Day Uno

El culito de la Catedral

 

It took me a while to find out that the reunion for Erasmus students I was supposed to go to at midday was not at the campus I was standing in, but Campus de Espinardo, a little way out of Murcia. By this time it was 11am, so I had to hurry. I got on the 39 bus which took me straight to the campus. The bus was packed with Erasmus students. Words from the world’s many languages were floating above me. By this time, I was only barely standing on my two feet, so I couldn’t be bothered making friends. Not just yet. There would be time for that later… I must admit, I was also prejudiced towards this whole Erasmus program. From what I’ve heard, it’s sex, drugs and rock & roll. That and the fact that I had imagined the language spoken among the Erasmus kids to be English, gave me the reason of distancing myself from this new international crowd. I was here to learn Spanish. Plus I already have my international crowd in Budapest. One of them is enough ;)

Flats

The reunion was held by the head of Erasmus at the University of Murcia… “Spain is hot, Spanish is cool”, we were informed. We were each handed a pamphlet in which we could find all sorts of Uni papers we needed for enrolment, classes, news of organized trips, of organized parties… After the reunion I headed back to La Merced. There I started looking for a flat. Lots of billboards with lots of advertisements fill the university walls. I jotted down some numbers. I saw two guys pin up an advertisement for Erasmus students. I told them I was looking for a flat, and they took me to their office and gave me a number to call. They also gave me some good tips about how to go about finding a place and other important things you need to know in Murcia. They asked me where I was staying that night if I didn’t find a room. I replied that I’d find a hostel or something. They shook both their heads and their forefingers at me and insisted I sleep at their place. They assured me they were normal guys by informing me of their homosexuality. I told them I wouldn’t take advantage of them either as I had a boyfriend. We agreed to meet later on in the evening, which gave me some time to get my suitcases from the bus station and start calling around about flats. 

La Catedral

I bought a Sim card and started calling the many numbers I had made a list of, and in turn organised flat-looking for the following day. When I arrived at the boys’ flat, I had to laugh: I was carrying 40kgs worth of luggage and looking at four flights of stairs. The building had no lift. Matias and Julio (my hosts for the night) were very hospitable: I was to take a shower, a long one; I wasn’t to help with dinner, I wasn’t to make my own bed; I was to sit and talk about myself. At this stage I was terribly tired (not having properly slept for almost 40hours) so I tried to defer ‘me’ and asked them numerous questions so that I could do the listening. In the end I’m not sure which one (talking-listening) would have been the easier one, as my ears were not yet tuned in to Murcian Spanish; concentration was needed. Whilst talking in the kitchen, I was offered an insight into the lives of four different households, as from the kitchen area I could see into four other flats, or should I say flats’ bedrooms. 

Flats

After a yummy dinner I told my hosts I was ready for bed. The living room was my bedroom. My wish of having a long-awaited great sleep was not granted however, thanks to my allergy to mosquitoes. I woke up sometime in the middle of the night and knew that I had been bitten. I couldn’t believe it when I felt two little bites on my mouth. One little bite on my top lip and one little bite on my bottom lip. From experience, I know that bites on sensitive areas of the skin are not going to turn out pleasant. My past golf-ball sized eyes are an example, for those lucky enough to have seen the freak show. Right now they were tiny specks on my face, but I knew they would grow. I got up and went to the kitchen, found some frozen food in the freezer and pressed it to my mouth, trying to prevent swelling. I went back to bed but had a very broken sleep, touching my mouth from time to time to calculate just how grotesque I would look in the morning. I was also woken up sometime in the early morning by a woman whom, by the sounds of her voice, if that’s what you can call it, seemed to be at least in her 50’s. She was vomiting.

The sardine fountain (Catedral in the background)