Finding/Making my way

Today was a pretty chill day compared to yesterday (monday sept 6, 2010).. let me give a mini recap so I can get back to today.

Monday I basically had tons of paper work to do and turn in at the University of Coimbra. I THOUGHT I was starting courses, to my knowledge courses start OCTOBER 11, 2010 I have a placement test oct 8. I'm like what??? What am I doing here so early? I couldn't been home chilling. I mean why does the program have documents stating that it starts sept 6?? and this is suppose to be a study abroad program right?...um.. this is AN EXCHANGE. except in my case I'm the only one for this semester. The program= set up courses and housing but other than that you have to learn how to jump, skip, sing, fall, whatever you have to do. Luckily for me I've been bless with not only traveling experience, but faith, a family on my back and a history of people holding their head up high. Besides my afro curly head weighs to much to be walking with it down. So when I go out by myself I'm always smiling at people and looking like I know where I'm going. shooot I usually never know where I'm going I just walk around and find what was never lost. One thing I've notice is that there are no streets signs, so all my memory of the neighborhood I live in is based on landmarks. for example: turn left at the supermercado (grocery store) keep straight till you see the pay phone, right at the barre, then walk all the way down the streets it curves down but don't worry and then cross the round-a-bout and then your there. lol

So that Monday after a busy morning and the news of me not starting courses till next month I just ate and slept.

Now on to today, Sept 7, 2010 I had lunch with my friend Sonia and her boyfriend at a cantina which is basically like the university food services but guest what?? ITS GOOD. They give you a full plate of food and its only 2,50euro compared to the nasty chicken fingers i had at the irish pub that was like 6,30euro ( I must have payed for the location). Anyways after eating lunch and talking we had coffee. I'm not a coffee drinker at all but here they drink it all the time. Its coffee and cigarettes. After I drank the strong coffee I just walked around in hope that I would find a dance organization in the student organization building. I seen some flyers but I didn't find an actual person to talk to. Headed back to my room to just chill.

Later, in my search to dance I went back to this ballet shop i stumbled upon and the same lady was working there from before, her name is Isabel. I must have been there for over an hour we just talked and talked. She encouraged me to keep practicing my portuguese and reassured me that I would pick it up. Isabel is a master student working on her final dissertation, which she turned in today so she told me to wish her luck because she doesn't want to do another year of school. I told her how I have been looking for places to dance so she gave me some names and said she would take me if I liked, of course I said yes (with streets with no names and google maps not that helpful i could use all the help i could get). After talking to Isabel I walked to the mall to find cheap food, I found something better than that! As i entered the mall i walked in no particular direction and then I immediately thought about the mall of america and how the food court is on the top floor, so I took all the escalators to the top floor. BINGO, all the food places were there and a movie theatre. After looking at all my options I settled for KFC, man it was so delicious!! the spicy chicken taste like the spicy chicken back at home, but as far as them french fries oh they never made into my stomach they went straight to the trash, but the corn on the cob..man I know someone seen me cheesing when I was eating.

As I left the the mall which is shaped in a huge circle i seen a picture of a woman and a man dancing so i walked a little closer and realize that inside this mall up three floors was a dance place. I went up the stairs to read the schedule. The studio is called sabor latino it has mostly latin dance classes for couples and women. I found one hip hop dance class, african dance but i need to figure out what ritmo means the class is labeled ritmo africano but that class is friday. So i'm looking forward to Friday and before that I'm going to check out some other studios. If all fails and dancing is too expensive here ill just dance on the tennis courts in the backyard of my residence..lol or something. Or I can join the gymnastic club I seen information about it at the student organization center, they have aerial dancing and I've always wanted to try that. I got options, things are always looking up when your attitudes up. When you travel, well actually anything in life, your attitude can dictate everything if one allows it to.

Well I'm off to bed its 1 15 in the morning here. A quote to sleep on:

"To feel today what one felt yesterday isn't to feel - it's to remember today what was felt yesterday, to be today's living corpse of what yesterday was lived and lost. "- Fernando Pessoa (Portuguese writer)