El Día de los Santos (All Saints' Day) y Aguarón

Last Thursday, November 1st, I didn't have school because it was All Saints' Day. All the schools had the day off and my host mom didn't have work, so she, my host dad, and I went to Aguarón Wednesday afternoon. 

I finally finished the 1500 piece puzzle that I had been working on for the past two weeks! I felt proud of myself that I was able to do that, of course with help from Rosa. I also felt a little sad 

about having to pick it all up because I had put in a lot of time and effort, but it couldn't stay there forever. 

I watched a movie called "The Queen." It was about Queen Isabel II, the Prime Minister Blair, and the effect Princess Diana's death had on the Queen. At the beginning the Queen seemed cold and distant and her people complained about it, but at the end she told Blair that she was brought up to think that her people would want her to act unaffected, indifferent, and so she did such that. I think she learned her lesson in the end, and she and Blair got along really well. 

We stayed over Thursday night. I had school on Friday and Rosa had work, so we left Aguarón around 8 in the morning so that I could arrive to my 9 am class on time. We were going to return to the pueblo after Rosa and I got out of work and school that afternoon, so I left a lot of my things in the pueblo. 

On Friday night I watched a movie called "Cold Mountain," which stars Jude Law, Nicole Kidman, and Renée Zellweger. It was about the Civil War and I thought it was very good. 

On Saturday I got up around 10 am, ate breakfast, and soon afterwards went for a walk with Beatriz, Rosa, and Kim (the dog) through the mountains. Kim was very excited because he was born in Aguarón, and so the pueblo feels more like home to him than Zaragoza does. 

About twenty minutes into our walk we met one of Rosa's friends in the pueblo, María Jesús, with her dog, Leo, who is a year old and whom she found in the streets. She and I had met once before. All of us continued along the path with Kim and Leo running ahead and sniffing around. We passed many gardens, trees of different nuts (pecans and almonds), and vineyards. The trees grow naturally there, and we picked some of the nuts and ate them! Rosa accidentally gave me a bitter almond, but I ate it anyway. I also got to eat some of the grapes from the vineyards, and they are smaller than the ones in the US and have small seeds that you can consume, too. They were so good! Very sweet and juicy. We saved some of the nuts, putting them in our pockets. We also happened upon some wildly growing mushrooms which María Jesús wanted to save to show to her husband who apparently is an expert with mushrooms, or can at least identify them easily. She picked them up and put them in an empty plastic bag she was carrying. Then Beatriz climbed up the side of the hill where the mushrooms were found to find more. She did, very small orange ones, which I guess are one of the best kinds. After that we all did a little treasure hunt for more edible mushrooms, climbing up the hill and looking around. I didn't find any, but they found quite a lot. We did this for at least half an hour. When we finished we returned to the pueblo and went straight to María Jesús' house to ask her husband about the mushrooms. I'm not quite sure about what happened, but I think most of them weren't any good. We left and walked back to our house. A car had just left the driveway when we entered it, and we saw Jesús holding a plate full of giant, orange mushrooms! His friend who had just left gave them to him. No wonder we couldn't find any! It was close to 2 pm, so we set the table for lunch and Rosa started cooking the meal. We ate the mushrooms fried and they were very good. Afterwards I did some homework and later that night, after dinner, I watched another movie called "Shall We Dance?" It was more for relaxation. 

One of the gardens

Trees changing color!

Olive trees

Vineyard

Beatriz and Kim

Almond trees

The tiny orange mushrooms

Where we searched for the mushrooms

María Jesús' dog, Leo

On Sunday I got up around 10:30 am. A little after breakfast Rosa asked me if I wanted to meet her friends who had a piano they said I could practice on. I said yes, and so I went with her. Their names are Mari Carmen and José, and they are some of Rosa's best friends. One of their nieces, Carla, is living with them right now. Their family is very musical they told me. Carla plays the flute, and two of the grandparents' children teach in conservatories. The piano itself was quite old and some of the keys sounded funny, but overall I'm quite happy that I can use it. I practiced for about an hour, then Jesús came to say hello to Mari Carmen and José, and after I walked home with him. It was almost lunchtime. After we ate I did some homework, and around 4 pm we left Aguarón.