For such a large city, it's remarkable how many coincidences and strange encounters I've had in just a few days of living here. Maybe it's more than a strange encounter and instead, God's way of telling us- the adventurers who decided to leave "home" and trust in Him- that He's looking out for us and ensuring that we do not feel alienated at all whatsoever. I'll give several examples. One of my first days of class, I got on a nearly full bus to come home. Walking through the aisle, I was searching for someone to share a seat with for the 30 minute ride. I spotted a nice-looking girl about my age and chose to sit next to her. I glanced over to her lap once I was seated to see she had English textbooks just like the ones I have. So I asked her, "Oh, where are you from?" Turns out not only is she an auxiliar like me, not only is she from Georgia, but she is from Roswell. WOW. She went to UGA, studied International Relations and is taking this year in Spain before pursuing a masters in international relations. She even knew some of the same people I knew. We had a lovely chat the whole ride home and exchanged information, even walking together for several blocks after getting off the bus. Several mornings later, I saw her again heading to work. Really sweet girl, looking forward to seeing her again on and off the bus.
Last week, I was spending my Sunday afternoon exploring the city and resting for the week ahead. I decided to stop in a cafe chain and get a few croissants for the mornings. Standing behind me in line was a young guy wearing LSU basketball shorts. So I asked him if he goes to or graduated from LSU. He replied "oh my gosh, hey Stephanie...we are friends on Facebook." When I first accepted this position, I joined several groups on Facebook of auxiliares and auxiliares placed in Madrid. We were mainly exchanging comments and questions on the visa process and several people friend-requested me. HOW CRAZY! We sat down and had coffee and talked for a while about our first days in the city. We are planning to watch the big LSU-Bama game together on November 5th.
One of my flatmates, the Brazilian, met another Brazilian by pure happenstance when they both happened to be looking at a room for rental at the same time. They are from the same town in Brazil and are able to speak Portuguese together. I went to lunch with them both today.
I'd like to think that being thankful for these little things is what enriches life (and especially this experience) because in such a huge city, half way across the world its still possible to find a piece of home. You can imagine my reaction was a little different when we were standing in line to buy tickets to a palace in Segovia this weekend and Auburn fans were in front of us. Now that's a piece of home I could go without seeing until July!
Source: 16house.blogspot.com via Elsa on Pinterest
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