End of first semester reflections

It's a little surreal sitting here writing this post knowing I'll be going home tomorrow. This first term has consisted of a plethora of experiences, with fun times, a few hard times, and a lot of cultural appreciation along the way! Whilst it's fair to say I haven't particularly enjoyed all of my classes at uni, resulting in the second half of the semester dragging to a certain extent, at the same time it feels like yesterday that I first arrived in the blazing sunshine and 30 degree temperatures. Since then, walking the same route to my faculty each day from the train station I've witnessed the seasons wizz by and watched the trees change the colour of their leaves before shedding them. To me this daily journey has acted as a metaphor for my experience since arriving in September: in the same way that the weather changes from day to day, life keeps moving forward and a particularly rough day will eventually be replaced by a better one.

The past few weeks have been a lot easier than the start of middle of term (thankfully!) due to only having a few assessments left to complete. I've reached the end of my first 15 weeks having managed to somehow pass all my seminars meaning I can present myself (unlike one or two unfortunate students!) at the looming exams at the end of January. Looking back on my goals I set myself before leaving the UK, thus far I've successfully completed goal five: pass. It's also fair to say I've achieved goal two: travel. Since arriving, I've made three short day trips to Toledo, Segovia and El Escorial, and three longer weekend excursions to Granada, Seville and Valencia, alongside getting to know the wonderful city of Madrid itself! And I've made plans to visit Bilbao and San Sebastian in my free few days between my January exams and the start of second semester classes. I've also smashed goal three: eat out. I've been to 24 different restaurants and cafes, establishing some firm favourites to which I've returned a number of times! This week I've a sublime pumpkin quiche with cashew cheese and a delicious blueberry and lemon scone at the artisan and tranquil Bunny's Deli and a superb buddha bowl and incredible tiramisu at the fairly hippy and buzzing Vega. Goal one and four, on the other hand, are a very different story... I've definitely not spoken as much Spanish as I naively hoped I would and as of yet I'm still no extrovert. But hey, baby steps right?

On a different note, I have noticed an improvement in my swimming, which I've been doing 2-3 times a week to stop me from going insane without my bike to ride.

This past week I went to check out the Christmas lights at the Botanical Gardens which were lovely and visited the extremely underwhelming Christmas market in Plaza Mayor (the German Christmas markets in Birmingham are tens times better in my opinion) which sold a lot of cheap Christmas tat which I imagine you'd find a lot cheaper in a pound shop. Though thinking about it I've not seen any of those in Spain, so maybe Spanish citizens have to wait 11 months before having the opportunity to spend their pennies on useless capitalist pieces of rubbish manufactured in China and that break after two uses. Anyway I seem to have wondered off on a tangent... I finished the semester on a high last night, going out with three of my best friends here: Juan, Jose and Pedro, and in typical Spanish fashion dancing the night away until the Metro re-opened at 06:00.

I've got lots of revision (i.e. learning the content for the first time) to do before my January exams, but I'm giving myself Christmas off. Looking forward to a proper break, Christmas baking and riding my bike!

So for the last time of 2019, hasta luego!