I’m not even going to bother giving a “It’s Been a Long Time
Since I’ve Written” disclaimer...
Summer 2014
I spent all of July working as a blogger at a summer camp in
a haunted monastery. I was up to my ears
in blogging at the time, so this blog obviously got pushed aside. It was a great experience...I made lots of
new friends (that would come in handy for the next school year as most of them
lived in Madrid) and had an incredible time.
All of us bonded quickly over the not so delicious cafeteria
food served on metal prison trays (only made a bit more palatable by our “spice
bag” full of Sriracha, BBQ sauce, and Cajun seasoning), the God awful internet
connection that made my job 345 times harder, the one and only bar in the town
of 200 people, the bats that flew into the classrooms during the day and our
bedrooms at night, and daily workout videos done in a room right off of the
cathedral, and constant ghost stories.
Memories were made and as happy I was to return to air conditioning and
cooking my own food, I would relive that month in a heartbeat.
In August, I flew home for a month to see my family and the
best, cutest nephew in the world. And to
eat sushi. Lots of sushi.
Once back in Spain, I went with Juan’s family up to País
Vasco to go to a wedding. Whenever I had
told people I would be going there, everyone warned me how Vascos know how to
party. Oh, if only I had known...
The wedding was beautiful (as was San Sebastian) and after
the ceremony, Juan and I were starving by time we hit the cocktail hour. We strategically positioned ourselves right
where the waiters came out of the kitchen with endless trays of delicious,
bite-sized foods. We munched and drank a
bit, but were still peckish as we sat down to eat. The first plate was an incredible foie gras
and caramelized apple tower. Then came
the second, a salad with lobster, caviar, and shrimp. Then came another...a seafood cake. After that, I was stuffed. But, oh no, those
were just the appetizers. After a brief
intermission (Juan and I went on a quick walk to try and digest as much as we
could), out came to mojito sorbet to cleanse our palates, fish and vegetables,
duck in a port wine sauce, and cake with a chocolate sauce and tangerine ice
cream. I could not move one muscle in my
body when we had finished and I would have sworn I had just gained 20
pounds. Not half an hour later, people
(yours truly included) started on mixed drinks and not two hours later, little
snack foods were brought out to keep people from getting to wasted. We danced for a little bit after that, but
after every song I got those cramps that I always associate with running the dreaded
mile in high school. All I could do was
put my hands on my head and breathe in with my nose and out with my
mouth....People weren’t lying...Vascos know how to party.
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| Just look at how big that menu is... |
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| A day trip to Pasajes de San Juan |
School
After Juan and I moved into our new (and wonderful)
apartment at the end of September, I started work at my new school in October.
This year, I am at an elementary school outside of the city of Madrid. It takes me an hour each way, door-to-door,
to get to and from work. The commute
definitely took me some time to get used to, but once I jumped on the “Serial”
train and then filled the void it left in my heart with “This American Life,” I
found that the trip flew by (and became strangely educational).
I really like my school.
Although I do miss the other teachers and my students at the high school
in Navalmoral, this year I work with five other language assistants and have
enjoyed becoming friends with them.
Also, the big difference this year is that I work with first and second
grade. No, it’s not a big
difference...it’s a reeeeeally big difference.
I had to fine tune my patience skills and learn how meditate to survive my
first semester with the kiddos. That
said, they are all good students and since it’s a bilingual program, I’m always
amazed at how much English they actually do know.
Over the year, there have been some great days...us language
assistants set up a haunted hallway for Halloween and had (maybe too much) fun
terrifying the students with it. There
was also a big Christmas assembly where each grade dressed up and performed a
song for the school, ending with a school wide dance party turned rave in the
gymnasium. Also, just recently in
February, we spent weeks decorating the school in preparation for “Cultural
Week,” where each grade dressed up like a different medieval era job. First graders were archers and jesters, so
naturally, I dressed up like Katniss Everdeen.
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| Just part of the insane amount of Cultural Week decorations. |
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| Auxiliares! |
Trips
Since the price of living in Madrid is just a bit (ie: a
lot) higher than Navalmoral, I haven’t been able to travel as much as I did in
the past three years. The main trip I
went on this year was with Whitney to Frankfurt. We went in the beginning of December, when
all of the Christmas markets were up, so the holiday spirit was incredibly
palpable. I think Frankfurt could have
been a little boring outside of Christmastime...but during December, it was
magical. We sipped mulled wine, gulped
down boots of beer, and ate lots of brauts over our two full days in
Germany. One of the days, we took the
train (a story in itself...it took us three hours to make a one hour trip) to
the nearby town of Heidelberg to see a quaint Baroque style old German town.
Before Christmas, I crossed the Atlantic to go home for two
weeks for the holidays. Being home was a
breath of fresh air and being off of work for that long was even better. Once
again, I hung out with my family, played nonstop with the best nephew in the
world, and ate sushi. Lots and lots of
sushi.
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| Birthday dinner with the padres. |
The best part of the trip was when I was boarding the flight
back to Spain. For my Christmas present,
my dad had upgraded my British flight to Economy Plus (a tad more legroom, a
few inches bigger TV, an extra bag of pretzels or two). I was really excited to leave steerage and
have a few more perks, but I was also really stressed because the language
assistant reapplication period for next year opened up at 6:00pm the same night
as my flight, which left at 6:30pm. I
had given my mom a crash course in how to apply for me on the (unnecessarily)
complicated website, but I wanted to be on the phone to talk her through it as
I boarded the plane. At 6:00, I was
waiting in line to board and I getting even more nervous because the website
wasn’t working for my mom. As I
approached the ticket scanner, I told my mom that I would call her back after
the airline worker scanned my ticket.
Instead of a quick, “Enjoy your flight,” the woman could only manage to
get a red light from the ticket scanner.
She told me to step to the side and to wait for someone else to help
me. At this point, all I wanted to do
was call my mom back and make sure I got my application in as quickly as
possible (positions are assigned on a first come, first served basis). It took a few more minutes for a worker to
take my ticket over to a computer to see what the problem was. After punching a few things into the
computer, she told me that she had to reprint the boarding pass. Once printed, she handed me over the ticket
and casually said, “Oh, you’ve been upgraded to Business class.” WHAT?!? I think I was in shock because her
words didn’t fully sink in...maybe she just meant to say Economy Plus?
I boarded the plane and as I showed the flight attendant my
ticket, she directed me to the left...to Business class! I settled into my POD and called my mom back. After having to call Whitney and get her help too, I
got my application taken care of and was able to enjoy the champagne and
bottles of water handed out to us as we waited for the plane to be de-iced. About an hour into waiting on the runway
(which I had no problem with), I heard a noise that sounded like water being
spilled all over the floor. Scratch
that. Not water...vomit. That’s right...a man just two pods down from
mine had vomited all over his seat and had somehow cleared the barrier between
his seat and the guy’s in the pod next to his.
Neighbor-Pod Guy was covered in Vomit Man’s vomit. I knew there had to be some catch to Business
class... Nah...still worth it. Once the
vomit was cleaned up and seat changes were made (Vomit Man moved one pod to the
front and Neighbor-Pod Guy had to move back to Economy Plus...I didn’t think
that was very fair), we took off and I had the best flight of my life. The food was delicious and as I laid flat in
my pod and watched movie after movie, I felt like I was just relaxing on my
couch at home.
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| Perfection. |
I ended up talking to a girl sitting next to me who also got the same surprise move up from Economy Plus to Business and we figured that Economy was overbooked, so the airline just pushed everyone up a class. If that’s true, I can’t thank my dad enough times for the best Christmas present ever. I know luck when I see it and maybe I should have bought a lottery ticket when I landed in Madrid...
One of the best parts of every year was
a few weekends ago...CARNAVAL!! I’ve been able to visit Navalmoral a few times
since moving to Madrid, but I was so happy to be able to go for Carnaval. It was incredible being with all of my
friends again and running around the old stomping grounds. On Friday night, Juan and I chose to be snug
and warm and wear our animal PJs as our costumes. Juan’s crocodile costume was surprisingly
popular, as we saw about 5 other people sporting it, but my dragon PJs were one
of a kind. On Saturday, a big group of
us dressed up as the metro stops of Madrid.
It was a huge hit! Juan’s costume went over especially well...“Alto de
Extremadura” means “The Tall One of Extremadura”...he went as himself, wearing
an Extremaduran flag. After watching the
parade on Sunday afternoon and having flashbacks to being in it last year as
Avatar, we made the drive back home to Madrid.
More highlights: Back in November, Juan and I hosted Thanksgiving and with more than enough food to go around, we celebrated Spanamerican Style. In January, we went to see The Lion King (my birthday present) and "El Círculo Vital" was stuck in my head for weeks after.
This week it's supposed to get up to around 70 degrees here...back home is buried in snow and although the mountains are a short trip away (where there's enough snow to pretend to be 10 years old again and sled) and I do miss snuggling up to the fireplace with a cup of coffee, I'd take 70 degrees any day...
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