Monday, 6 October 2008

Day three and four of Alcala

Today was a very quiet day on the touring front as Sundays, and Monday too for that matter, are not largely for visiting places in Madrid except for restaurants and cafe's.

So instead I spent the day with my friends, eating, drinking, chatting and practicing my Spanish and their English.

I was again humbled when my friend must have introduced me to about over a dozen of her close circle of family and friends and every one was better at speaking English than I was at speaking Spanish.

It makes me wonder what would happen if any of my overseas friends was to come to visit me in my hometown of Gillingham how many of them could even introduce themselves in another language, let alone hold a decent and lenghty conversation. However, I do not mean to be cruel to my anyone back in the UK, I am just making an observation that English is very definetly being educated around the world and that in England we are not realy pressed or encourged to do so outside of junior school.

The fact that in every city in Europe that I have visited so far, including the smaller towns, have all had posters up for The Wall Street Institute of English, but not for any other language is a reflection and indication that English is being far more widely advertising and promoted than any other language.

It would be a sinful shame if in another fifty years or so English had become the first language of the entire world, with only the other languages being taught at home or in schools to a basic level, but the way things are going I can see this being a real possibility, unless there is a huge global economic and communication breakdown when no one outside of the UK and the USA would then have a need to know English.

My friend in Alcala has been so very accomodating and friendly throughout my time here, even giving up her bed for me and chosing the sofa for herself, that I cannot thank her enough and I know that I will miss both her and her friends dearly when I fly to Brazil.

As I am now only a few days away I admit to feeling nervous, more than at any time before now, as I feel that this is where the true adventure begins, far from Europe and without any friends that I have already met, relying only on my preparations to get me through and hopefully meeting one or two nice new friends along the way.

It has not helped my nerves that as I booked most of the flights months ago, although none of the airlines have gone bust thankfully, what they have done is had to change the times and even the days of the flights, which is altering my plans and preparations much more than I would have preferred.

I can only speculate what the next few days will have in store for me, but my calm and cool exterior facade is beginning to crack from the inside and only once I have reached there and found myself able to cope will I be able to seal them over again.

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