sudadera nueva

Today I bought a Universidad de Salamanca sweatshirt. And yep, I am blogging about buying a sweatshirt... feel free to judge me. Anyways, almost every one of the hundreds of tourist shops in Salamanca sells these USal sweatshirts in every color imaginable. I needed something warm to wear for my morning jogs, so I decided to give in and buy one, even though I might as well buy a shirt that reads, "Hey, I'm a tourist!" Oh well... I like it and it's warm.

The reason I'm blogging about this incredibly captivating story is because I managed to go to a shop, speak Spanish, and leave without making a complete fool of myself for the first time... (kind of)! Even though I learned most of the necessary phrases and vocabulary in my freshman year of high school Spanish class, I always seem to forget everything I've learned as soon as I step into a tienda. 

At the first shop I stopped at, I managed to politely greet the lady working there, ask about sweatshirts, prices, colors, and sizes without any problems. Unfortunately she didn't have my size in the color I was looking for, so I moved on to a second shop. Everything went smoothly at the second shop until I went to pay for the sweatshirt. She told me it was 13 Euros ("trece") and I thought she said 30 Euros ("treinte"). I was expecting it to be around 15 Euros like most of the other tourist shops in the area, and thought she was trying to charge me double the normal price! I froze, confused why such a seemingly-nice lady would try to rip me off, and asked her "¿Cuánto?". She gave me the sympathetic awwe-you-don't-understand-Spanish-very-well look that I'm all too familiar with and wrote down the price to show me. I was soooo close to making a purchase without embarrassing myself. Oh well, at least I got my sweatshirt (and it didn't cost 30 Euros)!

Random fun fact: Most ATM's in Ames charge me more to withdraw money than the ATM's here in Salamanca. Hmmmm...