At least she didn't ask me how to spell Eyjafjallajökull....

Today in one of my classes the teacher asked me to write the countries and capitals on the board in English, as she said them to the class in Spanish.
So.
This assumes that 1) I know all the European countries and their capitals in English and 2) I know the translation of all the countries and their capitals from Spanish to English.

Are you kidding me? I didn't want to be the ignorant American and confess that we actually never learned all the European countries and their capitals in school. BUT. Even if we had, it would have been at least 10 years ago in middle school, so forgive me if I'd have forgotten a few. Hmph.

Here's a little taste of how the hour went..

• Tallin, Estonia -> Tallinn, Estonia
• Vilna, Lituania -> Vilnius, Lithuania
• Skopje, Macedonia -> Skopje, Macedonia 
• La Valletta, Malta -> Valletta, Malta
• Liubliana, Eslovanía -> Ljubljana, Slovania 
• Minsk, Bielorrusia -> Minsk, Belarus

And my personal favorite...

• Reikiavik, Islandia -> Reykjavik, Iceland (Yeah...try thinking of that off the top of your head.) 

Disclaimer: I didn't know any of these, I had to look them up when I got home. But really, can you blame me for not knowing them? 

Emma - 3. Lesson plans attempting to ruin my social life - 0.

4 words you don't want to hear late at night when you have to be up early in the morning: "We're out of gas." Aka if you want to take a shower have fun doing the cold water dance.

And it was fun. And cold. And I hopped around a bit trying to avoid letting the icy cold water touch me anywhere than the bottom section of my hair. (Definitely gonna have to take another shower asap as soon as la bombona gets here tomorrow.)

It's moments like those when I really reflect on the fact that I am in a totally different country. I mean, the only time the hot water went out at my house was when my Dad decided to "fix" the water heater and forgot to tell anyone. Love you Dad!

But today was such a great day that not even an icy shower could ruin my mood!
Today I....

• Successfully ran my first ever lesson plan in front of a class. It was for third-level, their biology class, and it was about the health problems associated with McDonalds. It sounds lame, I know, but I managed to tie it in really well with what they were talking about in class (saturated/unsaturated fats, healthy diets, etc.) and the kids looked like the had a lot of fun.
• Thenn, I followed up that with teaching my second ever lesson plan. This time it was for the second-level English class, which also went well. I felt really bad at the end though, cause I had told them to draw the best jack-o-lantern they could and 2 winners would get a chocolate bar. I never realized how hard it is to pick only 2 winners when the whole class is staring up at you with puppy dog faces. I felt so mean...
• And thennnnnnn, last thing I swear, I had my first private lesson with 2 little kids, Paula and Miguel. Miguel is 5 and Paula is 6 and they are adorable! They would ramble away in Spanish and somehow I would understand exactly what they said and respond in English, and somehow they always got what I was saying.  We had been coloring for a few minutes when Miguel jumped off the chair, looked me and said "coloring is really boring, just so you know." Thanks Miguel, I'll make sure to remember that. So then I made them paper airplanes and they used each other for target practice. I taught Paula how to say "Airplane 2 Miguel 0!" SUCCESS.

Everyday I get more and more respect for the teachers I've had through the years. This is hard work! Trying to talk over a class of 25 13 year olds? Impossible. Especially for me because my voice does. not. carry. Thankfully a couple of kids in the first row (thank you George, Beatriz and Alberto) would laugh at me when they saw me attempt to talk above the noise and would loudly yell at everyone to shut up. Worked every time :)

Here's some funny moments I've had in the past few weeks of "being a teacher"...

• One of the teachers I have conversation class with me insisted that in British English it's right to say "I'm going for hike" or "I'm going for walk", not "I'm going for a hike". Can anybody back that up?
• That same teacher kept saying "moto-cycle", forgetting the /r/, no matter how many times I repeated it for her. Super funny.
• 2 second-level students gave a mini-presentation on the origins of Halloween--and apparently it was created in America. Haha :) If you're interested in the true origin of Halloween, click here.

I'm starting to really love my job. It's not that I was expecting to hate it, but I hadn't really thought of the whole job aspect of moving to Spain, I was a little more focused on the "moving to Spain and traveling" part. So CHEERS to everything starting to work out and me realizing that I actually have the capacity to teach&explain things, which I never in a million years thought I could do.

Morrisons. Aisles & Aisles of Deliciousness.

Today at Morrisons (a British grocery store) I literally cleared out their Starbursts display. I am proud of this. Granted, there were only 5 bags on display, but still!

I love Morrisons. And because of that, I love living in Algeciras just a little bit more. I mean, where else in Spain can you jump on a bus, and 30 minutes later be happily looking through aisles and aisles of american-ness deliciousness?
What's that?
You mean, you don't know anywhere else? Exactly! Granada might have the La Alhambra, Barcelona might have La Sagrada Familia, but Algeciras has Gibraltar a mere 30 minutes away, and Gibraltar has American Food!

You might be thinking I'm over reacting just a tad....but if you've been living in Spain for the last month and been making do with UTH milk, had a craving for bagels and cream cheese but been unable to satisfy it, or been to a candy store and wanted something delicious but didn't recognize anything, than you should be able to understand my excitement.

(By the way, for anyone who isn't a fan of UTH milk, try the GOAT MILK. It has a much milder taste here than back in the states, and I like it 10x better. Try it and let me know what you think!)

"You look better in person"

In case you were wondering, my spanish students are very attentive. I said the f-word (yep..) accidently in what I thought was an under-my-breathe tone, but the whole class burst out laughing. Oops.

In that same class, that starts at 9:15, which is about 2 hours before I am even-semi awake and conscious, the English teacher told me I was UNPHOTOGENIC.  How did this happen, you might be wondering?

Well.

As I was so nicely presenting her class a power point about myself&where I come from, I pointed myself out in some of the pictures of me in a group of friends. The entire class + teacher said "that's you??? No way!! Really?" (I wasn't wearing my glasses in those pictures.)

I laughed and said yup, really. And that's when the teacher said it.
"You look so different in person, much better, much more beautiful. How do you say...when someone doesn't look good in photographs? ...Unphotogenic! Yes that's it, you're very unphotogenic. You look better in person."

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Thanks. What?
I'm just going to say that was one of those spanish/english confusion moments, just like I have all the time. But still, she speaks very good English, so how she messed up that badly is beyond me. Maybe that's exactly how she meant it, but thought that I would take it well. I'm not sure.

In that same class I also demonstrated my complete lack of knowledge of American actors/actresses and famous people. EMBARRASSING!
All the kids had written mini-biographies of famous Americans and then I had to guess who they were. Look, I'm sorry that I couldn't think of Benjamin Franklin off the top of my head when you asked who created the lightening rod. Aaaaand I'm sorry I have no idea who that actress from Disney Channel is.  Give me a break, I haven't taken history class since high school, and I don't watch the Disney Channel (on a regular basis).

It's been a rough day.

Update: But I don't want to end this on a completely depressing note...
After I wrote this I went to my second class and 2 kids gave me presents! They looked like our plastic coil keychain thingies that we have back home, so when a kid came up and said "this is for you" I think I gave him a strange look. It wasn't until a girl took one off her wrist and said "here you go" and Carmen, the teacher, commented that everybody is wearing those bracelets, that I put 2 and 2 together.
Yay :)

And thennnnnnn, I went to meet a woman who wants classes for her 6 year old daughter, and now I have 2 hours a week set up with 2 kids, and I'm about to set up another 2 hours a week with 2 more kids. None of whom speak English, so I'm getting paid to talk to myself and play games with them :) Best. Job. Ever.

The things I learned from a foreigner today :)

So, Eli and I went out for coffee this afternoon and then back to her house to make "lunch" at 5pm. I guess I can say that I am now officially on the spanish eating schedule... Fantastic! Anyway, as we were walking up the sidewalk to her house, up walked Aram, our Mexican friend. It was literally like we had planned it, yet we were all surprised to see each other. 

Important note: Aram is here looking for work and just kind of drifts around all day doing whatever he wants, so the chances of running into him like that were pretty freaking small. Actually, he drifts around all day collecting things from the dumpsters behind stores like El Corte Inglés.
This might sound sketch, but he's been making bank off of this! Today he'd found a navy blue peacoat with no rips, no stains, absolutely nothing wrong with it, and m.a.g.i.c.a.l.l.y, it was just my size :) He tried to tell me that I could buy it for 1euro, which I said was ridiculous. A good jacket like this can easily cost up to 150euro! We agreed on 20. So...that's how my afternoon went, how was yours? :)

He is honestly one of the most interesting people I know. He studied anthropology for a while in school, and is just full of all this completely random information. He told me today, (this has nothing to do with anthropology, it's just interesting) that The World Islands off the coast of Dubai are sinking.
He travelled around Morocco for 6 months, he's been to Dubai, all over the states, lives in Mexico and now he's bumming it Spain trying to find work in Gibraltar. Pretty cool guy.

Anyway.
Sorry to get sidetracked.
Here are some of the things I learned from this Mexican today:

• People who are color-blind are generally passive, happy, laid-back people. If you know me well...you might understand why I laughed as I thought about this. 

• Chupito (spain spanish) = shot of alcohol        chupito (mexican spanish) = a drunk old man

I was telling a story about how I had to take a shot (chupito) or warm tequila, but halfway through my sentence they both started laughing. Apparently because they had no idea why I was talking about taking a drunk old man. Fair enough, I would laugh too if someone told me that.

• Eli and I are horrible people for laughing so hard we cried while watching this video...

• But it's perfectly acceptable to laugh at this one.

These videos just don't get less funny, no matter how many times I see them!

• I also learned, as you read above, that if I can't find a decent job when I go back to the states I can always dumpster dive for extra cash. Not...that I would...but it's good to know there's an option.

• Tequila + milk + chocolate sauce = delicious? I beg to differ.

The most important part of this little story was when he told us that mothers give this to their babies when they're teething...I guess that's one way to shut them up, get them a little tipsy! Haha :)

• And then I learned from Eli that in Mexico they make a stew from the meat off a cow's face. Wow, eww.

So there you go, all the useless albeit super interesting info I learned today. Don't you feel wiser now?

What's been happenin' lately.

I single handedly started a class wide argument in social sciences, after I attempted to teach them a new game. Everyone was yelling at each other about how "you didn't win!! She did the points wrong!" Oh, that's nice, blame it on the new assistant when you're the one playing a game you don't understand. Thanks.

Went to Gibraltar for a couple hours on Saturday with Kristina, my british roommate. She forgot her passport the first time because she was so excited to go "home", she hadn't even realized she would need a passport to leave one country and enter another. Then she started cracking up as she saw the british flag and the customs sign, and commented that walking into Gibraltar felt exactly like going back to London. Cold and depressing. (There is a PERPETUAL RAIN CLOUD over the rock, I don't understand why. All of Algeciras and the coast was clear, warm and sunny, but once we crossed into Gibraltar it was windy and cold and cloudy.)

Went out Friday night with a giant group of Spaniards. (One of them was a "student" of Eli's and the rest were all his friends.) Quite the experience. Getting one Spaniard to do anything at a reasonable pace is quite the challenge, much less a giant group. We had dinner at 11:30 at night...yup. That was definitely a first for me!

Made dinner (fish tacos yum!) at Christine and Xabi's on Saturday, and then went to the bars at 2. Another first!

Explaining to the spaniard english idioms like "cutting a rug" and "that's what she said".

Then we were looking on youtube for the BICHO video, where a drunk spanish guy comes home (luckily his roommates film it) and tells them how he asked a girl on a date and she said "no, eres un bicho raro!" (Which means more or less "no, you're a disgusting creature" ish, not really sure how to translate that.) And then he starts saying "she couldn't have just said no, I'm busy, or no thank you, she had to say eres un bicho raro! That's not necessary!" Does anybody remember this video? Or know how to find it?

• Update: So I have a terrible memory, which explains why I never found it. The video is "contigo no bicho", look it up on youtube if you're interested, very funny!

Xabi trying to explain to us why Larkin was so drunk, but we were still completely sober - "I'm not segregating... but she had like 15 drinks." Me-"Um what?"  Christine-"You mean, I don't want to exaggerate." I'm sure glad she could translate what he meant, cause I had no idea.

There was a c.r.e.e.p.y. spaniard standing behind me and breathing on my neck. And at one point he made a snorting sound near my ear. And then throughout the night if I made the mistake of looking in his direction he would raise both hands in a rock and roll fist pump stance and wait for me to do it back. Yeah...not gonna happen buddy.

We were out until 4am, which I realize for Spain is still quite early, but I was just fine with calling it a night.

The Day I Wore My Workout Clothes in Public..[[& other things]]

For the most part, I tend to stumble across other auxiliar's blogs who have starting lines like "I'm sorry I haven't posted anything for the last 3 weeks, here's a 5 page run-down of what's been happening lately." And we all know how much fun those are to read.
So for this reason, I am not at all sorry that I blog incessantly. I accept it, embrace it, and cross my fingers that you embrace it too.

Anyway. On to the reason I actually decided to blog in the first place. 


Today I had one of those moments that remind me WHY I LOVE TO TRAVEL. Because this morning, after I sprinted from Gibraltar center to La Línea bus station in record time only to find out that the next bus didn't leave for half an hour, consequently meaning that I missed my train in Algeciras by 5 minutes to go on a hike with a group of auxiliars, I was having a hard time remembering why I had moved halfway around the world where I, A) knew absolutely no one and B) was now going to be sitting around my apartment all day feeling sorry for myself because I didn't have any friends.

(And let me just say, that in Spain, wearing workout clothes and tennis shoes in public warrants you a lot of stares. And cat calls. So then wearing workout clothes and racing through the city center with a purse in one hand and a cell phone in the other, warrants you about 5 times the number of stares. Okay, I understand the second part, but what is so strange about wearing nike shorts and tennis shoes??? Spanish girls wear a lot less clothing than that.)

Thankfully Eli called and knocked me out of my stupor, and we walked through downtown taking pictures. We were headed in the direction of ice cream (which I still consider a major food group) we passed a Moroccan-looking guy who called out "Americanas eh?" Yes, very clever, I thought, you can spot us a mile away because we clearly do not fit in here. Way to point it out.

We mumbled something in his general direction and kept walking. Then he said "do you work here?" Now I was intrigued, because la gente in Algeciras usually absolutely never strike up a conversation with strangers on the street. So we turned around.

Within the next 20 minutes we learned that he is Mexican, speaks nearly perfect English, is in Algeciras looking for a job, lived in Morocco for the last 6 months, yada yada yada. I could keep going, but the important part of this story is that he was Mexican. Remember this.

Eli and Aram connected instantly, since Aram is from Mexico and Eli is in love with everything Mexican after having studied there for a year and a half. Anyway, 20 minutes later, we invite him to come get helado with us. And then we sat and talked for the next hour and a half. And he single handedly convinced me that I need to visit Mexico asap. He was so friendly! A Spaniard will rarely call out to you on the street just to say hi, unless he is calling out "ehh guapa, venga aqui!" or something equally uninviting. I want to experience this strange Mexican culture where people are inviting and friendly, even though you might be a total stranger.

(Side note: I'm well aware that not of all of Spain is like this. The people of Algeciras are, after all, nicknamed Los Especiales. And Algeciras is not known to be an especially inviting or enjoyable city.)

It was just so refreshing to meet a stranger on the street, have a great conversation, and then walk away knowing you might not see him again, but that you just had a fantastic time, regardless. THIS IS WHY I TRAVEL. This is why I put myself out there, in the hopes that I can make friends from around the world and broaden my horizons and perspectives. I just need to keep this in the back of my head on all those days where I'm holed up in my apartment feeling sorry for myself.

Teachers were right...the kids really do make it all worth it.

So this morning, as I attempted to take a new route to school, I wound up getting ridiculously lost. I took bus #3 instead of #5, thinking that #3 had a drop off spot closer to my school. It didn't. 
Instead, the bus driver kicked me off the bus at the end of the route in to the middle of a very unfamiliar neighborhood, complete with dusty streets and abandoned lots and the sun beating down on the pavement.

This was at 12:15. I was feeling slightly hysterical as I walked down the road, and I texted my bilingual coordinator that I was sorry, but I was going to be late to my first class. I was lost in the middle of god-knows-where but that I would make it to school when I could. She texted me back "okay...but class doesn't start until 12:45 you know."

Fantastic. I had originally taken this bus instead since it left on the hour instead of a quarter after, and I had to be at work at 12:15. Or so I thought. Damn it. So now I was just ridiculously lost for no good reason. That made me feel so much better. Not.

I got back on the same bus, complete with the same driver who had kicked me off 20 minutes earlier. Yes, he noticed, and yes, he laughed at me. Since I couldn't stand the thought of going all the way back to the center, I jumped off at a random stop on the way back and hoped I could randomly stumble in the general direction of my school.

Luckily I was able to head straight in the direction of the Bay and run right into the school. And then the students ERUPTED into excited cheers and claps when I finally stumbled into class, only 10 minutes late. That made it all worth it.

What made it not so worth it was how I spent the next 2 hours attempting to translate spanish math vocabulary into the english vocabulary I had learned back in middle school. Truncamiento = truncate, redondado = rounded, etc. (right? Hopefully I'm not teaching an entire class of 14 year olds the wrong vocabulary.) The result? Me realizing I had basically no idea how to do 9th grade math. Fail.

The worst part (or best part for story telling purposes, depending on how you look at it) was when the teacher wrote a number on the board, gave me the white board marker, and asked me to explain in English how to solve the problem. Ummmmmm WHAT? I didn't even remember how to do the problem, much less explain it in english to a class that didn't speak it well. (The problem was doing those greatest common multiplier, least common divisor tree thingies. Know what I'm talking about? Yeah, don't worry, I had no idea either.)

On the plus side, all the kids in my classes are really awesome. Ester asked me last week where I had gotten a copy of the The Hunger Games, since I had told them that was my favorite book. Today she excitedly told me she borrowed a spanish copy from her friend and couldn't wait to read it. Other kids crowded around me after the bell rang, showing me things and asking questions. Every time I see one of them in the hallways they shout my name and make sure they say hi and bye. They might not be cute little 6 year olds, but they are definitely sweet and a blast to work with.

This is an amazing book if you haven't heard of it, it's part 1 of a trilogy. Read it!

And one of the boys is convinced I speak Spanish. So his PLAN OF ACTION is to ask me things in Spanish and wait for me to react. Luckily, he started doing this in the hallway before class started so it was super noisy and I really didn't have any idea what he was saying.

Then after school Eli and I went to her house and she made lunch. It's such a bonus to have friends who like to cook :)

Short Stories

Tuesday 10/4 - I did my first load of laundry today (yeah, I know, gross) and didn't realize that I had never washed the pair of neon yellow socks that had in my laundry basket. Consequently, all the white areas of my other clothes are now a light, pee-color, yellow. Lovely.

Thursday 10/6 - Apparently in Spain, although there are public dumpsters for trash/plastic and recycling located throughout the city, you are only allowed to use them between 9:00 and 10:30 at night. Which would explain why I thought it was weird when my roommate took out the trash late last night, and also why I got LINGERING STARES from a group of kids nearby as I had the audacity to throw away my bag of trash at 4pm.

Wednesday 10/12 - While Eli and I were talking to Aram, the Mexican guy, he mentioned something and used the word "stanked". And then looked at us for confirmation that we understood him. Ummm....no. No idea. He thought for a moment and then said "you know, like a puddle. A dirty puddle." Yup, cleared that right up. And then the light bulb went on in my head and I said "do you mean stagnant?" That's exactly what he meant and how I got that from "stanked", and "dirty puddle" I can't tell you. But it was just a little reminded of how we are all from such different worlds. 

No hablo español, I mean, I don't speak spanish!

When I walked into the teacher's lounge this morning I was greeted by one of the English teachers, Pilar, who said "so you have something prepared for class today?" Umm....no...was I supposed to? Shit. She then proceeded to tell me that it was totally "fine", and instead we would just be working on the simple present tense, and they would be finishing up their presentations from last week. And, if I had a sudden moment of inspiration could I come up with a game for them to play during class to help learn the tense. Yeah, I'll get right on that. 

I did eventually come up with a mini-competition game, but since the workbook made it seem like they were just learning this verb tense, the sentences I came up with were at a beginner level. So basically, the kids looked like geniuses when they had the right answer figured out before I even finished reading the example. And I looked like I had no idea what was going on. Great start for me. 

The day did have it's bright spots though. When I walked up the stairs to the English class, I was promptly bombarded by 2 girls, one on each side, demanding a picture and insisting that I not tell Pilar they had brought their phones to school. They said all this in Spanish, and I nodded because I had understood everything, but then I realized that I'm not supposed to know any Spanish. Oops. 

They already know that Eli lied to them about not knowing Spanish because some of them overheard her talking to the bilingual coordinator. So they're very doubtful that I don't speak it either. Whenever I hear them speak in English I have to purposely arrange my face into what I *hope* is a puzzled expression, like I have no idea what they're saying. It's a difficult charade to keep up.

Tomorrow Eli and I have our appointments to get our residency cards, so I don't have to be at the school until 1. 

And Wednesday is a holiday. 

And Friday starts my 3 day weekend. 

Good first week.

New Goal - Speak British

One of my original prerequisites for finding flat-mates was that I wanted them to be as international as possible. (Spanish, Italian, French, English, etc. Hopefully a combination of people from everywhere.) When I learned that I was placed in middle-of-nowhere Algeciras, I realized I might have to revise that prereq. a little bit. 
When I first moved into my piso, there were 2 spanish girls and 1 spanish guy. Living with 3 spaniards was great, don't get me wrong, but the INTENSITY of having to focus on listening to a foreign language all day every day made me really worn out.

But a few days after I moved in the guy moved out, and the extra room was taken by a girl from England! This has been fantastic so far, not only because I have someone to speak english with for once, but also because I get to have my inner-child pleased by listening to the English accent day in and day out. It's been wonderful (:

Last night Christina (my flatmate), Eli and I went out for tapas. Here are some of the new words I learned:

• fringe = bangs
• pissed = drunk (^ i knew both of these, but it was still fun to hear her say them)
• shopping trolley = little canvas bag on wheels that spaniards use to carry their groceries home
• spotty = zits, breaking out
• i'm not stressed = i'm not worried about it
• jumper = pants (i knew this too, but once again, my inner child was excited)

After talking with her last night and all day today I caught myself once or twice slipping into the accent a bit. How fantastic would it be if I came back from this year not only speaking spanish better, but also talking in a british accent? I'd call that a success!

Pretty sure experience should be required for this...

I finally have MY SCHEDULE in hand for the next year! It's not bad, it could be little better but it's not bad. (Actually, it's pretty spectacular, I'm just complaining since I hate mornings.)

The way the school works is a little confusing: There are 350 kids total, and of those kids, about 100 of them are in the school's bilingual program. There are 4 levels in this program, and each level has 1 class. For these 4 classes, all their subjects like math, biology, physics/chemistry, social sciences, and of course english, are taught by bilingual teachers and will have our help for the next year. Their "extra" classes like cooking, art and music are taught only in Spanish, and include the rest of the school. So Eli and I will be working with roughly 15 teachers and 100 students. Not bad.

Then it breaks down further when it comes to our schedules. Eli chose to work with the 1st and 4th levels, which means I have the 2nd and 3rd. I will be in each of the classes for my levels once a week. So for the days I have class sometimes I'll just be there helping, but other times I'll have to come up with my own lesson plan. 

My schedule turned out well, I work Monday-Thursday with my longest day starting at 9:15 and ending at 2:45. So not that strenuous. My shortest day, Thursday, I work from 9:15 o 12:45, with a tutoring session after that. I'm especially pleased about the Fridays off part, since we have 3 long weekends with Monday and Tuesday off, which means I'll have some 5 day weekends to go traveling!

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that everyday there is a half hour break at 11:15 when all the teachers go across the street to get coffee. I think I could get used to that lifestyle :)

I also volunteered to tutor a couple of the teachers during my breaks, so I'll be making extra money.

I really really hope this year turns out well, I'm starting to panic and wonder what I got myself into, since I've never had any experience teaching or doing private lessons, but I feel as though they expect me to know exactly what is going on. And I am completely lost. The application made it clear that only minimal levels of spanish were required and that absolutely no teaching experience was required, but I am wondering how on earth you would survive this job if you didn't speak spanish, and how I am supposed to survive with no experience in front of classroom. I feel totally and utterly unprepared for this, as I am sure a lot of others are probably feeling too. There seems to be a lack of communication between La Junta and las escuelas.

SO.

This should be interesting, wish me luck.

Short Story Time

Friday 9/23 - I told Emily I looked like a "boho". I meant hobo, but that's just how sleep-deprived I was after 30 hours of traveling to get to Granada. I didn't even realize I'd said it wrong.

Monday 9/26 - I wanted to get a fanta limón from a vending machine in my hostel, but I pressed the wrong buttons and got a can of beer instead. Who knew they sold beer in vending machines here?

Tuesday 9/27 - I started off my morning telling myself that jamón serrano (cured ham) isn't as bad as I remember it, and that I could totally have some for breakfast to start my day off right with some protein.
Then I spent 20 minutes trying to choke it down...Tear off little pieces and swallow them quickly, stuff whole pieces in my mouth and try not to taste it while I chew, eat it with toast, nothing worked.
All this while maintaining a face of composure for the Spaniards walking by who already thought I was weird because I clearly was not spanish.

Wednesday 9/28 - I ran into the RESIDENT CRAZY MAN not once, not twice, but FOUR times in the same day. Apparently he walks around the city, finding random benches to sit on and yelling at the invisible people who won't leave him alone.
The last time I saw him he was walking through a plaza, waving his hands in the air as if describing a story, and talking very loudly. Then he stopped, made a motion as if he was tossing something away, and then started laughing a loud, manical sounding laugh. It was haunting.
Nobody else looked alarmed, so apparently this must be a common occurrence?

Friday 9/30 - Little victories, like completing a conversation with a spanish roommate and adding my first spanish friend on facebook (Carlos), make my night so much better! I know that's not really a story, but it is a landmark and deserves to be commemorated.

Cadiz, Jerez and Orientation Day.

The Spaniards sure aren't timely in anything they do, but at least they get around to it eventually. After a week and a half of living in Spain with out a clue about how to get my residency card, how was I was going to get paid for this "job" I had apparently moved here for, or really, without any idea about what I was actually going to be doing for the next 9 months, the Ministry of Education finally decided that it might be a good time to get together for a little chat.

Orientation was 4 hours long, about 3 hours longer than necessary. But all in all, there was some solid information thrown in. I learned that I technically already have a NIE number, since I am here under the government's protection, but I still have to go through the ridiculous paperwork and time to actually get the number in my possession. FABULOUS.
The guy who was telling us this also told us in a conversational tone that the paperwork necessary and how strict the process is will also completely depend on the worker that you talk to. Hence, some people fly through the process with no trouble, and other people get migraines trying to get everything done. You know Spain, you're really backwards about somethings.

I also learned that there is a 3rd auxiliar in Algeciras! Unfortunately I couldn't see who was talking, and so I have no idea who it is. But I will keep my eyes and ears peeled for another American.

Anyway, enough about orientation. I ALSO spent the 2 days "sightseeing" in Cadiz and Jerez. I put sightseeing in quotation marks, because I was mostly too depressed to sightsee by myself, and my feet hurt. So a majority of my Sunday in Cadiz was spent feeling sorry for myself in my hostel with the excuse that my feet hurt too much to walk anymore. And then Monday in Jerez was spent the same way, with me reading 150/170 pages of The Hunger Games, which I managed to find for free online.

(On Monday though I actually was depressed, since I got to La Real Escuela de Arte Ecuestre 15 minutes (!!!) after the last entrance time. I then proceeded to walk the whole way around the school, peering in through gates to take pictures, and just generally being the creepiest tourist I could possibly be. Then I shopped away my sadness for the next 2 hours and spent the night curled up with my computer, cursing my throbbing feet. It was fun. I highly recommend traveling alone. NOT.)

However I did see some cool things, and I had a WOW moment in Cadiz, so at least it wasn't a complete waste. (A WOW moment is that moment when you're traveling and it hits you, just how spectacular or beautiful or amazing it is. Whatever it may be.)
In my case, it was "Wow, I am standing in front of the Castle of San Sebastián, a quarter of a mile at at sea, at night, with the wind whipping through my hair and the waves crashing on the rocks below. It was a surreal experience, and of course i had decided to leave my camera in the hostel since I wouldn't be needing it. Of course.

This is a bad picture since you can't really see the castle, but the bridge leads out about a quarter mile from the mainland to the castle. At low tide you can walk all the way out to the castle, but at high tide locals like to use the bridge as a jumping point to go swimming.

Amigos, Españoles y Americanas. Finalmente

I have friends, I have friends, I have friends! La de da de da!
Don't judge me, you try moving halfway around the world without knowing a soul and then try not to act excited when you finally realize you have people to talk to again.

That was my biggest fear moving here was that I would spend all my friday nights in my room watching tv shows on ch131.com.

But nope. Eli (the other auxiliar), Christine (the other american expat) and her novio Xabi (read: Shavi. diminutive of Xavier I believe?) and I went out for tapas and drinks.

Here's some of the highlights of the first of many great nights to come.

Me explaining to Eli that the Granada fútbol jerseys looked like Wally from Where's Wally.
Get it? Yeah, not so much.
Well, Xavi got it right away because apparently that's what he's called in Spain.
Christine reminded me that in America, it's called Where's Waldo.
Oops.

Xabi explaining his experiences at the Seattle Seahawks football game. "The game was starting and people were still outside drinking, not caring at all. We walked into the stadium and the Seahawks were winning 10-0....What?" He was also very excited that he got to wave the finger (the #1 foam hand thing) around like a crazy person.

Me-"So people have lived in this area for thousands of years but in the 17th century the whole city was demolished and then rebuilt."
Christine-"Well they should DEMOLISH it again. Cause they did a terrible job."
(Christine and Xabi are very adamant that Algeciras is an ugly city. Which it is. I told you so.)

Explaining what party foul means to Xabi -- "una falta de fiesta"

Telling Cris, my spanish roommate, that in the U.S., spanish time is a very popular and well-used phrase. She really thought that was awesome.

We had the most epic spanglish/spanish/english conversations going.

Listening to "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" in the most back alley bar I've ever been in, while drinking kalimotxo (half red wine/half coca cola), and having flashes of Bryant & mi novio breaking it down at house parties. (I miss you guys by the way, you'll have to do another rendition of that when I finally make it back in June!)

Ha! Take That Rick Steves!

Finally, someone who has something decent to say about Algeciras. This is literally the first website I've found that mentions anything worthwhile about staying here, besides this blogger who has been living here for the past two years.
So with that for an introduction, read away to find out all the reasons Algeciras is worth a visit!