My host family - Pt.1

To make a spanish omelette:

The secret is that you must fry the potatoes first.  1) Peel & slice the potatoes thinly. 2) Fry the potatoes by boiling in olive oil.  3) Remove potatoes from the pan.  Add 6 eggs to potatoes & stir it all together.  4) Pour eggs/potatoes into pan with some oil @ bottom & cook til it's starting to fry the bottom.  5) Use a plate to flip the omelette onto; then slide back into the pan, cooked side up.  6) Slide out of the pan & eat its deliciousness!  

A Spanish omelette

I wanted to write this all down here, so you too can make a delicious Spanish omelette.  My host mom learned how much I like this Spanish food & let me watch to learn the art.  My host family really went all out to provide great food & accommodations for me.  They had me try sheep's cheese and a fruit called a "paraguaya" (like a peach flattened into a disk) and some special chocolate pastry that is their grandma's favorite.  The paraguaya in particular has now become one of my favorite fruits.  Our evenings at tapas bars and our day in Madrid were full of similar food tastings, including things that seemed quite weird to my palate.  The pig’s ear was a big no for me, as well as the fish eggs pressed into something that looked like ham.  (Spaniards and their jamon.  Seriously!  What would they eat if God hadn’t created pigs?!)  However, the pickled fish on bread & cheese was pretty good, and I’ve found I really like tinta de verano.  It makes me slightly ashamed of what a bad hostess I am when people visit me.  I may not like cooking & I don't show my love to others through cooking, but this family has shown me how being a great host also comes through listening and then using what one learns's about the guest to create moments of sharing together.  Like when I answered a favorite movie question with “I enjoy the Muppets.”  They chose the new Muppet movie for the next weekend’s movie night in order to share the experience with me.  (Their review: most of the things I laughed at didn’t translate into humor in Spanish.  Sad!  Or maybe I just have a weird sense of humor.) 

 My family is also really good with helping me practice my Spanish.  They correct me and answer my questions as needed, but usually they are okay with me botching grammar horribly or returning to English as needed.  I try to return the favor by talking to them in English in a similar way.  (One of the reasons people host us monitors is the opportunity to get English conversation practice.)  I love talking with Bea (the mom) b/c we move pretty fluidly between Spanish and English.  We speak the other's language for the easy things and our own language for the harder things.  The 12-yr-old, Maria, seemed to get embarrassed by her mother’s mistakes in English, but I bet she didn’t realize how comforting it was for me to hear her mom's mistakes.  It helped me know I could expect the same grace when I needed it during conversations.  

It was fun to spend so much time with a tween-aged Spaniard though.  Last time I came, I felt that the teenagers (most of whom idn’t speak English) kind of blew me off b/c I couldn’t speak the same language as they.  With Maria, I was able to have a lot of good conversations, since we could move back and forth between our native languages.  One day we went to the pool.  Maria wanted to show me this boy she has a crush on.  I asked her if she'd ever spoken to him, and she said "once."  Gosh, I remember being a middle schooler like that!  And probably like that in high school too.  Haha.