My visa is ready! My visa is ready! My visa is ready!

Actually, that's a wild exaggeration. My visa renewal process has passed the first of two stages of renewal, according to the online system. Now I have to wait for a letter that tells me to go in for an appointment to get fingerprinted, to turn in photos and, of course, to pay another fee.

But this means there's a light at the end of the Spanish bureaucracy tunnel. Which is fantastic, because we've been told that this year they are taking even more time than usual to process visas so some people may never get a new card. I went on June 25th to renew it, so it has quite literally been nearly half a year. And that's not including the two to three weeks it will take for me to receive the letter, and then after that the forty or so days that I have to wait for the actual card.

But the good news is that at least until next August I won't have to go back down to lovely Aluche for any more stupid Return Authorization forms. Score!

Aluche

Today I took my annual pre-Christmas departure trip down to the Spanish immigration office (referred to ever so fondly by most of us Americans as Aluche, after the neighborhood and metro stop in which it's located) to get the accursed autorización de regreso document that permits me to leave the country and reenter while my visa is in the indeterminately lengthy renewal process.

I hate Aluche. As if it weren't enough that it's where illegal immigrants in Spain are detained (and not known for its good conditions), the place reminds me of a combination between a prison and a circus. Maybe you're laughing, but I'm dead serious. The building looks both like a creepy cinder-block building not much unlike my high school and a bizarre multicolored circus tent.

Do you think this looks like a government office?

But, alas, the greatest part about the office in Aluche is not its schizophrenic architectural styles. It happens to also be located right across from the site of an enormous prison called the Cárcel de Carabanchel. The prison was not only one of the biggest in Europe until its demolition in 2008, but it also had a pretty bad reputation - it was, after all - built by political prisoners, for political prisoners. Spain's most recent (and hopefully last) dictactor, Franciso Franco, had the prison built in the early 1940s, immediately following the Spanish Civil War. After Franco died in 1975 it was (supposedly) mainly used for regular criminals. It was finally closed in 1999, and during the next nine years the building remained abandoned and subject to graffiti and destruction.

Carabanchel Prison before its 2008 demolition.

Now all that remains of the building is the original entrance - kind of like some sort of ancient Greek or Roman arch, except creepy and Spanish. Like a disturbing ghostly metaphor for those visiting the building across the street - those living in Spain but who aren't actually residents or citizens, which the government makes pretty clear that this is not all that welcome.

Significance of leaving the prison's main entrance?

Traveling Sola

Last June I bought a plane ticket to Stockholm. I knew that I wouldn't be going home for the summer, and since many of my friends were leaving Madrid for good or for the summer months, I wanted to take advantage of all of the free time I would have (one of the advantages of being a teacher). So, on a whim and without any travel companions, I bought a ticket to Stockholm.

My first thoughts were: okay, either I'll find someone who is around and wants to go or I could meet my parents there when they came to (at the time) an undetermined European location. And, if worse came to worst, the ticket was only €68, so if I decided not to fly, no biggie.

Then I got to thinking - one of the only ways to get to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia that I was dying to visit, on a budget airline was via Stockholm. No one else I'd talked to seemed to ever have any interest in Estonia, so I might as well just do it while I had the time and the opportunity.

How can one not want to go to Tallinn after seeing this view?

So I got planning: booking flights, finding and booking hostels, researching my destinations and their surroundings, etc. (For those of you who don't know: I LOVE Excel. I wouldn't say that I excel at Excel but I certainly do excel at organizing my travel details in Excel. All of my multi-city trips have resulted in extensive, often color-coded Excel spreadsheets. It makes everything so much easier. Really, it's just common sense.) I finally wound up planning four days in Stockholm, four and a half days in Tallinn (one of which would be spent in Riga, the capital of neighboring Latvia), and nearly four days in and around Girona, a city about an hour north of Barcelona. It would total a little over 13 days of travel, 100% on my own.

Stockholm is also incredibly beautiful (and expensive....).

The closest I'd traveled alone in the past was a few flights to places alone (London, Paris), where I met people in those places, a few days in Madrid one summer when I came here to go on a dig down in Murcia, and a few hours wandering around Vienna alone when, as a group, we decided to split up. None of those actually counts. So I was nervous about the idea of traveling two weeks alone but I was also really excited about it.

Besalú, a cute little town in Catalunya (Spain).

Now for the point of this post, my experience traveling alone - I loved it. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy traveling with friends and my family (until we start arguing with each other), but traveling alone is a really great experience that I think everyone should try at some point in his or her life. It's not for everyone - but you really never know until you've done it.

Why I love traveling alone:

The main square in beautiful Riga.

1. The obvious: you can go wherever you want to go, do whatever you want to do, and spent as much (or as little) time or money doing whatever it is you want to do. Maybe this sounds ridiculous, but quite frankly, if you're spending a lot of money (or any money) and personal time to travel, you should do whatever you damn well want to do. For example, when I stayed in Tallinn I took a day trip to Riga, which was a four-hour bus ride away. Probably very few people would be willing - let alone interested - in doing a day trip within a trip that required eight plus hours of bus rides. I also tend to be the type of traveler who tries to fitasmuchinaspossible. I don't like to waste time or money, and most of the places I visit I don't have any intention of returning to in the future (the world is just too big). It's easier to cram things in (if necessary) and make fast decisions when yours is the only vote that matters.

2. You often have the opportunity to meet other travelers. This isn't to say that you can't meet and talk to other travelers when you yourself travel in a group. It's just more likely when you're alone, and staying in hostels helps a lot as well. Whether it's people you simply talk to in the hostel, or people you eat lunch with or explore the city with or go out with at night, that alone makes the trip worthwhile. I love talking to people who are equally interested in traveling or talking about where they're from or really anything - we Americans may consider our country a "melting pot," but I've met far more foreigners living and traveling here in Europe than I did even living in New York City. It's the repressed anthropologist in me - I want to learn as much as I can about other cultures.

Walking through a bog in Lahemaa National Park. NBD.

3. I, personally, tried to join in on tours that would be with other people, which turned out to be something that I wish I'd been doing all along. Many cities outside of western Europe (i.e. Spain, France, Great Britain, Germany) have organized free walking tours. Most places they occur daily, sometimes more than once per day, and you just show up and the tour goes, rain or shine, whether there are four people or forty, and it's completely free. At the end you can give a tip, since this is the only way the tour guides get paid, but you're in no way obligated to do so. The best part is that the tour guides (at least in my experience) are very good and very interested in what they're doing, even if it's just a hobby of theirs. They give you great information about the city's history and monuments but also about the hidden gems of the city. I did a tour like this in Stockholm, Tallinn, and Riga, and they were definitely worth it. I also did a day-long organized trip to Lahemaa National Park outside of Tallinn. There were seven of us plus our great tour guide, and aside from being able to see this part of the country, which I wouldn't have been able to do by myself without a car, it was nice to do it with other people.

4. Maybe it sounds cliche, but traveling alone is great thinking time. Actually, I was a little worried about traveling by myself because I get so incredibly bored with myself and my own thoughts, especially here in Madrid. I suppose had I really not interacted with other human beings (aside from saying hello; can I have a sandwich?; which way is the train station?; etc.) I would have gone crazy from too much alone time. Luckily this wasn't the case; I had just enough time to think about what I was doing, where I was, the history behind it, etc. (Not to mention I had enough time to reflect on why the heck I'm living in Spain and teaching English here. Still.) I think this also makes traveling more relaxing (because keep in mind that I'm talking about "traveling," not "going on vacation"); you have time to organize your thoughts, which I know I often have a hard to doing when I'm working.

Nothing more relaxing than this gorgeous beach town in Catalunya.

5. You're isolated from everything you know. Which is liberating. It makes things more relaxing. I've always traveled with some sort of device that uses the internet, which I'll use to check emails, let my parents know that I'm still alive, and that sort of thing. But aside from that, everything around you is new territory. The places, the people, the experience. It makes you more eager to do things, maybe even things you'd never before considered doing. (For me, having conversations with strangers. I normally hate talking to strangers. But turns out, once I actually get into a conversation with an interesting person, it's nice. I love to here travel stories - where people are from, where they're going, where they've come from, why they're there to begin with, etc.)

So there it is. Since this summer trip I also went to Switzerland in November by myself, which I also enjoyed. Like I said, company is great and I will almost never turn down a travel buddy, but I'm glad to know that I always have the option of going on my own and still enjoying it. In fact, I'm already brainstorming a good long trip through the remaining countries on my list before I leave Spain for good.

Typical Espanish

You know how there are certain words that are like nails on a chalkboard for some people? For example, if you watch "How I Met Your Mother," you know that Lily hates the word "moist." Well that's how I've come to feel about the phrase "typical Spanish." I think it's perhaps mostly because of the way it's used: in its own incomplete sentence and heavily Spanish accented. Teepeecal Espaneesh. I swear, if one more person tells me something is "teepeecal Espaneesh" one more time, I'm going to pretend that I didn't hear them.

Anyway, one evening last week I was eating a bowl of cereal (cocoa crispies, to be exact) with milk and one of my roommates asked me if I wasn't going to heat up the milk. I replied that no, I always eat cereal with cold milk. "¡Qué frío!" ("How cold!")

Now, I can't speak for all Spaniards since I've really only witnessed very few eat cereal and I haven't started a poll, but it's definitely relatively common here to pour milk on cereal, and then stick it in the microwave for a minute or two. When I lived with my señora (host mother, essentially) during my semester abroad and then my first year here this time around, she would always stick bowls of Special K cereal in the microwave and heat it until that stuff must have been soft enough to drink like a hot smoothie. 

I personally gag at the smell of hot milk (I'm not sure what would happen if forced to drink it), so the thought of heating it with cereal until the latter is a soggy smelly mass kind of makes me lose my appetite. But hey, cultural differences. Typical Espanish.

Announcement

That's it. It's not even December yet. (Okay, it's only three hours short of December, but still.) It's not even winter yet. SO WHY AM I SO COLD??

It is currently just after 9 pm here in Madrid and it's 39 degrees Fahrenheit outside according to Weather.com (although apparently it "feels like 32" due to - I'm guessing - the wind chill). That's under 4 degrees Celsius for my non-American, non-Fahrenheit-using readers. I mean, that's cold, but it's not cold.

So I ask myself, if I can't bear to go outside when it's only in the 30's, how am I going to survive the winter when it actually hits? Winters in Madrid aren't too bad...once you hit the "warmest" part of the day. But temperatures often get into the teens or single digits (Fahrenheit) at night.

You may not recognize me in my frozen state.

But even that shouldn't be a concern for me. My main concern is that if I can't handle the cold here when it's not even that cold, how the #*%& am I going to survive another Bostonian winter when I finally move back to the good ol' US of A?

So I'm making an announcement now to give everyone fair warning: instead of moving back to the US, I'm moving somewhere tropical. I don't know where. I don't really care where. Just somewhere where the temperature doesn't drop below, say, 75? (I'm the type of person that likes the heat. I fully enjoy the 95 degree summer days of Madrid). (Well, and preferably I would like to end up in a relatively stable country...this may limit my options greatly. Also perhaps somewhere with low humidity...which might bring me down to zero options.)

If you need me, I'll be here.

So that's it: I'm moving somewhere tropical. No worries, though, I'll let you all come visit me in my tropical paradise.

Inventiveness

You may have noticed that I post a lot about food. Take a lot of photos of food. All in all just plain old eat a lot of food. Well, it just so happens that it's not your mind deceiving you; half of the time I'm pretty sure I'm thinking about food.

In my defense, food and foreign cuisines are much more interesting when you live in or travel to other countries. In my opinion, food is of much more cultural importance in lots of other countries than it is in the US. Take ham in Spain, sausage in Germany, pasta in Italy, pastries in France...you get the idea. And, I'll be honest. I just plain old like to eat. Luckily, at least thus far in my life, I have been blessed with relatively decent metabolism.

It may not look like much, but this sausage in Freiburg was amazing.

I'm much better at baking desserty things, but I've had to get creative and inventive when it comes to real food living here, whether it's making something American or attempting something Spanish. Don't get me wrong, plenty of things that I would make and eat all of the time in the US are super easy to make here, but some things are just crap. Take pizza here in Spain - I'm pretty sure a decent pizza simply doesn't exist. Anywhere. This literally bewilders me, because making a decent pizza shouldn't be all that difficult. And for chrissake, we're closer to freaking Italy here than in the States! So I've developed pretty decent pizza-making skills (dough and all - that's right).

Homemade pizza.

Anyway, last night I was invited to a Thanksgiving dinner event (which was a lot of fun and the food was amazing), and it got me thinking about T-Day leftovers. What the bleep you do with a leftover 20-pound turkey. For example. Since I had no leftover turkey, I improvised. In other words, I bought a (very small) whole chicken. The goal: classic chicken noodle soup. Spain knows how to make great bean soups and stews. But I think chicken noodle is an American classic, and I miss being able to pick up a can of it in the grocery store (not that crap Campbells stuff, by the way, something like Progresso) and then heat it up and am ready to go in a matter of minutes.

So long story short, I spent the day boiling away: first chicken (that thing barely fit into the largest pot we have), then chicken carcass with vegetable scraps, and finally vegetables, chicken, noodles, and homemade broth. You probably don't save on money (especially considering the gas or electricity you consume simmering things all day) if you live in the US and have the canned alternative. But once in a while, and if you have the bird carcass anyway, it's 100% worth it. Not to toot my own horn here or anything, but this is hands down the best chicken noodle soup I have ever had. And the best part is that I have a crapload of it leftover (so actually, I'll probably be really sick of it by Wednesday and then I'll be saying that I hate it).

Well, I'm going to stop glorifying my soup and obsessing about food...for the time being. Until next time!

#37 See all of Madrid from the Tetas de Vallecas park

I should preface this post by telling you two things:

     1. This park is actually called Parque Cerro del Tío Pío.
     2. I have attempted twice to get to this park during the day (i.e. before the sun set). I have failed twice.

Okay, so explanation of point one. This tiny park is located in Vallecas, a neighborhood in the southeast of Madrid. It's a nice little park formed of several little hills. Thanks to the shape of the hills, someone - and I'd venture to guess someone of the male gender - nicknamed the park "las Tetas de Vallecas." The response that I received to my comment on how I thought the nickname is a bit funny, since the hills are not of equal size: "Well, the human body isn't always symmetrical!"

Point two. The tetas - err, hills - give you great views of Madrid, both during the day and while the sun sets. Naturally, because I'm lazy, I've tried to go a little bit before sunset to kill two birds with one stone. And, naturally, I've underestimated the time it takes to get there from my apartment. The second attempt was more successful, in that there was still a bit of light and I was able to take some mediocre photos. Maybe one day I'll manage to get there during the day?

Huelga General 14N

Today is the third general strike in Spain since I started living here. Three general strikes in a matter of only a little over two years. And that doesn't include all of the other protests, public transportation strikes, airline strikes, air traffic controller strikes, multi-month camp-outs in Madrid and Barcelona's main squares, etc.

One of the various ads for today's strike.

Seeing as I'm obviously not a Spanish citizen and my future isn't dependent on this country's economic or societal well-being, I don't really feel right in expressing my feelings in detail on the topic of the general strike. Don't get me wrong - I have a very strong opinion on the issue, but I only feel justified in saying this: based on the past strikes and the current one, the 24-hour general strike doesn't seem to be a very efficient way of going about finding or working towards a solution for Spain's current problems. (Spain, by the way, is not the only country responding to the current crises by means of strike - Greece, Portugal, and Italy have also been going on strike, although I couldn't tell you to what extent.) In my personal opinion, attempting to halt the economy for 24 hours really doesn't seem like an effective or responsible way to respond to what the Spanish government has been doing lately (or, perhaps better said, what it's failed to do lately). I get the irony - but it's irresponsibly counterproductive.

It's definitely an interesting time to be in Spain. Unfortunately, I'm still pretty certain that things are going to plummet further before they start to look up.

Stupid Time Difference

The time difference between western Europe and the east coast of the US (i.e. home) can sometimes be a pain in the butt. The six hour difference means that typically when people are leaving work around 5 pm, it's already 11 for me here. By the time they get home, its midnight for me at the earliest, and while I don't exactly tend to go to bed early, that is my time for unwinding and preparing for the next day of screaming little monsters. In other words, if I want to chat with a friend, it's a little too late. If I need to call Mommy (who, lucky for me, is a teacher and leaves work a bit earlier...usually), it's still sort of late.

But you know, you get used to the time difference. Not a huge issue, or even inconvenience really.

Until tonight. November 6th. Well, by now it's November 7th here in Spain and I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHO'S WON THE FLIPPIN' ELECTION!!

I can't stay up all night, but I'm too nervous to sleep. Conundrum.

It's Kaki Season!!!

I seriously do not know how I went twenty-four years of my life without this fruit. I discovered it last fall - they're called kakis here, persimmons in English - and I think I practically lived off it for three or four months. Then I spent about nine months eagerly awaiting the start of 2012 persimmon season.

Why so special, you ask? They're sweet, crunchy, have a fantastic, thick, pretty orange skin (I know, I'm weird, I always eat my fruit with the skin on, no matter how tough it is...unless it's like, an orange). Perfect for autumn. And, if you cut them horizontally there's a star in the middle, a bit like when you cut an apply horizontally.

Word of advice, though: there are two main varieties of persimmons, the gross variety (in my opinion), which is shorter and rounder and you have to let ripen until it's really soft and then you scoop it out; and the good version, which is slightly more elongated and eaten while it's firm. Mmm, I love crunchy fruit!


Edit: After some disconcerting research, I discovered that you shouldn't eat persimmons too often, and you shouldn't eat them on an empty stomach, especially with the skin on (i.e. basically the only way I eat them). Apparently they contain "a compound called shibuol" that doesn't react well with stomach acid and could eventually lead to digestive issues. I have no idea how much of a risk this is or if it applies to all different types of persimmons but...maybe just to be safe I'm going to stop eating them for breakfast every single day.

Made in the USA...Sold in España

Remember I wrote this post about American things (or things found in the US) that I miss because you can't find them in Spain? (Part Two is coming, hopefully soon, by the way.)

Well, here's a brief update on American products of a different category: things that you actually can find here in Spain and that I miss enough to pay ridiculously exorbitant prices for every once in a while.

1. Canned pumpkin.  Maybe fresh pumpkin is better (I don't know, I'm too lazy to have ever tried cooking with it), but even fresh pumpkins aren't very popular here. But to me, autumn = pumpkins. Among other things. But especially pumpkins. Not to mention Thanksgiving just isn't Thanksgiving without a pumpkin pie. So finding canned pumpkin is a once or twice a year necessity. I'm not sure if there are any Spanish grocery stores that sell canned pumpkin, but I've never seen it. If anyone ever has, please let me know! But anyway, I've always gone to Taste of America, where it costs €3 a can. Not terrible, but more expensive than I've ever seen at home. I recently bought a couple of cans to make pumpkin bread with, and it was totally worth it.

The cake mixes are perhaps the most overpriced - €6 or €7 a box!

2. Brown sugar.  The concept of brown sugar just doesn't exist here. They've got "azúcar moreno," which sort of is brown sugar (and is what that translates to), but in reality, it's only what we call raw sugar. Not the same as our probably extra-diabetes-enducing molasses-sugar mixture. Obviously this isn't something I use all that frequently, but I do like it on oatmeal and making certain baked goods, such as the good old chocolate chip cookie, is impossible without it. I also buy this at Taste of America - where it's generally about €1,50 - because I've never seen it in regular grocery stores either.

3. Peanut butter.  The funny thing is, I'm not really even much of a peanut butter fan. I love love love peanut butter cups or any other form of chocolate and peanut butter together, and I love it with apples, but I never eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, for example. I think it's the texture - it's just way too much between the stickiness/thickness of the PB and the bread. Anyway, I remember when I studied abroad here I brought a jar of PB, knowing that it was hard to find, and I went through that thing with lightning speed. I don't buy it often now, but I've found it in a couple of grocery stores and I therefore don't bother bringing it from the US. The latest regular-sized jar I bought cost me €4,50...which I do think is a lot for peanut butter...

Baking soda is also sort of a weird situation here - they sell what I think is the chemical equivalent here in grocery stores, but I think it's used more for cleaning than for baking. Normally it's only baking powder here. I've never tried this supermarket equivalent because I bought a box of way overpriced Arm & Hammer at Taste of America a couple of years ago and obviously I haven't even gone through a quarter of the box. I'm more likely to have to get new baking soda because this box is going to expire, rather than actually run out.

Sesame, onion, and plain bagels!

One last thing that is hard to find here in Spain, and when you do find it, it's usually not that great, is bagels. They actually sell them at Taste of America and also some specialty bakeries, but I've found it's much more cost effective (and let's face it, much more FUN) to make my own bagels. Mmmm.

So there you have it: these are the products that I occasionally like to pick up, mostly at Taste of America. (Notice how it's all food?) It's a cool little store (right by the NYU campus here), and they carry both food products and even American-style cookware, such as cupcake pans, cake decorating items, etc. They even have some weird products that I've never seen before (mostly brands, not actual foods), which is a funny, but seeing as America is pretty big, I guess I'm bound to not know ever brand ever in existence. Also, several times that I've bought stuff at Taste of America, they've given me random things free with my purchases - like this bag of Goldfish in the picture above. I don't even buy Goldfish often in the US, so I really can't remember the last time I've had them, but it was a nice little culinary reminder of home.

Polska

I've gotten the question several times, "why Poland?" The honest answer was a combination of: I wanted to go somewhere I knew little about, somewhere different from western Europe, somewhere not too touristy, and somewhere that I wasn't sure would be a safe place to travel on my own (it is completely safe, by the way, I've just read to avoid night trains).

Panorama of Krakow.

Poland was the first surprisingly excellent choice I made for travel this summer (the other being my first-ever solo trip to Sweden, Estonia, and Cataluña in northern Spain, but more on that in another post). I had relatively high expectations for Poland, and they were more than exceeded, in Krakow in particular. The whole country, from the Tatra mountains at the southern border with Slovakia to Warsaw (I really still can't believe that this city was more than 85% destroyed during WWII and managed to rebuild and bounce back in a matter of only about 20 years - incredible) to the Baltic coast, is all really beautiful. And, like Hungary, everything is really cheap and the cuisine is awesome (provided that you like potatoes, cabbage, sausage, and dumplings, to all of which I say, keep it comin').

Morskie Oko, the largest glacial lake in the Tatra mountains.

Sunset in Torun.

PIEROGIS!

So anyway, this blog is really more supposed to be about Spain and the joys of living here, so I'll keep the non-Spanish stuff to as much of a minimum as I'm capable. I'll leave you with two things:

1. in Poland we went to the cities/towns of Krakow, Zakopane (in the Tatras mountains), Warsaw, Torun, Malbork, Gdansk, and Poznan,

2. and a piece of advice - if you have the chance to travel to Poland, do it. It's so underrated and so worth the visit.

Hiking in the Community of Madrid

If you've ever been to Madrid and done day trips in its alrededores, such as Toledo, Segovia, Alcala de Henares, etc., you probably leave the city via Barajas airport surprised at the fact that, well, you can see mountains in the distance. Believe it or not, Madrid actually has quite a large area of mountains (mostly to the north) with a great deal of hiking and even some skiing in the winter. Madrid itself is actually the highest European capital at some 2100+ ft (650 meters). (Apparently Andorra's capital is actually higher but Andorra only sort of counts as a country so I'm just going to give this one to Spain because aside from football, they don't have a lot going for them at the moment.) We have a weird climate here - pretty cold in the winter (because of the altitude), though not nearly as cold as the New England winters I grew up with (in the city of Madrid it rarely snows), and pretty hot in the summer, with mid June to the end of August in the 90s(F) and often days that get above 100F. The air is very dry and therefore it mostly only rains for a couple weeks in the fall and the spring and rarely ever in the summer. Not going to lie - the weather here is pretty fantastic.

See? Told ya there are mountains. This is by Puerto de Navacerrada.

Mountains overlooking the town of El Escorial (see the monastery?)

View from "la Maliciosa" (literally, the "malicious" mountain - it's a toughie).

But anyway, back to the mountains. I really never knew much about Madrid's surroundings for too long of a time. I vaguely knew somewhere in the back of my mind that there are mountains in the north (maybe from my mild obsession with maps, the Google variety in particular), but I never took that thought seriously. Like I said, if you go outside Madrid - of even if you're in Madrid - you'll notice that because it's so dry, vegetation is scarce. Highways leading out of Madrid literally pass through flat, dusty, bare fields. Even the mountains themselves aren't very green from a distance (and in actuality, some aren't).

Green. (Patones de Arriba)

Um...not green. (La Pedriza at the end of the summer.)

My point is, I never thought Madrid would have good hiking.

Wrong. Madrid has some great hiking with some beautiful views and great trails. It took me a while to discover this, but I found out in a great way. Last fall, a friend of mine was Googling hiking in the Madrid area and came across a group that does hiking excursions on the weekends in the fall and the spring. At this point it was November, so the season was over (the mountains actually do get snow and ice in the winter), but we decided to check out the group when the spring season started up.

Check out this view! (Patones de Arriba/Cancho de Cabeza)

Basically, a few years ago, two Americans living here started the group and over time it grew. They also wrote a book about many of the hiking routes in Madrid (both north and south of the

Lots of pretty mountain flowers.

city, actually), because they discovered that there weren't any books on this topic published in English. Unfortunately, they're both back in the US now, but the group has been passed on to new hands (we went on the first hikes for the "fall" this past weekend!) and it's really a blast. Not only was I proven oh-so-wrong about there being no nature in this barren land, but each time I've gone on hikes I've met new people from various places - some Spaniards, some Americans, other foreigners living in Madrid, tourists in Madrid that are just there for a few days, etc. Some people you see once and some people go regularly and you get to know them. It's a great social experience - not only does it get you out of the pollution-filled city into some fresh air, but you meet new people and often times it's a great intercambio opportunity (the hikes are led in English but often you find yourself talking to someone in Spanish).

Animal life - mountain goats of some sort.

LOTS of cows also.

The hikes really vary a lot in scenery - sometimes you're walking in a forest, sometimes you're practically rock climbing, sometimes there are caves, sometimes there are animals (both wild and domesticated). Sometimes the routes start or end (or both!) in cute little Spanish towns that you may otherwise never know to visit (such as Patones de Arriba). Sometimes they start or end in well-known towns that already attract lots of tourists (such El Escorial and Chinchon). Sometimes it rains, sometimes it snows (once, honestly!), sometimes its 90 degrees out in the blazing sun...but I've always had a good time (cheesy or not).

And we always end the hikes with a nice cold one of these:

 On some rare occasions we're able to end a hike like this:

Dipping our feet in the water near Rascafria on a hot June day.

So if you live in Madrid, you should check out the group. If you're just visiting Madrid, you should still check it out!

Teaching Eeengleesh in Espain

I thought that since it's nearly September (seriously, HOW did that happen?), it was about time that I finally actually admit to the fact that, well, I'm living in Spain to teach English, not to go gallivanting off to as many foreign countries as possible. As you may or may not know, this past year I somehow got myself into teaching English to (mostly) preschoolers. I had seven classes in the primary school (fourth, fifth, and sixth graders), but the majority of my 25 hours teaching were spent with 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds. Don't ask me how or why that happened. (Not because there isn't a why or a how, but rather because it's better that I leave that topic alone.) So anyway, I spent the greater portion of the last ten months reviewing colors and numbers, playing games, and teaching songs. (That's right, my friends, I was forced to break my strict rule of never, ever singing in public - but it's okay because they're so little they don't care, right? Or perhaps the opposite, I'm scarring them for life with my awful singing voice?)

I'm still not sure how, but I somehow grew to enjoy teaching the little kids. After all, they're too young to be really obnoxious or critical or negative like teenagers and preteens can be. This isn't to say that teaching such young children English is a piece of cake, because it isn't; more than anything it's very difficult to keep their attention for nearly an hour in a language that is almost entirely foreign to them when they're that young. Some classes wound up being really great and easy and fun, while a select few others were just short of a nightmare.

Naturally, the five-year-olds were my favorite this past year. They're the oldest (in preschool), they know the most English, and they also just happened to be a really great group of kids. (I know teachers aren't supposed to have favorites, but let's be real - it happens. I absolutely had some favorite students, and the majority of them were five-year-olds.) Unfortunately, it's unlikely I will have these students next year when they more to first grade in primary school. I'll see them but I most likely won't teach their English classes.

Preschool graduation.

I should probably clarify that the majority of my preschoolers still have an...interesting level of English competence. This is something that varies greatly amongst Spanish schools, and as far as I know, the English program at my school is relatively new. The vast majority of the preschoolers I teach have never heard or spoken any words of English when they enter preschool at three years of age, and since they only get an average of five hours of English a week, the learning process is slow. However, I can generally lead my classes in English and speak entirely in English with my preschoolers and they understand the majority of what I say (especially the five-year-olds), but they aren't able to produce full sentences on their own. My four- and five-year-olds know how to say "My name is...", "I like...", and "I'm fine thank you, and you?" but these are automatic phrases they've learned by memorization. By the time they reach third or fourth grade they will most likely have a pretty decent level of English (as far as Spain goes), so they're on the right track.

But the great - and surprising, to me at least - thing about their level of English is that they do understand a great deal of what I say, even if it's just the gist of it and not word for word. Furthermore, they have an incredible vocabulary, the five-year-olds in particular. They know more animals in English than I think I knew in Spanish previous to this year, they can tell you what the weather is like, they know a ridiculous amount of insects in English, they can tell me what foods and sports they like, and most impressive of all, they know the alphabet in English and can identify a lot of words written out in English. It really is incredible how much information their brains soak up.

Anyway, my classses in primary were a much different experience (i.e. they can usually - keyword "usually" - speak full sentences in English and they're often much bigger pains in the butts). I had a little bit of different things, science taught in English (a serious nightmare), English grammar classes (where I was actually for once the teacher's assistant, what I'm actually supposed to be), and English theater workshops (a mix of fun and nightmare). I'll admit that even though the primary classes could be miserable, mainly because of the students' awful behavior, it was generally nice to have a mix of older kids with the little preschoolers.

I'm going to leave commenting on the Spanish education system, the program that I'm a part of in order to teach here, and the differences between education here and in the US until another time...probably once I've finished this school year because, well, I want to keep my job (if you catch my drift). But I will say, it has been a very interesting experience...

Oh, and the above video is the five-year-olds at their preschool graduation, singing a song in English (not taught to them by me). The quality isn't great, and I didn't realize that I was NOT recording the song until halfway through (oops), hence why it just starts in the middle of a line. But I think it's cute and they did a great job singing it - it's a challenging song for their age/English level!

Hungary (and a little bit of Slovakia!)

I can honestly say that before I visited Hungary I really knew nothing about the country. I'd seen amazing pictures of Budapest and heard great things as well, but in terms of central (and eastern) Europe, my knowledge is basically non-existant. (Is there a reason why in high school I had three years filled with the pilgrims, the American Revolution, and the US Civil War, and yet we never got past WWI - during which, by the way, I still have no idea what happened? Something about some archduke being assassinated? Anyway, my point is that my European history is extremely limited and I think the only things I know about communist/Soviet occupied Europe I've learned by visiting formerly occupied countries...yes, America, there are other countries in the world besides you.) Anyway, tangent aside, I learned a lot about Hungary and even central Europe just in the five days we were there. And the country (and city of Budapest) is really beautiful.

View of Pest across the Danube from the Fisherman's Bastion in Buda.

What else can I say about Hungary? Well, for one thing I have two pieces of advice: you should absolutely go, but you should absolutely not go in July or August, unless you're a masochistic person who enjoys high temperatures and intense humidity. Hungary seems to be doing an okay job, economically speaking, but it's still not western Europe. This obviously means a lot of things, but what I'm trying to say is that air conditioning is scarce, and well-functioning AC is even scarcer. We had an extremely miserable first night's sleep until we discovered that - thank God - the window actually DID open. We also had a pretty brutal train ride to a little town called Visegrad. But enough about that.

I'm not going to give you a detailed account of what we did during our trip because, well, I think that's pretty boring. And my pictures will give you a better idea of that anyway. What I will tell you is that aside from a few days in Budapest, we also took day (or half-day) trips to the little towns of Visegrad, Szentendre, and also the larger city of Bratislava, the capital of neighboring Slovakia. We loved Budapest and Bratislava. The other Hungarian towns were nice and pretty but nothing too spectacular.

Bratislava - isn't it pretty?!

The last thing I'll tell you about Budapest is that one of the best things I did (I use the word "best" instead of "favorite" intentionally, and you'll understand why) was a relatively new museum called the House of Terror. I know what you're thinking, I was too - sounds like some cheesy horror museum or haunted house tourist trap. Well, horror, yes; cheesy, not quite. The name is, unfortunately, very fitting. Basically, the museum covers the Nazi Germany and Soviet occupations of Hungary during the 20th century. Let me tell you - this country had it rough. They had a tough time recovering after the first World War (during which they lost 70%

House of Terror

of the country's territory) and as a result, had a difficult time fighting off Nazi Germany and not just one, but two periods of Soviet occupation (Hungary was never a Soviet state but they had a communist government both before and after WWII). So anyway, the building in which the museum is housed was actually where both the Gestapo and the communist government had their headquarters. Particularly during Soviet occupation, it was no secret that torture, imprisonment, and executions were going on in the foreboding, gray, Soviet cement block-like building. Thus its nickname.

So there's my Budapest trip in a nutshell (maybe...I'm not very good at keeping things short). Great trip, great food, and beautiful city(ies). Just oh so hot and sticky.

Spanish bureaucracy (and why it makes me wonder sometimes why I'm still here)

I'm going to tell you a little story about one of the most BS things about living in Spain as a foreigner. But first I have to explain a little bit about the process of obtaining the documents to live here legally. So, Americans coming to study in Spain on a student visa for more than 180 days have to apply for a residency card. The process is a pain in the butt, but if you have all of the right documents, you usually have no (major) problems getting your card. Renewing the card is a bigger issue. Again, it's not that it's difficult to renew your residency card, but the process can be frustrating and it takes forever.

Let me give you a brief overview of the first time I renewed my card. Last year (2011), the process basically went like this: call the Extranjería (immigration office) 60 days before your card is due to expire and they give you a date for an appointment to submit renewal documents. My card was going to expire August 23rd, so I called June 23rd. I was given an appointment for September 1st. Yes, you read that correctly - the appointment was for after the card was going to expire. Unbelievable. No worries, though, this is totally normal (for Spain).

On September 1st, I submitted all of my documents and was told that I would receive a letter in the mail telling me when my new card would be ready for pick-up. Approximately three to four months. Okay...

So December (three months), rolls by, January, February...no sign of any sort from the Extranjería. Finally March hit and at this point I'd been living in Spain without a valid residency card for literally half a year. By the time I was going to receive the new card it would be time to renew it again for the next year! But anyway, the company I work for told me to just go to the office in person to see if the card was ready, because likely, it was and I was just never going to receive that damn letter.

So I went sometime in mid-March to look into the whereabouts of my MIA residency card, and low and behold, it was sitting right there in the office. (Who knows how long it had been sitting there; I think I'd rather not know.) Here's the kicker though - in order to be handed my card, I had to pay a fee of 16 euros. This is on top of the 20 or so euros I'd already paid at my renewal appointment. My card was basically being held ransom! Spain: 1, Sarah: 0.

Long story short, I got my card. Three months later (June of this year) I had to make an appointment to renew it again. The process has changed a bit this year, so we'll see how long it is before I get my new card this time around.

Now, here comes the major BS part. While you're living in Spain with an expired residency card, it's fine so long as you're in the renewal process and have proof that you've made the appointment to renew it. However, this technically prohibits you from leaving the country. So essentially you're held hostage in Spain because the government is as slow as molasses. Why don't you guys go take another siesta or two. You can get around this, however, by applying for an autorización de regreso ("return authorization").

So, another day that I had to get permission to leave work in the morning to go to the immigration office way out in el culo del mundo (the middle of nowhere) so that I could go home last December for Christmas. Another ten euros that I had to shell out just for a particularly ghetto-looking piece of paper that says that I am allowed to leave Spain once and return once (valid only for 90 days from the date of issue!). This is the part that irks me the most - I have to pay the Spanish government for permission to leave the country because they are incapable of processing a cheap little plastic card that says I live here legally in a timely fashion. Seriously, the epitome of the term "bullshit." Spain: 2, Sarah: 0.

That was last Christmas. This summer (actually, tomorrow) I am traveling for two weeks in Sweden, Estonia, and Latvia (I know, bizarre choices) and I moronically failed to notice that when I booked my (non-refundable, of course) plane ticket back into Spain from Estonia, I did so for August 24th. Literally one day after the expiration date of my card. Faaaan-freaking-tastic. Originally I was going to just risk it - I'll being flying within the Schengen area, which means I won't be going through customs anywhere, and therefore no one should be checking my visa. When I went to Portugal last December I was never asked for my visa or any sort of documentation other than my passport.

But then, on two separate occasions already this summer - going to Hungary from Madrid and returning to Madrid from Poland, the obnoxiously irritating Ryanair check-in desk attendants asked me if I have a visa. The guy in Poland had a field day scrutinizing my passport before he asked me about my visa, and then had the gall to ask me if I had noticed its upcoming expiration date. So I guess my frustration in this case is not just with Spanish bureaucracy, but also with the pesky little Ryanair workers (who I only imagine get some sort of bonus every time they find an illegal American in Europe, as if they're bounty hunters or something).

But in all seriousness- are airline attendants even legally allowed to request your visa? It makes sense to me that they should make sure your passport is up-to-date, but shouldn't checking visas be the job of immigration or customs officials?

And even so, how is it even their business if I live legally in Spain? Isn't that for Spanish immigration officers to keep tabs on? Why do other European countries even care how long I've been in Spain? I'm an American with a US passport - I'm clearly not trying to take up residence in Poland, for example.

So anyway, I spent yesterday (Sunday) hunting down a place where I could print and make photocopies of documents in order to apply for an autorización de regreso today (Monday). Of course, being a Sunday in August made things particularly infuriating because practically nothing is open on Sundays and the places that are seem to all be on vacation for the month of August (financial crisis? huh? no money? let's go on vacation for a month anyway!). On the verge of tears I finally found one place that was open (after about four or five that were not), and they even had a photocopier. I was so grateful I almost hugged the guy who works there.

End of story, I went this morning to request the aforementioned BS document, forked over ten euros that I barely have to spare right now, and was given the paper with no problems (I had my doubts for a few reasons, but I won't go into that). The man helping me was also very nice, which is a refreshing change from the series of bitter and rude employees in practically any form of customer service in Spain. Spain: 3, Sarah: maybe 1/2.

So tomorrow I'm off to Stockholm, sola. Some quality alone time with yours truly. I would be willing to bet a good chunk of change that I won't even need to present my autorización de regreso form. But if so, I'll be fighting those petty little Ryanair employees to the death over my legal residency, rest assured.

Buen verano a todos! (Enjoy the rest of the summer!)

Made in the USA

Over the course of the past two years that I've been living in Madrid, I've had several people ask me, a) do I miss the US?, and b) what do I miss about it?

Do I miss the US? Kind of a weird question. I mean, it's where I lived for nearly my whole life and where my entire family and most of my friends are. I'll call Madrid "home," but it's not really home. On the other hand I'm in no rush right now to get back to the US. To be honest, I've adjusted fairly well (intentional or not) to Madrid and certain aspects of the lifestyle here. But there are things I will never get used to, for example: lack of personal space, those damn people who are so unbelievably anxious to get off the metro at their stop, even though I have no idea what they're in a rush to get to (hello, you're Spanish), and grocery stores being closed on Sundays or banks only being open until 2 pm every day of the week. But even these things I've (begrudgingly) come to accept.

There are, however, some things about the US I'll always miss; things that either don't exist in Spain or that just aren't the same here. But I think the more time I live here, the more the list of American things decreases. For example, I used to bring back certain toiletries, peanut butter, Kraft macaroni and cheese, etc. when I would take trips home. There are still some toiletries that I buy at home and bring back (mainly because things like contact lens solution, for example, are so damn expensive here), but the list has more been reduced to the things I really need, rather than the things I just like.

Anyway, there are still some things that I'll always miss. Some things I can live without, some (more abstract) things that will keep me always coming home (you know, until it's for good). Here are just a few (in no particular order):

1. Iced coffee. It's not that this doesn't exist here, per se, but rather that in my experience, it's not quite the same and it's not as easy to find. Sure, you can go to Starbucks but it's expensive. It's really rather strange that it's not more common here, seeing as it gets ungodly hot in the summer. I suppose it's in part due to the different style of coffee here: small and strong, versus the American large and watered-down. Regardless of the reason, I find myself trying to steer clear of Starbucks during the hot weather months simply to avoid the temptation.

Oh, refried beans, I think I miss you most of all.

2. Good (and cheap) Mexican/Tex-Mex food. For anyone thinking, "but Spain is full of tacos and enchiladas and fajitas!": please, dear god, go review your high school history textbook. You're on the wrong continent. Yes, yes, Spain once conquered the land that is now Mexico, but the cultures between the present day countries is quite different. Including food. You'll find practically nothing spicy in Spain (perhaps one reason why Mexican food is hard to come by). There are Mexican restaurants in Madrid, but in my experience, they're far from spectacular and also quite far from cheap (or reasonably priced, even).

Ok, maybe he's an exception...

3. That hard-working American attitude. Okay, we have tons of lazy Americans. But by Spanish standards, we work too hard. Sorry, Spain, you just don't work hard enough. Maybe I shouldn't be bringing what could be a sensitive cultural topic into play here, but I really can't help it. I do know plenty of hard-working Spaniards, but the general attitude I observe is, "enjoy life first, work a little later in order to afford enjoying life." I mean, for goodness sake, what country in the world still has a siesta midday?? Again, I'm not going to delve deep into a political-cultural debate, but have you guys seen the state of your economy?! I'm not suggesting you become a workaholic. But there's nothing wrong with enjoying your job and working hard at your job. It is, after all, a major part of your life, whether you like it or not.


4. Summer barbecues with family (or friends). Family get-togethers are big in Spain. Barbeques, not so much. Maybe it's a weird thing to miss, but let's face it, it's one of the best ways to get families together. (It's so much less crazy than Christmas!) Sadly, I've gotten kind of used to no Thanksgiving over here, but this past 4th of July was the first time I wasn't in the US, and it was a bit of a bummer. On the rare occasions that a grilled meat smell wafts into my apartment, I get really nostalgic for home.

Open 24 hours!

5. Drugstores like CVS. There are, of course, pharmacies in Spain. But the type of store where you get medicines, shampoo, birthday cards, random food items, and certain household items like CVS in the US just doesn't exist here. I honestly don't know what's so great about CVS - maybe it's the convenience of being able to get lots of different things all within the same store, or the fact that it's usually open pretty late, or maybe even the fact that you can print out photos and go back in an hour to pick them up. Whatever it is, I miss it.

I don't even know what countries half of these flags are from.

6. The international foods section in the grocery store. I know this is a weird one, but cooking and foreign cuisines are two things I really love, and thus a lot of experimenting occurs. (And, on rare occasions, I cook something normal.) Anyway, in order to cook food from other cuisines, or at least make hilarious attempts, you obviously need certain ingredients that aren't necessarily common. Spanish grocery stores do have a foreign foods section, but it's a lame attempt generally consisting of one or two shelves stocked with soy sauce, Asian-style noodles, jars of salsa (mild, of course; I've never, to my chagrin, seen medium, and looking for hot salsa would be like expecting rain in the desert)...and little else. A few weeks ago I had to go to several different grocery stores in order to hunt down a simple bottle of teriyaki sauce. Before that I had to settle for a fajita seasoning packet instead of a taco seasoning one (which let to a somewhat catastrophic culinary result). Oy. I guess I'm stuck on the ham-cheese-bread diet for the remainder of my time in Spain.

So there you have it. Not a long list at all. Maybe there are other things out there that I would add to it, but I started this post a few days ago and haven't really thought of many things to add to it. But really, the fewer the better - I won't be seeing any of this stuff until I go home for Christmas.