hiking near Manzanares el Real

Yesterday I went to a place about an hour north of Madrid called Manzanares el Real. I went to hike La Pedriza de Manzanares and El Yemo- a river valley area and mountain near Manzanares. It was an excursion put together by a CouchSurfing group I'm in that's made up of people in Madrid who like to hike, mountaineer, etc. The forecast called for snow, and while it did snow lightly for maybe 30min, other than that it was a great sunny/partly cloudy day!! There were about 30 of us in total, so it was a big group, but it was a lot of fun!! Hopefully there will be more hikes planned soon!

soap

I have taken for granted the fact that there is always, or at least generally, hot water and soap in bathrooms. I learned quite quickly after coming to Spain that I was not going to get hot water anywhere very easily, but it somehow took me much longer to learn that soap is also a luxury. There is one bathroom at my school that has soap, luckily it's the bathroom in the building I'm in 95% of the time, but none of the other bathrooms do. Nor does the Casa de la Juventud- a popular place that offers lots of classes (music, dance, art, sports, etc) where I take my salsa class. I commented this to a friend the other day and she told me it's true- soap is something you have to bring with you if you want to use it. She explained how when she was in the hospital (for a routine visit, nothing bad) that she went to bathrooms in several different locations and not a single one had soap- in the hospital!!! Nor were there any of the hand sanitizer things on the walls that we have gotten so used to seeing after the H1N1 outbreak. Seriously?! I mean I can sortof maybe understand business wanting to save money, but in a school full of kids getting sick all the time, and especially of all places in a hospital there should definitely be soap available for use!!

grades

I may have mentioned before how the Spanish grade on a scale from 1-10, with 5 or higher being passing and basically 8.3-ish or higher being an A (or sobresaliente as they call it). That standard in and of itself seems a bit low, coming from a background where a 70 is passing and a 93 or higher is an A, but this post is inspired not by the differences in determining the different levels of achievement but rather how these achievement levels are viewed. In the States grades are a private matter- between you and the professor, no one else. In Spain the teachers are known to go down the list, calling out everyone's test grades so that everyone in the class knows what everyone else got. Not only are the grades announced but commentary is also added, such as "you need to study more" or "for you this is good work" or "if you keep this up I'm going to fail you", etc. I have gotten used to hearing grades announced in this manner, but I'm still not entirely okay with it. I guess it is motivation to do well though. Another thing I found interesting is that some teachers also go down the list and ask everyone if they've done his/her homework. The students are shockingly honest. I know in the States students would say yes even if they hadn't done the homework, but here they'll say if they've done it or not, or even what parts they did complete if they only did part of it. I mean I'm sure the teacher will found out eventually but I was still surprised.

NIE

After being in Spain for over 4 months and lots of paperwork and running around, my NIE (national identity card) was finally ready, and I picked it up from the office in Madrid today! This means I'm officially a resident foreigner for the second time in my life.

Discipline

I've talked about discipline differences before, but this week was the first time I saw something truly shocking (to me) in the classroom. We were in class and one of the kids was goofing off more than normal. The kids were paying attention to the pranks rather than correcting the exercises they had completed for homework. The teacher flung everything off of the kid's desk, forcefully lifted the student's face up to look at the student in the eye, and told the student 1) to pick everything up 2) to stop the tactics, etc and be quiet. I thought forcefully lifting up the head, and hence shoving the neck backwards was bad. As time went on the kid didn't stop. The teacher shoved everything off the desk. The kid kept sweeping his arm across the desk and the kids were still telling the student to stop rather than paying attention to the lesson. Finally the teacher walked over to the desk, and put all their weight on the kid's arm so the kid would stop moving it and continued reviewing the exercises. The kid started crying, and the other students were paying attention to the crying. So after about 5min of crying the teacher stood the student up, put the student standing at the front of the classroom and said (all in Spanish), "okay, you win. you wanted attention here you have it, the class is yours. Class we have clown, go ahead, continue." Luckily after about 3 min. the bell rang, and I asked the teacher about it later. The teacher said that the kid is always really annoying and never pays attention because the kid doesn't have to learn English because the student is mentally retarded. I about flipped out! That sort of discipline would not happen/be allowed in the States, and certainly not allowed for a child who has mental issues. I was shocked. After talking with some others about the incident it's apparently normal...

2 weeks is not long enough

Coming back from vacation is never easy, and this has proven true once again. After a two week vacation I'm back in Madrid and exhausted and looking forward to the next vacation and it's only the first week...

My vacation however was great! I flew into Geneva, Switzerland where I met up with my family! We went to Chamonix, France to snowboard in the Mont Blanc valley for a few days- it's absolutely gorgeous! It's also the crossroads of France, Italy, and Switzerland so you could snowboard in all three countries! After Chamonix we went to Torino, Italy briefly to see the Egyptian museum and tour a castle before heading back to Geneva for New Years. The second week of my vacation I was visiting my friends near Avignon, France. It was nice and relaxing, and there was delicious French food!

Alas I've had to come back to work but all I can think about is planning other trips!

the holidays abroad

At school today we celebrated the season with a Christmas songs performance. Each class preformed a song, parents were invited, and the excitement of vacation was definitely in the air. It was a relaxing and entertaining last day of school for the year. This also means that I've officially completed one trimester and I'm 1/3 of the way through my year as an auxiliare here in Spain!

While the holiday season in the States starts as early as pre-Halloween, the holiday season in Spain starts around mid-December. Several people get annoyed at all the hubub and what not that occurs Stateside, and I must admit that it can be overwhelming at times, but there's a famous saying "you don't know what you have till it's gone" which applies here. Unlike Thanksgiving which is purely an American thing, there are signs of Christmas, quite a lot actually. While the city has lights, a big tree, and chocolates in the stores, there is still something missing. I've been streaming Christmas music on my computer, as well as watching some of the movies usually on ABC's 25 days of Christmas (which I used to watch religiously- for enjoyment or to avoid studying I'm not sure, but the classics are ingrained in my memory!) but there's still something missing. While skyping with my parents Sunday (to be able to see the skins/cowboys football game... another American tradition I watch religiously) I realized what was missing- the smells. After Thanksgiving the tree is up, and the oven is working hard. For a month I not only see the lights, watch the movies, listen to the songs, hear the bells, but I'm also surrounded by the smell of a fresh pine tree, and warm cookies coming out of the oven :) Nothing can beat the smell of a live Christmas tree, Mom's fudge, or Dad's peanut blossoms right out of the oven! Sayings become cliches for a reason, and it is true that there's no place like home for the holidays. Happy Holidays to everyone, everywhere!!