Getting Acclimated

My Kitchen My family hadn’t yet seen Spain, so they decided to drop me off and take me traveling before I started orientation in Madrid. The day I was leaving rolled around and I was only half packed with twice the stuff as I needed strewn about my bedroom. I finally managed to pack my clothes into two suitcases that I was going to drop in my apartment as well as a smaller one that I was going to travel with, with a smattering of things tossed in the suitcases my family members were bringing. We spent a few days in Madrid until I could drop my belongings in my apartment. The temperature was over 100 degrees and, in the heat of the afternoon, we were exhausted faster than usual—quickly adopting the Spanish siesta (naptime). I thought the meeting I had with my landlady was a simple 2 minute exchange of the keys and money but, boy, was I mistaken! This woman didn’t speak a word of English, but gave us an hour tour of the apartment, anyway…in Spanish. The apartment doesn’t have air conditioning which meant after about a minute and a half I lost what the landlady was telling me to the dizziness brought on by the heat. I proceeded to nod my head at every pause in her speech, acknowledging everything from ‘this here is the microwave’ to ‘be careful when you do the laundry,’ not actually processing any of it. After we finally made it out of my apartment we went to Barcelona for a few days, relaxing out at the beach, before we returned to Madrid. My parents flew home the following day, while I set up camp in my apartment. Since I had been traveling I already had two loads of laundry that needed doing. I put the clothes in and waited, remembering to wait three minutes after it stopped to take out the clothes (so as to give the front-load-machine time to drain). Somehow, the water stayed in the machine and came careening out when I opened the door. With a recycling bin and a glass, I attempted to get all the water out of the machine and toweled up the flood from the floor. Because I didn’t know what I did wrong the first time, it flooded again after the second load—at least that time I was prepared, bucket and glass already in hand! Just as I had finished mopping up the mess, my first roommate walked in, trying hard not to laugh when I told her that I flooded the kitchen…twice!