A perfect day to watch futbol

Today was wonderful. I even had to get up at 7am on a weekend and it still was wonderful. Number one reason why: Sun and heat. Luis works as a soccer referee for the kids’ soccer games on the weekend. We thought he was working in La Puerta today, so the idea was that I would get up early, catch the bus with him and the kids, watch the soccer games, Ben and Eve could also come and watch some of them games when they woke up and then we could all have lunch together. I got up, got ready and we rushed down to Rincon de Maxi to have a coffee before we had to leave. It was there that Luis’ boss showed up and reminded him that we were actually going to Beas de Segura today, not La Puerta. Awwwww. We were trying to think of a way we could still stop in La Puerta and have lunch after the games but decided it just wasn’t going to happen today (buses are even more sporadic on Sundays). Even though I didn’t get to see Ben and Eve I was still so glad I went. I left the house wearing a tank top, turtleneck, sweater, polar fleece jacket, my Northface jacket and a scarf. I even thought to myself “I don’t think I brought enough” as I started walking towards Rincon de Maxi. It’s been super cold here all week. Well, I was wrong. The sun came out and it was gorgeous. Really, seriously, amazing. The longer I sat on the bleachers the more layers I shed. I finally made it down to the turtleneck and sweater and was still too hot but couldn’t shed anymore layers without a little indecent exposure. Every now and then Luis’ boss would come over to check on me, joke about the fact that I could sit there and tan and then he would head back to work. There were about 20 teams at the field. There were two games going on simultaneously from 9:30-2. The 10-12 year old team from Siles played first and won their game. The 8-10 year old team played last and it was an absolute massacre. The kids seemed excited and surprised that I got on the bus with them this morning and throughout the day a few of them came over to give me updates about how well they played, or just come chat a little. The kids also tease Luis mercilessly about being bald, and he’s a good sport about it. Luis’ nickname in the town is Luigi so usually jokes about “Where’s Mario?” come into play at some point. This is an interesting fact that I don’t think I’ve shared yet. Apparently most everyone here has a nickname. My guess is that so many people have the same or similar names that they create nicknames for each other to more easily distinguish people. I’ve asked but it seems I don’t have a nickname (or at least one people are willing to admit to me). I’ll let you know if I eventually get an apodo (nickname).

Weekend visitors and a crazy Monday

Saturday and Sunday:
On Saturday I slept longer than I anticipated, got up, got ready quickly, finished cleaning the apartment, and put the sheets and blankets near the heaters so they would dry faster (no worries, the heaters here are designed so you can put things on them without having anything go up in smoke). Brittany and Roberto got here about 2pm. I met them on El Paseo and then we walked with their stuff up to my apartment. They got to see the apartment for a few minutes, drop off their stuff and then we headed back to El Paseo to get their car and drive to the restaurant. The restaurant really wasn’t that far away but we were going to be driving to the waterfall after lunch. Luis, our tour guide for the day, met up with us at the restaurant. We had about a two hour lunch complete with salad, calamari, patatas bravas, chicken, fries, ice cream and flan, coffee and wine. It was definitely quite the lunch! Brittany and Roberto had compiled a list of questions on their way over (such as “how the heck did you get here?”) so we chatted about my small town life and how beautiful and relaxing Siles is. After lunch we piled into the car, stopped off at Luis’ house for a jacket, at the Mezquita for a bottle of water and then we headed off to Rio Mundo to see the waterfall. I wish we could have gotten to the waterfall about an hour earlier because the light would have been a lot better for pictures, but the drive over there was beautiful. It was really nice to take a little field trip away from Siles. We really don’t go far, but it was a nice escape, especially with Brittany, Roberto and Luis for company. We snapped a bunch of pictures but didn’t stay too long. It was really pretty and made me wish I had a car here so I could make more of these little trips. I’m sure there are a lot of nearby hidden gems that I could see, if only I could get to them. After seeing the waterfall we went back to my apartment, then headed to a café/restaurant I hadn’t been to yet. It had a fireplace so we warmed up, had a beer and some tapas and continued chatting. From there we moved to Mezquita, had more drinks and more food, then went to Menphys were we had another drink, and then to Pub JJ for another drink (granted all of that took place over many hours). Brittany and Roberto got a small taste of most of our hang out spots here in Siles. We had sooo much food today! We got home about 1:30 and went right to bed. I got to test out my futon, which is fairly comfortable except for the fact that it is diagonal. In the morning Luis brought over churros and chocolate and we had breakfast together (admiring the view from my window) before Brittany and Roberto hit the road.
















I still haven't figured out what I'm doing for puente or Christmas vacation. I have the 3rd-8th of December off from work and the 23rd of December through the 7th of January. Brittany mentioned that she and Roberto might go to Norway for puente. I've always wanted to go there (although going there in December maybe wasn't my original plan) but we'll see. I can't believe it's already the middle of November. If you have ideas of what I should do for my vacations, let me know! I'm not totally thrilled about the idea of traveling solo but haven't totally counted it out either.

The rest of my Sunday was very unproductive and relaxing. I watched a movie (Definitely, Maybe) and then tried to take a nap. Not long into my nap I got a phone call from one of the dads that wants me to give his daughter private English lessons. He said he was in Siles and wanted to drop by to talk about the specifics of getting lessons set up. (He couldn’t understand me very well over the phone). I shouldn’t have pulled out the hard copy paper of my schedule, because then he could see that I don’t work on Fridays. I had told him I wasn’t available to give lessons on Fridays and I still tried to stick with it, but I failed. I got conned into giving a one hour lesson on Fridays at 7pm. What a lame time. I really wanted to maintain Fridays as my free day to clean house, do laundry, hang out with my friends, etc, but he said that Fridays or the weekends was really the only time he could bring her, at least until Christmas. Grrrrr. I was in a bit of a bad mood after he left, but I listened to some music, got my Bella Baby orders taken care of and tried to get some photos updated and eventually I felt fine. I went to bed super late…one of those days were I did basically nothing and time still managed to just fly past.

Monday:
This morning was my first private English lesson. I got up, rushed to get ready and headed out the door. Luckily Isabel (the woman who I was giving the lesson to) lives right next to Steffi, so I had a pretty good idea about how to get there quickly. I got there and we had breakfast (toast with olive oil and honey and coffee with milk). Her word for the day was ‘wheat bread.’ Isabel is actually a teacher at my school, but she’s on sick leave until about Christmas time. She loves speaking English and wants to pass the level 3 exam so she can be qualified to teach English. We chatted a little bit about learning second languages, the necessity/non-necessity to learn another language in the US, her husband’s work, and our weekends. After breakfast she got out her English book so I could see what she needed to work on. She let me take the book with me so I could prepare for the following week. Isabel asked me if there’s anyway we could do two 45 minute sessions on Monday and Tuesday instead of one hour long session. I generally don’t mind, but told her I can’t do that until I make up some of my October hours at the school. The school is going to pay me for the entire month of October even though I was only there for half of it. To make up for the hours I missed I will be going to the school early and preparing class materials, posters, etc. She said that was fine, and when I was done making up my hours we could switch. I also agreed that instead of paying me at each session she could pay me at the end of the month. I hope this doesn’t end up being a problem. It makes me a little nervous.

I headed out a bit later than 9:45 and rushed off to the school. Luckily I happened to run into Pepe who was in his car. He drove me to school and I got there just in time. Today I got to work with the 5th graders first. Veronica, Migel Angel, Vicente and Angel were with me today (I’m trying really hard to actually learn their names). I had Miguel Angel with me last week as well, and I’m beginning to wonder if it’s Sebas way of giving himself a break. Miguel Angel makes me want to pull my hair out. Today’s session actually ended in tears and bloodshed. Yep. That’s how great it was. Miguel Angel and Angel were screwing around and Miguel Angel knocked Angel in the mouth and cut his gum. He started bawling, of course just as class was supposed to be getting over and Sebas was coming with the other students to tell everyone to go back to their normal classes. Great. That makes me look *real* good. Sebas didn’t seem too concerned though. He reassured me that those two tend to be a handful and overreact. Really it was basically the smallest amount of blood possible to still be considered bleeding, but Angel milked it for all it was worth. Ay, ay, ay. Really, besides that, and the fact that once again the students wouldn’t stop chatting it really wasn’t soooooo bad. We did get all the exercises done, which doesn’t usually happen.

After that fantastic class I had an hour and a half break until my next class. I hung out in the teacher’s room, and tried to find pictures of lungs, heart, etc. for my body systems mural. I also made up a schedule for myself so I could get a better feel for what spaces I had available for private lessons. I chatted with Antonio and some of the other teachers about lesson plans for Christmas and had a cup of coffee and napolitana.

Finally it was time for English class with Ines and the 1st graders. Welcome to extravaganza number two of the day. Inés said the kids were really good last Thursday but on Mondays they tend to be atrocious. They were up and down and chatting and to make matters worse all the toilets were out of order except for one. This class was right after recess, when they get to eat breakfast and drink their juice boxes, so of course every single kid in the class had to go pee…and we’re not talking the can-I-go-to-the-bathroom-to-escape-class “I have to pee” request. We’re talking twenty-some first graders holding their crotches and doing the pee-pee dance. Oh. Joy. By the end of class we had gotten them all to the bathroom, gone over the new English flash cards (talking about toys), sang the One-Two-Buckle My Shoe song and done 2 worksheets in the book. We had a few minutes left so we played a game (reminiscent of Marco Polo only we were sitting in a circle and the person in the middle was blind folded and had to figure out who in the circle was making the cat noises). End of class was signaled by one of the other teachers coming in with a few of Inés’ 2nd grade students who were apparently being extremely difficult. Poor Inés…she got to leave the 1st grade class to go deal with her own class of hyperactive, juiced-up kids…and me? I went home. Thank you God!

When I got home I was determined to be productive (unlike I usually am in the middle of the day during the week). I set up my computer so I could listen to music, then set to work on my list of chores.

-Laundry? Check.
-Dishes? Check.
-Clean kitchen? Check.
-Make bed? Check.
-Finish making schedule I started during recess? Check.
-Compile list of possible Christmas lessons? Check.
-Update photos on Flickr, Tuenti, Facebook and my blog? Check.
-Make lunch? Check.
-Put clothes away? Partial check (some aren’t dry yet).
-Look for pictures of British castles for my 4 year olds to draw? Getting there…

I also chatted with Maria for a little bit. She wanted to see the pictures I took at the park so I got those up and she really liked them. Not bad for an afternoon. My apartment looks a lot better now than when I left the house this morning. The time did go by really quickly though and I still have a lot more to do in the next 2 days. Ahhhhhhh. I hope I can get it all done! The only thing I *have* to get done tonight is finding pictures of those castles. I can find general pictures of castles, but I’m not really sure how to go about finding simple pictures of British castles that 4 year olds can color. Blllllllah. Welcome to the life of teaching I suppose.

Tomorrow is my second time working with the 3-5 year olds at the other elementary school. I’ve been here a month and it will only be my 2nd time working with them (due to my trips to Jaén). Last time I was overwhelmed because the teachers didn’t know I was coming, I didn’t have anything planned, Sebas was out of town and the teachers just turned their classes over to me. I’m hoping it’s going to be worlds better this time. I arranged to work with the 3 year olds during the morning routine when they talk about the weather, the date, the day of the week…stuff like that. The 4 year old class is the only other one I have to plan for, then Sebas is back in town and will be leading the two 5 year old classes. I really, really hope tomorrow goes well. Luckily, even though Monday-Wednesday is overwhelming, it goes by really fast. I like having all my classes crammed together.

I think my cough is starting to get better too. I still have some fits but it seems better. Good thing otherwise I think Luis would have personally drug me off to the doctors to get checked for bronchitis.

I’m enjoying having my heat on, although it makes going outside rather unpleasant. It’s not snowing yet, but it has gotten so cold in the last week!

On another random note, they are opening a gym here in Siles sometime in the next month-ish. I hope it's sooner rather than later. After the last few days I feel gross. So much food! I would love a good run, although running up and down the hills of Siles sounds both painful and awkward. As if I don't have enough people looking at me normally I can only imagine what they would think if they literally saw me running around town. People here don't do that.

Well I’m off to find pictures of castles (as long as my internet works…it started cramping my style about an hour ago and is having a hard time connecting). That’s the internet’s way of saying I get to have a break for the rest of the day, right? Riiiiight.

November = the beginning of hibernation

Saturday:
Saturday I met Luis at Mezquita for a beer in the evening. We called Fernando too, but he said the night before had been crazy and he was tired. We moved over to Nicols and hung out there for awhile until we saw Edu (Steffi's husband). He invited us over to one of his friend's apartment. We headed that way but when we got there Steffi said that the people weren't really comfortable with random people dropping by and also they had just been talking about a sensitive subject and the woman was really upset...not exactly a party going on...Steffi said she would try to meet up with us in a little while. We went back to Nicols, had another drink, didn't end up hearing from Steffi again and so eventually we just went home.

Sunday:
Almudena showed up at my door around 4:45pm and I was in sweats and hadn't showered all day. I hopped in the shower quickly and met Almudena down at Nicols. There I met some of her other friends. Almudena was able to stay until 6pm but then I stayed and hung out with her friends. We went to Rincon de Maxi (another cafe) for a refresco and a tapa, and then we all went home. I watched a movie, hung out a bit and then went to bed.

Monday, Today:
I had such high hopes for getting things done today.

That didn't happen.

The weather here today has been so gross. It's been really windy. I'm glad I at least made a few friends before everyone went into hibernation!

The dust tends to collect quite rapidly in my apartment, so today was going to be my cleaning day. I got about half done. The mop and broom and dustpan are laying about and the dishes haven't been done. I did manage to get a load of laundry done. I figure if I do small loads of laundry frequently I won't have to worry about running out of clothes while they are drying.

Tomorrow is my trip to Jaén. Ava and Ben have already left, and no one at school can drive this time so I'm going to take the bus. The bus leaves at 6:30 in the morning. Yikes. I just realized that usually I buy my bus tickets online and print them out...but since I don't have a printer I'm not totally sure what to do. Do I go somewhere and try to find a printer? Can I pay when I get on the bus in the morning? I have no clue. I'm going to have to do some research.

I will be arriving in Jaén at 10:15. I will have 2 hours and 15 minutes to find my way to the extranjeria, have my appointment, and get back to the bus station to catch the bus back to Siles at 12:30. Supposedly there is another bus that leaves late in the evening. I could always try to find this bus if I miss the 12:30 one, but I have not found this mystery evening bus anywhere on any of the bus schedules.

It's going to be tight. Inés said, worst case scenario I can call her and tell her I won't be around to teach on Wednesday if I get stuck in Jaén. What craziness. All for a 10 minute appointment in a city 2 1/2 hours away.

This morning I woke up, went to school and taught the 1st and 5th graders. I had the 5th graders first. Sebas is back. He said the trip went really well and that the kids were very well behaved. He took most of the class like usual and I took a group of 4. Two of my kids were good. One was ok. One made me want to pull my hair out. The cabinet on wheels with the laptops on it happened to be in the room we were in and he WOULD NOT stop asking to use the computers. He was a total pain in the butt. He wouldn't do the exercises I told him to do, he would mumble his way through anything I asked him to read and then he tried to cheat off his friend's work so he could get it done faster and have time to use the computers. Grrrrrrr. I was so frustrated.

After that I had a break that I used to try and find free recordings of kids songs and nursery rhymes for the little kids and for Ines to use (specifically the One Two Buckle My Shoe song). If any of you teacher friends of mine have good website ideas about where I can get this kind of stuff let me know please! I had some luck, but eventually it was time to teach the 1st graders. Inés already had an activity planned so I didn't need to prepare anything. She had drawn up a shoe that she photocopied for each of the students, and then I helped glue them to some stronger paper. The kids were each given a shoe to color, then we poked holes where the laces would be and gave them each a string of twine so we could teach them how to tie shoes. We sang the "One Two Buckle My Shoe" song and let them color. Pretty low key day for me in this class.

I headed back to my apartment when school was over and have been tucked under the covers surfing the internet basically all afternoon. I should run down to the ATM to at least get some money for my bus ticket tomorrow but I won't be surprised if that's all I do. I should probably go to bed early anyways since the bus leaves at 6:30aaaaaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmmmmmmmm.

The weather is really messing with my go-get-em, meeting people attitude. I can only imagine what it's going to be like when there is snow on the ground.

Now I feel like a real teacher

Ok, I felt like today was really my first day of teaching. I got to the school a little before 10. At 10 I worked with Sebas teaching the 3rd graders. I just took a small group of them (5 students…Rafa, Rafa, Carlos, Marta and Marta) and we did some reading and listening activities. One of the Rafas is deaf. That was a challenge I hadn’t prepared myself for at all. Luckily Sebas had some different material planned for Rafa…he just wanted to be apart of my group to feel included.

After the 3rd grade class Sebas and I went to the 6th grade class. I spent the beginning of class fielding questions about me, the US, and Selena Gomez. Sebas then picked 5 people to go with me but all of them wanted to go with me. Sebas joked around that he was going to go home and take a nap because they all wanted to go with me. So, I took the selected 5 students to the English classroom and we talked about parts of the face. One of the girls told me she liked my eyes. Good use of the vocabulary we were studying. :) Rocio (Pepe’s daughter) was also excited to be apart of this group with me.

After the 6th grade class there was recess. I chatted with Antonio (one of the teachers) while we hung out with the 3rd and 4th graders. After recess I went to Antonio’s 4th grade classroom to help teach science in English. We mostly talked about me and where I was from and a lot of geography. Their concept of world geography was awful. Antonio said they used to spend a lot more time on it but don’t anymore. When asked what states the kids knew of I got answers ranging from London to South Africa, France and Italy. It’s a good thing I brought a map of the U.S. I had a couple other kids point to a map of England in the hallway the other day and ask where the U.S. was.

I had a 15 minute break before I needed to go with Inés and her 2nd graders. Inés seemed very stressed out today. Her kids were pretty rowdy and she must have been tired. After she took us to Jaén yesterday she had to come back to school and work until 8pm (Tuesdays are meeting and training days). We taught seasons, colors and clothing to the 2nd graders. One of her second graders (Rocio…different from Pepe’s Rocio) drew me a picture. Stefi’s kids had drawn me pictures when I was at their house but they got tucked away when we were cleaning. This is the first drawing I can put up in my apartment.

School was done at 2. I stuck around a little bit longer to talk with Antonio. His science class is the first one I actually have to prepare lessons for. I have no idea what I’m doing in that regard. His English speaking science class is two days a week. It makes so much more sense for me to be apart of both days if I have to lesson plan. If I only do one of the days it’s hard to know what they covered, what they still need to do, etc, etc. The only problem is that part two of his science class is supposed to meet on Fridays and I don’t work on Fridays. He is going to talk to Inés and see if he can switch his Spanish speaking science class and English speaking science class so I can be at both the English speaking classes. It will put me over 12 hours a week, but I think in the long run it will simplify my life. Inés has been really hesitant to put me over 12 hours but I hope she approves this.

I went home, threw some potatoes in the oven and had patatas alioli for lunch. At 4:15 I walked back to school for the adult English classes. I was under the impression that it was one class but it is actually two. I met with the teachers Marta and Fernando (neither of whom knew I was going to be around to help with the classes). I stayed in Fernando’s class for two hours. In the coming weeks I will only be spending one hour a week with each class, but since it’s still unsure what my schedule will be like with them I wanted to be present. I am going back to their classes tomorrow to finalize a schedule and work with Marta’s class. It’s quite interesting to listen to how they teach English. There are a lot of grammar rules I wouldn’t have really thought about otherwise.

Fernando is very nice and he has a Scottish accent. I figured he must have studied there but he said he’s only been abroad 4 days in his life. I was shocked. He seemed flattered to know that he has a non-Spanish accent when speaking English. He is not from Siles but is living here now and adjusting to small town life and lack of nightlife like I am. We swapped numbers so I have another café con leche buddy. I thank God for every new person I meet here. I realize you can’t befriend everyone in a week but today has been the first evening that I felt lonely (with the exception of my very first night here in the hostel). Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad I’m here. I just wish I had some good go-to friends here my age. I know it will come…it’s just the hardest adjustment.

After class I ran into another one of Juan’s friends that lives “in the stone house next to the school.” I chatted with him briefly then headed back to my apartment. When I was almost there I realized I had forgotten my wallet and keys in the classroom. I hurried back but wasn’t too concerned because even though Fernando’s class was finished, Marta had still been teaching. Wrong. They also left early and by the time I got back to school the gate was padlocked. Insert swear words here. Thank goodness I had just purchased a Spanish phone yesterday and that Fernando had given me his number. I called him up and he called Marta. Marta drove back to the school (I was afraid she lived far away but she was pretty close) and let me in. I grabbed my stuff, thanked her profusely, chatted about our plans for English class tomorrow and headed back to my apartment AGAIN.

While I had been sitting outside the school waiting for Marta a group of my students came down the street and they all waved at me. They are so cute. I like that they feel comfortable approaching me and talking to me.

My plan was to be productive and that didn’t happen at all. I spent the evening catching up on Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice and How I Met Your Mother episodes. This was a challenge because ABC doesn't stream their shows internationally. I found a site that would let me watch for an hour, then require I take an hour break. Lame. After I’m done with this blog entry I plan on going back to my lesson planning and then going to bed but I may end up going straight to bed and just waking up early. In addition to the stuff for Antonio's class I also need to make a poster for the other science teacher, a recycling poster for Sebas and come up with a list of English conversation topics for the adults. Ay, ay, ay. I don't feel like doing any of that. Hopefully I can get in a rhythm now that I know what types of activities I will be doing and plan ahead during the weekends. Trying to do these types of activities (lesson planning and poster making) the night before kind of sucks.

Tomorrow is my other long day, but at least then the bulk of my work week will be done and I can relax a little more.

I also need to ask the landlady how to use the washing machine. I’m almost out of clothes and afraid of flooding or over-suding my apartment. You would think descriptive pictures on a washing machine would work across any language but that isn't really true. I also need to go to the post office and the bank. Hopefully I’m not too tired tomorrow, because it’s probably going to be a busy day.

Wish me luck for my second full day of teaching tomorrow!