Week 9

By Joni

Lost in Translation: Well, I wish I was typing this from the comfort of my own home, but unfortunately the internet story continues. This week, however, there seems to have been something lost in translation in an English conversation with our building's community president.  It's annoying enough to live it out day-to-day so I'd prefer not to rehash it all in detail.  Basically internet has never been setup in our apartment and the building is responsible for preparing cables before the internet company can lay their cable and give us access to the web.  The maintenance person for our building apparently adapts the common "mañana" attitude so common here, promising to show but taking his sweet time in doing so.  I think we'd prefer to be told "It will be ready in 13 days" rather than literally being told "tomorrow" with no follow through.  To their credit, apart from having a confusing system for appointment making, Vodafone has done all that they said they would do when they said they would do it.  We are just nervous that this luck will run out with Vodafone as soon as our building gets everything in order.  Also, we are totally capable of living without constant access to the internet - the main thing is feeling less connected to friends and family in the U.S. than we're accustomed to.

Another instance of lost in translation that is both a bit more lighthearted and a great deal stranger is our experience with the library nearest our house.  Unlike most libraries, this one does not allow patrons to check-out materials.  I would understand if the library housed historic documents or special, hard-to-find books, but by everything we've seen the material seems to be both contemporary and not all that curated.  The library does, however, have all-important internet access we crave, so we headed there on Tuesday to get caught up on email and weather another round of LingoBongo job searching.  I thought it would also be a good place to study Spanish and complete that day's homework, without other distractions that come from being in the house.  But as I attempted to enter the first level of the library, a librarian stopped me and said that books were not allowed into the library (meaning I could not bring in my workbook from my Spanish class).  I was also not allowed to take in my folder because, if I understood correctly, it was too full of paper. If they were blank pages that would be fine. A notebook is fine too, and I think folders with not very many papers. Mine had far too many. A library where books cannot get in and cannot get out.  Prison for books.  So weird.

Exploring the City: As many of you may have seen on Facebook, I bought a unicycle last Wednesday. It has been

great fun riding it around Madrid, as I think it is and even more rare sight here than in the states. The woman at the bike shop told me no one ever buys unicycles from them, and I'm pretty sure it's one of the only places in Madrid where you can actually find a unicycle. On Saturday, Aaron and I took advantage of the beautiful weather and rode/walked super fast (which is easy for Aaron with his long legs) to Retiro Park for the afternoon. We found a tranquil spot in the grass to lay our blanket down and spent the afternoon studying Spanish, eating a picnic lunch, listening to Podcasts, reading, coloring, and talking to some passers-by, all the while listening to the various musicians wandering about the park. It was a wonderful, relaxing afternoon that was followed by a lengthy, indirect, and exhausting ride/fast walk home.

Sunday we intended to check out a special, temporary exhibit at the Prado Museum, but the tickets were sold out, so instead we attended an Improv comedy show with our friends Alex and María. The show was in English, thankfully, as we are not advanced enough yet to follow improv in Spanish. Oddly enough, one of the performers used to work at TtMadrid, and we had actually met the guy there several weeks prior to seeing him perform! We are finding that we often see familiar faces when we are out and about in Madrid, which feels really nice and makes it more like home. 

Memorable Meal: Aaron so graciously cooked dinner for me on Saturday while I was busy reading Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and it was delicious!  He made a very

traditional Spanish dish - a tortilla! Those of you not familiar with Spanish cuisine might be wondering how just one tortilla can qualify as a meal, especially for two people. Well, in Spain, a tortilla is not simply a flat bread-like food, it is more like an omelet.  Typically the egg-based dish is filled with potatoes, and for his inaugural attempt Aaron added red pepper and onion.  It was definitely a successful first go at a Spanish recipe, especially considering we didn't tend to cook anything outside of a crock-pot or casserole in the U.S.  It's also worth noting that this homemade tortilla was FAR superior to the store-bought variety Aaron had for lunch at TtMadrid during our TEFL course, which stunk up the entire school after being heated in the microwave.

Everyday Life: We've now been in our apartment for over three weeks, so it's about time we posted some photos.  Here is the grand tour:

Our street, Calle Delicias.

Welcome to our building! It is well-secured, requiring keys for two different locked doors at the entrance.

Our door is on the left; 6B. Luckily our building, despite being old, has an elevator. I'm all for getting exercise by taking the stairs, but we live on the 6th floor (which is actually the 7th floor), and much like my mom, I cannot handle circular stairs for that amount of time without getting substantially dizzy. 

As you enter, the living room/dining room is the first thing you see, and the bathroom is directly to the left. The roof you see through the window belongs to a church building. We are lucky to have it there instead of another apartment full of neighbors that can see in our windows. The church being near us also means that our apartment is very quiet because most of the week there are no people in the building. 

The bathroom is pretty small, so it was difficult to get good pictures. Bear with me. 

The shower is tall enough for Aaron, but unfortunately a bit too narrow to comfortably maneuver to shave one's legs. 

Here you can see the top of the toilet. Do you see the silver ball on top? You flush the toilet by pulling this up. Almost all toilets in Spain have this mechanism, or a button in the same spot. Not once have I seen the lever type of flusher that I am used to.

Here is another view of the living room so you can now see the dining table. You can also see that if you go into the hallway, there is a room immediately to the right. That is our bedroom. 

Upon entering our bedroom, there is a chair in the corner, and the bed is to the left.

On the far wall, we have plenty of drawers, cupboards, closet space, and shelves.

The closets are behind the mirrors.

If you return to the hallway, the next room is our narrow little kitchen that sadly does not have an oven. It is actually very rare for apartments to have what is called an "American Kitchen" with an oven. We may eventually invest in a toaster oven, but for now we are going without.

The left side of the kitchen. Yes, that is a washing machine. In Spain, washing machines are located in the kitchen. Where is the dryer, you ask? We'll get to that in a moment.

The right side of the kitchen. There are two small blue stools here in case we would want to sit at the counter, but I don't think we will ever do that when we have a perfectly functional table in the next room.

The cupboard above the sink functions solely as a clever drying rack for clean dishes. I love that they are out of sight!

Finally, at the end of the hallway, we have the spare bedroom.

The primary functions of this room are to store extra things and large objects, to iron clothing, and...

...to dry laundry! Madrid is a very dry place, so clothing actually air-dries very quickly. I don't know anyone who has a clothes dryer. 

This room also provides access to the clothesline (of which I also couldn't get a great picture) located in the interior of our building. Most buildings here have these openings in the center so the rooms can have more windows, and thus more light.

En la clase: With all the fruitless internet appointments and (slightly-less-fruitless) interviews, we've not had a lot of time to take part in the cultural activities that accompany our Spanish classes.  But this past Friday we were able to venture out with some classmates to a local tapas bar.  Our classes end at 1:30 PM, which allowed us to just beat the hordes of people that piled into this seemingly un-expecting corner restaurant.  It was nice to chat with our classmates (both in English and Spanish!), as well as trying some delicious dishes.  I don't love seafood, so I skipped out on the dish of mussels and paella, but I did really enjoy the plate of fried pork and green peppers, and the bite-sized ice-cream-filled chocolate desserts.  Aaron enjoyed everything, as always :)

In addition to having our regularly scheduled group lessons, I had the opportunity last Wednesday to take part in a free 1 on 1 lesson with a trainee currently enrolled in the Spanish version of the TEFL certification program.  I always ask a lot of questions in a group class, and so it was really great to have all the freedom to ask whatever I needed without the slight inhibition I have in class when weighing whether or not the class would benefit from my question.

Final Notes: Yesterday I interviewed with another academy and was offered and accepted the job! In addition to the job I took several weeks ago (with My Helping Shadow), I will be working for Living Languages teaching adults on Mondays and Wednesdays. Next week I should be able to tell you more about these jobs, as they both start on Monday! It will be so strange to go back to work after not having done so since ending my last job on June 19th. I'm pretty sure that, up until this hiatus, I had never gone more than three weeks with out working since I got my first job in 2005. It has been a great adventure, but I certainly look forward to having a regular routine again!

Aaron is still plugging away at the task of finding work. Like we mentioned before, it is not difficult to find a job, it's just difficult to piece together the right ones. Many of them offer teachers only a few hours a week with lessons located in the far reaches of the city, some offer strange hours with big breaks or irregular days, and some just really don't pay enough. We are also finding that it is difficult to get a job living here on a student visa because many companies are not willing to go through the legal process necessary to hire us when they could just hire a native speaker from the UK. Luckily there are many new job posts each day, so he is continuing to interview at different places.

Technically though, Aaron had his first job last week! No, not as an English teacher, but as a voice actor. One of the job posts on LingoBongo last week was seeking a "male native English speaker with an American accent around the age of 30." Not much information was provided, but Aaron sent a message of inquiry stating his background in theatre and writing. Before being officially selected for the job, Aaron had to record himself reading two sentences that were sent to him. I like to think my "voice coaching" helped him to land the role. After being chosen, Aaron then had to proofread and edit a script for a commercial for a start-up company called CIRKL that plans to offer health care plans to people with freelance jobs. The following day, he met the team of three people at the metro, then they went to the headquarters of a local bank to record the approximately 1.5 minute long script. This took only about two hours of Aaron's time, he had a great time, and he got paid! We are definitely now on the the lookout for more opportunities like this. 

Week 8

By Aaron

Lost in Translation: If you read our week 7 post, you most likely assumed that we were mere hours away from finally getting internet in our apartment. And if this were another country, your assumption would have been correct.  But this, my friends, is Spain, where seemingly straightforward tasks tend to take a little longer than expected.  This past Saturday morning, a technician from Vodafone showed up to our apartment just as we had scheduled.  After intimately exploring some key places in our apartment walls (as well as a few other places in the building), the tech informed us that some existing wiring in the building was broken.  This meant that we had to wake up the building president, Rosa, and ask her to call an electrician.  By some stroke of luck, Rosa speaks English and is incredibly kind.  She explained that she would have to call Liliana (our landlady) and ask her about an electrician.  The following Monday and Tuesday, Joni received calls from Vodafone that seemed to be asking her to schedule another appointment.  To the best of her ability, Joni explained that she needed to wait until the electrician repaired the cable before the technician could return to install the fiber for our internet.  Each time, the person on the other end of the line appeared to comprehend Joni's response but simply stayed on the line.

Joni: ¿Tu necesitas algun más?
Vodafone: No, es todo.
Joni: Vale.
Vodafone: ...

It would be creepy if it didn't also seem very polite.  Perhaps the conversation had diverged from a flowchart and the representative didn't know what to do.  At any rate, Joni eventually hung up the phone.  On Tuesday evening we heard from Rosa that the wires would be repaired the following day, so we ventured to our neighborhood Vodafone branch.  After all, in-person awkward silences are much easier to interpret!  A woman at Vodafone told us that we needed to provide Cat's NIE # in order to reschedule the appointment.  Naturally!  She provided a number that we could call, so long as we had the NIE#.  After returning home and calling the number, Joni was on hold for 20 minutes (with an English speaker!) when she realized this phone time was eating up her monthly allotment of call time and that we should simply return to Vodafone.  We arrived 15 minutes before the store closed, but no more patrons were being allowed in.  So far today Joni has not received any calls from Vodafone, so we'll head to the store again to plead our case.  Hopefully next week the update will be that we have internet, full stop.

Exploring the City: Our neighborhood is located about a 20 minute walk from the Río

Manzanares.  It's a rather underwhelming body of water, little more than a large drainage ditch working in tandem with the M-30 roadway to cordon off Madrid's center.  Luckily there is a paved path for cyclists and runners, as well as some nice park area nearby.  Most impressive, however, is the Matadero, a former slaughterhouse-turned-art-space adjacent to the aforementioned river.  We headed there on Saturday to check out the Festibal de Bici, a glorious all ages jamboree with activities ranging from a vert skating competition to a "slow bike" race to an area filled with paper confetti for throwing about.  It was loads of fun, and we were proud that we could walk home.

After getting settled in our apartment we were ready to ingrain ourselves in the sacred neighborhood institution known as the library. Friday we visited the Biblioteca Regional Joaquín Leguina, a former brewery turned library within a ten minute walk of our home, and obtained library cards.  It is a beautiful building and a great space to go if you're seeking solitude to read or write.  The weird thing is that the books in this particular branch cannot be checked out.  It remains to be seen if this is the case for all libraries in Spain, or perhaps if it is a condition of a card issued to a person with a passport and not a resident card, but at any rate it is a place I imagine myself returning throughout our time here.

Memorable Meal: My parents and sister raved about the churros con chocolate they had in

Spain during Emily's semester abroad, so I had been looking forward to trying this traditional Spanish treat ever since we arrived. What better place to start than at our doorstep, right?  Well, unfortunately we were met with disappointment. First of all, we ate the churros for breakfast, which is a terrible idea, as they don't exactly make up a nutritious meal. Churros are basically just deep-fried bread served with a thick chocolate sauce. We thought this seemed more like a dessert, but the churrería near our apartment is only open during the morning hours, so churros for breakfast.  They smelled amazing, but tasted a lot like the breading of an onion ring, sans onion. I expected them to be covered in cinnamon and sugar, or powdered sugar, making the churro itself a delectable treat and the chocolate merely a bonus. These churros, however, had nothing on them and thus, alone, did not taste all that great. As for the chocolate, I expected a consistency similar to that of chocolate from a chocolate fountain (basically melted milk chocolate). Instead, it was more like a thick hot chocolate that was clearly made with water as the base. It was, however, the best part of the whole experience, despite its shortcomings. Needless to say, we will not be returning to our neighboring Churrería, but we are still more than willing to give the treat a second chance at a different location. 

Who’s Coming to Dinner: It was a relatively quiet week for dinner guests - most of it was spent chipping away at the pasta leftovers from the previous week. On Sunday we sought out company, once again in the form of Ben & Cat, and once again visited Massart.  (Sidenote: I learned that the Spanish word masa translates to dough in English, so there may be some wordplay going on here...albeit with an extra s).  This week's selection was the Barbacoa: tomato, mozzarella, barbecue sauce, ground beef, onion and corn. Twice in two weeks, I know, but we don't have our own oven and there are 28 tantalizing varieties of pizza on their menu.  I have no regrets.

En la clase: We are really enjoying our Spanish classes, which is good since it comprises

the majority of our days at the moment.  All the teachers we've had are wonderful, and each day we are pushed to expand our ever-filling base of vocabulary and grammar.  Much like our TEFL course, the Spanish classes have a very international feel. In my class I'm now the lone student with solely U.S. citizenship.  In addition to the time spent in the classroom, we have regularly scheduled cultural activities - all in Spanish - lead by our teachers.  Last Thursday we went on a scavenger hunt of sorts at an exhibit on costumes from productions of plays by Miguel de Cervantes and Shakespeare, commemorating the quadricentennial of their deaths.  I was a little disappointed, as I initially thought it was a conversation with designers about their stylistic choices connected to the text, but the costumes on display were worth the trip.  This past Tuesday we had a zumba style dance lesson from one of our teachers that incorporated steps from salsa and cha-cha.  In addition to elevating our heart rates, this activity gave us all the requisite vocab to conduct stretching exercises!

Final Notes: Job searching is tough.  It's not that there aren't jobs available, but rather knowing which to take and at what time.  English classes are typically conducted in the relatively early morning (7:30 - 9:30), the lunch hour (1 - 4) and then the "afternoon" (4 - 10).  If you aren't selective it would be possible to leave for work before 7 AM and not return until close to 11 PM.  The more interviews we attend the easier it gets to start feeling out how to efficiently fill our time slots while coordinating to ensure we get to spend some of our waking hours together.  No new news to report on this front, but we hope that things will become more certain in the coming days.

Perhaps more noteworthy than anything else in this post is that last Thursday I finally beat 2048.  It's been years since I started playing, and now I need another addicting game to drive me mad whilst wiling away my time listening to podcasts.

Week 7

By Joni

Lost in Translation: On Monday, after living in our apartment for almost a week with no internet (and rapidly blasting through our month's allocation of mobile data), we decided to try and tackle the beast of getting internet for our apartment. The previous tenant had a router, and simply purchased a SIM card for internet connection. He left the router at the apartment, so we thought this should be a simple task. All we needed to do was buy a SIM card of our own, right? How hard can it be?  Well, I don't really know anything about setting up internet. I have been fortunate enough to have lived, at this point in my life, only in places that already had internet set up, and the price was included in the rent. 

We went to our local shop that had one employee who spoke no English, but I was feeling confident because I had a week of Spanish class behind me. Unfortunately, however, none of those classes covered all the different internet package options or vocabulary related to internet. After a lot of miming and repetition of phrases, we learned that that the SIM card option would only allow us to buy a limited amount of internet connection per month, and would quickly add up to be very expensive! Thus, we needed to explore other options. We left that place feeling a bit defeated, but remembered some helpful advice from Laurie (Aaron's mom). She told us while they were living in Puerto Rico she learned that everything takes three tries, and to expect the same in Spain. So far, this seems to be a pretty reliable piece of advice (although with apartment-hunting that number sky-rockets). 

This task did, indeed, take three tries in the end! (Well, I hope). That same night, we attempted try number two. We popped into a Vodafone store with the intention of signing up for a plan we found online, but we needed a NIE card to do so (a temporary Spanish identity card).  We have begun the process to obtain our NIEs, but we won't have them for about another month and a half. We would prefer not to wait a month and a half for internet access at home, especially while we are still in the midst of the job hunt. 

Luckily, however, they don't really care if the NIE card you use to sign up is yours or not. So once again, Cat and Ben came to our rescue! On Wednesday, Cat and Ben met us at Vodafone for try number three. Cat generously allowed Vodafone to copy her NIE, and she "cosigned" the internet contract with me. If our friendship wasn't already official, it is now. 

Now we wait for Saturday when Vodafone is scheduled to come to our apartment and set everything up...fingers crossed that it happens without a hitch!

Exploring the City:

Our favorite phrase when shopping at Aldi.

We finally made our first trip to Aldi!  Aldi was our go-to grocery store in the states. Its low prices, random snacks, and lack of choices were all the perfect characteristics for us frugal, snack-loving, indecisive people. While we were slightly disappointed not to find some of our Aldi favorites from the states, we still had a great time perusing the inventory and finding great buys. My favorite from the trip? A large container of sour Smurf-shaped gummies for only 1 Euro.

Our bounty.

A cool building nearby Aldi.

Memorable meal: After church on Sunday, Aaron and I walked around the Moncloa area in search of a place to eat lunch before returning home. We wandered past a place called Massart, and upon discovering they serve pizza, we promptly made our way inside. We were initially overwhelmed/excited by the wide variety of options for types of pizza, as they all sounded absolutely delicious, but ultimately we opted for the Chicken Curry Pizza. Wow. Even before I took a bite, I could tell I was going to love this pizza. Of the pizza we've had in Spain thus far, most are a bit dry; this curry pizza, however, had a bounty of sauce (both tomato and curry) and cheese, as well as other toppings (onions, chicken, and oregano). My non-meat-loving palate is getting a bit tired of the copius amounts of meat served at every meal (specifically jamón, or ham), so I was so excited to have a meal in which the meat is merely an accessory. As we were consuming this heavenly dish, we discussed that perhaps we should make this a weekly after-church excursion so we can try all of the (surely) phenomenal flavors of pizza offered by Massart. Although then this section of the blog may get a bit repetitive...

Who’s Coming to Dinner:
We had our first dinner guests in our new apartment! In attempt to thank Cat for her signature on our internet contract, we had Cat and Ben over for dinner. The meal was mediocre, but the company was fantastic. Aaron and I realized we haven't really cooked a true meal since we left DC three months ago. All summer we traveled and either ate out, or at the homes of friends and family where they usually provided the food and we maybe just helped a little bit. In August, of course, we lived with Marli and had breakfast and dinner provided for us daily. Our lunches have consisted of sandwiches and fruit, and occasionally eating out. In addition to being extremely out of practice, we also have not adjusted to the different selection of groceries available at Spanish grocery stores. As a result, we had some spaghetti with a rather bland sauce (despite accidentally mixing in what I now think was supposed to be salsa), a salad with a thick and creamy balsamic vinegar, bread, and of course ice cream. The ice cream was delicious, as always, so luckily we were able to end on a good note. We are happy to have polite friends who happily eat our food, even if it tastes like it came from a cafeteria.

En la clase: 
Aaron and I are currently in the midst of our second week of intensive Spanish classes. We continue to be challenged and learn a lot every single day. This week we've even picked up a couple extra free classes! TtMadrid offers, in addition to the TEFL certification course, a Spanish teacher prep program. Just as we had to do teaching practices during our course, they need to do the same. Two of the Spanish students/teachers were actually our classmates last month during the TEFL course, so it's a lot of fun to be on the other side of the table now and get to learn from friends!

Final Notes: 
Now that the apartment search is behind us, we are on the hunt for jobs!  Or rather, jobs are on the hunt for us. There is such a high demand for English teachers in Madrid that our interviews feel more like we are interviewing the organization, rather than the organization interviewing us. TtMadrid sent out our resumes to their network, and they also send us a "Job Alerts" email almost daily with new job openings. Between having our CVs sent out and sending just a few applications through the Job Alerts, Aaron and I have received many phone calls and emails of interest from potential employers. In total, I've been to 9 different interviews, and Aaron has been to 7.

I have accepted one position so far with an organization called My Helping Shadow. Before my schedule is confirmed I will be teaching a few classes in order to find the best fit. The organization works solely with children, either at My Helping Shadow, or through in-home lessons in the afternoons/evenings. Once I have a solid schedule established at My Helping Shadow, I will look for another position to fill up the rest of my time, hopefully working with adults so I can experience working with all ages.

On another note, it rained!  Why am I so excited? Until Wednesday, I had seen maybe a total of 3 raindrops in my time here in Madrid. Wednesday was rainy, and I actually felt cold!  I haven't had that sensation in so long. It felt great to sleep with a comforter again, rather than on top of the blankets. Bring on fall, please!

This past Saturday we ventured out of Madrid for the first time to visit beautiful Segovia.  Aaron and I were delighted to be accompanied by our classmate Emily on the trip (about a one hour bus ride from Moncloa station in Madrid), and we met up with our classmate Jill and her boyfriend Jonathan. A small city northwest of Madrid, Segovia is perhaps best known for it's striking aqueduct.  Minutes after getting off the bus, we turned a corner and saw the ancient aqueduct presiding over the town. The juxtaposition of this historic structure with the bustling little town full of life struck us as representative of the Spain we've seen thus far - a place with a strong connection to traditions that is nonetheless very modern.  

Me, Emily, and Segovia.

After taking in the lovely views of the aqueduct with sky and

distant countryside in the background, we continued on to the town's main square.  Later in the afternoon on our return to the bus, we witnessed a bride and groom greeting guests from a balcony at a hotel in the square!  Adjacent to the square is the Segovia Cathedral. With sprawling spires that can be seen from several places in the city, the cathedral's grandiosity is a fitting compliment to the aqueduct.  We enjoyed walking through the cavernous interior and admiring the art that appropriately decorated each room. 

After the cathedral came a lunch break where we devoured yet another menú del día.  

All the food was good, but I think the highlight was the soft, fresh bread served to start the meal.  While we usually don't feel like moving after one of these massive meals, we were beckoned to continue the journey to the Segovia Castle.  

While it is yet another towering structure, the castle is at the edge of Segovia and sits atop a cliff that surveys the countryside.  This location is beautiful but also served a tactical purpose when the castle was still in use - without a drawbridge it would have been quite difficult for any enemy to cross the moat and scale the large stone walls! 

Now would be a good time to mention that we benefited from the insight of Jonathan, who effortlessly translated all of the Spanish signs and gave us digestible summaries of the history.  We were grateful to have Jonathan along and really enjoyed getting to know him better.

 Aaron, me, Emily, Jonathan, and Jill.

View from the castle's tower.

After exploring the castle, Emily, Aaron and I set off on a race

against the clock to catch our return bus home.  With approximately four minutes to spare, we handed the bus driver our tickets...and were told that we needed to see the clerk inside the station to officially re-book our return trip.  This meant we had to wait for the next bus, which was not a direct route, but

local with several stops, that departed an hour later.  Temporarily defeated, we perked up when we noticed a pastry shop across the street and decided to treat ourselves after a day filled with walking.

All in all, it was a really fun day, and we look forward to many more excursions in the year to come!

Fun fact: I learned this week that my Spanish teacher is from Segovia!

Instead of a horn, this car neighs like a horse.