After getting several complaints about the apparent lack of entries on this site - and the seeming lack of my good self being alive and well - I'll tell you a bit on how I spend my days here in Salamanca, but I'm warning you: it won't be the least interesting.

It's not all sun and sangria in Spain these days. When I walked to school this morning (a brisk walk that was) it was bonechilling -7C. On Friday tens of thousands of children didn't go to school because of the weather, cars got stuck in the snow, trains and flights got cancelled. And I've heard the phrase "you must be used to this temperature" more often than I care to remember. And to my pleasure I've been able to answer "actually, it was 8C in Reykjavík today".

So... my life in Salamanca? Well, I usually wake up a bit too late and therefore have a rushed shower and skip breakfast (I know, I know - it's the most important meal of the day). In the morning I have a class on spanish culture (history, arts, current affairs, etc.), which is my favourite, but politics should not be ingested on an empty stomach. Then I've got a 2 hour grammar class and 2 hour conversational class. Most things close for the siesta, when Spaniards go home and have the main meal of the day. Since I'm lazy and place more importance on reading than food I usually grab a yoghurt or have a salad and then crawl into bed with a book and have a catnap. In the afternoon (if the nap doesn't turn into a coma, which tends to happen) I usually watch a spanish film and then attend a lecture and spanish culture. After the second dose of culture (Brian, just imagine how many culture points I'd be scoring if I were partaking in the counting!) it's time for a cup of coffee or red wine and tapas in town. And when I go home I've still got my homework to do and I've learnt that it's absolutely impossible to do it in the morning, breakfast or no breakfast. So, as you can see, there's absolutely no time left for emails or blogs. And this is the censored version, occasionally more time is spent on the red wine and less on the sleep.

The city is absolutely fantastic (more about that later, when I find time to upload some photos), my flatmates, who are from The Netherlands, Canada and England, are great and everything works at the flat, for which I am very grateful.

And if any of you want to come for a visit you are more than welcome, the airports in Madrid and Valladolid are the closest ones (Ryanair does Stansted-Valladolid). And time - time is a relative consept and can be molded as needed. And just to squander the credibility of my words I now have to run, or else I'll be late to class.

Welcome to Europe. Where there´s snow, things work and the toilet paper is to be disposed of in the toilet and not the bin next to it. It´s cold but efficient and I love it. It doesn´t have the chaotic charm of the Middle East, but after a few hours at Cairo airport I don´t miss it a lot. The staff there should practice on moving a couple of wheelbarrows around before actually trying to control something more complicated. Then possibly try organizing a scheduled bus to the next town. If that works out OK then maybe, possibly, think about running an international airport. Hrumpf.

Salamanca's great, school's great, life's great. The only thing I need now is a few extra hours in the day. More on school and stuff later.

And now I'm in Luxor. And I've just showered and put on (my only) clean clothes and I must be one of the happiest people in the world. Bulk of the credit goes to the aforementioned much-needed and much-longed-for shower, but a big chunk of it is due to the new socks I've got on (no clean socks surely justifies buying new ones?) since new socks is one of the 7 wonders in my humble world.

The last 3 days I've spent leisurely sailing down the Nile in a felucca. Feluccas are traditional sailboats which have been used for travels on the Nile as long as man remembers, and even longer, for at least 5000 years. In this case it shouldn't be called sailing though, since there was hardly any wind it was more just drifting. The major difference between travels on the Nile now and then is the cruise ships which noisyly whizz by, while the feluccas are still pretty much the way they have always been (toilet stops on the river banks and all). Many thanks go to the wonderful men/women who invented wetwipes, sunscreen and mosquito repellent, without it the last days wouldn't have been as thoroughly enjoyable.

I also looked at a few ruins since I left Cairo, and intend to check out some more temples and stuff, but I have to admit that after a few weeks of travelling I'm prety much ruined-out. In fact I'll happily try not to see anything over a 1000 years old the next few weeks. Geographical features excluded.

And now that I'm showered and feel human again, not to mention energetic, I'm going to make dinner. Admittedly it says in the "house rules" at my guesthouse that cooking is forbidden in the rooms and it's pointed out that there's a restaurant on the 1st floor, but making fruit salad hardly constitutes as cooking? It's just chopping, possibly food prepairing. And who needs a restaurant when you've got a penknife and a plastic bag?

After dinner I plan to veg out in front of the TV (yes, TV!) and hope that the English/French/Arabic Nile TV has something interesting on. Other than Mubarak's talk with Chirac or Le crise syrienne (which I'm actually interested in but alas, my French is not quite good enough. Actually it sucks.), or Egyptian Gardens. So, off to dinner.