sigh

I found out yesterday that my Granny died on Friday. Please pray for her. I´m so sad that I´m stuck here while the funeral is going on as I write this. I´m trying to not just go around crying all the time because it´s pretty embarrassing and instead of asking what might be wrong people just look at me funny and move away, trying to be subtle. Just because I´m sad doesn´t make me a psycho, people.
Not having internet is killing me. Last night I tried to go to a mall where there is WiFi but there were no plugs for public use and my laptop had zero battery. I ended up using a free plug on a power strip next to these chairs that give you a massage for one euro. I got yelled at twice by a security guard telling me I couldn´t plug my computer in there, and couldn´t sit in the chairs unless I was paying for a massage. It was really frustrating...why advertise WiFi and not have any plugs? But luckily Bohumira´s mom and sister let me spend the night at their house so I got to Skype with everyone back home. Still, it´s just not the same. Now that my laptop is charged up I have a little more freedom and am going to try to Skype them later at a café or even at the mall.
On Friday I accidentally skipped my first class because I got confused about the time it was at, and today when I went the only people that turned up were four other international students who had also skipped on Friday (some less accidentally than others). There was a note on a desk at the front that said that NO ONE had shown up on Friday, but we weren´t sure who had written it or why, or what it means for the class the rest of the semester. I hope this class isn´t cancelled because I don´t know which other one I would take, and it´s also very frustrating that decisions seem to get made without informing anyone, but it also doesn´t seem right that no Spanish students would be enrolled in an upper-level class. Even just a non-cryptic note would be fine in terms of information, but doesn´t seem possible. Tomorrow apparently we don´t have classes because of Carnaval (which I don´t think I´ll participate in...it sounds like what happens when Halloween and Mardi Gras combine, and I don´t really feel like trying to find out what that´s like) so the earliest I´ll find out ANYTHING about this class is Friday. Great.
On the bright side salons here are super cheap and today a Portuguese woman waxed my eyebrows and said that the Americans before her had done a pathetic job.
Anyway, I have a lingering feeling that I´m just wasting time and money being here. This feeling doesn´t seem to bother the Erasmus students, who basically go to another country for a year after college to party with other Europeans from different countries and learn how to swear in a different language, but I don´t think I can be content with the Erasmus-style life 24/7. I´m trying to be grateful for the opportunity, especially because I think this is the last time in my life I have so much free time on my hands (and as a result may be the ONLY time a thought occurs to me like ¨well...I´m bored...guess I´ll write my thesis...¨), and not everyone gets to loaf around in Europe for six months, but I feel sickeningly unproductive so far, and a little like I´m just playing around and putting off a real life as long as possible.
Anyway, wish I could be home.