After that I headed up to the English room and talked to Sebas about mixing up our routine. Usually he gives me 4-6 kids and we read something from their book, and then do some exercises in their accompanying activity book. I proposed that with the eldest kids we make Christmas cards and send them to Steph’s students (My friend Steph works in a Spanish immersion school in Vancouver). That way they could interact with students from the US and use their English in a fun way. It would also give me us a chance to teach them some Christmas vocabulary. He loved the idea. After that I had class with the 5th graders and then had a break to work on stuff for my private lessons, as well as get things prepared for Thursdays Christmas card making/lesson extravaganza. I printed out a bunch of Christmas drawing pages I had found so the kids could color them, cut them out and include them on their Christmas cards. I also helped Antonio and Silvia put up the backdrop for our “Charity Christmas Tree.” The kids are painting egg cartons green and we are putting them up in the form of a Christmas tree. I’ll try to put up a picture later when it’s done. We are putting boxes under our “Christmas tree” and collecting donations for people that don’t have enough for the holidays. After that I was supposed to work with the 1st graders. Inés is usually with me during this time, and we had planned on having the 1st graders make the typical Thanksgiving hand-turkeys so we could put it on our mural. I think I forgot to mention this mural before. Hehe. This is another thing I will need to get a picture of. I drew a basic, cartoon-ish turkey that says “I am thankful for…” The kids traced their hands and made turkeys out of them, then we cut the hands out and pasted them onto the mural as the feathers of the turkey on my poster. With just the second graders we didn’t have enough hands/turkeys so we were going to do the exercise with the first graders too. Well, Inés wasn’t at school on Monday and the normal 1st grade teacher was frazzled because the kids were being crazy. She asked if I could wait until 1pm to try and do the lesson…that’s only 45 minutes later so I said sure. I hung out until 1 but then the teacher asked if we could just do it the next week. I felt bad for her. She seemed exhausted and overwhelmed. Sure…one less lesson I have to plan I guess! I went to the small market/grocery store next to my house (Juani’s) and picked up some cream cheese, lasagna and chocolate. Quite the shopping trip, right? Haha. After that I went home, did laundry, had lunch, consolidated by clothes on the ‘tendedero’ (my new clothes rack) so they didn’t take over the entire apartment, chatted with Maria and then took a short nap.
I woke up and received a text message that I should come to her apartment right away so we can meet and go somewhere to watch the futbol (soccer) game. Barcelona and Madrid were playing so it was a big game. I met Almudena at her apartment and she was juggling dinner and laundry and cleaning the apartment. We headed off to Mezquita, had a mosto and watched the beginning of the game but there weren’t any seats. We got their too late. Almudena is a Barcelona fan but Rulo and Maria and a bunch of others are Madrid fans. I lean towards Madrid although I haven’t fully formed an alliance yet. Most of the people in Mezquita were Madrid fans. Shortly after we headed over to Nicols. Nicols was filled with all the Barcelona fans. Almudena’s parents were there as well as a couple other friends of hers. There were still no seats but the environment in Nicols was better…mostly because it was filled with Barcelona fans and Madrid was getting their butt kicked. The final score was 5-0. Yikes. It was really funny to see Almudena’s dad. He comes off as being SO serious all the time, but every time Barcelona scored he was up dancing and cheering. Luis showed up sometime in the second half and hung out with us. Also the group of teachers I’ve been going out were there too. When the game ended Almudena headed home but I stuck around with Luis and the other teachers. I had planned on going right home after the game…it was a Monday after all and I needed to teach in the morning. Haaaaaaaha. Foolish me. Going home after a big game, even if it is a Monday? Noooooo. Not until 2:30am.
A guy Luis knew (as well as a bunch of others throughout the night) came over and was trying to convince me to root for Barcelona. I mentioned that my dad had a Barcelona jersey and he got really happy and Luis buried his face in his hands. Haha. I told them I would watch the rematch in May and then decide who “my” team would be.
We were at Nicols for quite awhile. Initially I had fun there but there was a group of guys there that I’ve had a hard time with since the beginning of my stay here. I don’t understand them and I know they are saying suggestive things. I always get really uncomfortable and although I know good things to say/do in English, Spanish leaves me at a loss. It’s more upsetting and frustrating that my Spanish isn’t good enough to defend myself than the actual things they are saying. They say “Oh, I’m just joking” but then they continue. They’ll say something, and even though I don’t understand the words, the fact that the other guys around him start cracking up put up a large red flag. Luis was close by and keeping an eye on the situation, but also told me that he wanted me to learn how to defend myself. When I shoved a guys arm off from around my shoulders Luis stepped in. I’m sure I was visibly frazzled and Luis talked to them. We stayed for a little while longer but not long. We headed over to Pub JJ. Luis could tell I was upset, and he thought I was mad at him for not knocking their lights out. No…starting or dealing with a bar brawl really wouldn’t have made me feel any better. I explained my language frustrations and he started trying to teach me phrases for situations like that. At Pub JJ we ran into another guy we knew, and another guy that had studied English awhile back. The guy we knew started teaching me Spanish tongue twisters. I didn’t stay too long. I had a Coke, chatted it up with our little group long enough to relax and feel better, then headed home. 2:30am. Goodness. On a Monday!
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