Madrid: Year Two

Well, it's been a while. This past month or so has been really busy, what with school starting and my being sick for the past three weeks. I'll leave school to another post, basically because that's a whole can of worms that I don't feel like opening here quite yet.

In the meantime, before I got sick, and during the recuperation period (a weekend in the middle when one cold went away and before the next one started), and this past weekend, I've been trying to really go out and enjoy Madrid and this great "fall" weather because last year I was always too busy and stressed out with schoolwork to have much time to go out and explore.

Living room with balcony

On September first I moved to a new apartment, not too far from my old one. It was a little sad to leave my señora's because I liked living with her and having her company, but so far I really like my new place. I live with three other people, two Spaniards (both from Basque Country), and one French guy. They're all very nice and I think we get along well. Our apartment is also pretty nice, aside from the new neighbors who just moved in across the patio from my room. [Patio: most Spanish apartment buildings are square or rectangular, and in the center there is a gap, with a patio on the ground floor and open air between the sides of the building on the other floors.] This particular patio is really small, so to begin with I could easily have a conversation across the patio without having to raise my voice if for

Our fifth roommate, Ella

Street view from the balcony

some bizarre reason I ever wanted to. Therefore, I could also theoretically see into their windows and their balcony, and vice-versa, if the curtains aren't drawn. It's just a little awkward. But it's not that big a deal, except when on some occasions it sounds like there is an entire frat house living there, all inclusive with loud music and constant, loud conversations. Luckily this doesn't seem to happen at night, so I can't complain too much, but some Sunday mornings I just want some peace and quiet. I also have another neighbor who tends to like to play (not very good) guitar around 10 pm, but he usually stops around bedtime so again, I can't complain too much.

Anyway, a few weekends ago, I went with some friends to a little town south of Madrid called Aranjuez. The town is mostly known for the palace, which used to be the summer palace for the royal family, and the ridiculously extensive (and beautiful) gardens. It's a really pretty town, and when we were there it wasn't overrun with tourists, so it was a great place to visit. I think it's on my top five favorite Spanish cities/towns.

The three of us in front of fountain in the Jardin de Parterre

 Additionally, since my family left in August I've been exploring some places in Madrid as well. Some places are very familiar to me, like the Retiro park, and some new, like Andén 0 (an old metro station that is now a museum) and my new neighborhood.

Anyway, aside from school and this stuff, not much else has been going on. Well, I suppose Spain's economy is going to crap (um, why couldn't Greece and Spain and those other countries screw up last year when I needed the euro to be weak when I was dealing with the exchange rate to take money out of my American bank account?). And the public school teachers have been going on strike for a while now, but that hasn't affected me because I work in a colegio concertado, which is basically the Spanish equivalent of a charter school. In my next post I'll hopefully get a chance to talk about my teaching job. My next project is to finish organizing a trip to Extremadura, an autonomous community bordering Portugal, for the four-day weekend coming up at the end of October. I also just booked plane tickets to Lisbon for a long weekend that we have in December. It's always good to have something like that to look forward to and to motivate you to get through long weeks at school.

Until next time.