Guest!

My dears friends, Esmeralda, Hans and their baby Esme are visiting us!
They're going to stay for a few days with us and I'm very happy to have them here and show off about Barcelona.
Their visit made us realise that we're not prepared for visitors despite having an extra room. That room is now where my desk and computer lives but it can well be a guest room, and we're going to need it when my mother-in-law arrives next month as she's staying for a whole months and cannot sleep with P. So we'll have to find another place for my desk and stuff.

We'll have some time to do all the changings rooms' stuff next week because more or less the whole week is taken as a holiday. P's having a sort of mid-term break and most of my clases has been cancelled as my students are going out.

New Harry Potter's cover.

I'm soooo looking forward to read the final book of the Harry Potter series and here is the cover, which was presented recently.
I've enjoyed reading the whole story, each and every book, and P. and I shared the books and loved the movies. "The husband" is one of the few people I know who remained untouched by the story.
Of course, I've already bought the book at amazon, so, with any luck we'll get it before is in the shops here. Keeping my fingers crossed!

This is Spain!

This is a true story as it was reported by "the husband".
He was waiting for his bus at the bus stop when a car parked just touching the bus lines, ok. Then a second car appeared and parked actually on top of the no-parking-bus lines on the street totally blocking the way for the bus to stop and pick up passengers. "The husband" harrumphed to himself but said nothing as there was still some room to catch the bus on the zebra line.
But then a third car appeared and park on the zebra crossing, and then "the husband" couldn't resist any longer and approached the driver and calmly said the Spanish version of "listen mate, parking is not allowed here for a couple of reason: first, people need this to cross the road and second: we need this space to be able to get into our bus". The guy got off the car, looked around and then shrugged and as a way of explanation say "but, mate, this is Spain!" then turned and left.

"The husband", a very patient and calm man, smiled, shrugged off and went back to wait for his bus.

A few minutes passed and a car stop, looked at the people waiting at the stop and the driver said: "are any of you guys going to the Autónoma?" (the university campus where "the husband" works)... both "the husband" and another guy said yes to which the driver reply: "well... I'm going to the math department there, so, if that's on your way, I can take you there and save you the waiting".

"The husband" said that this was an enlightening experience for him as he finally understood what "the Spanish way" really means. It gets on your nerves sometimes, but it can also make your life easier, just follow the flow. Very Zen-like. ("the husband" not the country)

Easter eggs and Monas

This week I started to see Easter eggs in the bakeries and supermarkets. Here, the tradition includes the eggs and something else called Monas de pascuas. To start with I couldn't understand the meaning because "monas" means "female monkeys" in Spanish.
However, today I learnt that Mona is a word coming from the Arab “munna” which means gift. The Easter mona was a sweet bun with a hard boiled egg baked into it and which was traditionally given by godparents to their godsons and daughters. You can still find the traditional ones in some bakeries.

The egg-decorated pastries tradition was overtaken in the mid twentieth century by chocolate with which fantastic figures were created to call children’s attention. Each Easter Monday, godparents, specially Catalan, give children this fantastic delicacy.

In Catalonia, where the tradition has become a great event over the years and specially in Barcelona, a city famous for its designers and great taste in everything, it has become the chance for master chocolate makers to show off their art and knowledge, exhibiting their most incredible creations. Some are internationally acclaimed, such as the late pastry cook and chocolate sculptor Antoní Escribá (new shop) or OriolBalaguer whose creations are true chocolate art jewels as you can see in the pictures here, they look even better than the bejewelled Fabergé eggs. (a click on their names will take you to web sites with more information about them).

That sort of designs are at the very top of the Easter eggs industry and are accordingly very pricely and not to be founded in my local bakery. However, even the local bakeries here in Sabadell are showing off beautiful or funny creations to tempt everybody, from images of football idol Ronaldinho with his Barcelona Football Club shirt to the Teletubbies and everything you can think of in the middle, you're totally spoiled for choices. As you can see in the last picture taken from one of the local pastisserias here in Sabadell.

This is another tradition that we're happily going to embrace!!

Dealing with bureocracy

Allegedly, Napoleon said that England was a nation of shopkeepers. He probably meant it as an insult, but for me is one of Britain's virtues and I miss that above many other things. I love to shop in England, online, in Malls, in chains, whatever... is a pleasant experience, you're allowed to browse 'till you drop, exchange no reason asked, pay with whatever you happened to carry with you and the post is reliable and fast if you want to use ebay or amazon or whatever.

The whole concept of business seams to be different here.
Let's start with the concept of time, which here is definitely not related to money in any way. Time is more of a relativist idea, very Einstein's, meaning that nobody really cares about time, so the delivery man will say that he'd arrive between 9 and 12 am and you can be waiting for ever, the same with your GP: they give you an appointment card with a date and a time but that's only a sort of guideline regarding the time that your GP will actually see you. As for my students... some are better than others and I'm always on time to start my class... only to be left waiting there for ages, there's one group which are always at least 30 minutes late each and every class. The worst bit is when they call and cancel the class in advance, because if the class is cancelled with more that 24 hours notice I don't get to charge that, so I miss my earnings.
That's the only thing I really dislike about being my job, because it means that even when my time is always taken since the beginning of the month, I never know for sure how much I'm going to make at the end of it.
That's why I'm still searching for a more stable kind of job.

Then there's the horrendous costumer service when shoppers are treated as a nuisance and that's even before they need some help, so imagine trying to complain about whatever problem!!

When we first moved to our rented flat, we got a phone with Telefonica, it took them for ever to connect us and the service was total crap, we complained and nothing was really solved so we moved to another phone provider. We were asked why and we told them and we thought that'll be the end of it. No! Now we discovered that they were taking money from our account to pay for a commercial phone (much more expensive that a family one) for months even though we did not have a direct debit with them!! I don't even know how they did it. They took around €1.000 and now they refusing to give our money back! They say they investigating the matter and that can take forever. We're considering going to the ombudsman but we cannot even find one!!!
I do believe that the employees at Telefonica did that on purpose to us after we complained, as a sort of vendetta. Because even when (and there's still a big if) we solve this, nobody on Telefonica is ever going to be penalised, it's nobodies fault and we got all the trouble.

Now I find out that I want to return the lovely MP3 player that "the husband" bought for me. It's totally gorgeous but it doesn't have a radio and doesn't run with Linux (the operative system that I use in my computer instead of Windows), so I want to change it for another one. I'm bracing myself here because it's long an uncomfortable enough if you want to exchange something in person in any shop so to exchange something that you bough online and got by post... I don't even want to think about it.
There's a reason why people here don't shop online and even ebay is only just starting here. Actually, there's probably more than one reason as we're sure to find out soon.
"The husband" e-mail the company and they're ok with the exchange and say that they'll contact us to agree on how to do it. That was yesterday and I'm still waiting. I'll let you know about this.

You've been... breathalised!

It happened recently when I was going to work and the police stop me and asked me to take the test. It was around 3pm, which here means just after lunch for most people. The idea is to catch those driver who had just finished lunch and taken a few glasses of wine with it, because the local perceived wisdom is that wine at lunch doesn't really count as drinking and driving.

Lunch here is a lengthy business and something that people take seriously. Most jobs actually close from 1pm to 4pm to allow people to go home, have lunch and rest a bit before going back to work until 8pm.
Most schools do the same and most children actually go home to have lunch and a siesta before doing the second half of the day. My son is one of the few who stays at his school for lunch and he enjoys 3 courses plus dessert and then he plays with the other "unfortunate" kids whose parents work full time. The menu is rather good and very healthy in a Mediterranean style, most days they start with salad or some sort of vegetables and always some fruit for dessert, always fresh seasonal products from the local market freshly cook (Jamie Oliver's idea of heaven). I think he has chips once a month or something like that. P enjoys the food (he's never been a picky eater) but he's looking forward to the next school year when he'd be able to go home for the siesta.

People who knows me, knows that I don't drink much alcohol anyway, so this was sort of police time being wasted on the teetotaler. In any case I didn't mind, it was my first, so it give me something to write here and I had plenty of time for my class (I'm almost always on time and is my students who keep me waiting because they cannot humanly understand the idea of starting the class on time... Spanish time is really at least 15 minutes behind any other normal idea of time). Whatever. My test was ok and they didn't even check on my driving licence!! With all the troubles I went to get it!!

Look at this!!

I'm on my own most of the day and I'm totally hooked to my MP3 player. Is the one thing that I carry with me wherever I go and the one thing that I'd be lost without. I listen to all sort of stuff, from podcasts to the BBC, from FM local radio to music, from audio books to unpublished books read by their author, you name it, I listen it at some time or other.
I had my for more than a year now and it's starting to fail. You know how this things are, just like mobile phones they're not designed to last for long, they're supposed to be almost disposable. I hate that, I think is a waste and bad for the environment but... that's how things are.
Luckily "the husband" is very clever and every time my Creative Zen MP3 failed he managed to fix it, rescuing the thing from the rubbish bin and me from the loony house time after time.
However, now I started to use my MP3 player for my classes and I do need it to be reliable for more than just my own entertainment. So, I was talking about buying one for months but fretting about them being still too expensive and so forth.
Today, totally out of the blue, I've got a parcel with a lovely, purple, slick, tiny and totally gorgeous Sony NW-A1000 MP3 player. It's so tactile, all rounded, and the design is totally awesome. I'm in love. And I haven't even tried it yet!!
"The husband" just bought it for me, no reason.
He's totally the best.

I do like to be beside the seaside!

Sunday was such a lovely sunny day that we decided to go out to the beach. It was a bit windy and the water was cold for our taste; think Cornwall in July, great for any Brit, too cold for spoiled us. However, it was great to just lay down there, under a lovely warm sun and watch the kite surfers in their wetsuits. There were loads of them, as the weather is nice, sunny and windy and the beaches are still empty of swimmers and sunbathers.
(The picture here is not mine, it's just to show what kite surfing is for those who don't know. I'll download mine as soon as i have some time)

After a couple of hours we went an visit some friends and had a good time chatting and drinking mate.

As a family we had a big discussion yesterday. In the UK was mothering Sunday, so I told the guys that I expected a present. Then "the husband" realised that here in Spain father's day is on the 19th of March (St. Joseph's day), so he should be the one getting the presents. At the centre of my argument was the fact that we're having a British calendar in the kitchen, so it's easier to see the days there. "The husband" think that we should follow whatever the rest of the country where we're living does. Then I argue that in any case St. Joseph shouldn't be father's day as he's not Jesus' dad anyway, but we're not believers anyway so that was totally dismissed.
The final decision was, of course, P's because he's, after all the only Englishman in the family, and the only son anyway. he decided that it was father's day that we should celebrate because he already made a present for his dad at school. He's very down-to-earth and practical, our little one.

In any case, it doesn't really mattered because we all went to a lovely restaurant and order whatever we fancied and we all had a lovely day, which is the whole point of it, isn't it? to celebrate family.

However, I still want a new MP3 player for the next whatever celebration. OK?

Saying goodbye is always sad

Who is sadder when you say goodbye? The one who's leaving or the one who's staying?
This is a sample of the more philosophical questions on my mind. Nos very deep as you can see.

A friend of ours came to stay with us for a few days before going to live in Brazil for good. She's Brazilian and she and "the husband" known each other since they were teens; they met in a lovely village by the sea in the south of Brazil where both their parents owned summer flats. They lost touch with each other and by total chance met again in Bristol during the 90's. I meet her and her late husband when I was pregnant with P. and we all became friends.
Tim, her husband, was a genial and lovely Welshman with a wicked sense of humour. In a sense, he's the first blogger I knew because when he felt ill, he used to keep all his friends updated about his fight against leukemia using e-mail. His very last e-mail was the saddest thing in the world, because it was still all filled with hope, and he sadly passed away a few hours after that. That was around 5 years ago.
Miriam is the bravest person I know and she's been an inspiration for me because of the way she faced adversity and overcome with enormous dignity what was a hard blow in her life.

She's been talking a lot during the past years about what to do with her life. She's like me in that we both need new challenges and goals. (I think that it can also be said about Deb B. too). She sold her house in Bristol around the same time we sold ours but she wasn't sure about what do to next. Finally last month, she decided to go to Brazil to be closer to her mum and siblings.
That's a big move and I can totally understand what a big deal this is; she's being in Bristol for the past 18 years and most of her friends are there, plus a lovely boyfriend. She doesn't have children but has two lovely Bichon Frise doggies that we used to dog-sit when she went on holidays.

So, she and her doggies stayed with us for a few days and it was great to have them around but also it was really sad because although we do love Brazil is very unlikely that we'll go there often. We really don't know if we see each other again, although we do hope so. In any case we'll keep in touch by e-mail and I know she reads this blog from time to time. I did try to encourage her to write her own blog, so we can follow her experiences in Porto Alegre (a city called Happy Port can only be a great place to be, don't you think?). She's planning to buy a flat overlooking the river and maybe a country club cottage for weekends. British pounds can go a long way in Brazil these days.

I took her to the airport just yesterday and it was very sad to see her going. Very selfish, I know, because we'll miss her a lot and I will also miss Pippa & Poppy, her dogs.

It's sad lo leave a place you loved but it's also sad to stay and see a friend going away.
I wish Miriam all the best in her new life in Brazil and do please let's keep in touch.

Red Nose Day

P. and I are going to be watching the red nose day today, as we do every year. I'm very proud of P, as he's giving most of his saving to the charity.
Don't forget to donate today! Here is the link if you'd like to do it online.

RED NOSE DAY!!

Wind donoughs

That's my own translation of the name of the traditional sweet thingy that we're eating this days. "Buñuelos de viento". They're made with flour, butter, eggs, sugar, a touch of anise seeds and cinnamon, deep fried and then powdered with sugar. They're very seasonal and you can only find them in shops from now and until the beginning of Easter's week. They're incredibly light and when you bite them they feel like little, mostly empty, bubbles of sweetness, as if they're made from "wind" (not that the end result of eating them is wind, as P. asked).

I discovered them yesterday in the bakery and asked about them. The lady there already knows me and she always gave me a sample to try of everything together with an description of the ingredients and, if necessary, the season where you suppose to eat them. That proves to be a very successful selling strategy as it usually results in me buying a bunch to take home and share with the guys.

This is the link for the recipe in English.

I'm very bold in the bakery and I try most things there, but I'm still in awe regarding the fishmonger. They have an amazing variety of fish and sea food there, I wouldn't know where to start or how to cook those things, I couldn't even name most of it! I just quickly pass in front of it, taking glances at the goodies as I go. The fish are artfully presented in a bed of ice and some of they are still alive in water (lobsters). From time to time they're sprayed with a fine mist of water, so they look ever so fresh and tempting. If I only I knew where to start!

Are you there?

Just want to ask you to write questions, suggestions and so forth in the messages board, I'm running out of material to write about!
I always answer the comments, and, please, do not forget to sign them!

A mother's worst nightmare

For a couple of hours I didn't have a clue of the whereabouts of my son and I felt all those cliche feelings: the longest hours of my life, sick with worry and I was about to die.

"The husband" and I gave the poor kid conflicting orders on what do do after school. I wanted him to go straight home because I had a class cancelled and "the husband" told him to go to his office because he totally forgot that I was due to be at home.
On top of that the kid say that his bus was latter that usual, although in retrospective I suspect that he stayed a bit longer playing and missed his bus. I just don't want to dig further into the true story.
The fact was that P. was late to arrive either home or my husband's office and I was sick with worries. To try and distract myself I watched TV but, as it happens, it was the news and a 7 years-old boy disappeared yesterday in Canary islands... talk about synchronicity!

The poor kid has a 45 minute commute each way to school everyday and with both parents working and his sport commitment, the schedule of where to go after school is ever so complicated!
Plus he's got his absentmindedness from his dad.
Life is going to be much easy when he goes to a school near home from next September.

We are the champions!!

I mean P's rugby team. They're the official champions of their age group of the whole of Catalunya!!
This morning we went with to the local championship in the lovely seaside town of Tarragona, a bit south of here, more or less 2 hours drive away. The weather was great, it started a bit chilly in the morning but it was so sunny that it got increasingly warm until we ended up in t-shirts. However, it was never uncomfortable because of the sea breeze. A lovely day for the kids to play and for us to spend outside. What a world of difference from rainy and muddy Bristol's rugby!
And play they did! They were a sight to behold, (well... I am an over-the-top proud mum!). They won all the matches they played but one and that was a draw. At the end they got more points than every other team and the did win the championship!!
The kids really fought for it and they play as a team instead of fighting between them for the ball as sometimes they do.
It was a great day out and I know I'm going to have a raspy voice all week long now, I couldn't stop cheering up! (luckily for me, my son's still in that age when he's not embarrassed by a over enthusiastic , Banshee-screaming, pom-pom waving mum).
Of course, even the catering food was good. The kids ate for free and the parents payed only €6 for a meal ticket that included 2 choices of salad and 4 choices of barbecue (local Catalan butifarra sausage, standard sausage, chorizo criollo - Argentinean style! - or beef burger) plus 1 drink (soft drink or beer) and dessert (ice-cream). All yummy, of course.
We're still elated by the victory and as dirty as we could be, after all that seating on the floor and jumping around, plus with very red noses as I didn't realise that we need sun cream even though is early March.

Oh, what a perfect day!

It's beggining to look a lot like Christmas!

Thanks to the post office.

Today I received a note from the post office that they tried to deliver a parcel and they couldn't because there was nobody at home. So I went to pick it up and found a lovely box filled to the brim with chocolates, sweets and a wonderful book! All courtesy of my friend Anja, who lives in Germany and is the sweetest girl ever!
We're very grateful. The guys got their share and they did grunted their appreciation and thanks while they were munching away with glee.

The best part of it all was the total surprise which only adds to the thrill. She sent us the parcel just because she loves us and it feels GREAT!

What I find totally uncanny is that she always manages to do this when I need a boost. How does she knows it? and well in advance!! I felt loved and now I'm terribly grateful. My friends are all over the world but here and I miss them all, but this does bring her a lot closer!!

Thanks a lot!!

Not too bad

Yesterday I had my third assessment with Steve. It also was the first class with a new group of bankers and I was, of course, very nervous. When I finished my BA I swore that never again I'd submit my self to the indignities of having to undergo an exam... and here I am.
Never say never, is the easiest way to look like an idiot!

Whatever!

I did prepare the lesson and all the material, making sure to have enough batteries to play the tape, photocopies of the first lesson of the book that I'm planing to use and so on.
I had to juggle things a lot in order to take this class because Tuesday is training day for my son and it was the day that "the husband" has the car. My son's school is 45 minutes by bus from the house and he travels by bus, then he had a quick snack and off we went in the midst of rush hour so the motorway was in a standstill. It took us 45 minutes to reach his club when it usually takes us 15. Luckily I left the flat with time to spare and the Bank's building is just 5 minutes from the club so I was on time for the class. That's important because Steve is a stickler for punctuality, and rightly so because students are paying us by the hour. If they're late, which most are here because they work on Spanish time, that's ok but we cannot.
I have the utmost respect for single mums, specially when their charges are young. "The husband" is totally supportive and he often goes out of his way to take care of our kid needs but even then it was hard sometimes. Now, as the boy is getting older and more independent, things are easier, but I can't wait for the next school year when we hope he'll attend a school nearby.

Back to the class... I even tried to learn the student's name in advance but that was no help because Steve gave the wrong list of names anyway so I started the class based on the totally wrong information. It wasn't my fault but his, so it didn't bother me much and the class went smoothly enough. We'll see soon enough what does he thinks of it all. There's definitely a lot of room for improvement but... fair enough... I'm just starting.

I've bought a dock station for my MP3 player, with 2 little speakers in eBay. It cost me a fraction of the price of buying it locally, even including the P&P and it arrived this morning. The idea is to use it with my MP3 players instead of the old-fashioned tapes that I'm currently using for my students to hear part of the lesson and that are wearing off fast. Now I have to figure out how to make MP3 files from the tapes...
I also plan to take some public radio podcast for more advance students to listen to different voices. BBC news are great material, but there's also loads of much more informal podcast that will make great material.

OK. I'm off to work.

Programming little minds

"The husband" started teaching our son a computer language so he'd be able to program stuff. I privately though that the kiddo was far too young (he's 10) for that but I let them be. And I was totally wrong. The language is not a "kid-language" but a real one called Delphi and "the husband" started teaching the little guy how to create shortcuts so that his laptop writes "hello" when he turns it on.

After a few hours "the husband" came back to the living room and he said that he was totally blown away by the ease with which young and mostly empty minds can learn and get the information when they really want to. "The husband" just gave the kid some pointers and he just run away with that, solving problems and thinking in tune with computer logic.
And this is, mind you, the same child who is far too lazy to write properly or do all his homework! There's not child genius here, just a motivated and curious child.
If he keeps like that we'll have a hacker pretty soon!

Part of what is expected from me in Steve's agency is too keep updated their interactive web page with learning material for students. I'm trying to learn how to use a program to create graphics and interactive quizzes that students can use to learn and build up knowledge. I've no problem with getting ideas, but the programming part is driving me crazy.
Now I'm thinking of getting my son to learn to use the program that I need to use, so that I'd give him the ideas and material and he'll then build the web page! He can then buy for himself his beloved Wii.
Of course I could pay him for that, or is that child labour and thus not allowed? I need to check labour laws in Spain.

Friendship is....

We all have friends but for the most part we cannot remember the exact moment when we found one. Mostly because friendship are ongoing processes: you meet a person and, with time and shared experiences, such a person became a friend.

Well. I think I've found one today. Isn't that magic?

I actually meet this lady a few months ago. She takes her children to the same rugby club where my son goes. "The husband" meet her before I did and after seeing her a few times he told me that I had to go and talk to her because we have tons of things in common. I did go and talked to her and she was friendly and nice enough and we certainly had a lot in common but it wasn't until today that we sort of click. The chat went a little deeper, a little further and, my gosh, we do have a lot in common.

We're from the same place with strong links to the UK (she married into that, I've just feel in love with Bristol), she lost her mum almost a year ago, she also lost a sister and have another one back in Argentina. She likes to read and now she's a bit embarrassed to admit that she's into chick lit latelly (hehehe!!) plus she also prefer to read in English. She doesn't have a feeling of belonging here, not to anywhere. She's funny, articulate and clever. She loves music and is forever planing to one day learn to play an instrument. And, last but not least, is the extremely odd fact that she's forever planing to start doing some yoga but never find the time, energy, whatever, to actually do it. That was creepy!

Now I have to introduce her to podcasts and she has to make me wear some make up and she'd be my doppelganger!!

Shortlisted!

Wow!!
I've got an email from Editorial Planeta, the publishing company, saying that I'm shortlisted for the post they advertised. They asked me to fill and send a questionnaire and told me that they're going to invite me for an interview soon.
I've got butterflies in my stomach now!

Post mortem

Steve's a sweet. We meet today to do a post-mortem of the last class he attended, the one that I totally "efed" up. He didn't fire me today! Instead he sat down with me and told me that all new teachers do have some problems while explaining grammar at the beginning of their careers and that he really think I'll get better.

My little monster inside me whispered: "oh, boy, he really is desperate for teachers then". My little angel slap the monster off my shoulder, while remained me that it wasn't that bad.

He then went on (Steve, not the angel), to give me a few pointers and "how-to" and I'm very grateful because I'm actually learning on my feet here and all input from a pro are very welcome (and needed).

Now that I can analyze what went wrong with that blanking out in the class I think that there is, after all, such a thing as over-prepare something. That is a first for me. I never really though that such a thing as "over-prepare" actually could do any harm, it was in the same league as when those (usually thin) people say "I forgot to eat sometimes!". Yeah, sure! I could never forgot to eat, quite the opposite: I may actually forget that I already ate and go and munch some more! And I certainly never, ever, studied or prepare something so much as to ruin it. But I did this time. I over-prepare it, in the sense that I really wanted to do my best in front of Steve and prepare the class as if it was a play, so I had this sort of script in my mind and when the students didn't give me what I expected as a cue... well... I shut down.

From now on, I'll prepare my lessons well but I'll strive not to be Little Ms. Perfect.