Fiestas y la Comunion

So every year my school here in Burgos puts on this festival for the students. Primero de Bachillerato (my year) is in charge of planning this festival. This year, the festival is on May 27 and then it carries on to the 28th. Which means that this past week has been way hectic!! We have to plan everything! The theme, the food, the games, the sports, the dance, the party in the bar, the costumes, etc. It's a pain!!!
So planning is a pain, but doing it is more of a pain! To start the party on thursday, my year has to perform this pregon (a theater type thing where we have to dance). The theme for the festival is "toys" so the pregon is a story about a little girl buying a barbie queen and taking her to her house. The problem is, Ken is in love with the barbie, so he gets the G.I. Joe's to go on a rescue mission. So all the girls are Barbies and all the boys are G.I. Joe's. I have to dance! It's awful! And what's worse is that I have to dance in a tutu!!! Do barbies even wear tutu's??? And since I don't actually own a tutu, I have to make it. And since Cristina doesn't know how to sew, I have to. And since my host family doesn't own a sewing machine, I have to sew everything by hand!!! So I'm a little fed up with this festival if you can't tell.
The next time I write, I'll give you all the update and tell you how the pregon went.
But for write now, I'm going to write about a little thing called a comunion. Today I had to wake up early in order to go to Pachi's cousin's son's comunion (ya a little distant relative, but that's how they are here in spain). A comunion is a catholic tradition for 9 year olds where they prepare to accept Jesus Christ. Today's comunion had about twenty kids which means a TON of family members and friends. It was held in a really small church, so there weren't enough seats for everyone. The people that didn't have a seat stood right in front of us, so I didn't see anything. Plus, it was scorching hot! I was about to die!
After the comunion, we ate at a restaurant that was even hotter than the church. And the smoking doesn't help the heat. So basically I was miserable! But hey, at least I can say that I've experienced a real comunion which is more than most mormons can say!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

So for the past couple of years I've had this random tradition of really getting into Jane Austen stuff when school's about to end (although I watch the movies any time of the year). I absolutely love Jane Austen's novels and as many of you already know, the five hour BBC version of Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth is my favorite movie. But most of you don't know how I got into craze, so here's my story...

It all started back in 7th grade when the Keira Knightley version of Pride and Prejudice came out. Back then it just seemed like another romance film, so I didn't feel the need to see it in theaters. However, when it came out on DVD, I went to my friend Karli's house to watch it. We watched it in the morning and I thought it was ok, but nothing special. When I got home in the early afternoon, I went to my friend Jessica Ransom's house to tell her about my experience with the movie she absolutely hated. I asked her why she hated the movie and she told me that the five hour version was so much better. I of course thought that any movie over 2 hours was pushing it, so in my mind I thought my friend had gone crazy. But I was curious, so that same day we sat down to watch it. At first it was hard for me to understand what was going on (I was only twelve), but as the movie went on I found myself falling in love with Mr. Darcy. In fact, when the first disk ended, Jessica could not put the second disk in fast enough! So that's when my love for Jane Austen started.

After that lovely day in May 2006, I started to explore Jane Austen's works and I've come to love every single one of them. Although I've only read Pride and Prejudice twice, Sense and Sensibility once, and Emma once, I've seen tons of movies! Here's my favorite versions of the films:

Pride and Prejudice: BBC's version with Colin Firth (given)

This version really captures the characters' thoughts throughout the novel. I promise you that when you watch this version, you will fall in love with Mr. Darcy, as so many others have.

Emma: the one with Gwyneth Paltrow

Gwyneth Paltrow really is the strength of this version. She brings out the humor from the novel and the arrogance of Emma Woodhouse. But we also can't forget Jeremy Northam who plays an excellent Mr. Knightley!

Sense and Sensibility: the one with almost the whole Harry Potter cast which includes Emma Thompson

Sense and Sensibility is just a sad novel all around, so be prepared to cry in the movie. I love Emma Thompson as Elinor Dashwood, Kate Winslet as Marianne Dashwood, and Hugh Grant as Edward Ferrars. Actually, all the characters play their part to perfection.

Persuasion: 1995 (I've only seen this version, so there's not much choice)

I do believe there are other versions of Persuasion that are better, but this is the only one I've seen. I liked this movie only because I have a love for Jane Austen, but overall it wasn't a very interesting film. The lead actress, Amanda Root, seemed a little old to be Anne Elliot, but that's just my opinion.

Mansfield Park: 2007 version (again, the only one I've seen)
This was definitely a modern version of the book. Billie Piper plays Fanny Price and Blake Ritson plays Edmund Bertram. It was pretty entertaining to watch, but it didn't have the normal characteristics that a Jane Austen movie should have. It also seemed a little jumpy as it cut from scene to scene.

And I still have not seen Northanger Abbey.

I can't tell you guys anything about this version, but trust me, in a few weeks I'll have seen it.

So that's the list. I highly recommend getting into Jane Austen because it turns the end of the school year into a bright, happy time of the year!

Globales and the SAT

So now that I've caught you guys up on all my trips I went on, I can finally write about what's been happening around Burgos the past couple of weeks.
So the week I got back from school I had three partial tests, and one of the tests was on the first day back. So that week wasn't very fun.
The next week I had a partial history test on monday and then I started my globales on wednesday. We had to study two chapters for the history test on monday and then two different ones for the history global on wednesday morning. Although it was a ton of studying, I thought I did really well in both tests. Then wednesday afternoon I had technology and I totally messed one of the questions up. Oh well. Then economy and english was on thursday. I thought I did terrible in Economy and really well in English. Haha! The only hard thing about taking that test is the fact that everyone wants to cheat off my test and so I have to take it really fast and get out of there as soon as possible.
Well friday was the castilla y leon (the area of spain that I live in) holiday, so we had some more time to study. Then saturday when I started to study, this old man started to sing across the street in a park into a microphone. He was absolutely terrible!!! I got the biggest headache from just his normal talking voice, and I couldn't study. But Sunday I didn't study at all because monday I only had math.
The math global went really well, minus one problem that I worked on for 45 mins. Then tuesday I had Lengua and Science. Lengua was terrible (like it always is), and I think I'm going to fail just because I'm the only one that doesn't copy/cheat in my class and there's no way I can remember the titles of a hundred+ works! So that irritated me. But, the science test had a lot of "state your opinion" questions so I thought I did alright.
Then wednesday morning we had to take our philosophy test at 8 instead of the usual 9 because the director wanted us to get in another hour of class. Well that test was terrible because our teacher put some ridiculous questions that weren't even from the chapters we were supposed to have studied. So I think I did terrible!
Well after all the globales, I didn't have time to relax. Thursday I took a full SAT practice test (4.5 hours) and I actually did really well. My writing section was at ivy league level, and my math was basically there as well. I just need to improve my reading and I'm there! I got a 700 in writing, 670 in math and 620 in reading. I hope I did that well on the actual thing!
Well test day arrived and I had to get up at 3 in the morning in order to get to Madrid on time. We got a little lost, but luckily we had some extra time. When we were waiting to get into the american school, I noticed the kids that were surrounding me. What a group! There was this one boy with a leather backpack that came out of his mercedes convertible and he had blonde hair that was parted on the side. Then there was this other boy that was wearing a headband across his forhead in a way that made his hair in the back stand up. He had huge sixties glasses and he was wearing shorts with long socks. Oh and then there was this girl that looked like she could have been this boys twin, except she had long blonde hair. The point I'm trying to get across is, there were people from both extremes, just no one in the middle like me. So I ended up not talking to anyone.
When we finally got inside (we had to go through security) I got to see the teachers that were going to be in charge. Man! One man was wearing european jeans, with cowboy boots, and a t-shirt and he had the weirdest voice. When he first started giving directions, I thought he was acting! There's no way someone could have a voice like his! But, after 6 hours of the same voice, I figure it was real.
So that was the SAT. I drove home that same day and I thought I did ok, not good, not bad.
Now today I found out almost all my scores from the globales:
History partial- 9.5 History global- 9.25
Technology- 7.85
Economy- 9
English- 9.8
Math- 10!!!!
Lengua- 4.75
Science- 8.9 (one of the highest in the class!!!)
Philosophy- unknown
So it's been a good day! I might actually pass lengua for the first time which will be a first!!! We'll see...

Santander and more

So the day I got home from Youth Conference I went to the saturday morning session of general conference in Burgos at 6 p.m. (kind of weird). Well there I got to say goodbye to Elder Esteves-Garcia who was leaving in the next couple of weeks to go to the other side of the mission.

The next day I missed the saturday afternoon session because I was on my way to Bilbao! I met Noemi and Zuri at the bus station and from there we went straight to the church. We watched the young women session and then we had some free time. We went on a walk around a park and then it was time for sunday morning session. Since the Las Arenas branch comes to Bilbao to watch general conference, there were a lot of english speakers (all missionaries of course)! So I finally got to watch a session in English and it was SO much easier to pay attention and stay focused! Plus, since I was in a room with just missionaries, the mission president, and his wife, I couldn't really get distracted and I had to keep very good notes. Well when the session ended I got to see Rami and Natanael again and I got to see Rami's new haircut (above)! Hahaha I felt so bad for him! But his hair grows faster than mine! It will all be back in no time!

So from the church we went straight to Santander. We got there, ate some dinner (yummy french tortilla), and went to bed. The next morning we went on a walk around Santander and we met up with some German (at least we think they were german) boys. Me and Noemi decided to sit on a bench right behind them while Noemi's parents went to check out times for a ferry. The boys kept looking back at us and when we left to leave, they whistled at us! Noemi told me not to look back, but after a few seconds I did and they all waved goodbye. Noemi waved back and I took off running. Haha, typical me.

Well that week I had a very relaxing time just hanging out with Noemi. We went shopping, we went to the beach (several times), and we ate a ton of ice cream! Santander is beautiful and I wish I could go back!!!

Every time I'm with Noemi and her family I have a blast! So I was really glad when they invited me to go to Santander with them for a whole week! I didn't study at all and I just enjoyed every minute! It was one of the last times I will be able to hang out with Noemi, so we definitely enjoyed it! And I will always think of her whenever I watch a telenovela in the future! So thank you Noemi for inviting me!!! Hopefully we can spend a few more days together before I go home!!!!