Yuletide Posting

Well! It's been quite a week! School is out and I am currently sitting alone in my apartment on Christmas Eve (you may think that's a sad statement but it's the first time I've been alone in my apartment for more than a day and I plan on taking full advantage of that by not washing the dishes until tomorrow or maybe even the day after. I know: badass). 

The last week of school was hectic, but lovely. Lots of excited kids getting excited for Christmas! We actually had real class in science most of the week, but we spent basically every English class period making Christmas ornaments, Christmas cards, learning about Christmas in different cultures, and listening to English Christmas songs. I taught the kids the meaning of the words in "Silent Night," and that María is Mary in English and José is Joseph. I never thought about the fact that they would not know that, but it seems obvious once you remember, of yeah, they speak a different language! A couple kids made me Christmas cards, and one of them even spelled Merry Christmas correctly! That was not happening very often, let me tell you! Of course, And the kids got the paper they made back, so that was cool, too. (Actually, I don't remember if I said that they got to make paper out of newspaper pulped with water, but they did...). 

Thursday night Steve and I hung out at Triskel's for open mic night. Jesús, Pablo, Alex, and a new friend Tristan, came and drank and talked with us, and Jesús and Pablo and Tristan all played some, too. It was a really chill evening, but I was exhausted enough that I decided to leave early. 

Friday was full of Christmas magic fun times! We all went ice skating on a temporary rink set up outside of the Royal Palace. I can safely say I never thought I would be able to cross "Ice Skating in front of a Spanish Palace" off of my bucket list, but I can now! It was awesome, even if my feet were not happy in those crappy skates.

 After we finished skating, we all went to Melanie's to hang out, and we talked and drank and had some delish food (nachossss) and "watched" Notting Hill (it was really just background noise). 

Hannah, Julie, and I just got back from Granada today. We left Saturday afternoon and, after some drama finding our ride in the very crowded Sol Plaza, hit the road. It takes about four hours to drive from Madrid to Granada, and we got there around 6:30pm.
Our hostel was in an unmarked building on this road that was not even really a road, but it was probably the best hostel stay I've ever experienced. Very few other guests, beautiful view of the city, quiet, coffee, and wifi.

What more could you ask for? That, and it hosted an alley full of stray cats that were adorable to look at, even if they were too skittish for us to pet.

So, that first night we went down Calle Elvira and experienced some Granada tapa-ing. Considering we were on one of the most touristy streets in the city, I think we did pretty well with what we got. 

Sunday, we rose with the dawn (or noon...) and went to La Alhambra. Neither words

nor pictures

can describe the beauty of this place. It's one of those amazing human-made structures that is almost beyond fathoming,

you know, the ones people just say aliens were involved in because there's no way people could be that awesome types of buildings. An Arabic masterpiece palace and gardens that apparently Washington Irving spent some time living in, as we discovered when we saw his statue there.

I could have spent weeks in that place and I would not have even tapped the surface of all the beauty it has to offer. Definitely going back there before I die! Mostly because I was getting sick at that point and I'd like to enjoy it when I am well and capable of being awed properly. 

We met up with Julie's college friends Jana and Benin afterward, and went back to their cave apartment.

They actually really live in a cave in the side of a hill in Granada, complete with cactuses growing on top and a chimney coming out of the ground above. If I can't live in La Alhambra, I guess those caves could be a close second choice. After enjoying Jana's delicious homemade muffins and watching the sunset over the hill, they took us to some less touristy tapa bars and we had a true Granada experience, complete with fried eggplant in honey, which is just one of those things you have to try to believe how good it really is. 

Monday was not great for me just because of being sick, but we did get to see the Granada Cathedral.

This was one of those trips that was fulfilling enough to be satifying, but wanting enough to make you come back for more. Since I have basically decided that I want to go south next year, I will definitely have to experience Granada a second time. 

Today, we drove back with a lovely woman, Raquel, who it turns out is an English teacher in the south of Madrid, and likes Loreena McKinett (sp?). So now I'm chilling as the hour winds down to Christmas, spelling my hearty stew cooking in the kitchen and keeping myself good company. Happy Christmas Eve, everyone! 

Incredible! A Scandal! Beyoncé!

This week has been really good. Beyoncé gave us a reason to live again, I've been watching the lovely guilty-pleasure show Scandal, and of course, the end of the semester gives us all a little desperation to make us actually hang out with our friends and do things we should have been doing all along. So Thursday night, instead of going to Triskel's for open mic night as per usual, we ended up going to Naif Burger because Sam loves their burgers and nachos and we all wanted some hearty cheesy food. This would be the evening we discovered that the British, for once, say something in a less sofisticated way than the Americans do. Instead of saying nawchos and tawcos and whatnot, the British say nAchos and tAcos (like the "a" in cat). And it's disgusting. I mean, I really don't know what they're thinking. They aren't English words! You have to say them with the A the Spanish use! Ah! Getting to know British friends has involved numerous arguments over the pronunciation or usage or meaning of certain words and it's generally something we can just agree to disagree about. But this is ridiculous.

This weekend, I tested how much tv I could watch without melting my brain. Haven't hit the point of no return yet, so I'll continue experiments. 

On Sunday, Hannah, Julie and I went to a cafe to begin planning our Christmas holiday trip. I wanted to go to Morocco originally, but getting there is a little expensive when you leave it to the last minute, even if everything else is super cheap. That, and I'd like to be able to swim in the ocean when I go, so I'm thinking I might save that for spring break. So instead we're going to Granada, from this Saturday to Christmas Eve. We decided we want to be in Madrid for Christmas Day since most things would be closed anyway and we want to be somewhere familiar. But three days is plenty of time to see Granada, and we're really excited! 

Last night I watched the Incredibles with Sam and if you've forgotten how good that movie is, I'm sorry for you. So many great characters and lines! Apparently my friends are nervous when I write about them on here, but it was a fun night, even if I stayed up later than I should have on a school night. But it's the last week of school, so you gotta go a little crazy! 

 

Es la epoca

I always forget that Tuesdays are blog days. Well, at least until the end of the day or Wednesday. But this time, I remembered! Mostly because I actually have a decent amount to say!

So, I just spent a few hours watching Mulan and Hercules and writing Christmas cards. I got a bunch of Christmassy things at a little set up in Chamartin station where they were selling crafts made by (and to help support) mentally disabled people all around Spain. It was a really good, heartwarming atmosphere, and the crafts were honestly fantastic. Just gotta make sure not to buy anything too breakable! 

This last week has been pretty good. I am still working on deciding what to do next year (I know I want to do this for another year, and in Spain, but where?) and also editing my novel. Saturday, though, was Melanie's birthday. She hosted a Christmas party and had lots of traditional British Christmas foods, including Mince Meat Pies, which I'd never had before, and which I'm still not sure if I like or dislike, and a lot of other wonderful homemade baked goods. So, we all hung out there for a while and talked and watched Love Actually as it played in the background. I had a conversation with Kate about how, yes, American girls do find Hugh Grant attractive because he's awkward and British, and yes, that really is a thing. 

Julie, Hannah, and I went through Sol to get back home and eat dinner, and had a whole bunch of fun wading through the giant crowd that was gathered there. The weird thing is, there wasn't even aything going on! Just a ton of people! Sol Plaza is decorated, but I would never have expected it to bring so many people out, even on a Saturday. Of course, it was also a holiday weekend (Friday was Spain's Constitution Day... do we have one of those? Maybe in September?) Either way, it took us way too long to get to the metro, particularly since we had to go one further than we normally would have because the metro stop at Sol was just a giant stream of people exiting, with no room for people to get in. It was pretty crazy. 

But then the sun set and night came, and we all gathered again at Mad Dogs Tavern to hear Steve and Melanie perform for an entire hour (and a half, really), and it was so amazing! Melanie went to college for music, and her friend Joey (don't know how to spell that to indicate to you that Joey's a girl, but she is), was in town and played her saxaphone and flute for them on some songs, and another guy, Jeff, played violin for some other songs. Basically, it was just a nice, talented group of people sharing their love for music, playing their own songs as well as covers, and they did so well. I sort of designated myself photographer and perched on the mini fridge in the corner the whole time, so here are some results from that endeavor.

Melanie's beautiful smile, getting ready. 

Warming up as the audience gets settled. You can't tell, but ths room was TINY. There should not have been as many people in it as there were. 

Melanie and Joey. Joey was seriously an amazing musician, although I really love saxaphone so I might be biased. 

CONCENTRATE

This was as far as I could zoom out, and you can see how closely people are crammed in there! There were a lot of people that wanted to see these guys play! 

Steve lookin' pretty baller.

Melanie and Jeff with the fairy lights in the background. 

So that was my Saturday! Sunday consisted of my making tuna casserole and morning glory muffins to sustain me throughout the week, and yesterday went pretty much as usual. School was fine, and my private tutoring was great. Andrea and I played pictionarry and then when Daniel got there we made snowflakes, which they had never done before! It makes sense: it rarely snows in Madrid since the mountains catch everything, but still, I was appalled. What eight and six year olds haven't been like a million snowflakes by that age? C'mon! 

And today was good, too! I got to make snowflakes with the class where I help with art, and the kids loved it (duh). In English, though, I got kind of mad at one of the kids. It was probably the funniest reaction though, because they were supposed to write down a few sentences about their school. His read: My school is big. It has a teacher verry verry verry verry verry angry. It has 3 playgrounds. 

I basically bust out laughing and just said, Okay, but "teacher" is a noun, so it goes at the end of the sentence, after the adjective. And very is spelled with one R. So that was a funny experience. I hope he doesn't hate me. He was laughing, so I think that's a good sign. 

Anywho, I've been up too late the past few nights so I need to go to bed! 

Thanksgiving Month

It's been a couple weeks, and Thanksgiving is technically over (though not in my heart!), so I thought I'd update on what's been happening! 

School has been basically the same, I'm still very much enjoying myself and also considering returning next year. I found out last week that if I want to renew with CIEE, I should tell them I'm considering it by December 15th. Of course, I thought that this meant I had to absolutely commit to another year by then. Thankfully, as I found out today, that is not the case. I only have to give a noncommital nod. But the thought of having to decide this so soon has got me thinking. I really love this job, I love these kids, and if I keep up the good work, it is extremely likely I'll be placed with them again. I don't know how I feel about staying in Madrid, big city that it is, or about being out of the country for another year, but I do know that, since I want to travel in the summer and having a placement would make it easier to do that, it's something I need to seriously think about. So I'm making my mental pros and cons list and we'll see where that takes me. 

Because November is over, so is National Novel Writing Month and... I made it! Again! (Except I finished one day late because of Thanksgiving... shhh). So now to the editing phase. This is actually the first novel I've wanted to reread about doing it during Nanowrimo. The other two I could not even think about afterwards, I thought they were so bad! So that's a good sign, I think. 

And then Thanksgiving! Oh man, was that fun. I was in charge of roasting the "turkey" (chicken: they don't sell whole turkeys in Spain normally, and that's expensive anyway), and the pecan pie. First, the drama. Pecans aren't really a thing here. You have to go to the "posh" grocery store (like maybe a whole foods or something in the U.S.?) to get them, and even then, they're still in the shell. I don't know if any of you have shelled a cup worth of pecans before, but it is TOUGH! It hurts your fingers! And it's really difficult not to eat them all! Then, brown sugar (also really important for pecan pie) can only be bought at, apparently, Taste of America. (Actually, Steve found unshelled pecans there too, for 17 EUROS!) They also don't sell pre made pie crusts, or roasting baskets, and I had never dealt with a whole chicken before (at least that I had to cook). So all in all, it's a miracle everything wasn't ruined. The pie was decent, the chicken wasn't too dry, and everyone went home full and a little drunk. We met at Hannah's, Steve, Melanie, Sam, Begoña, Iñaki, and Hannah's fellow auxilar Shromsfionvsdf (don't remember her name). Hannah made pumpkin pie, green bean casserole, and garlic mashed potatoes. Steve made a killer sweet potato casserole (he also joined in the pecan brown sugar grief with me), and Melanie made stuffing and gravy that worked perfectly together. Sam brought the incredibly important vanilla ice cream and wine. Iñaki brought salad and wine. Begoña brought sparkling cider. We basically had enough bottles to each drink out of one instead of using glasses. We didn't, but we could have. 

So having all the traditional (except for the turkey) foods, even without the family, really made the holiday special for me. 

I went to the open market on Sunday and got some new shoe-bootie things and a black, suede slim jacket for like 15 Euro so. 

So this week in school we're starting to wind down with new work and review all the units we've covered so far. Today, I started on a Christmas mural outline that the kids will get to color in and put themselves onto. It's pretty awesome, as the kids watching me draw it kept telling me ;) 

So yeah! If I think of anything else important that happened in the last couple of weeks, I'll edit or something, but Thanksgiving pretty much covers it. 

It's Beginning to Look a lot like... Trash.

In case you weren't aware (though I've been talking about it a lot) there is a trash strike going on in Madrid now. So for the last week or two, trash has slowly been piling up on the streets and in the dumpters (and around the dumpsters once they were full). It finally FINALLY ended on Sunday (12 days long) but that just means it's going back to the normal schedule, and our trash doesn't get picked up until Thursdays (I think). The point of all this is that everything smells. 

So, over the last couple of weeks, life has been pretty normal. I have settled into a decent routine here, and particularly since I'm doing National Novel Writing Month, I find I have less time to just sit and be bored. I go to open mic nights, I watch movies with friends and roommates, I write and write and write. 

Exactly two weeks ago (I know because it was the night I was writing my blog) my phone was stolen at a bar, so I've been trying to get used to my crappy new Spanish smart phone. It is sufficient for my purposes, I guess. 

Sunday, I went to see Ender's Game in the cinema! And I saw it in the original version, not dubbed! (There were Spanish subtitles on the screen, but I could ignore them for the most part). It was SO GOOD. I really want to read the books again, now. 

Every other Sunday is Open Mic Night at Cafe de la Palma, and Steve and Melanie played this Sunday. They really rock my world on a regular basis; both are so talented and so gracious. Very good musicians and even better friends! 

And today, my class went to a theatre in the area to watch Alice in Wonderland, in both Spanish and (bad) English. It was so boring. Like, I have not been that bored in a long time. The kids around me were talking or falling asleep and I did not even care. I wanted to sleep, too! I would rather have taught them stuff they did not already know in science (but of course, they would always prefer field trips to science class). 

The weather here is basically the same as in Missouri, high of 45 and lows of a little below freezing, with rain. But while Missouri will get a lot colder, we're pretty much where we're going to be for the rest of the winter. At least that's what I've been lead to believe. 

Friday, I went to the mall and spent two hours searching for some knee high black boots. I tried on every pair I could find, just because I have really wanted some for a while. Finally got them! And they are beautiful, believe me. Now I just need to get some more actual fall/winter clothes, since I've just been layoring to deal with the cold.

I'm also getting really excited for Thanksgiving, since some friends and I will be celebrating together (including two Brits, I know...) So, sorry if this week is boring, but I guess that's my life now! Maybe I'll go somewhere crazy this weekend... 

Ciao! 

Obligatory

The last time that I went two weeks without blogging, everyone freaked out. So even though nothing has happened this week except me recovering from being sick and having my phone stolen, I'm posting a bloggg. 

So I guess obviously the phone stolen thing happened. Immediately after I posted my last blog post. I was in the bar using wifi and a futbol game came on and the bar filled up, and then when I got home I realized my phone was gone. That's it; whole story. I have a new phone now. 

On more positive notes, my teacher Rebeca told me yesterday that I should consider becoming a teacher for real, because I'm so good with the kids (blush!) which was obviously really nice to hear. 

And finally. Today I saw a train wash. Like a car wash, but bigger and for trains. And I thought that was pretty cool. 

So, now you all know I'm not dead. I promise, I'll have a real post next week.

Halloween, November Writing, and Toledo

Halloween! So Halloween day was ridiculously crazy for the kids; some moms from the parent teacher alliance equivalent here came in and had mask making activities to do in science class, which meant we also just watched videos on youtube. You would think Halloween themed videos, and certainly, Thriller is very Halloweeny, but after Thriller we then watched... every other Michael Jackson video out there. I never would have expected kids under 10 in Spain to be as in love with Michael Jackson as these kids are. It's really kind of amazing, but also weird. I dressed as a black cat because it was something I could use my own wardrobe for. The kids understood what I was but Halloween is so much more of a scary holiday here than in the US that they did not get why I wouldn't want to come as something scarier. There were no princesses here; Batman was the least scary costume I saw. The girls were all witches, or vampires and the boys were all vampires, batman, devils, or skeletons. Basically your standard scary stuff. That night was the open mic and Steve and Melanie played together for the first time in public, and it was really wonderful. They are both very talented and it is awesome hearing them play individually, let alone as a group. Steve and I watched Zombieland, in true Halloween fashion, but no parties for me. I was exhausted! 

Friday... I did... something... I'm sure... 

Saturday, Sam, Melanie, Hannah, Steve, and I all went to Toledo for the day! First of all: I could get used to the mild weather here. It is November and I hardly even need a coat most days! I think this week has been more mild than normal, but still. People are still eating outside at the restaurant and wearing light jackets. We got to the bus station at Plaza Eliptica at 10:20, as planned, to leave on the 10:30 bus. At least... most of us did. Sam and Jill were late, and Jill ended up not going because she had just gotten out of bed by the time we were supposed to meet there... oops! Sam and I were both starting to be sick (I was more than starting, and really I should have stayed home) but we really wanted to see Toledo. It took about an hour to get there and then we walked up the beautiful hills to the top of the city, and believe, there is quite a view there! 

Talk about a gorgeous countryside! We really just wandered around for a while, and because of that, and since we got there later than we had planned, we didn't end up getting to do everything we wanted to. But it was still really fun and a good day. We saw the cathedral, which is HUGE and seems bigger because of how small everything else in the city is. 

And Hannah, Melanie, and I went into a museum with an exhibit on Leonardo Da Vinci; it was of all his drawings and inventions, which they had recreated. 

Hannah and my favorite was definitely the "Worm Hoister." We know the "worm" part is about the kind of machine it is or something... but the idea of hoisting worms was just too funny. "Gotta hoist those worms somehow!" 

There was also a dungeon in the museum, which was the cause of great amusement to Melanie, who, having come from England, knows what real dungeons are. 

These dungeons! Pah! Too well lit, not damp or musty enough, too big, too comfy. Even their torture instruments are tame! Look, that one looks like a kitty! 

So we had fun in there while the boys, I dunno, got a beer or something lame like that. 

One site we could not pass up was the El Greco museum, especially because it was free when we got there since it was after 2pm. It was really beautiful and fun to look around; I felt like the grounds of the museum were more interesting than the paintings, but that might have just been my opinion... 

The cellars under the museum. 

The view from the 2nd story balcony. Beautiful! 

My favorite painting was definitely the one with the lion wearing the red hat. (Okay, that's not what it was... but it looks like it!)

We got a decent group photo in the gardens and moved on. 

Our plan was to get food and go see the Jewish Synagogue that was built in the 1300s, but Spain has a way of making you take your time sometimes. We sat down at a restaurant and spent the next hour waiting for the waitress to even come up and take our orders, so that by the time we left the restaurant, the synagogue was closing. Guess that just means we'll have to go back! We took our time wandering back to the bus station, wanting to see some of the nighttime happenings. 

Beautiful river with what seems to be the remains of a base for a bridge. 

Loving the weird sun spot on Hannah... haha. 

The cathedral with Sam and a random couple in the background... 

The rest of this week has just been me being very sick, not leaving the apartment Sunday or Monday and sleeping most of the time, and working on my National Novel Writing Month novel for November. I am currently at 8000 words (just about on target). My roommate Laura is also sick and at first we thought we had the same thing, but I have a sinus infection and it turns out she has pnemonia! Yikes! Hopefully she will get better soon. Begoña also went home again and brought back a bunch of fruit from her family; tangerines and pomagranates. I forgot the word for pomagranates is granada in Spanish, so when she first told me I thought she was saying she had gone to Granada. We cleared that up quickly enough, though. After this week of highs and lows, I'm hoping for some calm. 

Ciao! 

Two Tuesdays Later...

Blog nog: 

With Halloween quickly approaching, we're doing more themed lessons in class, particularly since, in science, we're learning about the human body/skeleton right now. Very easy to have some fun, scary lessons about the skeleton! There's even a great youtube video called the skeleton dance that the kids love and even request at the end of class. This last week, I didn't post anything because I was sick on Tuesday and because not toooooo much exciting had happened, so I figured I'd wait another week before writing again. 

So two Saturdays ago I went to Alcalá de Henares

(A beautiful church in Alcalá de Henares). 

with Hannah, Steve, Julie, and Sam

 (Hannah slyly smiles, Julie speaks, Sam not pictured). There was a "festival" celebrating the author of Don Quijote, Cervantes, and so we went and saw his house and church and just generally walked around the city for a while. Alcalá is about 45 minutes out of Madrid by train, and it was really beautiful,

but as far as the festival goes, there wasn't too much going on. While there we toured Cervantes House

 (here we're posing in front of the well in the courtyard of his beautiful old Spanish home),

We also saw some pretty churches 

(complete with a choir!) 

Had a fun photo shoot with Don Quijote himself:

and debated about what the heck these weird clumps of hay at the tops of the buildings were (turns out: birds nests...) 

 Finally we got some cervesas and tapas and headed home. 

Then Sunday I was starting to get sick, so I've been dealing with that for a while. Monday and Tuesday I was really sick (hence no blog post), Wednesday I went back to school because I was feeling better, thought the doctor gave me a note saying I could take the week if I wanted to. The problem is that my science teacher is out of town on her honeymoon and so the kids are kind-of on their own without me, particularly because the "subs" are just other teachers in the school coming to hang out in the classroom for an hour, and most of them don't speak English. So that's a problem. It's actually been pretty good: I've had to learn quickly how to control the class, figured out which class is the worst to deal with and which is the easiest, and made sure we got through everything we needed to. It's been trying, but good experience, I think. 

Then Thursday was the strike, so we weren't allowed to teach the kids anything from the textbooks (I still don't understand why that is, since WE weren't on strike... but half the kids were gone from school anyway, so I guess it's good we didn't progress in the course. Anyways, then Thursday night was Sam's birthday and Steve and Melanie both played the open mic at Triskel's Tavern and we all hung out and drank there for a while. 

This last weekend involved watching el Clasico (the match between Barcelona and Madrid) at Steve's apartment with Grant and Eric joining, and then going to a performance we were an hour late for (to suppport a friend of Steve's) and heading home early on Friday. Saturday was very slow and Begoña and I watched the movie Australia together (so good!), then Sunday, we had pumpkin carving! I really wanted to do something for Halloween so I invited Melanie, Steve, and Julie, and Begoña came too, to carve pumpkins and enjoy roasted pumpkin seeds at my apartment while watching Hocus Pocus and The Nightmare Before Christmas. It was a really good time. I made an homage to Buffy: the Grr Argh monster (complete with grr and argh),

Julie made a bat, and Begoña did some super creepy scupltures. Steve and Melanie carved apples because they couldn't find pumpkins,

which was funny enough to begin with, and the apple ended up a little harder to handle than anticipated. I actually had to search for an hour to find three decent sized pumpkins, and to do so I first went to a market that occurs every Sunday a few blocks from my piso. Didn't find pumpkins there, but I did get a small backpack I can use for work and another pair of sweatpants, which I have desperately needed. 

Now it is Tuesday again, and I can happily say I am officially living in Spain (according the the Spanish government) because I have done empadronamiento (which basically is just telling the government I'm living here and them acknowledging it). Empadronamiento is only important because I need it to get my temporary residency card, and my appointment to turn the paperwork for that in is on the 14th of November, soooooo. 

I'm also considering doing National Novel Writing Month (November) this year, but we'll see how far I get...

And now you're all caught up! Congratulations! Here's me picking my nose and Don Quijote's nose because yes I am 12 years old. 

Not Quite a Quarter of a Hundred

Birthday! My birthday was a mix of happiness with my new found friends and sadness that I couldn't spend the day (and night) with my old friends and family. I get out of school early on Thursdays, but that didn't stop all the girls giving me homemade birthday cards (I got four from about eight girls, collaborative efforts, and zero from boys haha), and shouting Happy Birthday at me multiple times.

I got home from school and took a well deserved 4 hour nap, not only because I was tired from the week (3.5 days, soooo long!) but because I knew I would be out late that night. And I was correct. First, Steve, Alex, Julie, and Jesús and I met at Cien Montaditos, that favorite cheap food and alcohol place of mine, for drinks and dinner, at about 9:30. We migrated, getting Daniele on the way, to Tristel's Tavern (an Irish pub) to listen to Steve play an open mic night, and stayed long enough that it dissolved into anyone coming on stage, so Jesús played as well. It was really fun listening to all these players, there was a band there that was just phenomenal, and it was all really chill. By about 1:30, my fellow Auxiliaries Allyson and Violeta had joined us and we moved to a bar, the name of which I am blanking on, but that was decorated and even built like a ship. It was playing good music and also weird videos that were unrelated to the music, such as that creepy stop motion Peter and the Wolf and an equally depressing The Little Match Girl. They had fantastic Mojitos, though! By the time we left there it was about 3:30am, and Alex and I walked to Plaza de Cibeles to catch our respective night buses home (mine, I have now learned, is #22, though I took #23 that night. It got me close enough). I got to witness a belligerent drunk get kicked off the bus, and that was the end of my birthday night! 

Friday I hung out with Steve and company at Grant's apartment for a bit, because it was Grant's birthday. By about 11:00, I think, a whole group of his friends came over that were a little too crazy for my mood that night, so I headed home and hung out with my TV for a while. I hung with Steve Saturday, stealing use of his wifi and introducing him to Welcome to Night Vale (which, if you, gentle reader, haven't listened to: DO IT). We also had pizza/kebabs at a restaurant in the area and watched The Chumscrubber, still not sure how that happened. Not much has happened since the big birthday night, and I am still loving school, while also wishing I could change more about the school and how the students are taught (and, you know, the world). For now, I leave you with the happy thought that after searching for a week I have finally found a basil plant and can have fresh basil again! Okay, so it's much happier for me than anyone else, but it should be enough! 

-ta luego! 

PS: the pics I meant to post last week but couldn't figure out how to: 

Begoña, Laura, Carlos and I playing Mexican Dominos

A big egg sculpture thing at the Reina Sofia Museum. ;)