where in the house is Carmen San Die--- i mean Gonzales

I love chatting with Carmen. She only speaks Spanish, and has that trademark Granada accent that is charming and incredibly frustrating at the same time. In Granada, people swallow the end of words, so instead of saying "Como estas?" you would say "Como esta?" And that's just the beginning... people talk so fast here, AND have a lisp.. it's a challenge to communicate sometimes! Luckily I've been able to understand Carmen for the most part, and we've had some great conversations sitting at the dining room table. She's hosted students for 13 years now (only girls) so she is very patient with me as I stumble along through conjugations and hand motions and visits to my Spanish-English dictionary (what would I do without it?) I'll watch the celebrity gossip shows with her (Spanish equivalent to Entertainment Tonight), and we'll chat about our favorite movie stars and musicians. Carmen has quite an eclectic taste in music: she loves Whitney Houston, Frank Sinatra, and Bob Marley. But most of all, she loves opera- she even took a trip to New York a few years back and went to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway.

We've had some deep discussions too. One morning I was reading my Spanish Bible at breakfast, and she asked me if I was Catholic. I told her that I am evangelical Christian, and she said she is technically Catholic but thinks the Church is very corrupt so she doesn't ever attend mass. We discussed religion for a while, but it was hard with my limited vocabulary. Even so, it was awesome to openly discuss issues of faith with Carmen. She said she believes all religions are basically the same: they are all paths that lead to the same God in the end. Politely, I told her that I disagree. She persisted: "Yes, they have differences, but they all believe in the same God". I shook my head "no": "sorry, I disagree." The phone rang, and as she answered her call I went back to reading my Bible. "You like reading that, don't you?" she said with a smile. This time, I shook my head "yes".