el fin

I think this will probably be my last post unless I feel like adding pictures with ironic captions at a later date. I am in the final stages of emptying my apartment of all the things I've accumulated in a year. So far, 100 euros has been spent shipping things home, and there is probably more on the way. (Which is to say, I'm sure the boat will lose the boxes of my things and there will be many well-dressed fish in the Atlantic).

I am on my way to Torre del Mar, a little beach town that is definitely either to the east or west of Málaga. On the agenda is skin cancer as a result of excessive tanning, Indian buffet on Sundays, tinto de veranos con limon (red wine and lemon Fanta... I know), and a 23rd birthday "celebration," if you can call turning 23 and losing my youth something to celebrate. I'm not bitter. 

Anyways, this year has been a real adventure. I was lucky enough to experience 119 degree weather in Sevilla in September, as well as the worst winter in Málaga's history, or something to that effect. I still don't speak Spanish, but I can swear effectively in a bilingual manner. I refreshed my memory of algebra, physics and biology (not really.) I learned that in order to keep the 12-16 year old demographic interested, talk Twilight to the chicas and basketball to the chicos. If you try to switch those two, eyes will be glazed over in an instant. I traveled to Roma, Firenze, London, Lagos, Lisboa, and many other cities in Spain.

In total, I would call this year a total success, with intermittent moments of homesickness. And, most importantly of all, I have learned that "blog" is "blog" in Spanish.

I should have come up with a better title.

tuenTi

Spain, like every other country in the world, takes the best parts of America and tries to make it their own. (It's like when Canada just slaps a maple leaf onto something and pretends to be a separate country. Yeah, okay. That makes you real people.) In this case, I'm referring to facebook.

Someone in Spain said, "hey! facebook! cool!" or maybe "oye! el libro de caras! que guay!" and then put their minds to work and presented these poor españoles with Tuenti.

I've had Tuenti since October, but whenever the niños asked, I'd play dumb. No, I don't use it very often, but I really didn't want to get stalked out all year. So finally, on their respective last days of classes, I took a photo with them, wrote my name on the board and said "Add me on Tuenti, if you want."  And of course, because I gave them an inch, they tried to take a whole kilometer: "Do you have facebook!?!!??!?!?!"  Facebook? No. There are incriminating photos there. Mom, Dad, don't bother looking. Privacy settings.

Anyways, after uploading their class photos to tuenti, my friend requests came flooding in. Seriously I think my number of tuenti friends was multiplied by 10. And we know that the number of social network friends shows how popular a person is in real life. (ie, myself = extremely popular).

One of my 1S1 kids took their class picture and photoshopped it (or "el photoshopped," as I'm sure it translates).

These kids are just killing me today. Excuse me, I have to go accept 400 tuenti friend requests.

hasta nunca, 4S3

Here is 4S3, a non-bilingual class, but one of my favorites. The teacher drives me to school every Wednesday and Friday, speaks nearly perfect English after being a Spanish language assistant in Ireland for a few years and attending university in England. This is BY FAR my most enthusiastic class, the class that is most excited to see me in the halls, when I enter the room, and I always leave to a round of applause. Flattering? Certainly.

BUT... Today they gave me a good-bye card... and that is when I realized that while we have had a lot of fun, they have learned approximately nothing.

Phonetic spelling of my name... Well, Americans can't do much better.

It sounds like a command almost, "WE NEVER FORGET YOU."

Or maybe robots.

We're human beens. Mistakes happen.

But how can I be upset? Look at what a good time they are, hanging with their profe, Jose Antonio.

Sad day.

1S1Niños

Here are my precious kids from 1S1 bilingual on our last day of clase. As you can see, they pay close attention to current economic conditions and particularly concerned about the unemployment rate- but not for John, who works in a bank.

sometimes in life you need to make sacrifices...

This weekend, my grand and valiant sacrifice was to trade hygiene for a couple more pounds in my savings account. London is not a cheap city and hostels for three nights ranged from 200 to 500 pounds... um, no gracias.

We had a specific neighborhood in mind, that of Earl´s Court near Kensington, because our friend already had a reservation at a hotel in that area. Because of the hideous price tags, we postponed booking a hostel until Friday morning around 11am. Did I mention we had to be at the airport by 4pm?

Finally, we found the beautiful Barkston Garden hostel. You would think that a place with the name "Garden" in the title, wouldn´t be as terrible as it was...

I won´t go into all the detail, but I leave you with a simple "Would You Rather?" question:

Would you rather stay at a hostel where there are bed bugs or a hostel where the toilets don´t flush?

Some of us didn´t have the luxury of choosing.