Jet Lag - again

It has been hard to update since my jet lag is making me all kinds of tired at weird hours. Yesterday I woke up around 8 or 9 and ate a balanced breakfast and then was out walking around town for some exercise and bought some things for the house. I am going to attempt to bake chicken today. I have some delicious lemon pepper from the US of A that I am going to add to it. One of my friends back home found some recipes for me that I can look around and try. It was nice being home and not having to cook that much, now I am back in Manzanares and in charge of buying groceries AND cooking. Honestly I haven’t had much of an appetite, lately I have been skipping out on dinner because I am not hungry – this will probably change when school starts (MONDAY!) and I have all of my private lessons.
I hope I can stay awake for it all!
I am excited about my lesson on Monday because I bought a bunch of books for the 4 year old I have including Little Golden Books, which has brought back many memories. I remember when I was younger my sister and I would go pick out a Little Golden Book for our Dad to read to us before we went to bed, family tradition, and a good one at that. I also bought some Dr. Seuss books – those are all classics. In fact, when I brought the books home, my Dad read The Cat in the Hat to me (yes, I am 23 years old, but I enjoyed it like a 5 year old).
Being home was worth all of the stress it took me to get home and back. Traveling is one of my favorite things – but sometimes the airlines make it so hard on you to enjoy it.

I have a huge process I have to follow when I fly out of Madrid. I have to take a train (2 hours) to Madrid and stay in a hostel overnight so that I have plenty of time to make my flight. The train schedule isn’t always convenient – I think they did that on purpose. I usually take a late train out so that I can still have all of my private lessons. Then it is a pain to take the metro from the train station because it usually involves a large amount of stairs (and more often than not, someone is willing to help me because I try and look extra pathetic). Then getting to the hostel, there is another flight of stairs – I had a suitcase filled with wine – making it a trek.
Then, I stay the night at the hostel, make sure to set my alarm and go to bed early because the metro ride is about 45 minutes from my hostel to the airport (again, switching one metro line without an elevator, leaving some poor soul to help me). I finally got to the ticket counter at the airport – which is another trek to a different terminal from which the metro drops you off. I get to the counter, and the agent gives me a middle seat – um yeah no. I asked her if that was the ONLY seat on the plane – she said it was. I was almost in tears knowing that flying for 9-11 hours on a plane in the middle seat is actually NOT okay with me. The plane was delayed 2 and a half hours – meaning I was going to miss my connecting flight from Atlanta to Dallas – you’ve got to be kidding me. You stick me in a middle seat – AND I’m going to miss my next flight. Two strikes Delta! I decided to go up to the ticket counter and just SEE if there were any other seats (by this time I contemplated paying for a first class seat), and the agent was like, “Oh yeah, here is an aisle”. So the lady at the ticket counter lied to me, but I was super excited to not have to deal with a middle seat (which by the way two larger passengers were sitting in the row I would have been in).
Finally on the plane, some idiot hits me in the head with his suitcase (Really?). I started feeling nauseous and my head was throbbing. The flight attendant came by and offered me some Tylenol and ice. She was so pleasant, it really made the flight not so bad.
Then getting another connecting flight was another story. I had to get in line with a million other passengers that missed their connections as well. The first Delta employee told me I had to wait until the morning to fly out (yep, staying in a hotel for the night), I was almost in tears. I just wanted to go home. The agent at the counter asked me what I needed, and I told her I was trying not to be upset (the tears were about the come out), and she then told me they had ONE seat on the 7pm flight – note it was 6:30 and I had to go through security behind a woman with all the metal jewelry she owned AND take a tram to another terminal. I had to run, I had to weave myself up an escalator, I had to run some more to make my flight – and I was one of the last people on.

Coming home to my family (and Chick-fil-a and Dr. Pepper) made all of that nonsense totally worth it.

Until Next Time

Tori XOXO

I'm back

If you noticed, I took a bit of a hiatus from blogging. I only told a few people the news that I was coming back to the States for Christmas, and I wanted to keep a surprise element for a few people. So I didn’t write about it. When I got home I spent a lot of time with family and friends and neglected to update you on my adventures.

I’ll update you slowly but surely on the highlights of my trip. Today I am just recovering from a long journey back from Texas. The Three Kings parade is today so I want to be good and rested for that. Tomorrow is Three Kings day, which is the bigger holiday (Santa isn’t the main focus here).

Karlyne, my roommate was chosen  to be one of the Kings yesterday so the children could drop off their letters of what they wanted as presents (the Kings bring presents). There are about 5 black people in Manzanares, and they wanted her to play the part, which I think is absolutely stellar. I don’t know if she is going to be in the parade, I passed out at 5pm yesterday so I haven’t talked to her about her experience.

Today I have to get a lot done, tomorrow is a holiday and we all know that means everything is closed. I haven’t eaten since yesterday morning and I only have pasta and rice in the pantry, so I need to go shopping and get some food. Back to healthy eating – fresh fruits and veggies. I am excited to cook with some things I brought back with me – salsa, lemon pepper, and I did splurge and get some mac n cheese.

Now…just have to wait another hour for the stores to open.

Until Next Time

Tori

Looking Like Christmas

Well, almost.
We had a bout of snow like I said last post and since then has been a bit warmer with a THICK fog. I had been wearing light jackets for the last week since it hadn't been freezing, what is this, Texas? Looking at the weather forecast this week looks like it will once again be cold.
On Friday we had a Christmas Cookie party. It was pretty fun using different utensils to try and make shapes with cookies. We used cups, wooden chopsticks and even a pizza cutter to try and make different shapes. I made a gingerbread man and kept saying "Not my gumdrop buttons!" from Shrek. Virginia made an Asian man, and a Yoda, both interesting...
Mike bought some milk (but we also had some beer on hand) so it was a good combination. We were going to watch Rudolph but somehow ended up at our favorite bar - Tubos. They had great tapas that night! I love that place.
Saturday was pretty relaxed, finished up some Christmas shopping and went to Ciudad Real with Mike, Virginia, and Virginia's parents. It was a great opportunity to practice some Spanish. Virginia's Dad speaks very "La Mancha" meaning his voice is semi-throaty, if that makes sense. We had a few tapas and wine there (wine was DELICIOUS) and meandered through the streets of Ciudad Real. They have all of their Christmas lights up so it was very pretty and decorative. I was a little overwhelmed by all the people there which was a good thing since I only bought a purse and didn't have any energy to look for/try on clothes.
Sunday was very relaxed, I worked a bit on my knitting (picture of progress soon) and just relaxed.
This week I am giving a lot of Christmas lectures, showing videos of Christmas Lights and some pictures from ICE! I have gotten a positive response so far since they don't really decorate their houses in lights. Also funny to note: Santa climbs up through the window (in Texas Santa would be shot for doing that haha) so some people have decorations of Santas climbing through their windows, I'll have to find a decent picture of that because I think it is hilarious.

Until Next Time

Tori

First Snow

We had our first snow yesterday. It was just a light dusting. Mike and I had to take a train to Ciudad Real for some official business. So the view of all the fields in snow was so pretty. That being said, I have never been so cold in my life. I must invest in a down jacket and a face mask that can cover my nose and mouth. This is why I live in Texas, it only gets this cold at night when I am indoors and can cover up with a blanket and sit by the heater and not move.
We have a small holiday this week for Constitution Day and some Catholic Holiday, so we are off until Thursday! I think I am going to Rudiera again to sit by the fire and knit (I am learning and my scarf is coming along. It isn't perfect, but that is okay!)
Next week I will be doing Christmas lectures, I need to choose what I will talk about because there is just SO much! I love Christmas!
I remember Christmas as 60-70 degrees and sunny outside (except two years ago when we had piles of snow and ice)

I'm sitting outside in the cold, so I am going to go now.

Until Next Time

Tori

Tramposos

I had class solo today, many of the English teachers are still out.
I had a class with 1 Bach. which is the older kids (16 or 17). Apparently they had a test in history after my class, so most of them were studying. SOME of them were CHEATING by writing on their desks, or they had small sheets of paper with notes on them. I was FURIOUS. I hate liars, and especially cheaters.
Instead of playing a game in class, I gave a lecture on cheating (and again, how much I HATE it). I let them study for the period, which I thought was pretty nice. Some of them explained to me that cheating is normal in class (HA!), so I told them how dishonest it is, and how unfair it is to those who studied and didn't cheat. I was just appalled.
One boy had a HUGE paragraph of notes written, so I waited until the end of the period and licked my finger and erased them all. Probably a 'bitch' move, but I gave them a whole extra hour to STUDY. Honestly, it isn't that hard! He told me he always forgets things, well, shoot, I had that problem a few times on a test but I didn't cheat over it, I took the grade (unhappily), but that is life. He also told me that I have yoga with his mother and to not tell her (which made me laugh).

Oh the adventures of teaching...

Thanksgiving

Dia de Gracias here was a nice second to being home. The whole week last week and even today, I have to give a presentation on Thanksgiving, which really made my mouth water the whole time! I talked about the history of Thanksgiving, and about the Pilgrims and the Indians (which is hard to explain what a Native American is...some of them don't even understand slavery but that is another subject). I talked a lot about the food and how my Mom makes many desserts on this day. This year she made a Pumpkin Pie, Cheesecake, brownies and TWO Apple Pies (one of which my dog Bandit enjoyed). I went in to detail about how the sweet potatoes are made (with cinnamon and marshmallows), mentioned cranberry sauce, and in one class had to talk about how to stuff a turkey (without getting too graphic). I also talked about the football games (Oh how I miss football!) and the Thanksgiving Day Parade, I even showed a video of it. And the last thing I talked about was of course, Black Friday. Many of them were stunned that stores would open at 5am, and how people CAMP OUT to be the first in line. They thought I was crazy. Stores here open no earlier than 10am, close from 2-5, and open again 5 to 8:30, except Saturday, when stores only open from 10-2, or Sunday when literally the whole town shuts down and NOTHING in open (Okay, maybe the gas station is open on Sunday, but for limited hours...
Mike had to special order a turkey, since they do not have those on hand here. And, after surveying my class, not many people here have even HAD turkey before (aside from sandwich slices).  He also made a homemade pumpkin pie, which turned out to be DELICIOUS. We had some mashed potatoes with a plethora of butter and garlic (yum). And an assortment of Spanish dishes brought by the Spanish attendees. It was a huge success, we even got to watch some of the Macy's parade since it was on 3pm our time. I haven't seen the parade in years given it comes on early in the morning usually, so it was nice to see it in the afternoon!
I was able to Skype with my family, and since my Grammy was in town, I even got to speak to her! It made me a lot less homesick.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Sintra

I. Love. Sintra.
I wish I had more time there. I could have spent a few days there even (people say it is just a day trip town). I went to Quinta da Regaleira which is this huge park in this pretty dense forest area. They had caves everywhere and tunnels. There is also this well that goes pretty far down:

 

You can go down it, and I went down a few levels then FREAKED out because I saw a huge spider web. Yeah, I am 23 and not above climbing down farther into a hole because of a huge spider. I also felt a water droplet hit my head and I RAN back up the stairs. I'm sure anyone watching me would have laughed. I spent some time walking up the steep cobblestone walkways. It was kind of calming and there were some great viewpoints to it. Same thing with the caves, I would "hear" and "feel" things so I would RUN out (possibly yelling some sort of obscenity.)

I was a little pressed for time, so I left the park sooner that I wanted, and headed to the next thing. I had to skip the Moor castle because I wanted to see the Pena Palace ( and I went to the castle in Lisboa). It is beautiful, and is painted a lot of colors.

 

I headed there to take some pictures, and go inside. I saved so much money with my Carnet Joven!  I spent some time there and got lost in the Pena Park on my way out. I was a little freaked because there was NOTHING around, and NO ONE could be seen, I felt so alone. Lots of green, lots of trees, and no people. I looked at the map, which was NO use when you are surrounded by trees and no signs to tell you where to go. I knew I needed to go DOWN (because the climb up was a bitch) only cobblestone roads at an almost 90 degree angle. Almost to the point where if you didn't run you would tumble backwards. 

I finally made it out of the woods (haha) and made my way to the bus to take me back to the bottom of the mountain. 

I wanted to go to Cabo da Roca which is the farthest western point on the European continent. By the time I got there, it was pretty dark, but it was neat to just BE there. It was super windy and cold, but I managed a few pictures before the last bus came for the night. I made it back to Lisboa by 8pm (and boy was I TIRED). When I got back to the hostel I made some yummy pasta and watched a movie.

I would definitely go back to Sintra if I had more time and money at the end of the year. Portugal was amazing!