I spent the weekend following our lovely trip to Granada having a well-deserved rest in Cuenca. Mary and two of her friends, Haley and Ashly (also language assistants and from the USA) came to stay and we had fun showing them the sights (and bars). Aside from a mild case of food poisoning (I suspect the culprit was a severely undercooked steak I’d had at a restaurant the night before) it was a perfect weekend of relaxation. The weather was glorious and, come to think of it, it was the last real glimpse of spring we’ve seen since.
Yes, here comes my customary English rant about the weather. It has been appalling; cold, windy and rainy. Of course, we’ve had intermittent sunshine and the odd bit of warmth to remind us that the sun still exists, but every time I allow myself to hope that spring may finally have decided to make an appearance, it seems the clouds roll in, bringing a menacing warning with them: “Keep your coats and boots within easy reach – winter’s not done with you yet!”. Okay, so I know the weather is unpredictable wherever you are, and I know it’s only March. But come on, Spain! Your climate is supposed to be significantly superior to that of the old Blighty. I feel almost cheated by how little difference there seems to be!
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| Snow in March! |
In fact, last weekend we even had snow. Yes, snow. In March. IN SPAIN. I was on my way to Madrid by bus when I realised how heavily it was snowing. The countryside of Castilla-La Mancha was covered in a thick blanket of the stuff, and the driver had to slow down as we drove through what seemed to be a small blizzard. As I was supposed to be meeting Hugh in Madrid, I was understandably concerned that the coach might break down and yet again we’d fail to spend the weekend together. Luckily, though, Spain deals with snow much better than England does – no big surprises there. On the journey I saw several snow ploughs and all the roads were clear and safe to drive on. Perhaps Cameron should take a leaf out of Zapatero’s book...
Anyway, political comment aside, I got to Madrid on time and met Hugh at the bus station. We got on another bus to Salamanca, where we were going to spend the weekend. Miraculously, nothing went wrong and we had a lovely time in Salamanca. The sun even shone... a bit.
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| Salamanca's Plaza Mayor in all its glory lit up at night |
Salamanca is a beautiful city, most famous for its university (the oldest and one of the most prestigious universities in Spain) and its magnificent Plaza Mayor, which has been voted the best square in Europe in the past. It was built of sandstone in the traditional Spanish Baroque style, and is enclosed by four facades made up of arches and porticos (covered walkways). There are several cafes and restaurants in the square, each with tables and chairs spilling outdoors so you can eat breakfast in true continental style, outdoors, people-watching. Needless to say, Hugh and I did so twice! How very European.
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| The famous carved stone facade of Salamanca's university... can you spot the frog?! |
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| The facade close up... if you look closely(on top of the skull) you'll see the lucky frog! |
As around 30,000 students study at the university, Salamanca has a friendly, laid-back student vibe. Hugh and I went to see the famous facade of the university. Somewhere amid what seems like millions of intricately carved flowers, patterns, skulls, people, shields and gargoyles, is a frog, cleverly and discreetly carved in among all the other detail. Legend has it that if you find the frog, you will have good luck in your studies and relationships. Of course, finding the frog is deliberately a challenge, and when we arrived there was a gathering of tourists staring intently at the facade, craning their necks, scratching their heads and pointing. We joined them and after a while, much to my glee, we spotted the frog (with a little help from a local man selling postcards, but we needn’t go into that). So hopefully that means I’ll pass my degree and won’t end up a spinster – phew!
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| The beautiful view of Salamanca from the cathedral towers |
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| The enormous cathedral |
On Sunday, after having crammed in as much culture as we could stomach (including a little jaunt on the mini tourist train, which moved so quickly that it was comical, lurching violently around corners so that it almost felt like we were going to fall out; the only photos we managed to take were a blurry mess!) we headed back to Madrid. There, we enjoyed a tasty feast at a Japanese restaurant – one of my ultimate treats when I’m in the capital is oriental and Indian food, as it’s hard to come by in the comparative modesty of Cuenca – and stayed in a very plush 4* hotel which we’d booked at a bargain price several weeks earlier. On Monday morning I caught the AVE (the high-speed train system linking several major Spanish towns and cities, into which little old Cuenca was incorporated just before Christmas) back to Cuenca for the first time. At 300km/h, it feels like you're gliding through the air and is a modern wonder compared to the horrors of Spain’s Regional trains which take about three times as long and feel as if you’re sitting in a tin can and being shaken vigorously. In just 51 short minutes I was back in Cuenca and ready for the working week ahead of me. A thoroughly civilised way to travel!
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| Mary, Jaclyn, me and Krista in fancy dress for Carnaval in Villarrobledo |
In keeping with the theme of telling you about my weekends, that brings us almost up to the present. The weekend just gone was a very intense, party-orientated one. On Friday night (already with rather sore heads from the night before), Jaclyn and I set off for Villarrobledo to visit Mary and Krista. Although it’s a small and relatively unremarkable town with a humble population of around 26,000, it is famed in Spain for its Carnaval celebrations. Carnaval is a festive season in Spain, immediately before Lent, in which many towns and cities host several days of colourful parades, live music and entertainment and the streets and squares are filled with people in fancy dress, drinking dancing and generally having a good time.
Some places make a much bigger deal of it than others; Cuenca isn’t one of them, but Villarrobledo is. When we arrived, the town was in the throes of preparing for its second to last night of a solid week of partying, and the atmosphere was electric. Jaclyn and I hadn’t been organised enough to procure fancy dress costumes, but we managed to fashion our own outfits out of a few odds and ends that Mary and Krista had lying around the house. I was a flamenco dancer, dressed all in black with a scarlet feather boa, red tasselled shawl around my waist, my hair scraped back into a bun and lashings of dramatic black eyeliner and red lipstick to complete the look. I even gave myself a beauty spot with the eyeliner, which I thought looked ridiculous at first, but gradually it grew on me (pardon the pun) and even got me several compliments... Shame it’s not real, then!
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| An example of the wonderfully creative fancy dress costumes at Carnaval! |
The festivities went on all night and the heart of the action took place under a huge marquee in the main plaza. As I looked around, I realised the effort and creativity people had put into fancy dress costumes was awesome. Everybody, young and old, had gone to the trouble of dressing up, and the standard was truly brilliant.
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| The impressive homemade Chinese dragon |
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| The Chinese dragon in action |
In other news, everything is progressing nicely on the school front. Although I still find teaching infuriating at times – I probably always will – and lack the passion I feel would be necessary to turn it into a career, I feel I’ve proved to myself that it’s something I am not only capable of doing, but capable of doing reasonably well. I’m not the best teacher of all time, but I certainly don’t think I’m the worst either. In the past couple of weeks, I’ve taught my classes about the English education system and typical British food. Both topics were received with a surprising amount of interest by the majority of my classes, which made me feel quite patriotic! When I was talking about the full English breakfast, one girl put her hand up and said, quite seriously: “I thought English people didn’t like mushrooms?” Well, I was stumped. What does one say to that? Although it was a massively generalised and largely unfounded statement, I welcome any sort of comment and it’s rewarding when the students are actually engaged and comfortable enough to participate.
Outside of school hours, I have also adopted another language exchange class (I already have one in school with a teacher, Juan). I met Myriam at mine and Jaclyn’s weekly yoga class. She heard us talking English and asked if we were interested in practising our Spanish, as she wanted someone to practise her English with. Jaclyn didn’t have any gaps in her busy timetable, but I decided I could squeeze in a weekly hour-long meeting with her. So, every Thursday we meet at a coffee shop and speak for half an hour in Spanish before switching to English for the remaining half hour. I really enjoy it, and listening to Myriam speak is very good practice for me as she’s from the south of Spain and therefore has a very different (and admittedly much more difficult to understand) accent. The first time we met we were both visibly nervous but thankfully we hit it off straight away so conversation flowed naturally. Much to my amusement, during our first session Myriam kept saying enhtusiastically: “¡Hablas de puta madre!” which is a rather crude way of saying she was impressed by how well I spoke Spanish. For those of you who don’t know, puta madre would translate roughly as ‘mother f**ker’ or ‘holy sh*t’, but is commonly used as a high compliment in contexts like these. I suppose it’s similar to when we say ‘sh*t hot’ to mean something good in English. Unfortunately I still feel like anything but when it comes to my speaking skills, but nevertheless I appreciate her kind words for giving me a confidence boost!
¡Hasta luego!
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