Now I know why People Siesta in Spain

This weekend was a marathon of fun. Thursday everyone in Baeza took the early bus to Jaen, the capital of our province to apply for our NIE, the national identity card that means we can stay past the 3 months we get with our student visa. So we spent the morning in a government office, talking to officials and running to a store nearby that had a copier when we found out we needed to copy literally every official document we had. We had to copy every last page of our passports. Even the empty ones. Don’t ask me why. That’s just the rule. Anyway, the paperwork is all in and in a month, I should be officially offical.

Friday began the festivities. This last week, Jaen hosted a feria, or fair, the likes of which we have never seen in the United States. Maybe Mardi Gras comes close. It’s basically a week full of good food, late nights, and lots of fun times. Dan, Lucia, Ellen, Meg, and I caught the bus to Jaen Friday afternoon loaded down with our backpacks. We met up with some auxiliaries who are teaching and living in Jaen and were kind enough to let us sleep on their couches and floor for the weekend. The night didn’t even start until 9 when we went out for tapas, something I have grown to love here. Basically tapas are great appetizer food, but in the best places you get a free tapa with each drink you buy, whether it’s alcoholic or not. It’s a good way to get free food along with a refreshing beverage. After tapas we headed to Botellon, which consisted of a large open plaza area where hundreds of people gather with drinks, whiling away the hours talking and meeting new people. Botellon was right next to a concert area, so of course we had to stop by when a concert started up. Did I mention that this concert didn’t start until 1 in the morning? No? Well it did. Crazy, eh? After the concert we went back to Botellon, which was nice because I got to meet some more auxiliaries who had come to town for feria.

Now, we didn’t actually make it to the feria until 4 am. And this is why Spaniards love their siestas. The feria is like the local fair multiplied by infinity. There are food tents when you walk in, and then you are surrounded by huge tents with dance floors blasting every type of music you could imagine. The next couple of hours were spent migrating from tent to tent, sampling music and dancing our feet off. I have never seen that many people out and about and having fun at 6 in the morning. There were three levels to the feria but we didn't make it past the first one before the night was over. We crashed for the day, the day mind you, at 7 in the morning and slept until 2, got up, took showers, fed ourselves, rested some more and then started the whole process again on Saturday night. We had a get together with auxiliaries, hit up botellon, got to the feria at 4 and danced till 7:30 am when we tore ourselves away to get some delicious gofres con chocolate (waffles with cholocate sauce drizzled on them), swung back by the apartment, picked up our backpacks and caught the 9:30 bus back to Baeza. Needless to say, everyone was running on empty by then. Here’s a great picture of Dan and Caroline at the bus station while we were waiting for the bus to arrive. It pretty much illustrates how unbearably tired we all were.

I got to recover a bit more today since I don’t work on Mondays until 4:30 at another school called Perez de Valdivia Formadores, where I teach a class of 12 kids who are in the equivelant of middle school in the States. There’s really no curriculum I’m supposed to follow, I just have to help them speak English, so I’ve been having fun with them, and they’ve been pretty cooperative so far. Although none of them actually seem to want to speak English and I end up speaking more Spanish there while I’m “teaching English” than I do anywhere else.

Today I finally went to the bank and opened up a bank account. I should get my debit card in about a week so when I get a check from work I can actually do something with it. I should be getting my medical insurance information soon too. So after I get that stuff, I think all the important things are taken care of here. Cell phone: check, job: check, NIE: check, bank account: check, Spanish friends to hang out with: working on that one.

Gallivanting through Granada

About 10 o’clock Saturday night, my friends and I decided for sure that we wanted to head to Granada Sunday for a quick visit. We're a little last minute, but hey, we have fun. We left Baeza on the 8:15 bus and spent the day walking around the city and visiting all the sights.

We arrived at the bus station around 10 and made our way to the Parque de Ciencias or the Science Park, which is a museum complex. It is one of the top tourist attractions in Granada with a planetarium, an animal exhibit, and a whole bunch of hands on exhibits about energy and motion. It reminded me a lot of the Children’s Museum in Indianapolis, one of my favorite places, so I had a lot of fun. This picture is of the tower at the Museum. After checking out everything at the Museum we hopped on the tourist bus, you know, those double-decker buses that take you around cities with a guided commentary. Of course we sat on top, getting a much better view of our surroundings and being periodically attacked by renegade tree branches if we didn’t move out of the way fast enough. They’re brutal. I know. I got hit in the face twice. Apparently I just don’t pay close enough attention to my surroundings and/or my reflexes suck.

We got off the bus around the Cathedral and discovered that there was a Renaissance fair going on. The streets were lined with booths selling pottery, jewelry, and knickknacks galore. There were also performers on the streets, making the whole place feel like a big festival. The gypsies were also out in force, trying to sell fortunes and asking for money insistently. You quickly learn to say no loudly and firmly and then ignore them even when they keep harassing you. Lucia got cussed out using this method, but it worked. We got doner kabobs for lunch (meat wrapped in a tortilla with whatever other ingredients you want with it) and sat on the steps of the Cathedral (in the picture) waiting for it to open at 4.

Spent some time wandering around the Cathedral, and then stopped by the Capilla Real, or Royal Chapel, right next door. Now the Capilla was pretty cool. It houses the tombs of Ferdinand and Isabel, the King and Queen of Spain around the time of Christopher Columbus. They ruled the country when the Christians recaptured the majority of Spain from the Moors. Ok, history lesson is finished for the day. Just needed to explain why it’s an important place.

Next stop on our route was the Alhambra, the Moorish palace and fort that Granada is famous for, located up the mountain right on the edge of town. We spent about 2 and a half hours walking around the gardens that surround the Alhambra and then trekking through the different parts of the Alhambra. It was gorgeous to see. The architecture was incredibly intricate and I can’t imagine how long it took to create these buildings with their fountains, walkways, and detailed stone carvings.

When we made it down the mountain we discovered that there had been a parade through town celebrating the national holiday. The buses weren’t running and Dan and I needed to make it all the way across town to the bus station to catch the last bus back to Baeza. We parted ways with Ellen and Lucia with only a bus route map in hand, hoping that the buses would start running soon so we could make it in time. We walked for quite a long time, around an hour, steadily making our way toward our destination. After a bit, it looked like the buses were running again so we decided to wait for the bus that would take us straight to the station; however, the bus never came. With twenty five minutes left before we would be stuck in Granada for the night, we took off speed walking through town. Our map didn’t have street names, and I don’t know how we did it, but we didn’t get lost at all. All I know is that I was following Dan through the streets of Granada in the dark at a run, hoping beyond all hope that we wouldn’t miss the bus. Now, you all know how much I exercise, so I hope you appreciate the sheer hilariousness of this picture. We raced into the bus station, bought our tickets, and dropped into our seats exhausted and out of breath.

I start back to school tomorrow, and it’s my first day teaching in the afternoons at another school. Wish me luck!

This is inside the Cathedral

Thoughts on being a World away from Home

So by the end of week two I feel a whole lot more comfortable here in Spain. I can understand people when she speak to me in Spanish and I only have to ask them to repeat themselves a couple times now as opposed to half a billion. Plus, I've been reading the newspaper in Spanish everyday so that's helping, reading about the banking crisis in another language is really confusing, let me tell you.

I finally got my teaching schedule and I ended up having a four day weekend every week, so I'm planning on doing quite a bit of traveling this year if the finances hold up. Lucia and I already booked a flight to Milan for the end of the month to celebrate her birthday, so that should be a blast.

I also fell into another teaching job on monday-wednesday afternoons. Dan, one of my apartment-mates told me about the opportunity and said that if I was interested I could walk over to the place with him one evening to hear details. We got there, the woman in charge sat us down for about 10 minutes and then got up, took us to a classroom, and told us to get started! It was a little unexpected, but I only had one student to work with so I managed to bs my way through it pretty easily.

I really like teaching at the primary school here and the kids make it so much fun. True, they rarely listen and hardly ever behave when you want them to, but they are so excited about life. I assist with classes ranging from 2nd year all the way to 6th year so I have a broad spectrum of ages and ability. Right now, they're all fascinated with me, waving whenever I walk by them, saying hi and bye bye. In almost every class, they tend to ask questions about the piercing in my ear since it's not common over here. When I catch them staring at me in the middle of class, it's usually because I've tucked my hair behind my ear and they can see the bar in my ear. It's really funny to see their looks of shock.

I finally got some pictures of Baeza for you all to look at. I put them in a Facebook album since it takes forever to upload them on this blog. You should be able to see them at this link: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2043968&l=40bce&id=11400089

and just so everyone knows, it's not warm here even though it's near the Mediterranean. It gets down to the 50s at night and tile floors really don't help keep the piso warm. This week we figured out how to turn on the warm water, so I had my first warm shower a couple days ago. It felt wonderful! If there's one thing I can't live without, it's a warm shower.

My first day at school was two days ago and for not having any idea what was going to happen, things worked out perfectly. I showed up at San Juan de la Cruz (my school) a little before 9, which is when class starts over here. I hung out outside with the kids for a bit before I saw the teachers entering the building and decided I couldn't be a creeper any longer. In a matter of five minutes I met a dizzying array of teachers and I feel horrible admitting this, but I don't remember a single one of their names. I'm pretty bad with names to begin with and meeting so many people at once really just compounded my naturally defective memory.

Anyway, I got a tour of the school, which is pretty big and situated in this really old building with tall ceilings and stuccoed walls. I sat in on English classes with a professor who is 23. It was really quite entertaining when the kids walked into the classroom, saw me, and asked their crazy questions such as whether I was his wife. The kids are really fun, have tons of energy, and really don't seem to focus on their studies too much :) In one class the only thing they had to do was copy down 7 sentences in 45 minutes from the chalkboard and the majority of them didn't even get that finished.

I haven't really gotten to do much with the students so far. I've just been observing class and taking it all in. I should get my schedule for work on Monday so hopefully then someone will tell me what I can do with the students so I feel like I'm doing something productive. It's actually quite boring sitting at the front of the classroom for 4 and a half hours listening to someone else teach.

Lucia, Dan, and I have been on a mission the last couple of days to get mobile phones so we can stay in touch with each other and our schools. So we've been traisping around town, comparing prices at the different shops, but the place we want to get phones from don't have any in stock and don't know when they'll have more, so when we're in Jaen (the capital of the province) for orientation tomorrow, we're hoping we can find a store that will actually set us up.

Eating here is so different from the States. At school we have a break from 12 to 12:30 where people usually have a snack of some kind, but lunch doesn't take place until the work day is over at 2. So I usually have bread, meat, and cheese for lunch at 2, then take a siesta from 2-5 because most of the stores around town shut down for "midday." Then when things open again at 5, we go do errands and shopping, and dinner usually doesn't happen until after 9 pm. Totally different from at home where I ate at 5 or 6.

And yes, I know, you want to see pictures of Baeza and my piso. I'm working on it. Don't you worry.