Kayla and me in Toledo

I had been told multiple times that the two places I neeeded to visit in Castilla-La Mancha were Toledo and Cuenca… so in the middle of November me and a few of the other Americans in Villarrobledo made a weekend trip to Toledo. Unfortunately, it was another cold and rainy weekend, but we still had a good time…

The first stop in Toledo was our hostel, where we ended up hanging out and lounging for a few hours. When we finally left we met up with Elisa, a friend of a friend who is from Villarrobledo but studying in Toledo right now. She was awesome and showed us around to a bunch of tapas places and bars. We ended the night at a place called Circulo de Arte, which is a former church now converted into a small concert venue/club.

Saturday we spent more time walking around the city. Toledo is one of those places where you can just wander and every few minutes you stumble across a beautiful building, church, synagogue, whatever. It’s full of narrow, windy streets and lots of hills. (Free exercise while sightseeing, always a bonus!) We also visited the El Greco museum, which started off a little slow but eventually became interested with his paintings being held in the last 1/4 of the visit.

Mellany, me and Kayla at tapas

Saturday night included more tapa-hopping and more rain.
There was one dish in particular that we couldn’t get enough of. It’s called “La Bomba” = the bomb. It’s a ball of mashed potatoes filled with some spicy-ish meat in the middle then deep fried and served with brava sauce. I had had a very similar tapa in Galicia when I visited my friend Julie there last February and I loved it as much this time. Now I just need to find somewhere in Villarrobledo that makes it…

We wrapped up our weekend with more walking around in the rain and a visit to a torture museum – ouch. Before we got on the bus to go back to Madrid (the to Villa) Kayla and I bought some manchego cheese and bread as a snack for the ride home… this sounds lame since I had just visited a beautiful medieval city, but that was one of my favorite things about the weekend… sometimes it’s the small things, right? Or just food. I’m not sure.

In the beginning of November I finally left Villarrobledo! For somewhere other than Albacete! Woo!

On Friday morning (November 4) I took the train to Madrid, which is only about two hours from Villarrobledo. First I met up with my friend Ashley, who I met during my year in Huelva. She is from Wisconsin and is back doing the program again this year as well, and her placement is in Madrid. We spent a rainy Friday shopping and relaxing a little bit. And Ashley was super sweet and threw me a mini birthday party since we have never celebrated my birthday together. After a night out at a crazy tapas bar and a few other spots around the city we came home early by Spanish standards (4:30am).

Ally, Julia, and me

On Saturday Ashley and I went to 100 Montaditos, one of my favorite eateries in Spain. They have 100 different small sandwiches (montaditos) so you can pick a few different ones, makes for a tasty, tasty lunch mmmmmmm. In the evening I went to meet my cousin Alyson. We maintained our tradition of meeting up on the first weekend of November every year (catch up on previous trips here).

There was a small mix-up when I initially tried to find Ally’s hotel, which resulted in me knocking on a random person’s door in the wrong hotel. Luckily, no one was there to answer! After I finally found her, Ally and I went to dinner at the same paella place we had visited the first time we were in Madrid together.

On Sunday we met up with Julia, a cousin of Ally’s husband Alex. She is studying this fall semester in Madrid. We ate at 100 Montaditos for lunch (yes, that makes it twice in one weekend for me. And, no, that’s not excessive).  We finished up our day with a little shopping and churros with chocolate, more mmmmmm! The unfortunately it was time for me to take the train back to Villarrobledo…

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Fast-forwarding a month to the beginning of December, I was back in Madrid to meet up with some other old friends, one of my roommates from Mary Washington, Kristen, and her fiance Jamie. They were in Spain for a week-long trip in which they visited Barcelona and Madrid.

Friday evening we hit up Plaza Mayor, the main plaza in Madrid. I have never seen it so crowded! Granted that doesn’t mean much coming from me since I’ve only been to Madrid four times before. But we were there on a holiday weekend (Thursday was a national holiday so many people had off Friday) and shortly before Christmas so it’s no surprise that it was packed. We also returned to the crazy tapas bar I had visited with Ashley (I had to give them an authentic Spanish tapas experience). Then we walked around and took pictures of Christmas lights before calling it a night.

On Saturday our first stop was for tostada and cafe con leche for breakfast before heading to the Prado museum. For lunch we feasted on paella, jamón, cheese, empanadas and sweets at a the San Miguel market. The main event for the rest of the day was El Clásico – the soccer match-up between Real Madrid and Barcelona FC. Jamie is a huge soccer fan so he was pumped to learn that El Clásico was being played in Madrid while they would be here.

He ordered a ticket online (for a pretty penny) and had it sent to the hotel because there wasn’t enough time for it to go the US. But there was a small scare when the package was conveniently “lost” when he got to the hotel. The manager of the hotel handled it though and got him a replacement ticket, phew. So at night Kristen and I escorted Jamie to the stadium. Unfortunately, it was a cold and rainy night so the atmosphere outside the stadium wasn’t as fun as it could’ve been. And I was wearing my Barcelona gear so I was a bit wary, but it was fine, no hooligans harassing me or anything.  Kristen and I watched the game from a bar near the hotel and it was so much fun. It was an awesome atmosphere – the place was packed with people watching the game, and there were even a few other Barca fans!

To wrap up my time with them on Sunday we visited the Palacio Real, the palace of Spain’s royal family. It was  pretty impressive, I had never been inside it before. Then once again, I had to catch the train back to Villa… two great weekends, neither one long enough…

I’m thankful for…

Maria and I in Almonaster La Real (Huelva)

1. Having good luck with my roommates. I don’t want to jinx the rest of my year here or anything, but I feel very fortunate to have had awesome roommates so far.

The first year in Huelva there was Maria. She was from the area so she knew a lot about the city and never hesitated to give me tips about where to go and what to do. It also helped immensely that she herself had lived abroad in Ireland and Germany so not only did she understand what it’s like to be living in a foreign country, but she also spoke English so she could help answer my questions easily. When we watched TV together (which was usually every afternoon while we ate lunch) she always explained things to me that I didn’t know or understand. Basically, she was an invaluable resource and friend.

I remember the very first night I had moved into the apartment. I hadn’t had the opportunity to grocery shop yet so at about 9:30pm when I had settled in I decided to go to the store to get something to cook. I figured since the Spanish ate dinner really late the grocery stores would be open late, too. But as I was walking down the street I ran into Maria, who was on her way home. I said I was going to the store and she told me it was already closed. “Do you like pasta?” were the next words out of her mouth. “Claro que sí, soy italiana” I probably responded. We went back to the flat where she whipped up some delicious pasta with veggies and we shared our first of many meals together. I was super lucky to have her as my roommate that year, and I will forever be thankful for that experience of living with her.

Last year in Karlovy Vary was Jess. I could elaborate a lot on our friendship, but mostly I will say that we both felt incredibly lucky to randomly be hired by the same company in the same town. We were super lucky that we had so much in common: running, cooking, eating, traveling, Czech beer, to name a few. It made my year living in a place where I didn’t speak the language and many people didn’t speak my language far more fun and less isolating than it could have been.

For the first few months we were really each other’s only friend in KV. Sure, there were our colleagues from work who I would definitely consider our friends, but they all had families and kids to occupy them most of the time. Eventually by the Spring we had made a few other friends, but those first few months would have been quite painful if I hadn’t had Jess. It was hard to leave at the end of the year because we were having so much fun, but I know that we will stay in touch. And I’m looking forward to visiting KV this year because Jess is back there teaching for another year!

And finally, this year I have two awesome Spanish roommates, Nagore and Eduardo. Though sadly I have no pictures of us together. The only picture I do have is of this note I found outside my bedroom door on the morning of Thanksgiving. My roommate Eduardo left me a note because the night before we were just talking about the holiday and how it’s such a big deal in America. Waking up to a small thing like that made it a little easier being away from home on Thanksgiving.

Nagore and Eduardo are both patient with me (well, with my Spanish) and very sweet and welcoming, always offering me food and whatever in the house. Neither one of them is from Villarrobledo, so whenever they aren’t working they go home to their respective towns – both of which I vow to visit in the Spring!

2. Skype. Facebook. Gmail/gchat/gvideo. Duh.

3. Digitial cameras. I can’t imagine all my photo-taking having to be processed from rolls of film…

4. “On Demand” in-flight entertainment systems that most (not all!) airlines have now. It makes an 8-hour cross-continental flight go by that much faster.

5. Living in walkable cities. Not having a car over here makes things a little annoying sometimes, but I’m grateful that all three places I’ve lived since moving to Europe have been easy to get around on by foot. It also really helps you to discover a place and burns more calories – toma!

6. Spanish food and Czech beer. Don’t think I need to say more there.

7. Last, but certainly not least, all of the super hospitable and helpful people I’ve met since moving abroad. I’m afraid to list them by name lest I leave someone out, but I want to say that I am so thankful that I have met so many friendly people in my time in Europe. These include my coworkers, neighbors, students, parents of my students, and other friends. People who have opened their homes to me, shared their culture with me, invited me to meals, given me rides to the airport, taken me to the doctor, I could go on… sometimes it’s hard thinking about all of my great family and friends in the US who are so far away from me, but meeting such friendly people here makes it easier and enjoyable to live abroad. This reminds me of a poignant, if sad, quotation I saw not too long ago that I will leave you with:

You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place. -Miriam Adeney

Happy Thanksgiving!

It was funny because I didn’t know that I was getting a bottle with a pop-up spout when I bought it… bonus!

I first met the new roommate (his name is Eduardo) very very briefly when he came to look at the apartment, but more than a week passed before we were told he’d be moving in. We had holidays on Monday and Tuesday (Halloween and All Saint’s Day), and our landlord told us he would come Monday night or Tuesday. So on Monday we cleaned the apartment in preparation for the move-in and we waited… and waited… he didn’t come. Not Monday night, nor Tuesday. So Wednesday we were back to work and business as usual.

And business as usual that day happened to be that my roommate Nagore was hosting a tupperware-type party for her colleagues from the hospital, except that the items for sale were not of the tupperware variety… they were a bit more delicate. As in sex toys delicate. So to begin with, the situation in itself was hilarious; just me being there with 20 or so Spanish women (all of whom were older than Nagore and I) and listening to them react to all the stuff was super funny. That would have been enough entertainment for me. (And I picked up a bit of new vocabulary, heyo!)

But to make things even more interesting, guess who showed up in the middle of the party to move into his new room??? Yes, that’s right, Eduardo the new roomie! It was hilarious! To make it even worse, his bedroom is off the living room where we were all sitting. We offered to make a path so he could move stuff in, and he was like “no it’s alright, I’ll just leave the stuff in the front hall and come back later.” Nothing says welcome to your new flat like 20 women gawking and gaggling at sex toys. I have no doubt that at that moment he regretted choosing this apartment with two female roommates… oh well, we’ll see how things evolve…

And a few more Halloween photos from Friday:

little preschooler pumpkins

some scary witches and me

ghosts!

me (black swan) and Juani (ghostbuster!)

Trick or Treat, amigos!

This year I’m working at a primary school, C.E.I.P. Graciano Atieza. Here in Spain the primary school usually includes preschool, too, so the age range is from three years old to twelve years old, oof! My school has about 450 students, two classes for each grade. And I have the pleasure of working with all of them, double oof!

My schedule is alternating so that one week I work with certain classes, and the next week I work with others. It’s great that all of the students have the opportunity to have me in their classes, however it makes it hard to get in a rhythm, plan activities, and to get to know the students when you only see each class once every two weeks. But the teachers are great, and many of them have a pretty good level of English. And the kids are really cute and sweet … but crazy! Totally crazy! They will definitely be a handful this year…

I had already commented on facebook (those of you on there may have already seen it) that I was enjoying watching Sex and the City, Friends, Beverly Hills 90210, and Modern Family on Spanish television (with Spanish subtitles, helps me immensely to understand exactly what they’re saying).

I also love watching movies (especially ones that I’ve already seen) on Spanish television. Last time I was in Huelva I remember watching Love Actually, Cape Fear (I will always remember that the word for lawyer is “abogado”), and Twilight. And this year so far I’ve already watched

• Sabrina (the original one)
• The Wedding Date/El Día de la Boda
• The Goonies
• one of the Harry Potters (not familiar enough with the series to know which one it was)
• Parent Trap 2/Tu a Boston y Yo a California (also the original with Haley Mills)
• Six Days and Seven Nights/Seis Días y Siete Noches (claro)
• King Ralph
• The River Wild/El Rio Salvaje

Can’t wait to see what other gems will be on the tele!

Last night my friend Kayla and I went to the hotel in the main plaza because we had heard that there was a language exchange night on Thursdays where people get together and practice their English (and English speakers can practice their Spanish). So we showed up around 10, and no one was there. The bartender told us no one had arrived yet but we could wait at the bar. So we did … for over an hour and no one came. The bartender definitely felt bad for us and gave us each a free lighter (which was a freebee from one of the cigarette companies, let’s not kid ourselves here) as we were leaving–it even came in its own box! Fanciest (and only) lighter I’ve ever owned! wooo!

Anyways, from there we decided to stop at one more bar and have a drink because we were already out. As we walked into the bar we saw a guy we had met on Saturday, a friend of our friend Jess, with whom we had been out with that night (she is the American who is married to a guy from here and owns the English academy). He had been really friendly and talked to us a bunch on Saturday night so he definitely remembered us when we walked in and was like “oh hola chicas, come meet my friends.”  (He said it in Spanish though, as he doesn’t speak much English.) So we met his friends that he was out with, who were all very nice people. And of course they all know people that I work with, or they attended the primary school where I’m working, etc.

In the same small bar there was also a group of three guys who were supposed to be at (well, more accurately were supposed to be running) the language exchange at the hotel. They didn’t think anyone else was coming so they decided to go to a different bar instead. So in the end we did meet the language exchange group and talked to them for a while and made plans to get together the following Thursday…

Like I said, I’m sure one day I will tire of this pueblo atmosphere where you always run into people you know or friends of friends, but for now I am totally content with it!

¡Hasta pronto amigos!