guuuuhhhhhhhhh

Fuuuuuckin' long day, folks. I think they just keep getting longer. I did get home before midnight tonight, which is a plus, but on the downside I had a rough afternoon. I've never done the whole get-home-and-crash-on-the-couch-with-the-t.v. thing before, but mannnn was I tempted today. Of course I didn't manage to. Grabbed my laptop and found myself with a friendly chap from North Carolina in the salón. Funny how meeting someone in your language that can change you from dead to super-talky. Still ready for bed though.

So anyway, adventures for today. I opened a bank account in the morning and then grabbed a bus to Hondarribia to visit them as well. (I was pronouncing this all along as Ondarribia, Spanish-style, but the colloquial Basque pronunciation is On-yar-bee, go figure.) I mentioned my difficulties with finding the location of the school in Errenteria before, so I didn't even bother trying to figure it out today. I just jumped on a bus and asked the driver where to get off. He dropped me off at the bottom of the town... I proceeded to walk to the top. (What is UP with these killer hills?!?) I just asked directions all the way up. Took a couple pictures which I will add tomorrow maybe (hopefully to the other entries as well, yay, illustrations!). The sun was out in what seemed to me to be full force, so I was a-nice 'n' sweaty by the time I got up to the high school. (See me backing away from kissing people. I felt bad.)

Usual discussion about "oh! you're not francophone? but..." yada yada, I just smile through. Some adjustments need to be made. Thankfully, I could literally swim across the river from Hondarribia to France, so I think that's going to be the plan for the weekend. ..... Not swimming across, but going to France. Heyo, time to get fluent. What do you think... possible? Ohhh.. why not.

I got driven back to San Sebastián in the car of this hilarious teacher that unfortunately will only be working at the school for a month. Once there, I stopped by the apartment that I informed my faithful readers about, in order to let them know of the developments re: the paper trail. (If I'm not making any sense, it's because I'm almost dead. I'll edit later.) What happened was... I need a contract from the apartment in order to show the police that I live somewhere to eventually get my visa extended from three months to a year. But the people in the apartment told me that their landlady didn't do contracts. So I told them I'd go to city hall and ask them if just a letter was ok, or...

Anyway, when I showed up, the bitch Ana looked at Juan like "what the fuck is she doing here", and muttered that she'd already rented the room out to someone who didn't need a contract.

Oh.

I could tell Juan really felt bad, and he offered a "lo siento, eh?" but I just turned and walked out of there. Man, was I ticked. Hoooooly. Like... FUCK!!!!!!!! Thanks for fucking me over, fucking bitch. (Really I never call anyone except Evan a bitch, but this one called for it.) But I thought... if she was going to do that to me, do I really want to live with her?

It was just annoying, because I had to then walk back to the train station, take the train to Irún, walk to the hostel, rummage through my shit to grab the other phone numbers for apartments I'd written down, rush back to the train station, train back to Donosti, back to the plaza, start calling. And I was already sticky and sweaty from the morning in the sun.

Anyway, I called a few places and did my best to get the directions to them. The first two I was going to see were someplace I couldn't walk to [Amara Nuevo], so I grabbed a bus down and then wandered around looking for the first. I found it, called at the door, and a guy answered and told me "no, we don't have a room to rent, she [the girl I'd talked with] must have made a mistake".

Uhhh... that was weird. Ok. Nnnnnnext.

I couldn't find the second one for the longest time, but I finally made it. It was in The Nicest Building I have ever seen in Spain. Drastically different from anything I'd seen before. The girls were nice... kind of quiet... nice... the room was pretty good... but they didn't have internet. GASP! (Seriously though... that's a major mark off. It drastically detracts from my quality of life.) And really... I didn't want to live in that neighbourhood. And the girls were just too... nice. I don't know. I just couldn't see myself living with them. And I didn't want to get roped into a place that felt so removed from everything. Really, I just wanted a place near the Paseo Nuevo so I could jog along it. Is that too much of a one-track mind? (You don't have to answer that.)

So I called some lady who was offering "rooms" (seemed suspicious to me... some sort of prospector) in the Parte Vieja, which is directly under the Paseo Nuevo. (I wish I could scan some map on here so you could see what areas I'm talking about.)

Ok: this is basically the map I have. http://www.informagiovani-italia.com/mappa_san_sebastian_3.jpg Amara Nuevo's at the bottom. My "previous" apartment was in the Centro; Parte Vieja's right at the top. Further up is just the sea.

Annnnyhoo... back to my long and boring story. It's really just monumental for me. You guys just want to hear... "oh, I'm so happyyyyyyy, I have the best place everrrrrr, come and visit!!!!!!" And you'll be like ok great, she's moved in, now back to my life. But anyway, I'll continue for my own records.

So by this time I was pretty nervous about my future. I no longer had a place, things were going fast, and what if I didn't find anything I really liked? What were the odds of places having Internet? I went up to the Parte Vieja, drowned my nerves in a McFlurry (not at all comparable to that piece of shit I had in Ciudad Real; this one was with real peanut M&Ms! Yo! That beats Smarties any day! Eat it, Canada.), and paced around outside the door trying to gear myself up for the worst disappointment.

Luckily, I didn't have to deal with that. There were three rooms to choose from, so not a huge rush to pick one. They were decent size, the kitchen was big and beautiful, there was just one guy living there who was apparently not a partier... T.V.'s in all the rooms... and... FREE WI-FI! OH my freaking GOD I was so happy to hear that. I was pretty much jumping around and hugging the landlady. (She was pretty cool, too.) Fuuuucking A.

I have to choose what room I want still: the one that smells like second-hand smoke, has a smaller bed, and some weird window connecting it to the one next door; or the more expensive one that has green walls, a nice bed, and is just off the kitchen. It's better but... it's a hundred-euro difference. What should I do? I just want to pick and move in ASAP, before something shitty happens again.

Wow, I am sooooo ready for bed. But before I go, do you guys want to hear what I ate today? I knew I was going to drastically reduce my diet when I came here, part of the reason I kind of let myself gorge on ice cream... but still, it's impressive how little food I'm eating compared to right before I came here. For breakfast I had a yogurt; then for lunch I had two pieces of bread (American-style, not that crusty stuff) with ham and lettuce; and for supper, that McFlurry. I just had that McFlurry for fun's sake... I don't know if I would have eaten supper otherwise.

Now if I can only keep this up for a year... :P I joke, I joke.