Hello everyone!
When I first moved to Spain, I was really worried about settling in. This covered pretty much everything about being away from home, to settling into my new working environment at the school to settling into the local area. Now I've been here for almost a month, I don't know why I was worried at all.
In my first post, I talked about how I was the least confident person you could have met when I first started uni, but being given the opportunity to spend 8 months in a different country whilst doing something I love has really helped my confidence develop. Last week my tutor from university came to the school, to see how I was getting on, to find out about the school and to observe some of my lessons. Surprisingly the visit went really well, it couldn't have gone much better to be honest. He said that he can notice a difference in my confidence already, and I was so happy to hear someone other than a family member say that. After all the worrying before I started, it finally feels like this whole experience really is benefiting me in a lot more ways than just developing my Spanish.
With regard to settling in, to both the area and the school, it has been incredibly easy. The staff at the school have been so incredibly welcoming and have helped me in more ways than I could have ever imagined. The school that I'm working in is a bilingual school and so they specialise in teaching English. Luckily for me, this means that I can really be of use during most classes throughout the week. The students at the school are all so lovely, and although their behaviour and attitude towards school is a lot different to students in England, I have been loving working with every single one of them. I've been lucky enough to be able to get to know some of the students really well, as I have 9 private English classes a week. Not only does this help to develop my language and confidence skills, it also helps to pay towards my living costs and any unexpected costs (which I unfortunately had to pay out for last month).
So far, my year abroad is by far the best experience of my life. I've met some amazing people and I'm living in a beautiful country for another 7 months and I absolutely cannot wait to travel to other parts of Spain so as to expand my knowledge of Spanish society and culture.
If there is one thing I want you to take from this post, it is to take every opportunity that is given to you. No matter how anxious you may feel about it, there will always be someone there to help you along the way. For me, that is my amazing family and the wonderful people I have met at the school. If you are lucky enough to get the chance to have a year abroad or even just the opportunity to spend time abroad, do it! I am so happy that I am being able to experience life in another country first-hand, and I would definitely not change a thing.
Do you agree with AbiH's advice that you should take every opportunity given to you?