Feliz Navidad

Hello Everyone,

Merry Christmas from Spain! I have not blogged in a really long time. I have been very busy enjoying life here in Spain. I have had so many experiences in the past month and a half.  On December 18th it was my 100th day in Spain and I gave a presentation to my Rotary Club all in Spanish. I have been working so hard on my Spanish and it was so rewarding after I was done to hear the Rotarians tell me I have improved immensely. Now I understand almost everything and can have conversations no problem. I still have a long way to go in order to be fluent, but at the end of the year I am sure I will be. For Thanksgiving I went to Alicante where 3 exchange students from America live. We made Thanksgiving for our host families.   Unfortunately mine couldn't come but I had a great time. It was nice to have Thanksgiving in Spain and teach the families how important this holiday is to Americans. I love telling people about American culture. I also went and had another Thanksgiving with my English teacher from my school. He was an exchange student 20 years ago in Michigan. I had a great time there as well and he and his family are very nice. I just recently got my grades from school and they were all very good. My host family was very proud of me. School is going much better now than the first couple of months.  I think it is because I have made some very good friends here. Two of my closest friends here are possibly coming to spend the month of July in my house! I am really excited for that. Well I have done so much more in the past month and half but it would take me to long to write it all. I will talk about what I did for Christmas. On Christmas Eve I went to my host Aunt's house where a lot of the extended family was. We had a huge dinner, there was so much food I could barely eat it all. Spaniards eat really late, so we ate dinner around 10 and finished everything around 1. We ended up going back to our house at 3 in the morning. The schedule in Spain I have noticed is so different, but it's part of the culture. Today for Christmas my host sister and I made pancakes for my family. They really like pancakes and so do I, so I was happy to make them. After lunch we opened up a few gifts. But opening gifts in Spain on Christmas is not the common thing. My host family only opens gifts on Christmas because my host sister likes to since she lived in America and likes the tradition. They traditionally open their presents on Three Kings Day, which is January 6th. I am excited to see the traditions for this holiday and hopefully next year I can show my family the way the Spanish celebrate the holiday. All in all I had a very good Christmas. Of course it was hard, I missed my family so much but I kept trying to think of how lucky I am to get to experience Christmas in a different country. I will be with my Michigan family next year so I need to enjoy my time here. I am very excited for New Year’s Eve and to see their traditions for that.  My host family has already told me a couple of them. Exchange is all about learning the culture and embracing it and I am so lucky because Spain has so much culture to enjoy. I have been here for 3 months and 2 weeks. My four months will be on January 10th. Time is starting to pass by extremely fast. The past 3 months have been filled with challenges, moments of sadness when I feel a bit homesick and moments of happiness, but I am determined to make these next months amazing. Feliz Navidad!

Brandon Dull