"Let them eat cake"... our whatever we can find

Eating here hasn´t been THAT bad. We went grocery shopping. Finding the grocery store was only half the battle; actually shopping and then cooking the food is a whole other area of frustration!! First of all, the people of San Sebastian would be absolutely disgusted with our wall of salad dressing at our grocery stores. There is no salad dressing here. Jen and I found 2 lone bottles at the store and that is it. Instead, we’ve been using olive oil and balsamic vinegar! They would also be disgusted with our aisles and aisles of frozen foods! They did have a frozen section, except it wasn’t a wall at all. You know those round bins at Raley’s that you can use scoops to get things like nuts and flour, ect? That is what their frozen section is!! It has all of these open bins FILLED with different types of seafood and frozen vegetables! You use a scoop to fill plastic bags with whatever you want! There are some prepackaged type things, but it’s not nearly as exciting as the “do-it-yourself” section! Jen and I bought a prepacked stir fry mix… yeah… we couldn’t understand the package so we chose by pictures. It had fish in it. Yes, I ate it. It was not the best thing I’ve ever had but I chocked it down! I have made a special effort since then to learn the names of fish here as to not make the same mistake! And guess where they keep the milk… on a shelf way far away from the refrigerated areas! Jen and I were super concerned for our health but we seem okay enough after drinking it; we haven’t died yet. Also, Spaniards do not eat peanut butter; they have a lot of jelly but no peanut butter! And imagine going to the store and not being able to understand ANYTHING written on the packages! It was interesting! We ended up with a bunch of groceries and were quite content until we got home. We bought this soup packet, thinking we’d make soup. We could not understand the directions on the back! When we had finally figured it out as best as we could manage, it said to add 1 liter of water…we realized we had NO idea how much a liter of water was! There was a measuring cup in the kitchen… but not in liters. We finally figured it out but cooking food by package directions is absolutely ridiculous. The package gives you about a million different options: Peel back the plastic 1 cm OR poke the plastic with a fork or knife OR remove plastic and place loosely back on container. We’ve decided we will be professionals at reading directions by the time this is all over with. And the bakeries and pastries shops are out of control; Whole cases filled with bread and pastries. Jen and I have determined bread is as necessary to Spaniards as is water. Jen and I have perfected the art of ordering food from places; you point and say “Quiero eso y eso y eso… (I want that and that and that…)”. That’s all it takes and we get what we want! And by the way, they have plenty of pasta and tomato sauce in the store so I won´t starve!