Fun Weekend Behind, Long Days Ahead

Well, I had a wonderful weekend. Most of the time was spent just relaxing with friends. On Saturday night, Anja and I spent hours just sitting in the city center in San Lorenzo just watching people and practicing my Spanish.  It really exciting to watch people who are so different from me and what I know. The mannerisms, the conversations it's so different. There's this strange feeling that everyone is so different, but somehow we're all people and still somewhat the same. On Sunday, Anja and I spent the day in Madrid shopping.  We were a bit worried when we got there because it was 11:00am and all the shopping stores were still closed.  After walking around and going in a random store here or there that was open, around noon all the stores opened. Quite strange for me, but apparently it's normal for Spain. I got tons of great deals, and I had a lot of fun showing Anja how to bargain shop.  Madrid is really a beautiful city, and it's so huge. I love being there and watching the people and being in the hustle-and-bustle of the city.  I'm really looking forward to being able to go to museums and learn a bit about the history of the city.

This week, I have to take a class in Madrid.  It's because of my job at the school. The program is set up on student visas so with a 20% unemployment rate in Spain right now we need to be fulfilling our claims of being students along with working so we're required to take this class. I lucked out by being allowed to take this one week long intensive course then I will go one Monday each month to Madrid for an evening class. The other option was to have to go every Monday which is extremely inconvenient for me and the family I work for.  So far, I've really disliked this class. These adult teachers are probably the most rude, argumentative people I've ever had opportunity to be in class with. They didn't listen or participate and were constantly being rude and telling the whole world their thoughts on something that everyone was otherwise perfect not knowing.  Anyways, after being in the class from 3-9 it's a bit exhausting.  I don't really have much time in the day right now. I wake up and immediately go to school, then to Madrid, then to bed.  I think, after this week, things will fall more into a steady pace and they won't be quite so new and overwhelming.

One quite unfortunate thing that is happening though is that Anja is with a family whose mother is extremely difficult to work with. She gets yelled at a lot for really stupid stuff, and even if it was legitimate, we're adults and expect to be scolded accordingly. Maybe if something is wrong or done a way this lady doesn't like she could just tell Anja to do it different next time, but unfortunately she's been horrible. Anja is looking now to move out by the end of the week because of a final "last straw" argument because Michelle and I went over to their house on Friday night and Anja didn't tell the mom. But, the mom had just said the night before that she was cool with people coming over and only if they were going to spend the night did she need to let the family know.  Anyways, it's really stressful for her, and we're all hoping she can find another job in this city or at least in Madrid so she's close.  Pray it all works out for her. Thanks :)

Driving

Yesterday, I only to teach two classes. So during the afternoon, which was completely free, my friend Anja taught Emily (the other teacher) and I how to drive a stick-shift.  We started out in a little supermarket, and after a few tries, I thought I was ready to try the road.  I suppose I was cocky or maybe I thought the whole world would stop for me to learn to drive. Needless to say, it didn't.  I did very well overall because I didn't crash or stall out, but i was panicking the whole time.  There were a million roundabout; I didn't know where to go. It was so scary. Emily kind of had the same experience. We weren't bad at driving, but everyone drives crazy here and people were screaming out their windows at her. By the time we got out of the car we all had headaches and tense shoulders from all the stress. It was really fun, but I hope I can do it for real very soon.

In one of the classes that we had yesterday, a little third grade boy raised his hand during an activity. I came over and asked him what he needed and he replied, "Eres muy guapa." Meaning, you're very pretty.  It was so cute. On that note, Grandpa, I think I found my Don Juan. His name is Diego and he's 3. Anja takes care of him and he doesn't speak any English.  He's a little bratty, but his good looks win me over every time. :)

I'm really glad it's the weekend. I think we're going to pick blackberries in the countryside in a little bit.

Trying to Get into the Swing of Things

Well, I'm halfway into my first full week, and it's pretty hard to adjust. I'm not used to working all day. Spain is really good in that they are more laid back, and I love meal time and break time.  The kids are wonderful, but they're exhausting.  They talk very loudly which I'm trying to get used to because by the end of the day my ears hurt a lot making me really sensitive to sounds. It's definitely something I need to get used to and mostly a problem because the monastery is the most echo-y building I've ever been in.  Something about the stone walls and floors I guess. Yesterday was exceptionally exhausting because right off the bat, I went to have coffee and practice Spanish with my friend Anja who speaks fluently.  This was good, but I have to focus a lot on something as simple as speaking.  Then, after morning classes, I had lunch in the teacher's comedor which consisted of focusing even harder because they speak about as fast as....well, I guess, as fast I do when I'm telling a good story. So, I'm sure you can imagine how hard I had to try to understand.  By the end of school, my head was pounding and my legs throbbing. I've always heard of people getting headaches from trying to listen to a different language all day, but something I didn't expect is that it actually made me a bit nauseous. After school, I went to a birthday party of a girl in Sally's class. I had taught her class earlier that day so all the kids at the party knew who I was. I was tired, but I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to be around people who don't speak English.  I ended up talking to a couple of 4th graders for most of the party because they were excited to help me learn Spanish.  The little kids spent most of their time on the trampoline, and when I went out to watch, they all started screaming, "¡Profe! ¡Profe!"  followed by a lot of high-pitched, fast, unintelligible Spanish.  They were all upset because there could only be "cuatro niños" on the trampoline at a time and so-and-so had been on for the longest...blah blah blah.  Finally, after a couple minutes of trying to get them to share, one of the dads came over and announced in Spanish that it's like at the fair they have two minutes and then they have to listen to me when I tell them switch. By the time I got home at 8:30 yesterday, I was dead. I went to bed at about 9:30. So far, this job is the most fun and great experience I've ever had, but I really need to adjust to the time and schedule before it will be comfortable going for so long.

This morning was the first time Marina left me alone to get Sally up and ready for school. She had to go to Madrid at around 7:30 so I was just going to get Sally ready alone. I was sleeping and heard a knock on my door. I opened my eyes to try and figure out what all the banging was and the first thing I noticed was that it was kind of light in my bedroom. I quickly grabbed the clock and saw it was 8:30! We have to leave at 8:40 to get to school on time! I threw the door open in a rush to see Sally standing there all dressed in her school uniform and had her backpack ready to go. All she said was, "Are we late?" in a calm little voice.  I've never met a more responsible 5-year-old in my life!  I quickly gave her a piece of bread with some oil on it, packed her snacks for the day, threw on some jeans and we were out the door.  Of course this would happen on the first day I'm left alone! I kept telling her I was so sorry I didn't wake up on time, and when I asked her how she woke up since she doesn't have an alarm she said, "I don't sleep so good in the morning." I asked her why she didn't wake me up if she was up for so long, but she calmly reminded me that she doesn't know how to tell time yet.  We got to school on time, but we were pretty exhausted. I had to call my teaching partner and tell her I couldn't get there on time because I had only enough time to get Sally out the door.  When I got back to the house to shower and rush back to school, I went to make Sally's bed because she needs to make it herself on Wednesday's and I didn't want her to get in trouble since I didn't remind her which was  my fault.  When I got to her room, I saw her bed nicely made! She's so much fun! I love not knowing what funny thing she'll say or do next.

Best Weekend in a Long Time

I had the entire weekend off which was really fun. I usually will end up babysitting one night each weekend, but it wasn't necessary this time. On Saturday, I was invited to a BBQ with  some other Au Pairs, and we just had a great time eating tons of awesome meat and talking for hours and hours.  They gave me this stuff that looked like a black meat with rice kind of mixed in it inside a casing. I asked what it was, and they wouldn't tell me until I was finished. It tasted really strange. It wasn't terrible, but I didn't really like it. Turns out, it was coagulated blood! YUCK! I'm really glad they didn't tell me until I was done.  I met a ton of new people there and it felt good to hang out and relax. Unfortunately they all spoke English, so I didn't get to practice my Spanish. I'm still working on getting more exposure.

Today, my new friends Anja, a Slovenian Au Pair, and Michelle, another American Au Pair, decided to go hiking to the top of the mountain. I've never been hiking so I didn't really know what I was getting myself into. Anja and I were complaining and breathing heavily before we were even out of site of the beginning of the trail.  We had lunch on the way, but we had no clue where we were going.  Michelle's "dad," Jose, explained how to get there in Spanish and Anja is the only one who can understand well enough, but apparently we should have had more people listening because we got very lost. At least we just kept trucking up the mountain, but what was supposed to be and easy trail turned out to be almost straight up.  We were basically on a cow's only trail because it was so steep and didn't seem to be going anywhere in particular just up. It was the most exhausting, terrible, fun, exciting adventure! We did manage to find our way to a proper trail on the way up marked by a white and red spot on a rock which was really exciting.  We got to relax at the peak for awhile before heading down.  At this point, what we thought was going to take two or three hours total had already taken 2.5 just to get to the top.  The way down should've been a breeze right? Wrong.  We somehow managed to get way more lost than the way up.  We just kept finding random trails taking us down, but when we finally got down we realized we were on the wrong side of this dam, but, determined not to have to retrace our steps by walking back up the mountain we decided to find an alternative. This led to crawling through picker-bushes and climbing down 10 ft sheer walls. I jumped and nearly broke my ankle at the end of this one.  Needless to say, we find our way back at the end of a 5 hour date pretty exhausted.  We were really proud of our wilderness survival skills. (Hud, if I would've had your machete, my life would've been a lot easier.)

So, we get back from all this excitement ready to just sit around and do nothing. I took the girls to my house for a break before they walked home, and I wanted to introduce them to Sally and William. When we got there, the kids were playing outside. The house is in a walled space as most places are in Spain, and Sally was excited to see us so she was standing on the top of the wall talking and telling us about her day as we headed up the stair to see her. Right as we were getting to the top, the dog hit her from behind and pushed her off the wall. I heard Anja gasp and I turned around just in time to see this poor little girl hit the stone floor ten feet below.  She was screaming and I scooped her up and ran inside. It looked like she had fallen on her side. I knew her head and neck didn't hit, but I was shocked she didn't break her ribs.  After several minutes of crying, she bounced back and went outside to play.  My friends and I all sat on a bench for about 20 minutes exhausted and in shock.  We were all just glad she was alright. She only has, in her words, "a sore bum" and a little bruise on her ankle.  She's a tough little kid.

I'm ready to start a new week. :)

First Day of Teaching :)

These kids are so cute! They're so much more respectful than American kids. It's nice to be in a house where the parents still teach the kids how to behave properly and without negotiating.  In the classroom, I work with another American girl and we teach the kids common phrases to say and explain them in English so we just give them a chance to really use their language skills. It was really exhausting today because the kids are a handful and have so much energy and it still feels like I'm waking up for the day in the middle of the night. I really love the people here though, and one of my favorite things is that we have coffee break every morning and go across the street from the school to socialize. I'm really trying to understand the language, and so far, I really only speak in Spanish to the little kids because I'm not embarrassed with them, but a lady I met this evening sounded really interested in teaching me Spanish and having me teach her English.  I really want to learn more so I'm listening a lot and looking for more ways to interact with Spanish-only speakers.

Tonight, after dinner, which we ate at 9 o'clock by the way, the kids had Friday night dance party! It was adorable. They're just so open and don't care about being embarrassed. I laughed the whole time, and most of their moves are really good for their ages.  Tomorrow, I was invited to a BBQ at someone's house. I don't actually know this someone yet, but he always invites over the Au Pairs I guess. My new friends who are other Au Pairs will be joining me.  It's a blast to be meeting new people and doing new things. Almost everything has something about it I've never experienced before so it's overwhelming at times, but I try to welcome it because it's something more to know.

The pictures are mostly of the monastery. That's where the school is so it's really awesome to work in a 16th century palace/monastery.  Also, this is my little buddy, Sally.

Rápido, Rápido

Hola, I made it alive! :)

I was slightly concerned about it turning out toward the alive part yesterday when I was at the airport and Marina (the mom of my family) was a bit late.  Of course, in any other situation, I would just assume someone was late, but being in a foreign country without a phone and only a little idea of what the person picking me up looked like, I was worried. Once I got in the car though, I was great!

We picked up William from his eye appt in Madrid, so I got to see a little of the city (only a little). Side note: Dad, you would finally have road rage with these drivers; I thought we were going to get crashed into the whole time. When we were getting back in the car to leave, someone asked me (in Spanish, of course) if we were leaving so he could park in the spot. I stared blankly for a good 3 seconds before I realized that someone was talking to me in Spanish. I finally said, "Si," and laughed at myself for looking like an idiot and being so shocked that someone in Spain spoke Spanish. haha. Escorial is beautiful; the streets are all uphill or downhill because its at the base of a mountain which makes me extremely nervous for driving a stick-shift.

On the drive home, we got a call from Shannon (the girl who used to be the Au Pair for this family, but now is a  full time English teacher at the school.) She said I got the job. Well, I thought I had the two hour a week job teaching English conversation, but it turns out I get 20 hours a week now and I think health care too.  This is pretty cool even though I don't know anything about it yet.  I do know it'll be cool to actually make money for traveling and stuff, and I know I'll be teaching 3-11 years olds. I thought it was really funny because I don't even know if I'll be good at teaching yet, and everyone else really shouldn't know if I'm any good. But, Marina said her and Shannon were really pushing for me to get the job. It's so nice that they're so confident in me. I definitely won't let them down. Every kid I've seen so far is probably the cutest kid I've ever seen. Not only are the all adorable just for being cute little kids, but they also start speaking Spanish and they're even cuter then they find out I speak English so they start speaking to me in the cutest accents ever! This going to be an amazing experience.

I was a little nervous about meeting Sally when we went to go pick her up from school.  I didn't want it to be awkward for her, and kids are usually pretty shy right off the bat.  But when she came out with her class, she came right over to her mom and me. Her mom told her who I was and she just gave me a big hug then grabbed my hand to walk outside.  She so adorable, and both kids are really well behaved.

I met a few other Au Pairs yesterday, and they were really excited about getting others together so it sounds like I'm gonna have people my own age to hang out with.  I met a lot of the other moms, and I really need to send an email to the person wrote the website I read that said in Spain they don't kiss on the cheeks when meeting. Everyone I've met has kissed me on both cheeks; it's so cute I just have to get used to it. I finally got used to the women doing it, but I thought when I met the director of the school that they probably don't do it more professional situations. I was completely wrong, so I just decided I better kiss everyone.  However, when I met the director's brother, another employee at the school, I was all prepared to kiss on both cheeks, then he shook my hand. I don't get it haha.  We watched Sally and all her friends play outside in the courtyard of the school after they were dismissed. The school is actually in Escorial, the monastery/palace, and it's so beautiful and ancient.  I played Piedras, Papel, o Tijeras (Rock, paper, scissors) with the kids for a good 20 minutes; they all wanted to join in when Sally and I started playing.

Well to finish the day off, I went to bed at about 8 o'clock because I didn't sleep the entire night before and I'm definitely jet lagged. I have a meeting at 9 this morning to get all the information I need about working at the school. I'm sure I won't write as much in the future, but when we set the clock for me to wake up this morning it was an hour off so I thought I was waking up at 7 and really it was 6 haha. Whatever, I have no concept of what time it is at this point anyway.  Adios :)

P.S. Mom, the coffee is great!

And So It Begins...

Hey Everyone, I'm really excited to set out on a new journey. I leave for Spain on Tuesday, and for once in my life, I can say with 100% certainty that I have no clue what to expect. Sure a lot of scenarios have run through my mind, but I don't know the answers to so many questions that I've stopped trying to piece it together. Instead, I'm waiting....waiting to discover...

I had an interview in Arizona on Friday. I'm really interested in going to A.T. Still University School of Osteopathic Medicine of Arizona.  That's a mouthful.  This school is awesome! I was afraid all the research I've done over the past few weeks on this school would turn out to be too good to be true, but seeing the school in person only made my desire to go there stronger.  The faculty was so kind and communicable which is quite a change from how I've experienced university staffs. The campus was new, modern and full of all the latest technology. The curriculum is new and finally centered around adult styles of learning.  All of these aspects of the college are great and things that drew me in, but above all the school is designed to put doctors in underserved communities throughout our nation. It's designed to give us experience working in poor communities where healthcare is limited, and it teaches us how to work with the people of the community to find the problem in that area and fix it.  This school seems to be truly made for someone like me.  I'm already attached and I don't even know if they will want me.  They gave me 30 minutes to show them my heart and exhibit whether or not I'm a good fit for the school.  I was slightly sad when I left the room because, for the first time, I realized, they might not want me....

All I can do at this point is wait. I have MSUCOM as an amazing backup option, but I still can't shake the feeling that ATSU-SOMA is the place for me.  We'll see what The Big Guy thinks because I'll go where He sends me. I know that's the place I will find purpose and joy. So, despite my temptation to spend the next 2-4 weeks worrying about it before I hear the news, I'm going to move forward and be content with whatever the outcome.  Either way, I'm going to become a doctor and live out my dream. For now, I look ahead to Sally.  The 6 year old girl waiting to become my best little friend in Spain. I can't wait to learn the language, experience the culture, and live in world so different from my own.

I'm excited for my journey, and I'm ready to keep everyone posted. Keep in touch. Pray for me and the huge decisions I have coming up. Thanks :)