She asked me if I'm bored.... I'm absolutely not.

Saturday Mariona, Martina and I went up to the mountains outside of Madrid and to the town El Escorial, which is built around one of the historical residences of the king. Mariona wanted to walk around and go inside, but el pequeño monstruo volvió (the little monster returned). I have babysat and met hundreds of kids, but I have never met one with more energy than Martina. Keeping her alive is quite a task because she has absolutely no fear of cars or heights or people or anything that I've seen. We walked around the royal palace/monastery which was scattered with eight year old girls twirling around in their communion dresses and dodging the red lipstick kisses of their tías. We ate lunch at a Spanish restaurant while Martina danced on her chair and pulled on the table cloth and made salt mountains. The lady next to us smoked on her cigarette while we ate arroz con tomates y pollo. I'm glad second hand smoke doesn't usually accompany my meals. We bought churros con chocolate that afternoon, which are really different from the ones in the US and just as good.

I walked around for at least an hour and a half on Sunday searching for the church building in Madrid. I finally found it on the opposite side of the street than the directions said down a little street that also wasn't mentioned. I tried to call the bishop a couple times throughout the week, but couldnt't get ahold of him, which I now know is because he has run off to Uruguay and no one is quite sure when or if he will return. Relief society was taught by a very large South American woman wearing a see through shirt. I couldn't understand all that much, but I don't think she was making very much sense in Spanish either. She stood up front for the entire hour yelling "en mi país el libro de mormon es...." (in my country the book of mormon is this... is that, etc). Her passion was intensified the constant repositioning of her fire red eyebrows that matched her bright auburn hair. Every time someone made a comment (which very few did) she walked up to them and pointed her finger at them and started yelling her country again. Even the woman in the back row who answered her phone and had a fully audible conversations on three different occasions didn't stop this lady. No way. I went back to the bus station with two guys from Sunday school. One was from Venezuela and was completely out of his mind crazy. He talked the entire time about really weird things and kept saying things in Japanese, I was really confused. He asked where I am from and I told him California (if I say Utah no one knows where it is) and then he went on for ten minutes about how I must be stuck up and racist, so I think I'll dodge him next week. Of course there were some really nice people there, but no one I met was actually Spanish.
I went to my first party yesterday, for Pao, who is 3 years old and the son of one of Salva's teammates. I've never felt so short in my life. I heard two of Salva's teammates ask if they could take me to a party with them after, but he told them no and that I'm his daughter now and they're not allowed to talk to me or take me anywhere, and the same goes for his other daughter, so neither of us went.
Martina doesn't like speaking English, or when I do, or when anyone else does, but she's getting a lot better. Yesterday I told her that English is the princess language and she told me "no digas esas cosas!! Princesas hablan español siempre!" Don't say these things to me, Princesses always speak Spanish!" She also asked me if she could play in my room sometime, and I told her that we can when we're friends (because she told her Mom that we're not friends), so since then she has been a lot nicer to me. We make fun of her all the time when she's bad, but she doesn't care, so it's pretty funny.
Today I went to the gym with Mariona like always and now I'm just sitting here with Salva while he watches Lost in Spanish and Mariona lays out in the sun because finalmente, hace calor aquí (finally, it's hot here)!

I wish I had my camera, I hate thieves.