We've had some great Spanish experiences during our first few days at Pueblo Ingles. We were fortunate enough to watch a flamenco dance the first night we met at the program. The flamenco is a dance performed in front of an audience with a couple of singers/guitar and in this case one dancer.
Last night we experienced our first queimada, which is a tradition that is native to the people of Galicia. The tradition is meant to scare away witches and evil spirits. The good thing is that it involves drinking! I always say, anything that involves drinking is worth doing! They use lemon peel, cinnamon sticks and a VERY strong alcohol. Once they mix the ingredients, they light the mixture on fire and let it burn for about 30 minutes. When it was burning we were lucky enough to have some volunteers dress up like witches and read a "script" to get rid of the evil spirits. Once the reading was done we got to experience an eye opening drink. Although the drink was strong, it was actually quite delicious. Not many people decided to go for seconds.
The next morning I had to get up a little bit earlier because I was asked to participate in a radio program that is run by the Diverbo company. There were three of us and we had to read a little passage that was written up by our master of ceremonies. He chose one Canadian (me), one Welshman, and one UK/American. I read my passage first and when I finished they said that they were quite confident where I was from. The other two then read their passages and were a bit more confusing than I was. The radio hosts guessed that I was from Canada and were even more specific as they knew I was from Ontario. APPARENTLY, people from Canada really do say aboot instead of about. All along I thought it was a myth!
We are having a great time meeting new people and learning about Spanish culture. Hopefully my english will improved before I return from Canada. I will try to post pictures soon.