My BIRTHDAY!

Today is my birthday and it was a great day. I woke up this morning to take the Spanish placement test so they know which Spanish class to place me in. After the test, we went to El Campo, a "dude ranch" with lots of animals, great sights, and even better food.

We pulled up to el campo (after a two hour charter bus ride.) There were chickens running around, cows in the field, and horses prancing around. When we got there, they had some food setting outside ready for us to eat. There were empanadas, chorizo, cheese, water and soda. After about fifteen minutes of snacking on that food (which I thought was my lunch) we went inside to a feast: there was a huge salad bar with lettuce, all the fixings, potato salad, veggie salad, and lots of other salad. I put a lemon vinagrette on my salad and it was very good (it reminded me of something Nana would make.) After the salad bar, they started bringing around all different types of meat on giant knives, ready to cut pieces off onto our plates. I tried a little bit of everything: beef, chicken, and lamb. After all the meat was gone, they brought out dessert: giant ice cream sundaes! Vanilla ice cream, nuts, chocolate sauce, and raspberry sauce. We all finished eating and then went outside. After sitting around outside in lawn chairs, relaxing and enjoying nature (it was beautiful outside,) they brought out even more dessert! This time they brought out flan, tiramisu, chocolate cake, brownies, chocolate mouse, and dulce de leche. After being COMPLETLY full and ready to vomit from eating so much (like thanksgiving day full,) we went to ride horses!

The horses were free (cost of money) and also free (not having to ride in a line.) I got on a horse, which I think was named Tostado, and we were off. There was a fenced off area we could ride in but it was pretty big. My horse had a hard time starting off but once he got going, we had a nice trot. Tostado and I were together for about fifteen minutes and we had a nice time. After riding horses, we went and looked around the farm at some different animals they have ( there are lots of pictures on my website.)

Once I got back to the main area of el campo, the director of IES (the program I'm over here with) called me over because they had a birthday cake for me with a candle lit in it. There were two other people in my program that have birthdays today so they had cakes too. They sang to us in English and Spanish and then I blew out my candle (forgetting to make a wish...oh well.) Since we were SO full from all the food they gave us, they wrapped up our cakes in foil and I brought it home with me.

I had a wonderful birthday and couldn't have asked for anything more than if I spent it with my family and friends from the states. Going to el campo was lots of fun and them having a birthday cake for me made my day complete. Take a look at all the pictures on my site...chau for now.