6th Grade Graduation

School's out for summer! This year is over, I can hardly believe it! Here are some photos of the graduation we had last Friday.

6th Grade group photo:

Before:

After:

Muy fashion:

Some of my favorites:

Little sister taking pretend photos of her big brother:

The teachers I worked with in the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades:

The kids did a little play about all of their years at the school. One of those years consisted of a rap in Spanish about farm animals. It's kind of difficult to hear at first, but gets a little better towards the middle:

"Pagatto duo notti, Angela"

For those of you who don't know, Italy is this mystical, charming country where everything is magical and there are unicorns and rainbows of gelato and pots of golden pasta... but sans the leprechauns because leprechauns are a bit creepy. Spending a weekend there has had me scheming on how soon I can get back ever since.

To start the adventure, Aaron, Ashley, Mike and I flew into Pisa and rented a car that I once again piloted. (sidenote- That makes three countries now- Spain, Portugal and Italy!) We drove around for a while trying to find the Leaning Tower of Pisa with our free rental car map that only had about 1/4 of the city's streets actually marked. Incidentally, during that search we accidentally found Galileo's birth home:
Question: How rad is Italy that you are driving around trying to find the Leaning Tower of Pisa and then you stumble upon Galileo's house? Answer: Pretty rad. Shortly thereafter we found the leaning tower and took a series of leaning photos. We also read up on the information about the tower and due to a series of complications and century-long breaks in construction, it turns out that they just built it that way. Those Italians...
Tourists lending a hand to help hold up the tower:
After the photo shoot we ate the most delicious pizza on the planet and then ditched Pisa for a drive through the Tuscan countryside:Our destination was the Cinque Terre, a spot on the Mediterranean where there are five little fishing villages with trails linking them. This was us on the side of the road above the first village:
We decided to visit the first two villages by car and then stay in the third village and hike around to the fourth and fifth the following day. That turned out to be the best decision ever. Here are some pictures of our village, Corniglia: When we got to Corniglia we met the village's mob boss, Angela, a 70-something year old lady who spoke only Italian, but was essential in finding us an apartment with a rooftop terrace. We mainly tried to communicate through Spanish with Italian intonation and the few Italian words we knew (mangiare, ciao, bella, arrivederci, pesto, formaggio etc.,) but really we just sounded ridiculous. Fortunately money is the universal language, so just enough communication happened for us to move in for two nights. Much to our delight, she paused to go buy a take-out foccacia pizza during our proceedings, saying something that we patched together as, "I'ma hungry, I'ma gonna eata pizza now." After we paid, she wrote a homemade receipt in Aaron's little notebook that said, "Pagatto duo notti, Angela." (Paid two nights, Angela) That wasn't the only thing that led us to believe that perhaps we were doing something off the books- She had us park the car at her own house and when we moved out two days later, she told us that if the police asked us where we stayed, not to tell them we stayed at her spot. And just like that, Angela reached legendary status in our minds.

Our apartment was on the third floor of the building to the left of the yellow building in this picture:The four of us on our terrace:Haha... Fanny Bazaar in Corniglia:
Photos from the hike:
Victory at the end of the hike:After two splendid days in the Cinque Terre we headed to Florence to visit the city for a day and then spend the evening with Mike's friend, Irene, at her birthday barbecue. Irene's house was lovely, located outside the city and you could even see a giant stone church atop one of the hills nearby. The people were friendly and the food was great. This was easily the best trip that any of us had ever been on.

Here's a shot of the famous church in Florence:
In short, Italy is magnificent. I can't believe it's taken me this long to get there, but I can say without a doubt that it will be significantly less time before I am back.

Crepes and sexual harrassment

I went to Paris this weekend to visit an old friend who relocated there. Having already been to Paris, I didn't have much of a touristic itinerary, which was nice considering that it was the start of the World Cup. Hence, shortly after my arrival on Friday we went to the Eiffel Tower where they had set up a giant screen, to watch Mexico vs. South Africa and then France vs. Uruguay. It was cool to watch the game with all the excited Frenchies and hear them all sing their national anthem at the beginning but unfortunately, the game was a real bore as not a single goal was scored. Thus, I amused myself by listening to the French announcers. A stark contrast to the animation of the Spanish-speaking world, French announcers are quite monotone. My favorite announcer moment was when one said, "Allez victorie, non?" (Go victory, no?) to which the other replied, "Ah, ouais." (Ah, yeah.)

Other weekend activities included wandering around Montmartre, dancing in a couple clubs, surviving the Paris metro, strolling down the Champs-Elysees, eating crepes and managing to get invited to a wedding. In the end, we decided not to go because we felt that it might be awkward explaining that we had met the groom at his bachelor party the night before...

All in all it was a pretty nice weekend. And while I won't go into extensive detail on why my blog is titled thus, let me just say that yes, there are plenty of Frenchmen who are complete gentlemen... however those were not the ones who flocked to me this weekend. Incidents throughout the weekend piled up and after enduring an hour and a half cab ride to the airport where I was propositioned for sex nearly the entire time (the driver did pause occasionally to change the music and think of words in the two languages I understand), my final straw was being told I had to take off my featherweight cotton cardigan at airport security so that the three young security guards could get a better look at my chest whilst scanning my bag and flirting with me. Flipping out in the security control certainly did pass through my mind, but I thought better and decided that getting to leave Paris without visiting a jail was reward enough for not decking one of them.


Other interesting Parisian sights...

The line to get in to shop at Louis Vuitton:

The mass of Algerian soccer fans who gathered at the top of the Champs Elyssees after the game. "One, two, three, Vive L'Algerie!" was their chant:

This little kid with a budding mohawk was pretty cute:
Princesse Tam-Tam:
At the crepe shop in Montmartre:
Tiny Eiffel Towers for sale at the Sacre Coeur:

Francisca and I at the Arc D'Triomphe:

Prom á la American

Super-hip chaperones and Organizer Extraordinaire Mike:

While I was busy planning a boring Science Fair, my amigo Mike, who is doing the same thing as I but in a high school here in Madrid, was in charge of throwing a Prom for his students. The evolution for how this became his responsibility went something like this... note that I took the liberty to paraphrase:

....First day of school in September....
Mike: Hello! I'm Mike from Tennessee and I'm looking forward to working with you!
Bilingual Coordinator (i.e. his boss): Hello! I'm your boss and last year's Fulbrighter organized a prom here and we want you to do the same thing. By the way, here is your class schedule for the year.
Mike: Oh. Ok, great. I'll see what I can do.

A bunch of kids and a teacher I don't know:

What followed next were a few months of planning, assorted props gathering (such as a tropical backdrop for pictures, streamers and balloons) and lectures to the female student body that boots and mini-skirts were not appropriate attire for a prom. He also managed to wrangle up some extra chaperones for prom night to pass out flowers and check tickets at the entrance. That was where I came in. I never thought I'd be on the adult end of prom and now that I have, I can sympathize with why some of my teachers looked bored out of their minds while the kids were busy humping like monkeys and trying to sneak out of the dance-hall to find the hidden flask in the bushes.

Insert awkward prom memory here:______________________

Really though, aside from being a grown-up (eek!) at a kid party, it was fun to see the different outfits the students chose (some were looking sharp while still others wore jeans and mini-skirts) and their excitement at the entrance of the prom court and subsequent crowning of the King and Queen. (I wonder if it meant more to them given that Spain is a Parliamentary Monarchy?) Anyway, they all seemed pretty happy with the results of the royalty picks.

Given that we even danced the Electric Slide to Billy Joel's Achy Breaky Heart, I'd have to say the only genuinely American things the prom was missing were the limos and the girls puking in the bathroom. However, as this was only the Second Annual Prom, I'm confident that within a few years it is bound to reach "Social Event of the Year" status among the high-schoolers... well that or maybe they just won't show up in jeans.

Prom court- the winners in blue just right of center

I went to a Bullfight.

Surprised? Well it's true. And no, I didn't like it. And no, I'm not going to start eating meat again. And no, I didn't cry. Fortunately we were in the 4.50 euro, no-shade, nosebleed seats of the famous Las Ventas arena because being any closer and seeing the large quantity of blood or hearing the bull's cries might have warranted a different outcome...

Here's the breakdown on how my life spiraled out of control in three simple steps: 1. A friend came for a visit to Madrid. 2. He wanted to see a bull fight. 3. Somehow, I was persuaded to go too. Apparently I succumb to peer pressure and cultural curiosities quite easily.

So in case you were wondering, a bullfight goes something like this...

1. A bull enters the ring and about 4 matadors wave their silky pink sheets at him. The bull chases them around one at a time and gets a little dizzy and a little tired, but aside from the stabs that he gets before he enters the ring (yeah, he gets a stab before even seeing the first matador), nobody draws any bull blood. The matadors run and hide behind the wall after the bull starts to chase them and sometimes the bull crashes into the wall. At times they do some really tricky stuff like make the bull run around them in circles with the bull's horns extremely close to their bodies. They also wear toupees.

2. Then the matadors with the horses enter. They have spears. They spear the bulls in between their shoulder-blades. Their horses have armor. The bulls try and jab the horse with their horns. The horse is usually ok. The bull starts to bleed a lot and gets weaker and madder.

3. Next come the matadors with the decorative sword-things. They chase the bull around and have the daunting task of jumping into the air to try and jam more swords into the bull's back without getting crushed by the bull. They are received better by the audience if the swords remain in the bull's back because after all, they are decorative swords. One of the matadors trying to do this got clipped by a horn and got trampled by the bull. I think he was ok, but I'm not really sure because he made it to the safety wall but then fell and after they got the bull off him, all we saw were his feet being dragged out of sight.

4. After all the decorative swords have been placed, the boss-Matador comes out. You can tell he is the boss because he has the red sheet and gold piping down the sides of his fancy uniform (?) I was scolded vehemently by a fan when I said "costume", yet still not provided with the correct term for his ornate get-up. The other employee-matadors have to have any other color but gold down their sides. He waves his sheet around a bunch and does what I believe is considered to be the "art" part of the show (where he has the bull running around him and does a lot of Shannon Miller-esque, arched-back finishes). This is usually when members of the crowd, like the little old lady in a pink and green dress behind me, start to morph into bloodthirsty pterodactyls that squawk "MATALO!!!!!" (KILL IT!) and other equally unnerving chants. The crowd is quite lively throughout the entire process. That same woman yelled, "Stop being shameless! You're not fighing with a cow!" in a later round. Once the boss-matador is ready, he gets the sword and kills the bull. Hellooooo arterial spray. It usually takes a minute or two for the bull to die so one of the employee-matadors punches him in the skull a couple of times to speed up the process. I am still unconvinced that this is an attempt at mercy, as has been the argument presented to me.

Notice how this boss-matador is missing his smart, little, black slippers in the photo above? This is because that bull was able to get a piece of him and then the slippers got lost in the process. He was so angry when he got back up that it looked like he was going to try and charge the bull. One of the employee-matadors held him back. Then while he regained his composure, the employee-matadors cornered the bull and shook their sheets at him to confuse him a little more. They also do this at the end when the matador is killing the bull.

5. After the bull is dead they attach him to some horses and he gets dragged out of the ring. The crowd goes wild. This gets repeated 5 more times, as they kill 6 bulls every match.

Well now that's the story of how a team of matadors kills a bull. Feel free to print this and read it to your children at bedtime.

The Spaniards with whom I've discussed bullfighting usually think it is either really great or absolutely atrocious. I've yet to find one who takes a position near the middle. However, matadors are treated like rockstars here. They have their faces all over the tabloids, their bank accounts handsomely full and the affections of many a female admirer.

Bullfighting has seen more opposition as of late, as some of Spain's Autonomous Communities have started deliberations on the banning the traditional "art" altogether. It seems that Catalonia leads the way on this issue. This article explains a bit about the current situation. (I'd just like to point out that I can't help but find it amusing when the author notes that right-wing reaction is that this is just another attempt from the Catalans to separate themselves from mainstream Spanish culture. While I, being a foreigner, don't really feel that I understand the whole depth of the situation as far as making a decision about the cultural ramifications of continuing or banning bullfighting, I still can't imagine that the main interest of the Catalans in favor of the ban would be cultural separation. Whatever happened to simply being against the killing of mass quantities of animals for sport?)

Though I can't say that I will ever attend another of these fights, it was educational to see what this type of archaic feat was like- it made me think of watching the gladiators of Ancient Rome. The house was full, the people were there for blood, and disappointed they were not.

One last thought- If you want to see this graphic video of a matador during a fight who recently took a horn to the neck and that left out his mouth, follow the link. I'll leave that one up to you.