Spain is Strange!

Now that my first semester is coming to a close, I feel I've been here long enough to provide a few credible remarks on some of the stranger aspects of Spain and its inhabitants.

-First of all, dipping cookies in coffee/milk/hot chocolate isn't weird... it's quite delicious, in fact. And it's not just done in Spain. Lots of Americans do it, too. The difference is that Spaniards are much more dependent on dipping-morsels. They simply DO NOT drink these beverages without dipping something in them. Never, since I've been here, have I seen a Spaniard just pick up a cup of coffee and drink it, without a hunk of carbohydrates to go with it. And if they don't happen to have a cookie at hand, a piece of bread, or even a sandwich, appears to do the trick. I'm not kidding. I've seen my roommate break off a piece of her baguette (with pate on it!) and dunk it straight into her hot chocolate for breakfast. I've seen an old man at a cafe let part of his ham sandwich go swimming in his coffee. (Yes, go swimming in his coffee. Not only do people dunk baked goods into beverages, they often completely let them go--they submerge them entirely, allowing disintegration to occur so the beverages take on a disturbingly lumpy texture).

-When finished with one's coffee or tapa or whatever at a cafe/restaurant, it is customary to throw one's napkin on the floor. Maybe this is just an Extremaduran thing because I never noticed it in Granada. But on my first day in Cáceres, my friend Javi suggested going to a restaurant called el Aljibe. When I looked in and saw that paper napkins littered the floor like large, dirty snowflakes, I asked if maybe we could go somewhere else. He assured me that all restaurants have napkins covering the floors--we'd find nowhere better. Sure enough, I soon found out that all restaurants do indeed sport charming memorabilia of former customers... honestly, it's as if they neglect sweeping in order to show off how many customers they've had that day. Although at this point I'm pretty much used to the look of the napkin-covered floors, I still haven't allowed myself to take part in it. I've had too many years of being told littering is wrong to allow my hand to release a used napkin right onto the floor. Besides, it's just as easy to simply leave it on the table...

-Spain is a very uniform country. In terms of food and religion, this is particularly evident. Over 70% of Spaniards are Catholic (although few are actually observant). Everyone eats Spanish food, which is basically just ham cooked in different ways and some seafood thrown in occasionally (and this isn't a problem for Jews and Muslims, since there are none). Besides the occasional Chinese restaurant, there is no variety here--it's all Spanish food. Being a Jew and a vegetarian, I'm quite a rarity (although at this point I can't really call myself a vegetarian since I've not really had a choice but to be lax with my eating habits).  In fact, I don't think many Spaniards even know what Jews or vegetarians are. When I did a presentation on Hanukkah at one of my schools, the teacher explained to the students that Judaism is another sect of Christianity in which you celebrate Hanukkah rather than Christmas. And when I've asked for vegetarian tapas at restaurants, I've been given tapas that just have little bits of ham in them, as if being a vegetarian simply means you eat LESS meat...that little bits of ham here and there don't count.

-Spain is so uniform in its eating habits that even the small details are consistent across families. I've eaten in a fair number of houses, now, and at each one, fruit and yogurt are offered after lunch and dinner. If you have fruit, you cut off the skin using a knife (peeling oranges using your fingers or eating apples without removing the skin warrants very confused looks). For breakfast, nearly everyone eats toast, and many people have it with jam. Jam is always spread with a spoon, never a knife. Eating a meal at around 7pm is not done. Lunch is always served between 2pm and 4pm, and dinner is served between 9pm and 11pm. If you're going to eat between 4pm and 9pm, it should just be a light snack. I normally just eat when I'm hungry, and since I had a small lunch yesterday, I decided to make myself an omelet for dinner at 7pm. My roommates couldn't conceive of what I was doing and asked why I was eating lunch so late. When I told them it was dinner, they looked at me pityingly, the way you look at someone who you believe is insane.

-Maybe if I were from a large Italian family living in New York City this wouldn't strike me as much, but being from a relatively chill Massachusetts family, I'm consistently amazed by how much Spaniards shout and interrupt each other in conversation. "Fatal" (which means just what you think it means) seems to be used every few sentences in typical conversation, making it that much more dramatic still. If you didn't understand what people were saying, you'd think travesties and tragedies were occurring right and left, but in reality, they're often talking about what they plan on buying at the grocery store or about a great aunt who has a cold.

-Handwriting here takes a little getting used to. I have to remind myself that m's often look like w's, p's often look like h's, and 1's (the number) look like upside-down v's. Due to these differences in penmanship, I've marked students down on their writing when really they were correct, and I've incorrectly written down my own residence card number on forms. It's probably for the best that writing by hand is becoming less and less common as technology takes over, because otherwise, handwriting in various countries would soon enough become so different that people wouldn't understand the penmanship of anyone from a country other than their own.

-In stores and restaurants, it is very common for employees to call customers pet names like "guapo/guapa" ("handsome/pretty"), "reina" ("queen"), "cielo" ("heaven"), and "cariño" ("love"). Even in stores, customers might call each other these names. (When waiting on line, for instance, someone might say to someone else, "guapa, it's your turn"). Yet on the streets, a Spaniard will act like he/she is the only one who exists. I can't think of one instance when someone smiled at me on the street--they look everywhere but at me. (I'm excluding instances of annoying men shouting, as these wonderful humans fall into their own, special category). Being from America, where calling strangers affectionate names can be seen as harassment and where people do often acknowledge each other on streets, at least with a smile (depending on the region), the contrast in Spain between behavior in stores and attitudes on streets strikes me as quite odd.

-Apart from these silly pet names, the names themselves here are sometimes quite...interesting, as well. A virgin is associated with each region of Spain, so girls will often have their patron virgin's name. They'll go around with names like "Mountain" ("Montaña") and "High Grace" ("Alta Gracia"). What's stranger still is that a very common boys' name is "José María,' and a very common girls' name is "María José." (They always go by both names together). Aside from how bizarre it is for guys to sport names with "María" in them and for girls to have "José" in their names, in English, this would be "Joseph Mary" and "Mary Joseph." Can you imagine how much a kid would be picked on if he/she had both of Jesus' parents' names? Here, it's perfectly normal, though. Also perfectly normal is naming your child Jesus. We have many of Christ's parents as well as Christ himself walking around here in Spain!

-In Spain, they seem to think it's OK  to have to unlock doors in order to LEAVE. I understand needing to unlock doors to get INTO places, but WHAT is the point of needing to unlock your way OUT of an apartment? The other day, I forgot my keys. I don't need to unlock my way out of my apartment itself, but to get out of my building, I need to use a key. None of my roommates were home, so I was trapped for a good while in the hallway, resulting in me arriving half an hour late to my private class. That was annoying, but if there were a fire it would just be dangerous. No fire alarm would go off (did I mention fire alarms don't exist in Spain?) so by the time I'd notice flames, I'd definitely not have time to locate my keys in order to free myself from the building...not to mention that there are a huge number of smokers in Spain so house fires are a legitimate concern.

Those are my main findings thus far...in ten days I'll be back in America, an EXTREMELY normal country. But once I return to Spain next semester, I'll keep my eyes open for more oddities and hopefully will make a part 2 to this post. My mom is already in Madrid, and I'm meeting her in two days and traveling with her around Madrid and to Barcelona...then we'll head home together, and this strange life I'm living, with these crazy people who throw napkins on floors and use spoons instead of knives, will be temporarily over.

I squeezed in one last mini trip with Caroline over the weekend. We ventured to Salamanca, where we experienced the famous nightlife and saw the famous architecture...but my favorite part of all, I admit, was sleeping in our beautiful, glistening, four-star hotel, which, for some unknown reason, was extremely cheap (cheaper, in fact, than all the hostels). I'd been lacking on sleep all week, and there's nothing like passing out in a pleasant hotel room. That's all for now!

Caroline and me (when we finally made it out of the hotel) with Salamanca's bridge and cathedral in the background!

Pastries and Painful Palaces

I'm back from another little trip...this time to Lisbon! In theory, it's not very far from Cáceres, but since Extremadurans don't seem very interested in having buses that run on a somewhat frequent basis, I spent all day Saturday traveling there. (OK, I'll stop being snobby--I know Spain is in a crisis, and Extremadura is the poorest place in Spain on top of that, so I'll stop complaining that I had to spend slightly longer traveling than I'd want to). I had a four-hour bus layover in Badajoz, which, as I said, isn't ideal, but at least it gave me some time to work on a story I'm writing.

Anyhow, when I finally made it it Lisbon, I met up with Jacob and his friend, Nick (who is now my friend, too, I suppose!) at Goodnight Hostel, which has been rated as 3rd best, 5th best, and 10th best hostel in the world! It's beautifully decorated, always has cheerful music playing, everyone there is super friendly (I made tons of lifetime friends in an instant...well, I probably won't keep in touch with them, but they were nice!) and they make lots of free/cheap food and drinks. I sound like an advertisement right now, but seriously, if you go to Lisbon (which you should--it was rated #1 city to visit in 2013 on tripadvisor, and tripadvisor always knows best!) you should definitely stay there. Jacob and Nick had gotten a lengthy tour earlier that day, so they gave me the abbreviated version ("A lot of history happened here" -Nick) while we roamed around the beautiful but not-so-ancient city (I say "not-so-ancient" because in 1755, as Jacob informed me, an earthquake almost completely destroyed Lisbon and surrounding areas). But at this point, you'd never know the city underwent such trauma or that it's in the midst of a horrible financial crisis. When walking around, all you feel is the energy from swarms of passersby and the swooping, artfully-sculpted Christmas lights that dangle from buildings and make streets glow in every color. The energy continues well into the night. We went on a "pub crawl," accompanied mainly by fellow Goodnight Hostelers. I won't go into it much, but I'll just say that Lisbon is quite a party-city.

No one in America ever seems to talk about Portuguese food, and I'd never been to or even seen a Portuguese restaurant before, but I don't know why that is because the food is superb. The seafood is obviously very fresh, so that's what I always ordered. I think my favorite dish might have been rice with seafood (a slightly soupier version of paella) that I had for lunch on Sunday, but that's followed closely by cod mixed with potato chips and olives made at the hostel Sunday night! Besides eating, Sunday's highlights included visiting the San Jorge Palacio; peering out over the city from various miradores; and going to Belém, where we saw a monastery with magnificent stone carvings, a 16th century formidable tower on the water, and, best of all, ate famous Portuguese Pastéis, which are cream pastries (I know that brings me back to food again, but these were so phenomenal I had to mention them...I can't even begin to describe them, though. Best to just go and see for yourself).

Two Delicious Cream Pastries Lie in Wait!

On Monday, we went to Sintra with two of Jacob's roommates. We drove endlessly up a very steep hill until we made it to the top, where we explored a very colorful, 19th century Candyland/Guadí-esque palace called Palacio de la Pena, which means "Palace of Pain." Luckily, none of the pain rubbed off on me...it was quite a pleasant experience roaming around the many little towers and passageways, in fact. The four of them departed shortly after, leaving me to kill time in a wonderful aquarium until my bus arrived. There I had the joy of being surrounded by swirling invertebrates, hermaphroditic sharks, sharks who eat their siblings in the womb, lounging sea otters, fish that disguise themselves to look like sand, and swarms of pimply Portuguese boys who enjoy pestering girls who are eight years their elder.

Palacio de la Pena

Now I'm back to Cáceres life, hanging out with my lovely, British Caroline and her swell roommates (who I talk to much more than my own roommates); desperately trying to find food that doesn't contain preservatives at the grocery stores (Spaniards don't seem to be very health-conscious); trying (probably unsuccessfully) to explain the difference between "a" and "an" to unruly first graders; and in my private classes acting out skits about going to the beach and eating tiger meat.

Naked Men, Crazy Men, the Eiffel Tower, and Notre Dame

My poor, little blog has been neglected for quite some time. I've been too busy teaching kids about Pilgrims and Native Americans, singing "head, shoulders, knees, and toes," and roaming the streets of Paris to have sufficient time to tend to my blog. Let's see...

So Paris was beautiful (obviously). Cáceres is in the middle of nowhere and doesn't have an airport, which gave me the excuse to visit my pal, Ellie in Madrid--if only very briefly--on Thursday night before departing from Madrid for Paris in the wee hours of Friday morn.

Althea Outside the Louvre

Upon my arrival, my friend Althea (who's currently studying in Italy) and I ventured to the Louvre to see some fine art and get a break from the bitter cold. (I thought Cáceres was cold but Paris was absurdly frigid). The Louvre apparently has some sort of mall attached, which Althea and I got lost in (surprise surprise) for quite a while before finally finding Greek sculptures, the good old Mona Lisa, and some ancient Egyptian jewelry, which was even more beautiful than the jewelry in the mall section of the Louvre! We also bought 39 euro museum passes for the weekend, thinking we were being thrifty, only to find out that as young, European residents we can get into all museums for free. Please let me know if you want to buy the museum pass off me (for a discounted price!) It's valid until the end of next year. We also poked around Notre Dame for a bit--nice place!

The next day, we hung out with a bunch of naked guys. (There was an exhibition of the male nude at d'Orsay ranging from Renaissance cherubs to a close-up photo of Eminem). We heard there was an amazing falafel place in the Jewish quarter, so when we were done viewing the nudes, we went to the first falafel place we saw there, thinking it was the one and only. But when we left, we saw that the entire street was lined with falafel places, and they all had award stickers, whereas ours didn't. But I thought the falafel we got was great, so I guess that's all that matters. We then went bakery-hopping 'til we were so full we could barely walk. We wandered around endlessly in search of the Picasso Museum, following all the signs that pointed to it but never finding the museum itself. We found out the next day it's closed for renovation...but wandering around Paris is never a waste of time because, as I mentioned, it's quite pretty. When we gave up on the museum, we decided to go see the Bastille, thinking we'd get to witness the dungeon where the poor Parisians were once buried. But when we arrived at the site, we discovered that it had been demolished long ago, and just a monument stood in its place...so much for that! We proceeded onwards to a larger monument called the Eiffel Tower, which some of you may have heard of. We went halfway up it, only to find out we'd be charged a lot more to go ALL the way up it. Reluctant to succumb to this sort of manipulation, we proceeded downwards. Even from the less-impressive height we had quite a nice view! Satisfied (for the most part) with our Eiffel Tower experience, we hopped on a train to see the Moulin Rouge. We were quite hungry from a long day of trekking around, so we planned to eat dinner in the Moulin Rouge area. We soon discovered, however, that the entire area is swarming with nothing but sex shop and strip club after sex shop and strip club. It's amazing to think that they all stay in business despite their hundreds of neighboring competitors. We finally found one of the only restaurants there, and the food wasn't bad (it's hard to find bad food in Paris). However, we were the only customers because everyone else in the area must have been too busy inspecting females remove articles of clothing.

A Seductive Statue Outside the Erotic Museum

Then Sunday came round, and we returned to the d'Orsay because we couldn't miss out on some good pointillism, symbolism, and post-impressionism (most notably Van Gogh!) After seeing the art of dead artists, we went to the Pantheon to see the tombs of dead, important people. We got to stand within jut a few feet of Rousseau and Voltaire's bones! We journeyed onwards to the George Pompidou Center, which looks from the outside like a very colorful factory placed randomly among the shops in the center of Paris. There we saw modern and contemporary art. So we got to travel through art's history all in one weekend, from the ancient Greeks to the post-impressionists to artists who are still alive and thriving. On the way to the George Pompidou Center, I accidentally provoked a crazy man, forcing Althea and I to sprint away from him as he angrily chased after us, until we safely made it onto a metro and zoomed away from his infuriated shouting. Other than that it was a very pleasant day (and other than that guy, all the Parisians I met were very friendly and nice...I kept expecting to meet the Parisian snobs you always hear about but never did).

George Pompidou Center

On Monday morning, I left Paris sad and greasy (the hostel shower was disgusting so I bathed in the sink, which didn't work so well) but also content that we'd had such a lovely trip.

As for other updates...the weekend before Paris, there was a Medieval Market here in Cáceres so two of my friends who are teachers in the nearby city of Badajoz came and visited. Unfortunately, the market didn't really seem all that medieval--there were just a bunch of stands selling things I didn't need and shouldn't buy. But on the plus side, a yak was wandering around, and I got to pet it.

I have a class of kindergarteners, four different first grade classes, a fourth grade class, a fifth grade class, and a sixth grade class, as well as eight private students...but I'm finally starting to learn some of the names and get to know some of the kids (although there still kids who will say "hola" to me on the street and I'll have no idea who they are). But that's been fun. There's nothing like being in a bad mood from having to wake up so early and then being swarmed by first graders all wanting to hug you. But it's not all perfect. It still bothers me that none of the gypsy kids have class books. ("Gypsy" sounds weird to me, and I know "Roma" is the politically correct word, but that sounds weird to me, too). They clearly miss out on learning and practice, and by fifth grade they're very behind and have a much lower level of English than the rest of the students. The other day, a gypsy girl in kindergarten asked me "where's my book?" when I was passing out the books, and it was heartbreaking to see how disappointed she was when I told her she didn't have one. She then proceeded to scribble with a black crayon in three of her classmate's books, and I knew I needed to reprimand her but absolutely hated having to do so, because if her parents had bought her a book, I know she'd be sitting there, writing in it, and causing no trouble.

That's a sad note to leave on, but I don't have much more to say, and I think the post is long enough. So with that, I'll bid you adieu.

Why I Can't Stand Nightclubs

Last night, I went with Caroline to the first club (or "discoteca" as they call them here) I've been to in Cáceres. I realized I really don't, in fact, like clubs at all. Here's why:

a) Girls spend forever putting on makeup beforehand (my roommate, for instance, got ready for hours before leaving the apartment), which stresses me out because I always just put on a little eyeliner and mascara, which takes 30 seconds at most. So I always feel like I've done something wrong and that I shouldn't even be allowed to enter the club--that I haven't sacrificed enough time pruning myself and therefore I'm not worthy of entering. Maybe I should go out and invest in some blush, fountain, and lipstick, but I don't even know where I'd begin or what colors I'd choose, and the energy all this involves makes my stomach churn. What's more, other girls show up in tiny dresses, heels, and no tights or jackets. They're willing to endure sore feet and the cold for the club, while I've got heel-less boots, a nice warm jacket, and adequately covered legs. I end up feeling guilty that I get to be comfortable, just like one o' the guys (who always get to wear warm jackets and heel-less shoes), while my fellow females are likely suffering, which in turn makes it hard for me to enjoy the night.

b) The volume of the music negates the possibility of conversation. This is about as long as a conversation gets in a club: "What's your name?" "Huh?" "What's your name?" "Mariel." "Maria?" "No, Mariel." "Maria?" "Yes." "Where are you from?" "Massachusetts." "What?" "Massachusetts." "What?" "Never mind." Therefore, if you want to interact with someone, the only way you can do so is by dancing. I like dancing, and I did enjoy dancing with Caroline right when we arrived last night. No one can deny that moving to music is satisfying. But I like moving to music, not moving up against random guys. However, guys on the prowl love clubs because the inability to converse gives them an excuse to immediately start grinding with you without having to get to know you at all first. Grinding, aka people pushing their bodies together in an extremely sexual way in the middle of huge crowds of other people, is considered socially acceptable because it is categorized as dancing, although "animal mating ritual" would be a much more accurate classification than "type of dance."I personally don't feel the need to get cozy with any random guy who for all I know could have picked his nose five minutes earlier or tortured his pet rat that afternoon. People on the street don't suddenly start pressing their sweaty bodies against you (or at least this hasn't happened to me...and I hope it hasn't happened to anyone else) so why is it suddenly OK in clubs?

c) It's suddenly OK in clubs because guys have the idea that girls are there simply to pick up guys (which is most definitely true of some girls, but definitely not all, and I speak from first-hand experience). Guys must think girls are just there waiting for a nice grinding session, or worse, for a kiss. (Yes. This happened last night. I was standing at the bar, with Caroline, when out of the blue and with no warning whatsoever, a grimy guy with an unappealing mustache kissed me. He didn't give me a kiss on each cheek, as would have been slightly more culturally appropriate. No. Smack on the lips, right out of nowhere. I now I'd slapped him, but just as I never think to honk at drivers who've done something dangerous on the road, I didn't think to do anything. I was too shocked). You shouldn't have to lie that you're married (which is what I did) in order to get guys not to harass you. You shouldn't need to be married in order to not want these things to happen to you. But somehow these charming men can't seem to comprehend that a girl who isn't married or even in a relationship could actually prefer NOT to suddenly be touched or kissed. And Latin men are notoriously pushy, but this type of lack of respect happens in liberal, little Northampton, too.

d) Filling up on alcohol is always a temptation because this can make even the most unfortunate of nights a little more pleasant. But spending 6 euros ($8) on a mixed drink I could easily have made myself at home for less than half the price is not something I like to do. It's one thing to spend extra money on food in a restaurant because in that case you're paying for the skill and preparation involved. But spending so much on drinks that take a second to make just doesn't make sense.

e) (This last one is specific to clubs in Spain). Spaniards don't go out til around 2am (the hour when bars close in America) and therefore stay out til sometime between 6am and 9am. As I don't know how to sleep in at all, this means I just completely lose a night's sleep. For instance, last night I went to bed at nearly 7am and yet I woke up at 9:57am. Missing out on sleep to spend a lot of money and deal with irritating guys just isn't worth it to me. Although I've never been a huge fan of clubs, when I was in Granada a year and a half ago, I didn't seem to mind going out that much--I often liked it. Maybe it's just that I'm getting old and boring.

I had more fun yesterday during the day. Caroline and I went to Mérida, a city south of Cáceres. It's home to the most important Roman ruins in Spain and the longest Roman bridge in the world. Highlights included a. meandering around and taking annoying, tourist pictures in the very site that bloody games and gladiator fights took place back in the day and b. eating freshly-made churros and chocolate. Delishhhh.

Roman Theater

An Arduous and Reckless Journey

So, my friend Stephanie and I set out this morning for what we thought would be a nice hike in the national park, Monfragüe. We took the train for an hour, looking forward to exploring the outdoors. When we arrived, the conductor asked us if we really wanted to get out at that stop. We said "yes..." not understanding why he seemed so surprised. Once the train had departed, we asked him how to get to the park. He said it was 15 kilometers (nearly 10 miles) away but that we could walk to a campground and maybe rent bikes there. So after trekking through a long path in the middle of nowhere, where there were just as many horses as people (not many of either), we got to the campground. When the receptionist said there were four bikes available to rent, we were quite relieved. But then, of course, it turned out that three out of the four had punctured tires. She called a taxi for us, but it would have cost us 60 euros, which seemed absolutely absurd. At this point, the park started to seem like this faraway nowhere land that we'd never reach in this lifetime. But there were still seven hours til our train back, and we weren't prepared to spend the day sitting in the station. So we began to walk and did something I thought I'd never do: put up our thumbs every time a car came into sight (which wasn't often, as no one seems to live in Monfragüe). We planned that if anyone questionable stopped for us, an imaginary friend would call my cell phone and tell me he/she could give us a ride, and we'd therefore avoid having to drive with creeps. When car after car went past without noticing our plight, we started to lose all hope. But then, at last, one came to our salvation. It was unfortunately a man (I would have preferred a woman) but he looked clean-cut and said he was a classical music teacher, so I tried my best to not be too anxious. He turned out to be fine in the end. I risked my life to go to the park, but it was beautiful and worth it. Luckily, on the way back, we got rides with three park rangers who were going towards the train station. So we got to go to the faraway, fantasy park that we thought would never be ours to see, and it all worked out in the end.

Yesterday I had a much less eventful day seeing Trujillo, a small city in the province of Cáceres. Although it's home to only 9,000 people, it had quite an impressive array of palaces, castles, and handsome views. I won't bore you describing it further, but it was quite a pretty city. And home to Pizarro, the dear conqueror of Peru! Gotta love him...

And two days ago I moved into my new apartment. It's infinitely cleaner and more appealing than the other one. My roommates are youngins (college Freshmen!). They all went home for the weekend but two out of the three are now back so we chatted a bit, and they seem nice, although I'm gonna need to get used to how fast they talk.

I would post pictures of Trujillo and the park, but I haven't uploaded them to my computer yet, and I'm feeling way too tired and lazy after hiking so much today. But later I'll be sure to post them on Facebook, and you can check them out if you want! (Although no one ever gets that excited about looking at other peoples' landscape/architecture pictures).

P.S. Don't worry, Mum. I don't plan to hitchhike ever again!

Diclaimer Regarding Dead Birds

It turns out that my roommate, Antonio's boss hunted the birds and gave them to him as a gift. Featherless and cooked, they were more appetizing. I actually ended up trying one--tough but decent. So, I feel bad I was so quick to complain in my previous post. And at least now that they've been consumed, there's one fewer gross thing to look at in the kitchen!

Dead Birds, Badajoz, and British-isms

I figure since my last post was about highlights, I might as well balance it out by recounting a few of the more bothersome moments:

 

-The school I work at twice a week in Cáceres is a half hour walk from me, which is fine when the weather is nice, but not so ideal when it’s raining, as it often is. Both days I worked there last week it rained, and on one of the mornings, it was pouring to the point that the streets were flooded. So when a bus passed me, I was the lucky recipient of a tidal wave that caused my jeans to cling to my legs and smell like mildew the rest of the day.

-One of the teachers I work with at my school in Miajadas consistently talks in unison with me while I’m trying to teach kids new English words, and as her voice is much louder than mine, all the kids can hear is her strong Spanish accent, which completely defeats the purpose of my being there. I’ll point to a red stuffed cat and try to say “red cat” before she can, but she always manages to shout it out at the same time, so all the kids can hear is “rrrrred (with a rolled ‘r’) cahhhht (with the ‘a’ sound of ‘almond’)”.  She’s a very nice person, though, so hopefully it won’t be too hard to work up the courage to tell her I’d like to speak on my own.

-The guys I live with are all good people, and the apartment itself is quite nice, but day by day it gets messier and messier. And since I don’t want to be the only person who really cleans, I must say, I’ve started to somewhat neglect the cleaning, as well. I wash my dishes after eating no matter what because it takes a second and it’s rude not to, and I wipe down the kitchen counters and floors and take out the garbage. But I lose motivation to go beyond the basic when no one else seems to care about the plate palaces in the sink, the cigarette ash coating the furniture, the cigarette butts in the toilet, the dog poop on the terrace, the nine toilet paper rolls on one of the bathroom floors that no one has bothered to throw away (I avoid that bathroom), the inches of grime that somehow creep onto the stove minutes after I clean it, the uncooked hamburger patties that are left on the counter for days on end (why?!), and the plate of dead birds (complete with feathers and all) that sits on top of the fridge (no joke). What’s more, I didn’t realize before I moved in that the sentence “no one smokes” (which is what it said in the ad for my apartment) actually means “everyone living here smokes.” I’ve gotten the privilege of waking up to the hour-long mucous-coughing episodes that only a smoker can provide. I’ve tolerated a permanently scratchy throat at the expense of sitting in the living room and socializing with my roommates rather than hiding from the smoke all day. But I can’t say that the idea of spending the next eight months with three “human chimneys” (as my dad calls smokers) appeals to me much. So I’ve had enough, and in a few days I’m moving to a relatively smoke-free apartment (I think only one of the roommates smokes but only does so in his room, which is really the best you can expect here in Lung Cancer-Lovin’ Spain).  My new bed and room will be half the size of my current bed and room, but apartment is cute and sunny with a beautiful view, so I think all should be fine in the end. I must say, I will miss my current roommates, despite their flaws, but we’ll pretty much be next door neighbors, so it’s alright.

-Shortly after informing my landlords of my decision and receiving a somewhat passive aggressive response about how it’s so hard to find new tenants in November and that the place is an apartment, not a hotel, who do I run into at a bar but one of the landlords herself. Not exactly the person I felt like spending my Friday night with. But she must have felt bad about her husband’s message because she was in fact quite friendly to me and told me to save her phone number and call her any time I had a problem or needed help with anything. She’s probably not the first person I’d turn to for help, but I appreciated the offer.

Now that I’ve gotten out some angst, I must add a few highlights to the post because for the most part, everything here continues to be wonderful and it wouldn’t be fair to ignore the good parts:

-I saw The Butler dubbed in Spanish. Despite the absolute absurdity of seeing a movie about American civil rights in Spanish, I quite enjoyed it. Also, my friend Caroline and I had previously tried and failed to go to the movies twice (we got lost the first time, and they were sold out the second time) so the success of actually seeing a movie in theaters was part of the reason for my enjoyment.

-My friend, Jacob, who in fact studied with me in Granada back in the day and is currently teaching in Badajoz, a city south of Cáceres, came to visit with his friend, Tom on Friday. On Saturday, Jacob’s friend, Pedro, a Cáceres local, gave us a proper tour of the ancient part of Cáceres. I hadn´t spent much time wandering around the winding, cobblestone streets, and I hadn´t yet seen the Aljibe, the Arab water house, so the tour was a plus. I then got to be a tourist in Badajoz Saturday night and Sunday. Badajoz is bigger than Cáceres so there was definitely more nightlife, and it has some pretty plazas, but the old part of Cáceres is much prettier than that of Badajoz. A main highlight of Badajoz was buying peanut butter, which I´m trying to refrain from eating all at once since I don’t think they sell any in Cáceres. 

Badajoz

-I might be learning just as many British-isms as Spanish words, as I’ve spent quite a bit of time recently with Caroline and Tom, both British. Apparently “fancy dress” means “costume,” (so you’d say “what fancy dress will you be wearing for Halloween?”), “push chair” is stroller, “pissed” is “drunk,” “stupid “ is “large” (“I’m learning a stupid number of British phrases”),  and the word “brilliant” or more often, simply “brill” is thrown into speech as much as humanly possible. It’s definitely been rubbing off on me. Instead of saying “I’ll meet you at your apartment at 8:30” I’ll find myself saying “I’ll meet you at your flat at half 8” or simply “I’ll meet you at yours at half 8.” I should probably try to resist this and stay true to my American roots or I’ll return in 8 months  speaking an odd mixture of European dialects and forgetting my true identity. The English that’s taught in schools here is also British, which sometimes really throws me off. The students learn phrases such as “She has got brown hair/She’s got brown hair” (which seems so silly to me…why not just say “she has brown hair”?!). When something is correct, you mark it with a “tick,” not a “check.” And the letter “z” is pronounced “zed.” What?! 

-My private, afternoon classes are the best. After spending the mornings trying to get the kids in my primary school classes to stop jumping around and giggling, working one-on-one with eager learners in the afternoons is quite satisfying. I had no idea just how many people were looking to learn English until I started these classes. I made the mistake of giving out my number a while back, and now I get calls nearly every day from desperate parents. I’ve capped it at five kids because I think more would be just too many different lessons to plan. But the satisfaction of seeing the kids improve and get more confident has made me consider some sort of future career in which I’d help people one-on-one. That’s quite vague, I know, but I don’t have more of an idea than that just yet…

Highlights

-Starting private tutoring sessions (I stopped working at the academy in my apartment building because the director was driving me crazy, showing up at my apartment all the time and changing my schedule on me...I'd rather work for myself without an absent-minded boss. I can make just as much money, so I might as well be boss-less and free). Yesterday I taught a boy who reminded me of my little brother, Ezra and made me miss him! Today I taught a very eager, energetic girl who's obsessed with One Direction. It was rewarding to teach them because they both really wanted to learn, unlike some of the kids in my classes in Miajadas, who persist in responding with "hola" when I say "hello" to them.

-Discovering that the reason a box of croissants I'd bought had magically disappeared this morning was because my roommate's dog ate them (the empty box was discovered in his little spot on the terrace). I thought my roommates had stolen them and was about to second-guess myself for thinking they seem like good companions. I'm sad about the lack of croissants (they were so good!) but I'm glad only the dog is too blame. (And according to his owner, he has a very strong stomach, so I'm not too worried about his well-being).

-Going out with my friend, Caroline, with the intention of seeing a movie, but ending up lost in the maze that's the Old City. We never found the theater, but we had our bags of candy we'd brought with us to eat at the movies. So we went to a bar and awkwardly munched on the candy while drinking wine until a waiter came over and sternly asked us whether we were finished. "¡Sí!" I said, my mouth full of candy.

-Teaching first graders at my new school in Cáceres. I asked the students what they like to do after school, and most of them said they liked to play sports, play video games, see friends, etc. But one girl said she liked to go to her friend's house so she could kiss her friend's brother. This type of lack of embarrassment is why I love first-graders.

-Finding a new trail to run on. (I'm obsessed with finding running trails!) Before my discovery, I was making lots of laps around a somewhat small park, but this trail seems to stretch on endlessly, winding around fields of tall grass; crumbling, graffiti-covered walls; and cottages where small, peaceful dogs stare at me as I go by (dogs here are much less yappy and territorial than in the U.S.).

-Spending the entire day last Saturday at one of my fellow teacher's country house with about 20 of her friends. We literally sat and ate from 11am to 12pm. When we weren't eating lunch or dinner, we were munching on olives, cheese, cakes, and chips. When I recounted this experience to several Spaniards, they told me that this type of excessive sitting and eating is very normal in Spain.

Me and My New Friend!
(I don't know too many people here so I have to make due with statues for now).
There was a woman who used to always sell newspapers in this spot. When she passed away, this statue was constructed in her honor. I know it was with good intentions, but there's something quite morbid about replacing a human being with metal...

Settling into Extremaduran Life

Two Pals Bonding in a Park near my Apartment

Now that I've been in Cáceres for 17 days (I can't believe it!) I've started to get into a rhythm: 

Tuesday through Friday my alarm shrieks miserably at 7am when it's still dark. I travel for an hour to Miajadas, a small factory town in the province of Cáceres, with fellow teachers who, like me, live in the city of Cáceres. 

Then I help the teachers infiltrate their students' ears with English. It's heartbreaking to correct their charming accents, to tell them that "does" is pronounced "duhhz", not "doos" and that "milk" has a short I sound--that you don´t say "meelk." It doesn't matter much anyway, though, because their English teachers are native Spanish speakers who have very thick Spanish accents, so the English they've learned up until my arrival has been a very Spanish-inflused type of English. Therefore, getting them to change they way they're used to speaking is not something that can happen in a day. I'm not sure it will even happen by the end of the eight months I'm here. But honestly, if their Spanish accents stay strong, that's fine. It's a beautiful accent. What I at least need to get them to do is UNDERSTAND English when it's spoken by a non-native Spanish speaker. They understand their teachers when they speak English, but when I speak English with my American accent, they look at me like I'm from a different universe. "Hello!" I'll say super slowly, so each sound is accentuated to the fullest. "How aaarreee youuu todayyyy?" They'll stare at me blankly, giggle, and say "¡habla en español!" ("Speak in Spanish!") But speaking in Spanish is not something I'm allowed to do, so instead we have to communicate with smiles and gestures. This isn't just little kids I'm talking about. Twelve-year-olds, who have been learning Spanish since kindergarten, will often fail to understand a phrase as basic as "how are you?"

I hope I can help them, but I'm starting to teach at another school next week, so I'll only have six hours at each one, and within each one, I'm divided up among many classes. So I'll only see some students for about an hour a week, which really isn't enough to expose them to English. If it were up to me, I'd devote all twelve hours to one class so at least those students could benefit, rather than spread myself so thin that no one benefits. But it's not up to me.

Many of the students here in Miajadas are gypsies. According to the teachers, gypsies don't value education and therefore don't buy their children the books they need or bring their kids to school on a regular basis. By 6th grade, many of the students have taken on a defiant attitute. When I try to talk to them, they say "No entiendo inglés" ("I don´t understand English") as if it's an established fact and there's nothing they'd like to do to change it. But in kindergarten, they still seem eager to learn, and it's disturbing to see them sitting at their desks, with nothing to do, while the other children color in their books.

Anyway, around 2pm the teachers and I embark on the hour-long drive back to Cáceres (during which time I usually sleep). If it's a Tuesday or Thursday, I then have more classes to teach at an English academy that happens to be right in my apartment building. Here's how I got the job there: One day, I was walking down the stairs with one of my roommates, Unai, and the door to the academy was open. Unai is friends with the director, so they were chatting, and the director, when he found out I was American, immediately asked me to work there. He let out quite a sigh of relief when I said yes-- he was clearly overbooked and desperate. So the following day I arrived at the academy, expecting that he'd tell me about the students, give me some teaching tips, provide me with some materials, etc. But he immediately set me off to teach four classes of students of all ages. Luckily improvising proved to work out fine, although by the end of the day I was so dazed i have no idea how I was able to cook dinner, brush my teeth, or put on my pajamas. Although it's obviously quite convenient to have the academy right in my building, it's not always ideal. The director showed up at my apartment one day when I wasn't supposed to be working, and asked if I could work. I told him no because I really wanted to take a nap. So hopefully he got the point and won't do that again. When I told Unai about what happened, amazed at how unprofessional it was for him to show up like that, he didn't seem surprised at all. He said bosses in Spain are often unprofessional and disorganized, and in order to avoid getting trampled on, you have to "echar cara" (stand up for yourself and be confident).

So yeah, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, basically all I do is teach. On Wednesdays and Fridays, I have a little more time after teaching in Miajadas to nap and explore Cáceres, which is always hustling and bustling at night. Unfortunately I can never stay out late if I want to avoid being a zombie the next day at work. Saturdays, Sundays, and Mondays are free days! It's definitely necessary to have three-day weekends if I want to travel at all since Cáceres is tucked far away from everywhere else in Spain. For instance, this past weekend, I went to a beach in Malaga with Antonio (who was back in Spain for a few days) and visited Javi's apartment in Malaga. That was about a seven-hour busride--definitely not worth it for only two days. Going to the beach in October made me feel like I was going back in time and that it was summer once again!  It's supposed to get cold here soon, though...But least I'll be able avoid the Massachusetts snow storms.

In Caceres, at Last

Hola desde Cáceres, España. I'm currently in the library on a weird wifi connection that keeps failing, so let´s see if I can make it through the whole post. I don't have wifi in my new apartment, which is why I'm here at the lib. That's the one downside to my apartment, which is otherwise lovely, luminous, cheerful, and cheap. I live with two Spanish guys and a guy from Portugal (and his dog, which no one mentioned until after I moved in and who appeared one day out of the blue in the kitchen, but that's fine).

Anyways, to backtrack...the rest of Scotland was swell as hell. What stands out most from the last few days is a trip I took to St. Andrew's, a coastal town north of Edinburgh, with Antonio, his friend and his cousin. We had to resort to taking a convertible, since it was the last rental car available, but I can't say I minded much.

 My flight from Edinburgh to Madrid was delayed, which ended up being lucky, because staying an extra night led me to meet an acquaintance of Antonio's named Javi, who happened to have the same flight as me to Madrid the next morning. We then happened to have the same train, as we were both going to the Province of Cáceres. Since I was homeless at that point, I got to stay with him and his mom for a few nights and eat her delicious cooking while they helped me get my feet on the ground. Definitely an ideal way to ease into the confusion.

And since then, the people here have been nothing but helpful. One of the teachers at my school and her sister have helped me get a residence card and set up a bank account, and a random old woman even walked with me to a grocery store when I couldn't find one. Javi and I also received a voluntary, free guided tour of the ancient part of the city one day. (An old man was pacing around the cobblestone streets, presumably in search of youngins with whom he could share his wealth of knowledge).

Cáceres is cute, with palm trees and lots of little shops. I can't say it's quite as beautiful as Granada, but then again, I can't imagine anywhere being as nice as Granada. And, of course, I've only been here less than a week and still have much to explore.

My students are also quite cute, maybe even cuter than Cáceres. Today was my first day, and I taught a class of kindergarteners, third-graders, and sixth-graders how to say "my name is," how to pronounce "crocodile," how to talk about our favorite hobbies, etc. I also had to explain to an inquisitive girl that  Americans come in all colors when she asked if all Americans are "blancos" like me.

I'm still trying to comprehend that this is my life for the next eight months. I keep switching between feeling extremely happy and excited and extremely terrified. But this is Extremadura, after all, so my extreme emotions have a place here.

P.S. Sorry, the internet is too slow for any pictures. 

Greeting from Edinburgh!

Right now, I'm sitting in bed in a windowless room hardly bigger than a broom closet. But don't worry--I don't usually spend my days in Scotland this way. The past eight days have been filled with plenty of culture and excursions.

Walter Scott Monument

Some highlights:
a) Going on a tour of the city. Among the many sites the guide showed us was a graveyard where JK Rowling would stroll around to get inspiration...there was a grave for Tom Riddell himself there! I also got to see a big stone block that back in the day was a punishment site for beggars (those considered too able-bodied to be on the streets begging would get their ears nailed to it).
b) Seeing an exhibit of fashion in paintings at the City Art Centre. Seeing portraits of well-dressed humans is always pleasant.
c) Climbing up the Walter Scott Monument (although the staircases are extremely narrow so passing people going the opposite direction involved plenty of awkward maneuvering).
d) Going to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. But I have to say, I enjoyed the area outside the museum more than the museum itself. Surrounding the museum are a bunch of grass-covered hills that spiral around pools of water. The mounds were slippery from raindrops, so Antonio (my friend who I'm staying with here in Edinburgh) and I slid down them on paper bags. It was like sledding but better because there was no snow involved!
e) Seeing some bloke get himself out of a bunch of metal chains and a straight jacket in just a few minutes.
f) Touring the Edinburgh Castle. I especially liked seeing the war prisons. Prisoners would use bones from their meat rations and straw from their bedding to construct beautifully intricate jewelry boxes, which they would sell to townspeople...crazy what people can do when they have enough time on their hands. I also enjoyed the fact that while all other prisoners received 1.5 lbs of bread per day, Americans were officially regarded as pirates, so their daily ration of bread was a mere 1 lb.
g) The coffee. Europeans make it so much better. I especially liked having coffee at the Elephant Cafe, which is where JK Rowling would sit while writing the first Harry Potter books.
h) The accent. Everyone always seems incredibly pleasant, but I doubt they're actually pleasanter than anyone else--it's just that the accent itself gives them a very cheery affect. Despite how appealing it is, the accent can at times prove a bit difficult to decipher (like when a bus driver recommended I get off at West End and I thought he said "Way Stain" and experienced a good five minutes of confusion).
i) Arthur's Seat. (Hills formed by volcanoes 350 million years ago). They're in the middle of Holyrood Park, an astoundingly pretty place. Walking up Arthur's Seat was breathtaking literally and figuratively (it's super steep so by the time I got to the top, I had to lay there for quite a while to regain energy).

View from Arthur's Sear

Lowlight (luckily it's quite outnumbered by all the highlights):
This morning I decided to be nice and keep Antonio company on his trek to work. I assumed I'd easily make it back because it seemed like we only made a few turns. But on the way back, it appears that I missed one of those turns because I kept ending up at various dead ends. I wouldn't have minded all the detours so much if it weren't for the fact that it was raining, I'd just bought a heavy bag of groceries, and I needed to use the bathroom. There were plenty of buses I could have hopped on, but I was determined to walk for some reason. However, I just kept getting myself more and more lost (which I've found is easy to do in the neighborhoods here since all the streets look exactly the same and have the same names... in this case, they were all Grange Pound, Grange Crest, Grange Terrace, etc.). Eventually I gave in and took a bus, but I didn't have the right amount of change, so I had to go around asking fellow bus-riders for change while trying not to fall over/drop my umbrella and shopping bag as the bus went around bends. So that's kind of the reason why I'm now sitting in Antonio's prison cell of a room, where I'm safe and dry, rather than roaming around like I usually do. But the city center itself is very navigable. I just don't plan on meandering around neighborhoods again. Anyways, I guess I'll go cook some of the food I bought today since I spent so much time lugging it around, after all.

Cheers, peers!

Adios, America

I'm back and soon to embark on Spain Trip #2! (Well, technically it'll be my third time in Spain...during winter break I couldn't stay away and ended up going back to Granada for a rainy but delightful week). This time I'll be there longer than ever (September 23rd til probably sometime in June of next year!) But I'm in fact leaving for Europe tonight to spend twelve days in Scotland before migrating southwards to Spain. I finally finished stuffing all I could fit into my bags last night, although I haven't actually dared to zip them up yet...we'll see how that goes.

I'm a little anxious, but if I were heading straight to Spain, I'd be unbelievably, incredibly, and overwhelmingly nervous (I probably wouldn't be writing this right now because my shaking fingers would make it impossible). After all, this time I'm not heading back to Granada for another carefree study abroad adventure of sangria-sipping and beach-hopping. I'm destined for Extremadura (even the name is terrifying!) to be una auxiliar de conversación (a conversation assistant). I basically signed up to teach kids English in Spain, and the Spanish government assigned me two schools that are an hour away from each other by car in remote towns in Extremadura. I'll hopefully be able to live in Cáceres, a beautiful Roman city in Extremadura with palaces galore, and I'll probably be able to carpool with teachers to the two schools. It would be a long commute but worth it to live in a pretty city rather than tiny towns. However, I'm not 100% sure this will be possible since those in charge of the program don't seem too interested in communicating with the auxiliares about anything. I'm also not even sure what age students I'll be teaching, or what types of classes I'll have, or really much of anything, for that matter. You'd think this type of information might have been relayed to me by now, as it's already September...but auxiliares from previous years say the Spanish government likes to delay everything as much as they possibly can and that I'll find out what exactly I'm doing the day I need to do it. In the meantime, I'll try and be zen about everything and not worry too much about the fact that I'll arrive there homeless, without a Spanish bank account, and with just a vague sense of purpose.

The weird thing is tonight I'll be leaving the country for 8+ months, which is nerve-wracking, but before all the craziness starts, I'll get to have a little vacation in Edinburgh, which is not so nerve-wracking. Plus, I think I'll fit right in in Scotland since I've recently been in the habit of calling everyone "lads" and "lasses." So it's hard to know if I should be nervous about the looming Extremadura experience or excited for my holiday in the UK. But in the meantime I'll go eat some French toast since I don't know when I'll get the chance to again!