During the day the sun shines and the Mediterranean breeze blows in, keeping it cool in our non-airconditioned rooms. Still, the warm weather and stress of the end of the school year often pairs up to form a fatal combination that makes siestas so appealing.
We've been doing a lot of evaluations for ACA and the accreditation of the school in general, and it's been interesting to see the frustrations as well as admirations surface. Last week Odette, the directer of ACA, visited and had a private meeting with us. We told her the good, the bad, and the ugly. Lots of people had a lot more complaints than I do, but the meeting ended on a positive note and we applauded what ACA is doing around the world. Today the accreditation team came and held another similar meeting. This one was shorter and the response was a bit more positive. We still discussed a few issues, but at the end the main person leading the accreditation asked if we would do this again, knowing exactly what we were getting into. Probably 77 of the 80 students here raised their hands yes. Would we recommend it to a friend or other students? Absolutely. What would we rate our teachers? Everyone agreed on A+ unanimously. The accreditation team seemed happy with these results and thanked us for our time.
And now here we are, with only about 3 weeks left, finishing everything up. Our calendars are full of banquets, farewell dinners, closing ceremonies, last-minute field trips, make-up tests, and the usual classes to attend and papers to write. I want to keep posting until the very end, so stay tuned and hopefully soon I'll have some photos to show as well. But for now, ¡hasta luego!
