Getting Back to Normal Life

I'm back in Spain after seven weeks of home leave in Bavaria. Great though it was to spend time with family and reconnect with old friends, part of me has been anxious to return to my routine. Anxious, in particular, to shuffle both French and Portuguese, which had been brushed to one side over the summer, back into the mix.

In an effort to resuscitate my derelict French, I've signed up for busuu.com (the free part). At rock bottom level. A1. This is just too easy, I'm thinking, as I whizz through the first section, and then I spell je m'appelle with one "p". Not so easy after all. A couple of episodes of dailyfrenchpod.com are meant to help me muster up the courage to re-instate my weekly 1-hour-long French lessons. I think I'll give myself another week's respite.

French conversation group starts again on the 13th. Cristina, our fierce and dedicated group leader, has maintained WhatsApp contact with me over the summer, maybe because she senses that I might jump ship at any point. She keeps us on a tight leash. That must be the reason that this group has been going for years, instead of disbanding after six months, as most of them do. Kudos to her.

On the Portuguese front, I'm watching kids' cartoons over lunch and I've received an email from my long-suffering Portuguese teacher. I've been ordered to her house for tomorrow morning. I already know what she's going to say about my deteriorating Portuguese, and it won't be flattering. I'll be armed with Austrian chocolates and a short essay which I'm going to write today. I'm also going to tell her that I've booked a weekend trip to her home town, Lisbon, for October.