Teaching

 

      Sometime around noon today I looked down to find myself in an apron with a giant tortoise printed on the front in bright pastel colors. His name is Tex. Because I'm wearing the apron, I am now Tex. I want to tell the three year-old student sucking back snot who is holding on to my leg that although my appearance has been cunningly disguised as an amphibian I am still his teacher before bubbles of mucus soak into my pant-leg. While trying to disengage him however, I am still trying to get three students to understand what I mean when I say 'please get that out of your mouth, it's not safe and you'll be electrocuted' and calm down a hysterical young Chinese girl. I look up at the teacher I'm supposed to be assisting and her head is in her hands.

     

Luz Casanova-The front of my school in Carabanchel

 

 My teaching day usually starts off so full of promise. I wake up and take a quick shower, throw on some clothes and pop my I-pod on and run out the door. I grab a coffee at the metro stop closest to my school. The air is cool, I have a hot drink in my hand and I'm awake and ready for the day.

      My first few classes are primeria or elementary school aged kids. These are my best behaved students of the day. They can be bribed with anything. Telling them I'll draw an American flag on their work if they finish is enough to get them in a frenzy. They ask questions, they are quiet when I ask them to be, and they are generally respectful and nice to be around. About 10 I get one of the older students to grab me another coffee and I chug this while writing in the staff room.

      My next group is harder. The seconderia students are not interested in where I'm from or how I can help them. I'm just the guy standing in the way of the chalk board speaking too fast in a foreign language. I try to get through the next hour without causing anyone bodily harm.

      By noon I'm out of steam and it's time for the big leagues.The infantil or preschool group is like if you took a group of the criminally insane, made them bite-size, then got them drunk. As I walk into the classroom I'm confronted by a litany of offensive sights and sounds. I rank them in my head to organize which to deal with first:

 

 

-There are two boys holding another, extorting payments in the form of jigsaw-puzzle pieces.

 

-A thin girl has her hand shoved up her nose to the wrist, searching for something that is probably better off lost.

 

-The boy in the corner being quiet and pensive as he stares at the wall just shat his pants.

 

-A crazed three year old has just taken ahold of a plastic cup and is wielding it as a weapon against four cautious students who are looking for their opening in what appears to be the toddler version of a classic bar brawl.

 

       I quickly disarm the cup kid, send the two mafiosos back to their seats, and (with paper towels encasing my hands) remove the girls forearm from her nose. I avert my eyes from the boy in the corner and wait for the real teacher to arrive to deal with the rest.

 

       When I get home I'm exhausted, my clothes need to be fumigated and I feel frustrated. Not because I feel overworked or mad, but because I didn't expect to care this much about teaching. I catch myself getting really excited when that light clicks and a student understands a tense or can answer me in broken English. When I flop down on the couch at night and grab a beer I thank God for the thousandth time that I had teachers in my life that stuck it out and put up with my snot, disrespect and insanity so that I could be here now.

     

 

 

 

 

 

Running with the bulls in Moralzarzal

The main street of Moral, you can see Cody, Jake, and I looking nervous there in the middle

I rubbed my hands together for warmth in the thin drizzle of rain and regretted not bringing a jacket. Multi-colored streamers flapped over the narrow street as young men smoked cigarettes nervously and laced up their shoes. The air smelled like coffee and beer from the cafes that were packed along the streets, their entrances now boarded up with thick wooden beams that stretched between iron fence posts. The posts are designed specifically for these fiestas and are there to keep shops, bars, and onlookers safe. People snapped photos and hunkered close together on top of the fences. Through the thickening rain I could see a white gate at the far end of the street. In the center was painted the rough outline of a bull. Suddenly, I heard a crash. The gate trembled for a second then settled. The bull run was about to begin.
Jake and Cody, my buddies from the BEDA program, and I had been invited to the pueblo of Moralzarzal by Greg, another professor who lived there and wanted to check out the town's week long fiesta and encierros, or bull runs. Sipping coffee on the forty-minute bus ride from Madrid, talking about running with the bulls seemed fun in an abstract, bucket-list kind of way. Cody and I joked about how close we would get to it and who would chicken out first. We had both grown up watching Real TV footage of the carnage at Pamplona every year when thousands of people descend on the city to drink and tempt fate with the torros. Shortly before leaving for Spain my Dad had sent me a youtube video compilation of the worst mano-y-torro clips to deliberately dissuade me from ever partaking.

Lacing up for the run

The good, or bad, part about this experience was that it was 9 o'clock in the morning when we arrived. The encierros were scheduled to begin in 30 minutes and Cody and I were stone cold sober. No liquid courage no warm us as we walked along the street and noticed dozens of police officers and paramedics in reflective yellow, standing behind the fences. We began talking strategy. What ifs. Maybe we should sit the first one out, you know, just see how it all goes down.
So we stood in the pouring rain. Trying not to shake from the rain and the low, ferocious bellowing emanating from beyond the white gate.
The way it works, two castrated bulls are herded through the streets from the bullring (plaza de torros) to the corral where the bulls are kept. Then the bull comes out of the gate and, ideally, follows the other bulls down the street and into the ring. The sound I heard next caused a ripple of excitement along the crowded street.
Bang!
The shot rang out and in the split second or so I had before I started running I realized with startling clarity that bulls are big.
Bulls are VERY big.
This one was pissed and running straight at me. In that moment I could see everything. The cords of muscle straining underneath it's slick hide. Its horns a foot and a half long and sharp. Rain slid off of them and onto the cobblestones as it shook its head, registering the street, the people, the confusing cacophony of sounds and sensations. Its eyes turned to slits, its haunches lifted and it pounced, hooves clacked loudly on the street, connected, then shot forward all in one motion like an arrow shot from a bow.
I was on that fence and scrambling to the top, pushing old folk and children out of the way, faster than you could say man-card revoked.
After the bull went past and I was able to pry my fingers off the wooden beams of my seat and avoid the looks of the elderly and children I had shamelessly manhandled moments before,  I determined to make the next one count. I was going to do this.
The next bull was even bigger than the first. And faster. It was a black blur as it flashed out of the gate and once more I found myself scampering up the sides of the fence and folding myself praying-mantis like inward to avoid getting snagged by a horn. I was lucky, but the guy standing five feet in front of me wasn't. When he tried at the last second to leap out of the way his feet went one way and his body another. His head ricocheted off the street and was immediately awash in bright red blood from a gash above his eye. The bull's left horn pierced his thigh to the bone then ripped it open in all in one motion before it was past us, down the street, then out of sight.
As the paramedics and police ran over and determined whether or not the man's femoral artery had been severed and the crowds continued to order beer and wait for the next bull, I thought to myself what a strange country I was living in.
The third bull was about to leave the gate. I tied my shoes tighter and got whatever a sensible distance is from an animal that has every reason to want to kill you.
When the shot rang out this time, I was ready. I took off. Bounding around tracksuits and Real Madrid jerseys, cutting close to walls and trying very hard not to look behind me. As the street grew narrower near to the plaza de torros the crowded fences began to point and raise there voices quickly to the action behind me. Somewhere behind me there was a mini-van with spikes hurtling towards me, gaining on me every second. I didn't look but pressed forward, underneath the arched gateway of the plaza and into the sand of the bullring then immediately to my right, running along the fence then vaulting myself over into what I hoped would be the arms of impressed onlookers but ended up being an unforgiving floor of cement. Milliseconds later the bull came flying into the stadium.
I wiped sand from a busted lip and heaved myself up to join the cheering crowd as the bull was marched away until the fight later on that night.
I promised myself that I would never do anything that stupid again. Then I ran three more times.

Madrid-The first couple of days

     The cool thing about Barajas airport in Madrid is that the metro, the underground subway that has lines running through every major barrio in the city, connects to it and allows you to get anywhere you need to go in less than 30 minutes. I had just spent a long, cramped airplane ride trying not to think too much about the fact that I was leaving everything behind for a year. So I sat on my thick duffel bag, zipping through the dark passages underneath city. I wrote down which lines to take in a little blue book that I kept in my back pocket and lugged my bag up and down stairs and through ticket booths until I arrived at the Bilbao metro station. Because the metro is underground and the airport a few miles away from the city, I had technically been in Madrid for an hour but hadn't seen any of it. This was my first sight as I walked up the steps and stood blinking in the fresh air.
     The Bilbao stop has 5 streets running through it in a tangled web. Overlooking the monument in the center are tall, pink and tan apartment buildings with wrought iron balconies and ceramic flower boxes. Mopeds zip by as white vans park crookedly on the clean sidewalks and unload massive cuts of Jamon Iberico, Madrid's specialty cured ham that's served sliced on baguettes with olive oil or tomato.
      Waiters in black and white moved around tables clustered under an awning, serving café con leche and churros. Always in the background was the rush and swirl of air as cars zoomed by and people ran down the steps into the metro to catch their early commutes to work.
      I let my bag slip down my shoulder.
      The sun was just coming over the top of the plaza, and I was finally here.
      That was nearly a week ago. Like I've told some of the other BEDA teachers, Madrid has completely blown away my expectations. When I was doing a bit of research on the city before moving I got the feeling that Madrid was much like any other big city. Noisy, dirty, with a few museums, some nice parks, etc. Nothing about that is correct.
      Madrid is clean. Cleaner than the majority of cities I've been to in the states even. Although the city does have its barrios that are more crowded and busy than others, it only takes a five minute walk to find a thin winding street with a café or a quiet square lined with trees.
     My first few days I stayed in Malasana (the n has a tilde above it but I still haven't figured out how to do that on an American laptop). The hostel was small and cramped. I had to lug my bag up four flights of narrow stairs to get to the room I shared with twelve other guys on aluminum bunk beds. After nearly 48 hours of no sleep I was jet lagged, my arms were killing me, and I started to have a sinking feeling that maybe I had made a mistake. I dropped off my things and rented a locker so that I could stow my laptop and passport while I walked around the city a bit.
     When I went downstairs there were four other BEDA teachers waiting to be checked in. These guys have since become some of my best-friends in the city but more on that later.
     That night I was alone on the bottom bunk of my room wondering what I was doing. I had little money, no plan on how to find an apartment, and didn't know anyone within a couple thousand miles. I was overwhelmed that I would go at least nine months without seeing my family or the other people I love. Sometime during this pensive, obnoxious self-pitying I must have dozed off.
    The next thing I knew someone was nudging my foot. The room was dark and I could hear snoring coming from the other side of the hall. I immediately made sure my pants and belt were securely fastened. Then I turned on the light.
     It turned out to be the guy from the bunk next to me, asking me if I wanted to go out and have a drink with him and some of the other people in the hostel. What I really wanted was sleep. I wanted to not think or talk to anyone or have to worry about the logistics of changing clothes in a room full of people. But I nodded and struggled into a wrinkled shirt and followed him downstairs. The next thing I know I'm in a square a few blocks from the hostel, sharing a beer with two British girls, a hilarious Londoner named Nathan (who turned out to be in BEDA as well), a few university students from Holland and Germany, and the guy who had woken me up to begin with from Mexico City, who was finishing up the last leg in his month long travel binge around Europe.
     We stayed up until 3 in the lobby of the hostel, talking until we had to drag ourselves up the stairs to bed.
     This post was supposed to be smaller and kind of recap everything over the past week; how I found a place, made friends, and explored that city. Its rambling and its hard to describe everything about the past week. All I can do is flip through the snapshots in my head and try to make sense it all. I guess the one thing that stands out the most is that first day and that rush of excitement and fear.

     Travel isn't safe. Not real travel anyway. We can try to explore another culture and its people but it's hard when we return to the nice hotels and comfort of the familiar that we use to protect ourselves. I know, because that is all I wanted that first night, but what I got in return was much more valuable, and I can't wait to see where the rest of this journey takes me.

Sunset over Retiro Park from the roof of my apartment

    

Why I'm leaving

     The last month has been full of goodbyes. I said goodbye to the amazing friends I worked with for over six years, my family, and all of the friends near and far who have supported me throughout this decision. It seems strange now that just four days until my flight the reason WHY I'm leaving has become obscured. Six months ago when I was applying to the BEDA program  it was all so clear: drinking a beer in a sun drenched plaza, seeing the Mediterranean, bull-fights, sleepless train rides, and the freedom to be anonymous. Now the vision is clouded by the press of goodbyes, as if this whole time I've been walking backwards away from it. A fog rolls in and the logistics of what I'm about to undertake confront me.
     So I think I need to take the time to remember the reasons why I'm leaving.
     Travelling is not a selfless pursuit. We call attention to our conspicuous absence  by our empty chair at Thanksgiving or the presents left wrapped under the Christmas tree. So I can't really use the excuse that my leaving will somehow be better for the people I leave behind. I'm going to miss weddings, birthdays, and births. I might not be there when a friend calls and needs help or to help cheer up my brothers or sister when they have a bad day.
     If that's the case then maybe it's the experiences I will have that will be worthwhile to them when I make my way home. Maybe it's the challenge of seeing how adaptable you are when you're stripped of comfort, financial security, and your ability to communicate. Maybe it's the rush of having a few clothes rolled up in a backpack with your passport and no plan that makes travel so alluring. Maybe it's the chance to feel fear, and to overcome it, to start from scratch, learn something new, recapture your youth, meet new people, recommit to your curiosity, fulfill a promise to your twelve year old self that said that no matter how uncomfortable it may be, or scary, a normal 9-5 just isn't going to cut it. Maybe it's all of these things.
     These are just the final death throes of the me that thirsts for control of any situation, and the growing pains of a new life abroad.
     I leave for Madrid in four days. I'm terrified and exhilarated to start this new chapter of my life and so thankful that I have people in my life that make this a difficult decision.

     So I guess I'm leaving so that I can come home again. Ready to share my experiences with the people I care about.

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." -- Mark Twain


    
    
    
    

The Schengen Visa

After rereading that last post I realized how discouraging it must be to people who are thinking about moving abroad. In an effort to make up for that I want to talk about one of the biggest hurdles you come up against when trying to join a language assistant program, the Schengen visa.

 

 



Much to my dismay, after the paperwork submitted for my initial interview with BEDA and the worrying about plane fares and selling off all worldly possessions before moving abroad, there's still one last (huge) step. Put simply the long-term student visa needed to stay in Spain longer than 6 months is a confusing purgatory littered with the bodies of those who simply give up and break under the strain of the process. The thing that makes it difficult is that NO ONE seems to know exactly which documents are needed or which sites to visit to get reliable information. There are only a few consulates in the U.S. and the majority of them require you to submit your documents in person. So, to give you an idea of how much a pain in the ass this is, if you live in say, South Carolina, you have to take all of your documents and physically bring them to the consulate in charge of your district. In Miami.

                                                                                 

 

The good news is, everyone who has been involved with these programs before you had to do this and are more than willing to help with any questions. I had planned originally on going in-depth into what exactly the requirements are and how to go about getting them done. But, the thing about writing is that someone before you has probably said it, and said it better. If you live in Florida, Georgia, or South Carolina take a look at Nicole's blog post about what the reqs. are and a great breakdown of what they cost. http://theperksofbeingawanderer.blogspot.com/2013/05/passport-to-paris-or-madrid.html

 

To set the actual visa appointment I used a third-party website. They charge a fee but it's only about six bucks and that was worth it for me not to have to sit on the phone for an hour listening to a Spanish rendition of My Heart Will Go On. http://www.vfsglobal.com/Spain/usa/Miami/

 

Right now I'm still in the process of getting everything together. My appointment is later on this month and I'll make sure to keep everyone posted on any issues that come up.





In the thick of it

     One of the biggest problems with this whole move is the paperwork. No one seems to know where this letter gets sent or what kind of background check you need, what number you call to get a human being on the line to talk about student loan deferment. It's easy to get discouraged. Lately I've been finding it harder and harder to picture myself in Spain. It was enough before, seeing myself hiking or drinking a beer in a café or travelling on a train. Now that all seems to be buried under mountains of forms. You start to realize, oh yah, this is why not many people uproot their lives to move to another country. It's not really the physical distance, or the money. Just the increasingly difficult acrobatics you have to perform to jump through their hoops. Time seems to move at two speeds: achingly slow or way too fast. When I think about the next three weeks without a day off, working at a desk all day then changing into my servers outfit, I just want it to fly by. Then I start checking off the days until my flight. With my bank account in the double digits and the list of things I still need to do, people I need to see, phone calls that need to be made...I want to sleep for a week.
    I'm in the thick of it now. But it will be over soon. A decision like this, an adventure like this, never happens when you've gotten plenty of sleep, are well rested and prepared. It kicks down your door when you've got one leg trapped in your jeans and your arms outstretched ready to fall.
    In three months I will be flying over the blue Atlantic, watching the sun rise over the Iberian peninsula, thousands of miles away from anyone that knows my name.