My Mini-Suburban Adventure

One of my favorite things to do in Madrid is to get lost. I don't think I've ever let myself do this before in any of my travels for a few reasons: 1) I only have a few days in the foreign city so there is no time for getting lost; 2) the foreign city is not safe enough to wander aimlessly around in; 3) I'm a big chicken and too scared to let myself be vulnerable; and, 4) I am traveling with someone and it is NEVER fun when two or more people are lost together...someone is bound to get frustrated, angry, and just hate someone (me!) for not caring about getting lost.

But since I would like this to be my Fran,-grow-some-balls! life experience, I've become a bit more accustomed to getting lost in Madrid. So every once in a while when I have time and in the mood to do some exploration, I go and get lost in Madrid. Yesterday, I decided to get lost in San Sebastian de los Reyes, a suburb of Madrid.

In the middle of the class, I decided that I really wanted to get something for my students as a goodbye present. The cheapest and easiest thing I could think of was a mixed CD. Music is a wonderful tool in learning a new language. I thought songs would at least give them some practice since most of them will not be able to continue taking English classes. But of course, to make the CDs, I needed to get blank CDs. I really didn't feel like spending a ton on it, so I decided to go to Media Markt, which is like a Best Buy. People have told me that this is the best place to buy electronic stuff because it's very cheap. The only problem is that it is in San Sebastian de los Reyes, nowhere close to where I live.

Now I'm not going to tell you all the details since I will not be able to fully explain it. Let me just say that I basically took a couple of buses, a train, and walked up and down hills and narrow streets. I had no map so I just had to go with the flow and guess everything. By the time I got to Media Markt an hour later, my bookbag was getting heavy and I was starting to get blisters from my not so comfy boots. I got what I needed at the store, and then decided to stop in Ikea next door. I've been wanting to get a mirror for my room since there isn't one (I never know how my outfit looks!). And with four girls coming to visit me this weekend, I know this would be even more necessary to have. After Ikea, I headed home. Two hours, two buses, and two trains later, I was home. All the while I was lugging my mirror with me. I'm surprised it didn't break.

Despite the long journey, the back pain, and the blisters, I had so much fun yesterday. I got to know a part of San Sebastian de los Reyes. I ran into the city's plaza del toros, the venue for bullfights. The city is known to have the next best running with the bulls after Pamplona. I will definitely check that out in August! I've also become more familiar with the buses and trains, which is always a plus considering I might be teaching there soon and would need to take the same train.

It always end up fun when I let myself get lost. For some strange reason, it is very liberating to not know where you are going. When I am lost, I always seem to find something I've been meaning to find but haven't had the chance to look for. When I am lost, I find something new that is cool and interesting. And best of all, when I am lost, I learn something about Madrid and its many surprises.

I Hate Goodbyes

I said goodbye today to my first class ever. It was very sad...at least it was for me. As you all know, it's very easy for me to get emotionally attached to people. I don't really know why. I just love people...well most people (I hate murderers, rapists, racists, kid-touchers, chaches, stupid girls, and rude, inconsiderate people!).

We spent our last day talking about random things, as always. I don't think I've taught anything the past two weeks because we always end up discussing random things. My favorite part of today was when we were discussing the crap they show on TV and how sex and drugs sell. Then Joe said, "They show one tit and people watch!" It was hilarious! Every time I hear a Spaniard say the word, tit, I just have to laugh. I'm laughing in my head right now just thinking about it.

I've decided to make a list of things I will miss and not miss with this class. I'm starting with the bad things first.

What I will not miss:

• the long commute
• dealing with stupid people on the bus
• trying to figure out what to teach for 5 hours straight

What I will miss:

• the students giving me tips on Spain
• the students' awesome hilarious stories
• our random discussion on politics, sex, love, family, children etc.
• "Donde vamos hoy? Flor, Puntito or Angry/Ugly woman?" - the three cafes we would choose from everyday.
• Flor - efficient, fast, and nice married couple who run the bar
  
• Puntito - eh! Not my favorite, but some students seem to like it
• Angry/Ugly woman - inefficient, slow, and not so nice woman running the bar, but I am obsessed with their tortilla Española! We call her angry woman because the first few times we went to this bar, the woman would get so frantic with having to make so much coffee that she gets annoyed and angry. We added the ugly because one of the students thought we were saying "ugly", not "angry".
  

This class was a very good group to have for my first time teaching. They made my job easy and fun. They also made me feel very comfortable...they pretty much became my family and friends. We have all exchanged contact information, so we can hopefully get together again in the future...one student might actually join me when I go to the Fallas Festival in Valencia. I will definitely miss my students.

I think this whole idea with saying goodbye after every few months will be my least favorite part of teaching. But oh well...such is life! Next week - hopefully, cross my fingers - I will see new faces and start all over again.

Are you kidding me?

A few times each week, I like to catch up on what's happening in America. They usually report on some things on America here (i.e. Election '08, NIU shooting, Lane Bryant shooting) but I don't really get all the details since as you all know, my Spanish just ain't that good!

Anyway, today I was checking out CNN.com when I saw this headline: "Too Pretty To Fly? Teens Claim Discrimination". After watching the video, I just thought, are you fucking kidding me??? I mean, yes I was not on that flight to really know if they were discriminated or not! But seriously! My favorite part is when one of the girls said, "I think they were just discriminating against us because we were young, decent looking girls. I mean, no one really on the plane was like us, except us".

Wow! This is just a great story. Almost as good as the fat lady and her skinny girlfriend who kept a sword next to their bed. Oh Florida!...sorry Tito and Gary!

Random Ramblings

The weather in Madrid has been kind of crappy for the past week and a half. It's been cloudy and rainy, especially in the beginning of this week. I've been told that Madrid winters are normally rainy and cool (but not like Chicago cold). But this winter (and the last 3 or 5 years), it's been very dry. Of course, this is just my kind of weather...it's way better than being in cold snowy Chicago. We had very sunny and warm (50's and 60's) weather the last two months...I even got to wear my flip flops a few times!

This weekend is supposed to be rainy. Since today was warm and sunny, I decided to take advantage of it. First, I went for a walk to the American store to buy some Duncan Hines cake mix...I want to bake a cake for Juan's birthday celebration tomorrow. Then I decided to go to Campo del Moro, which is a massive garden next to Palacio Real. My metro stop is right across from this and everyday, I think about going to it. But of course, I get tired or I have to go home and do work. Today was the perfect day for me to go.

So I walked around and admired the pretty trees and bushes (there aren't any flowers yet), and the enormousness of Palacio Real. It was very quiet and relaxing. Not many people were there - just old women (three of which passed me by and said hola...soo sweet) and couples making out. I found a nice empty bench under the sun and decided to chill for a while. I loved being there. It was nice to have peace and quiet. The only thing that bothered me were the peacocks. They had stupid peacocks!!! I know most people think they are beautiful birds, but to me, they are still birds!! One was hanging out about 20 feet behind me. I kept hoping it would leave, but it didn't. So of course I was constantly paranoid that it would attack me from behind. I started thinking, can peacocks fly??? I don't actually know! I imagine they can't with that big nasty thingy on their backs. Also, I learned today that peacocks make the ugliest sound. It's like this loud screeching squeaky noise. It was sick! It freaked me out each time I heard it. Anyway, the garden cops finally kicked me out at 6 because it was closing. I walked home so I could enjoy the sun as much as I can.

Besides being able to enjoy the weather. I was just glad that I was able to do something physical. Since I don't want to pay for a gym here - and I'm just lazy! - I've been feeling like the biggest fat ass! Going for walks is the only exercise I do here, which I got a lot of today. But of course I just have no self-control when it comes to eating. When I went to the American store, I saw a package of Pepperidge Farms Sausalito cookies. I decided to spend 4 freaking Euros ($6) on cookies. It just looked really good and I can't remember the last time I ate cookies. I think I totally underestimated how much I've been missing them. I started eating them during my walk. I ended up eating half of the package...that's 4 giant sausalito cookies! I am disgusting!

Pues, tonight hopefully I stop stuffing my face. Both my roommates went home to Pais Basco so I have the place to myself, and when I'm alone and doing nothing, I eat more. But sometimes a girl just needs some alone time, and I'm totally taking advantage of it this weekend.

Alright, time to go eat something...hahaha. Have a good weekend everyone!

Comida en una cueva

To celebrate the end of the course, my students and I went to lunch after class yesterday. The course doesn't actually end until next Thursday, but with people slowly getting jobs, yesterday was the best time for all of us to go. They wanted me to experience something that is typical Spanish. El Molar, the town where I work, is in the mountains. And in these mountains, there are many caves that people have turned into restaurants.

The course site is in the lower part of the mountains. After class, my students and I piled into two or three cars and I drove to the restaurant with Miriam and Mar. As we got higher on the mountain, I just got overwhelmed by the beauty of what I was seeing. I just kept saying, "Wow!, or "Oh my god!", or "I love this!". Miriam and Mar were laughing at me because I was just struck with awe. I can't even explain to you how awesome the view was. I'm not very good with describing images, so I'm not going to even try (maybe this is why I hated talking about imagery in literature back in my school days...f**king Scarlett Letter and its stupid rosebuds!). I wish I could've taken pictures, but of course I forgot my camera at home. Miriam did take pictures inside the restaurant so I will make sure to post them when she emails them to me.

My students were also laughing at me earlier because I was so fascinated when we were driving through very narrow streets. I've always wondered how people drive through these tiny streets. And now I've finally experienced it from inside a car! It was nerve-wracking but awesome!

Anyway, the restaurant was wonderful. It was called La Parilla (just like the great restaurant in Playa del Carmen). It is definitely a cave. You walk in and it's very, very dark. They have a couple of candles on each table to give the place a bit of light, but it was still very dark. When we walked out of the restaurant after lunch, my eyes hurt from the sunlight. Also, because it is very cold inside, they had a huge fire to keep it warm. The whole thing was very nice and romantic. All the girls and I were giggling and saying, "Oh this would be a great date place." Poor Joe, the only boy in class.

The students wanted me to eat real Spanish food, so I left them in charge of ordering. There was so much food! I had terrible food coma after. The meal started with salad and a platter of cheese and jamon (but from a cow, not a pig). Then came some grilled beef and lamb on a stick. The next part of the meal was the most difficult for me. It was a platter of morcilla and chorizo. For weeks, the students have been telling me about morcilla, which is basically pig's blood made into a sausage. And with my new "try anything" kick, I had to try it. My students wre waiting for my reaction as I was chewing on it. I have to say that it wasn't bad at all, but I just couldn't get the thought of it being sangre out of my head. So I stuck with eating chorizo...I love chorizo! Next came more salad and the main course, lamb cooked over fire. We ended the meal with a coffee and a chupito (shot) of various fruity cocktail.

It was probably one of the best meals I've had in Spain. It was a bit of expensive, 23 euros per person, but fortunately, it was my students' goodbye present to me. It was great...there's no better present than a good meal with amazing food.

Estoy constipado

Sometimes my students just crack me up! Today, I laughed so hard that I was crying.

For some reason, we all got to talking about false friends. Words that sound and look the same but have different meanings in different languages are called false friends. For example, the adjective, embarazada, sounds like embarrassed, when really it means pregnant. Oh wait, I just remembered why this came up. I was talking about how much I love non-pregnancy pregnancy tops because it hides the gut! I have no idea how we get into these topics. Last week, we started talking about Amsterdam, which led to talking about the Red Light District, then to whores, then to sex, etc.

But I digress...so back to false friends...

So after clarifying the different between embarazada and embarrassed, Isabel, one of the more advanced students, brought up the word constipado. She points out that constipado means to have nasal congestion, but to English speakers, constipado sounds like constipated. Suddenly, Mar, another pretty advanced student, says, "but I don't understand...what does constipated mean?" I start to awkwardly explain it to her. When she realizes what it means, she gets this look of horror in her face. She says, "What??? Many times I talked to English speaking people and used the word constipated instead of congested!!!" The class bursts into laughter.

Then it gets better...

Maria starts telling her "constipado" story. Let me preface this with the fact that everyone refers to Maria as someone who speaks Spanglish. We all know she is very smart because she is an economist. She has traveled the world and has visited the US numerous times. She understands English concepts fairly well. However, when she speaks, it sounds like she can't decide between English and Spanish. She mixes it so badly sometimes that it almost sounds like gibberish and no one can understand her!

Anyway, she starts telling us about when she was in Washington D.C. with her husband, who unfortunately got the flu. She went to the the pharmacy to get some medicine and talked to the pharmacist to get suggestions on which medicine to get. She says to the pharmacist, "my husband is bad in bed". Isabel and I looked at her, started laughing and said, "ummm what???" She repeats it again and still doesn't realize what she is actually saying. Isabel starts telling her in Spanish the literal translation of what she said. At this point everyone started laughing. Maria starts laughing as well and says in Spanglish how now she knows why the pharmacist was looking at her like she's crazy! To make things worse, when she talked to the pharmacist, she said, "My husband is bad in bed. He is constipado!" Everyone started laughing even more. Everyone started making comments like, "He doesn't need cold medicine for that!" or "No no no, her husband is a latin lover!" (This one is from Mar who was trying to save Maria from her embarrassment).

I was dying of laughter. I was laughing so hard my stomach hurt! It was great. I haven't laughed that hard in so long and it felt good!

My babies are growing up

Today, I felt like a very proud parent. As you all know, my students are all unemployed. They basically chose to take this English course among hundreds of professional development training courses offered all over the Madrid area by the Spanish government. This is one of their unemployment benefits. So throughout the course, my students are also busy looking for a new job.

The past few weeks, people have started getting hired. Two weeks ago, Mar was hired by a nonprofit. Last Friday, Carmen landed a great job at a bank. Today, Begoña got a job she really, really wanted. Begoña's employment was what made me proud the most.

Out of all the students that have gotten employed, Begoña was the one most interested in using her English skills in whatever job she got. She was going to interviews for positions that required some English skills, whereas the other ones interviewed for jobs that didn't necessarily need English. I sympathized with Begoña because she has told me about her interviews and how she always gets very nervous, loses her confidence and forgets all the English that she knows during interviews. I always try to encourage her because as someone who has taught her and observed her, I know she has the capability to have a decent conversation in English (she did live in Scotland for two years a few years ago!)...it may not always be grammatically correct or perfect pronunciation, but she can still express herself in English.

Yesterday morning, Begoña received a call from an employment agency about a company wanting to interview her in the afternoon. The agency told her that the interview will be done in English. So during break, she asked me to help her practice English so she can be in "English mode" before the interview. The other students would come up with possible interview questions and I would tell her how to answer them in English. The discussion continued after break and the entire class got involved. We were all helping her. By the time she had to leave for her interview, you can tell she was feeling a lot more confident - not only because she had English fresh in her mind, but also because the entire class was very supportive.

This morning, she told everyone that her interview went very well and she was waiting for the agency to call her sometime in the day. Everyone was very excited for her. Around noon, her cellphone rang. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at her. The funny thing was as she was heading for the door to talk on the phone, she automatically answered the phone with a "Yes?" instead of a "Si?". We all started laughing. This is probably only funny to us, but some students sometimes find themselves automatically speaking in English (even to other Spaniards not in our class), which means they are thinking in English. When they do this, they always get surprised with themselves that they can't help but laugh.

We all anxiously waited for the news when finally Begoña came back to the classroom and said, with a huge smile on her face, "I obtained the job!" (I love how she used the word obtained...hahaha). The class went nuts - everyone started cheering and giving Begoña hugs and kisses. It was great! I almost started crying. It was so nice to see all of them come together and really support each other. I swear, Spanish people are great!

The only bad news is that she has to start tomorrow (the hiring process here moves really fast!). Since the class ends next Thursday, the class is going to lunch tomorrow for an early celebration. We are all sad that she can't make it.

But we also know that this new job is way better for her than any lunch. We're all very proud of her, and most of all, I am very, very proud! Go Begoña!!!