First Day of Class at ECELA

Luncheon on the roof of Junin 1418

5 floors above the street (no elevator)

The New Students are introduced to the rules.

Empanadas! The insides are known by the fold of the pastry.

We had four kinds: cheese, chicken, beef and spinach.

I left the apartment early this morning in order to be at the school by 8 a.m. I easily negotiated the subway, and was proud of myself for remembering the way here from the apartment without use of the map. That is, until I by-passed the building by a block! In my defense, there are only two doors on the street that are visible, a number, and an 8 1/2 x 11 sign. Otherwise, it blends totally in with its neighboring buildings. But by the time I got to the next street I recognized my defense and turned around. I still got here a few minutes early!

In this program, new students always start on Mondays, and we had a fairly large group today. My name was the last on the list, and I was number 48. There are also many students who are continuing their work, having started previous weeks. They were not here for the examination period.

Most of the students are pretty young, just out of college, with the next largest group being senior citizens. There are not too many in my age group -- no doubt because most folks my age don't get a sabbatical! I've spoken today with people from lots of "foreign" places: England, Ireland, Scotland, New Zealand, Germany, Italy, Japan, France, and Sacramento, California. Several of the new students are from Knoxville, Tennessee. Most folks during breaks speak in English. I tried, unsuccessfully, to get conversations going in Spanish. We shall see how things go as the week(s) progress.

The placements tests were administered in many rooms throughout the building, and when a student finished, the tests was scored and the student was assigned to a class. My class was in their other facility -- about 10 minutes away by taxi. I got there just as the teacher entered and began teaching.

My class has two people (from Sacramento!) who are members of a UCC congregation. We got into liberal politics quite a lot in the discussions. Amazing what comes up when the lessons are the constructions for the expressions "I like" and "I don't like"!

I will close here, and will write more later in the week. It is certainly good to be here! I continue to be exhausted, which doesn't surprise me. This is hard work! And with what little experience I have with travel abroad, I am aware that it takes a tremendous amount of energy to adjust to a new country and culture.

And please continue to hold me in your prayers. I certainly need them!

-- Bill

P.S. On my entrance exam, there were more than one question that I was able to insert my hunor into my answers. At one point the man scoring my test stopped, looked up at me, smiled, and said, "This is good!"