The Adventures of Clio the Wonder Car!

I just got back from the Canary Islands. Feel free to be a little jealous. We had a long weekend due to some particularly notable Saints and so two friends, Monica and Laura, and I left rainy Madrid on Friday morning after sleeping on the chilly, uncarpeted airport floor. Our flight was at 6:15 a.m. and the metro doesn't re-open until 6 a.m. each morning so as an alternative to paying for a taxi in the middle of the night, we decided to hop the last metro at 1:30 and wait it out in the airport. That turned out to be quite an unoriginal idea, as the check-in terminal was already chock full of half-sleeping, penny-pinching travelers wrapped in overcoats and sweatshirts to keep warm. So full, in fact, that there weren't even any good wall spots left; we ended up having to find a nice support beam to wrap ourselves around!

Once in the Canarys, all thoughts of peacoats and scarves ceased to exist as we changed into flip-flops and short sleeves. We rented a car, a Renault Clio, and as I was the only one who knew how to drive a manual shift, I got to drive all weekend long! That actually turned out to be quite a feat, given the steep declivity of some of the roads I had to maneuver us up. For reference the island where we stayed, Tenerife, goes from sea level to over 12,000 feet (at the volcano Teide, the highest altitude in Spain) in only 794 square miles of surface area. Needless to say, I may have burned rubber on more than one occasion.

On our first day we drove northeast from the South airport along the brim of the island, stopping off in various beach towns to see the sights, walk along the volcanic sand beaches, stick our feet in the ocean and eat some local food. We made it to our accomodations in the north near La Orotova around 4 or 5 p.m. Our hostel offered spectacular views of the ocean and the Teide along with the smells of horse manure and the sounds of a rooster's crows. We laughed at the fact that our beds were actually above horse stables (with live horses in them) and remembered the disclaimer on the website that actually read, "Abstain persons that dont like the animals and the nature." Our host Manolo, quite the lively fellow, was great at offering us all kinds of information that was usually about 70% correct. We spent about an hour wandering around looking for a restaurant he recommended that night when we finally gave up and ate at a basement joint offering a little of everything. He was kind and his intentions were good so we called it even after I destroyed him at pool.

On day 2 we went up to see the Teide, where the weather was sunny and hot while it was cloudy that day in the low lands. We were well above the clouds and from the top it just looked like there was a white cloud floor. I don't know the last time that the Teide erupted, but there were black volcanic rocks everywhere we looked. This island boasts all kinds of ecosystems- in the south, the air was dry and the landscape desert. In the north everything was green and lush with lots of flowers. As we climbed in elevation there were pine trees and then at the top we reached the lunar-like landscape of volcano land. On our way down from Teide we stopped off at a restaurant and had a great meal of fresh fish, patatas arrugadas or wrinkly potatoes, and salad. The wrinkly potatoes are a Canary classic and are soaked in water with sea salt, which gives them their wrinkly look, and then eventually boiled.

Day 3 was spent mainly at the beach. We went one of the few beaches on the island without volcanic sand, Las Teresitas. The reason for its absence, however, is not because volcanic eruptions somehow magically missed this little aclove, but because the sand was imported from Africa! So for a short time this weekend I was on the sands of Africa- HA! On the way to the beach we drove through the northeasternmost point of the island which gave us amazing views of the ocean in all directions. It was just splendid.

Sadly, yesterday, we had to return our beloved little Clio and head back to Madrid. The flight was uneventful (thankfully) and we made it home in time for lunch. Back to school tomorrow for a two-day workweek and then three-day weekend again. ¡Olé!

Thanksgiving-mania!

Thanksgiving this year was a lot delicious and a little ridiculous or over-the-top, one might even say. True to American custom there was way more food than needed. And as we only had about 27 (!) or so people there to eat, it was shocking that there were any left-overs. Appetizers (to the left) included salmon/goat cheese sandwiches on baguettes, deviled eggs, cornbread and chocolate-covered strawberries. For the main course (to the right) there was roast turkey, chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, two sweet potato dishes, homemade mac and cheese, stuffing, green-bean casserole, cheesecake, pumpkin pie (they sell canned pumpkin at The American Store for about 5 euro a can, but it was worth it!) pumpkin cheesecake, and probably a few other things that I am forgetting.

We definitely tore the kitchen apart the day of, my friend Mike in charge of the turkey, chicken and gravy and me in charge of potatoes, beans, deviled eggs and desserts. How happy he was when some more friends arrived later in the evening so he could get a second opinion on the turkey and the gravy as I am STILL (yes, grandpa) a vegetarian. The verdict was good and the rest of the dishes arrived at the house later in the evening along with the guests. The night went quite smoothly and everyone seemed to have a good time. Éxito.

In hindsight, I still can't figure out why I decided it would be a good idea to throw a Thanksgiving bonanza for more than 2 dozen people, but in the end it all turned out well and good. My poor roommates put up with my week-long mood swings generated from feelings of stress for cooking for so many people and feelings of loss for my mother- her birthday falling on or near Thanksgiving every year making it an especially difficult yet memorable holiday for me as Thanksgiving and her life are two things that are completely intertwined in my neural fibers. At least they got to take advantage of some left-overs for their patience.

Since every day can be used as a learning experience, what I take from this Thanksgiving is simple. Next year, go to Grandma's.

a little inspiration.

A big, fat cloud of negative had amassed over my head arrested nearly two weeks of my optimism earlier this month when I found some inspiration in two rather small packages that helped me turn myself around.

I went to a reception celebrating 50 years of Fulbright scholarships between Spain and the United States. It was in a rather fancy building, in the fancier part of town in a high-ceilinged conference room with fancy chandeliers and waiters with fancy black ties passing around wine, champagne and caviar. As my 6th graders would say in their British-influenced English, "How cheeky!"

The reception was attended by former and current Fulbrighters (both Spanish and American), folks from the American Embassy, the US Ambassador to Spain and a random assortment of other interesting people related to the Fulbright program. There were multiple ex-Fulbrighters who spoke on their experiences, a former ambassador from the US turned Vice President of SUNY Buffalo who spoke on his time as an ambassador, and there was even a brief recorded salute sent to us from Hillary Clinton where she commended the program on 50 years of cultural interchange.

The speakers were good, but they didn't hold a candle to the moment where the host introduced the guests of honor: three of the first Fulbrighters from Spain to the US in 1958. She called on them to stand and slowly each of the wrinkled, white-haired becarios came to their feet. They were two men and one woman and one of the men was seated with the woman. They didn't speak, they just smiled while the audience applauded and then they returned to their seats.

Later on during the reception my friend Mike and I sought out the old man and woman who had been seated together for some conversation about their year abroad. Turns out they met on the boat from Spain to New York; back then the Fulbright program relied on boats for their inter-continental transportation, picking up first Fulbrighters in Greece, then Italy and finally Spain. In NY, they both attended Columbia, she at the Teacher's College and he for an MBA, and shortly after their arrival home to Spain they were married and are now great-grandparents.

They gave us accounts of life in the United States of 1958 during their year as students and also of some of their adventures afterward. In true 'we've been married for almost 50 years' fashion, they often completed each others' stories and interrupted each other to add pertinent details of the tale that the other had left out. At the end of their year the husband told us how he hitch-hiked across the US, first from New York to South Carolina, where he was stopped at dusk by a trooper- only to spend the night in a private jail cell, have the trooper make him breakfast in the morning, and then drive him up to Tennessee and drop him off, as hitch-hiking in SC was illegal. He continued along, stopping off in Mexico before heading all the way out to California. His wife, shaking her finger, cut in with, " Pero yo, no. Me fui a Puerto Rico- a la playa." ("But not me, I went to Puerto Rico- to the beach.") She did do a little Carribean island-hopping though, because they met up in Cuba for Christmas 1958, just days, they reminded us, before Bautista fled and the Communists took power.

We listened like two eager grandchildren asking for one more story before bedtime until finally after more than fifteen minutes of their anecdotes they, being two of the three Honored Guests at the reception, politely told us that while they had enjoyed chatting with us, they needed to move on. We thanked them for speaking with us and said goodbye with two kisses and off they went to socialize with some of the other guests. Mike and I smiled and decided we had fantastic luck to have been able to catch them at a moment where no one else had hold of their attention.

As one of the black-tied waiters walked by with more wine, I reached for a glass reflecting on all that was said, forgetting about all my earlier frustrations and hoping that one day, when I have white hair and I've shrunk to only 5'5, I'll be able to dazzle young people with the yarns of my life and the adventures I undertook, as these two golden-agers had just done.

The Tamara Life

This is an interpretation from one of my 5th grade students about a presentation I gave about myself in class earlier in October. Some of the facts are a little off and my work is cut out for me with teaching grammar, but it was my favorite one nonetheless...

My Humps

I wish I could make this stuff up...

My co-teacher of the 6th graders got married this weekend. As a wedding gift about 8 of the 6th grade girls got together and performed a dance for her on Friday. It was a big secret and they practiced for about a week during their daily half-hour recreo before they performed. The song- none other than Fergie's "My Humps". The dance- out of control. I did my best to hide my shock (and laughter) as it was complete with a wide variety of questionable moves you might see Fergie or Britney Spears do during a music video. One girl even did the splits. I am still curious why they chose that song in particular... After this I think it is official that I am getting old.

Pen-pals!

I am ridiculously excited for my upcoming project. I recently contacted some of the teachers from Cesar Chavez elementary school in Davis, CA, (which is a Spanish immersion program) to see if they might be interested in doing a pen-pal project with us this year. So far I have 2 teachers that have agreed to do it and I am hoping for a couple more. I think it will be interesting for the kids to talk to each other in both English and Spanish about what their lives are like. It may also highlight the difficulties that each side has with learning either English or Spanish. I would love for this to be some type of internet telecollaboration project but I think that my school's resources aren't quite up to par. I'm going to have to check up on that. More to follow...

Bilingual issues 2

Being a teacher of the target language in the bilingual school system here in Spain is quite an anomaly really. I don't adhere to the same schedule as the other teachers and I don't have any after school meetings or strenuous prep work. So far I basically just show up, speak English, pretend I don't understand Spanish when they talk back to me and go home.

I work with three teachers, one of which prefers to let me do most of the talking. She tells me which sections of the book she wants me to cover and then while I talk she works with one of the weaker students, grades papers or listens and interjects when she wants to add something. The second teacher has me sit in class like a student, listening to him while every so often he calls on me to act as an English parrot and then it's back to silence. I'm sure you'll be astonished to know that this is my least favorite class. The third teacher is both my favorite teacher and teaches my favorite group of students. She lets me come up with ideas for the units and allows me teach a majority of the time. It really seems to make a difference that the first and second teachers both resort to Spanish often when they think that the children don't understand, whereas the third teacher almost never speaks Spanish in class except to translate vocabulary words. One could suppose that this accounts for why the students of the third class have the highest level of English of the three classes.

Hence I am witness to three different teaching styles from three very different teachers. I have been brainstorming sneaky ways to inject myself into the parrot-teacher's class and right now I have come up with Show and Tell and upcoming Halloween activities. I was able to give a presentation about my life prior to Spain in the three classes. The biggest hits were pictures of my favorite food and a picture of bear eating garbage in Mammoth. They just couldn't believe it when I told them that bears wander around the town at night looking for garbage...

One Month: Como un pulpo en el garaje...

One month in mathematical terms... Number of times I've kissed a stranger on the cheek- oh, say about 100. Jars of Nutella devoured and works of García Lorca seen on stage- 1 each. Number of times my butt has been grabbed by irreverent Spanish man on the street- 1 . Number of times I've said "Shhhhsh!" in my 4th, 5th and 6th grade classes- 4,372. Nights I've stayed out 'til 6 am whilst awaiting the reaperture of the Metro- exact figure not available, but let's just say multiple.

Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is- so far, so good (because who doesn't love a simple cliché to sum up an entire lunar cycle?). This month has been quite fun, this weekend in particular topped the list... My roommates and I had a house-warming party at my apartment that had a great turnout, I went to a birthday party in the city center for a little dancing, we had a Sunday picnic in the park (we even played football- fútbol americano, mind you) and I saw the "new" Woody Allen movie "Whatever Works" in English with Spanish subtitles.

For me, the joy of reading Spanish subtitles during a movie is that I often leave with the translations of a few new and wildly entertaining linguistic snippets. Fortunately, this movie did not disappoint. The most recent of my Latinate metaphors, más perdido que un pulpo en el garaje, is used in correlation with the English metaphor 'a square peg in a round hole' and literally means 'more lost than an octopus in the garage'.

(On a sidenote- I would just like to marvel for a minute at the differences from the Romance to the Germanic languages when it comes to metaphors. While English, Germanic by birth, uses a very functional, no need for imagination type of metaphor 'square peg...' the Spanish come up with 'an octopus in a garage'? My first question (logically) would be- why an octopus? A bear would be just as lost in a garage. Or a toro for that matter (oh goodness, there I go being cliché again...) And why the garage? Why not the living room or the dining room? I suppose when you think about it, the obstacles that the said octopus would need to surpass to find himself in a garage in the first place do require quite a bit of imagination. And tangent finished.)

At times I still find myself wondering what I am doing here in a country thousands of miles away from my family and friends, being an American octopus in a Spanish garage. Living in a hub of concrete, buildings, pavement, plaster, cobblestones, scaffolding, tiles, marble, limestone and everything else that takes the place of grass, dirt, flowers and trees to make up Urbania, I sometimes am quite out of place. I have heard that Madrid is one of the cities in Europe with the most trees, and yet I refuse to believe it. The most bars, certainly believable. Madrid is probably the winner by exponential proportions. I'm not saying that the city isn't lovely, but the most trees? I'm just going to have to wait until I am shown mathematical proof.

As an octopus, I get funny looks when I eat my breakfast on the train on the way to work. Apparently nobody eats in public here unless it's in a restaurant (or they're getting drunk in the street and eating potato chips of course. They actually have a word that means drinking in the street- botellón, see picture to left). And I'm definitely not up in the latest courses in 'Defensive Street Walking'. I've been taken out by old ladies with umbrellas, pushed off sidewalks by workers, pretty much devoured by crowds and with not so much as a "perdon". A toddler even owned me on the sidewalk in front of the Prado last week. Granted I did end up the victor of that showdown due in no small part to my overwhelming size advantage, but you could tell he was the tough one and he didn't go down without a fight.

Of course, the bane of my Madrid existence, is that the bank closes at 2:00 pm. EVERYDAY!! And Does Not Reopen For The Evening. And you can forget about Saturday. It's closed. I have wised up with my one month of experience and have managed to figure out how to make it to the bank between the hours of 8:30-2:00 AND keep a job. It's been tricky, but I've assimilated. Fortunately, aside from the insanity of the bank, the overall adjustment from "Tammy Time" to "Spanish Time" hasn't been particularly difficult. Habitual unpunctuality and mid-day naps are already some of my finest attributes, so really, I've just had to get used to eating lunch at 2 and dinner around 9. Not bad.

To close (as I'm sure by this point many a reader has fallen victim to some other website), regardless of my passive walking skills, need to sleep for an extra 15 minutes in the morning rather than to eat breakfast at home, and severe dislike of banking norms, Spain grows on me more and more. The people are friendly, I can get a huge wedge of Brie cheese for only 2 euro, and the homeless man who sleeps in the plaza around the corner of my house has a pair of skis. For now, I'm content.

~ P.S. As a little bonus for you, I've included a picture of one of many pig's legs that adorn the walls of countless shops here in the city. How appropriate that this particular leg is also being used as a shelf/rope holder and may or may not have won a ribbon. Enjoy!

Bilingual issues...

So far it has been really interesting to see how the English teachers deal with the students who are new transfers, slower learners, or dealing with juggling 2 and 3 languages and for that reason can´t seem to filter out the others to learn English. I think this is going to be a focal point for my personal notes throughout the year. We have a transfer student in 6th grade who hasn´t attended bilingual school previously and really isn´t even up to the school´s 2nd grade standards for English. I am awaiting to what actions the teachers take to work at this problem.

Creative 6th grade Spanglish

Today when I walked into class one of my students asked me, "Teacher, do you know what is rechicken?" I smiled, thought about it for a second and replied that I had no idea. Then he blurted while trying to stifle his uncontrollable giggling, "it's CABBAGE!" I still was perplexed until he pulled it together and explained to me as if I were the child in the situation and not he, "You know chicken means pollo in Spanish, si?"

And then I caught up. Repollo is Spanish for cabbage. Of course in California our Spanglish typically consists of mixing Spanish and English WHOLE words in one sentence, maybe he can start a Spanglish revolution here in Madrid...

Madridilicious

Here I am. Madrid, Spain. Home of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand, Picasso's Guernica, soccer idol Cristiano Ronaldo, and now, me. I'll do my best to post my adventures here, although don't expect announcements of me sending out Portuguese explorers, revolutionizing art or winning soccer matches. I will however, be hanging out with elementary school kids and helping to teach them English in collaboration with their Spanish teachers in a bilingual elementary school in Fuenlabrada, Madrid, called CEIP Clara Campoamor. Sidenote- If you are wondering who Clara Campoamor was, she happened to be a Spanish politician, suffragette and women's rights activist- Spanish women were granted the right to vote in 1933 only to have it revoked 6 years later and not granted again until 1977!

Anyhow, enough history (especially when it's as patriarchal as Spain's has been) ... I have been in Madrid for about 2 weeks and in that time I have managed to secure an apartment, make a few friends, teach a couple classes and have a few laughs. I still have the entire city before me to discover, as the only real wandering I have done has been from apartment to apartment trying to find the perfect one. The apartment I finally found is lovely, everything I could have hoped for living in this old European city. My street is cobblestone, the apartment has high ceilings and little balconies on all of the exterior rooms. The railings are old style art deco and I can see a park from my window. (See photo below, the Pirate flags mark our apartment...) My roommates are also great, we all stem from different parts of the world but communicate largely in Spanish (with some French and English mixed in as well). Often times we have communal meals and everyone has a good sense of humor. I think it's going to be a great year.

My school is located outside of the city but it's still considered part of Madrid. I am teaching 4th, 5th and 6th graders as well as the 5 year old preschoolers. The kids have been incredible so far and I am really looking forward to this year with them. On my first day when I met my sixth graders they were really excited and the first question they had for me (aside from my name) was if I were American or English. When I told them I was American they all cheered loudly in unison (complete with arm-pumping and clapping) and the teacher had to quiet them down. Considering that the last time I came to Europe was 2003 during the Bush administration and I was often met with contempt and disapproval of my country, I thought for sure the kids were excited about President Obama. So the teacher asked them, "Why are you all cheering so much?" and the response (once the crowd ceased) came from an outgoing girl in the back named Maria. She said, "We don't like the English accent. It's, how do you say, muy raro (very strange)."

And that's just one more reason why teaching kids is so much fun. There aren't any politics or hidden agendas- it's all about telling it exactly how they see it, and usually they're smiling when they do. Refreshing.