Getting to know Laxe

On Wednesday I felt more comfortable.  I moved into my apartment and unpacked.  I went to the supermarket to buy a few groceries.  I had to buy bottled water because Patricia told me that I should not drink the tap water, and that I shouldn’t even use it to make tea.  So I bought water and a few other groceries.  They even had fuji apples, so I bought a few of those too.  On Wednesday, school ends at 2, so I met up with the other teachers at a café for a glass of wine and then Patricia made me lunch at her apartment.  We had fried eggs, bread, fried potatoes, asparagus and chorizo (Spanish sausage).  It was absolutely delicious! 

Yesterday was a gorgeous day, it was warm and fairly sunny so they showed me some of the beaches nearby.  It was interesting at one of the beaches when you walked along the wooden path on the one side was the beach and the sea, and on the other side was a farm.  The beaches were beautiful and fairly empty since the summer season is over.  I said that I love to collect sea glass in the US and they told me there is a beach “La Playa de Cristales” in Laxe which is full of sea glass and they said they would take me there sometime.  We went to a park that overlooks the ocean and watched the sun go down which was absolutely beautiful. 

Sunset in Laxe

I went back to my apartment after watching the sunset and watched a movie on itunes on my computer and went to bed.  I wasn’t even hungry for dinner since every time I’m with the teachers they’re insisting I eat, eat, eat, so it was nice to be able to go to my own apartment and take a break from so much food. 

Today I’m taking care of some practical things.  I went to the bank to take out money this morning and this afternoon the teachers are taking me to a town a little ways off to buy a cell phone.  I sat in my apartment to write all of these posts so that when I went to the café I would have a fair amount battery life left in my computer.  Each day I feel a little less homesick than they day before and a little happier to be here.  I’m looking forward to when I start working in the school as well as connecting with other Americans.  

My first day in Laxe

My first day in Laxe

Tuesday I went with the teacher to the school.  I don’t start teaching until next Monday, but I went so that I could learn about the school and figure out where I was going to live.  On Monday Mariluz, who picked me up at the airport said I should try to live in A Coruña because the majority of the teachers from the school lived there and commuted every day.  Also, she said Laxe is pretty depressing in the winter.  It would have been nice if they had mentioned this when I asked where I should think about living over the summer so that I could have worked on finding a roommate or apartment.  Anyways, the teachers thought it would be better if I stayed in an apartment in Laxe for the first month and I could work on finding an apartment and roommates in A Coruña.  There’s an orientation next week in Santiago for all of the language assistants in Galicia, so my plan is to talk to people there and find information about renting an apartment and finding roommates.

One of the teachers took me around Laxe to look at apartments, which was very helpful.  I ended up narrowing it down to 2, both with beautiful views of the ocean.  One was very modern and the other not so much.  But the modern one, I would have been the only one living in the building and the older one, the woman who owned it lives here with her family, so I chose the older one.  It’s perfect for me for just a month.  And the woman who owns the building worked in England for 20 years so she speaks English.  Even though I’m trying to speak mostly Spanish, it is nice that I could speak English to her if I needed to.  Her name is even Emilia, which is the Spanish Emily.  There are a few things about the apartment which confuses me.  The stove is gas, which would be fine, I’ve used a gas stove before, but you have to manually light the stove every time you use a burner.  I have not yet used a burner and I’m a little nervous to do it.  Also, I couldn’t get the water warm when I showered today.  So I took a very, very short shower.  Anyways, back to my first day.  As I said, I went to the school but they didn’t really have anything for me to do until the teacher came to look at apartments with me.  As I said it’s a longer day on Tuesday, but it’s broken up by a siesta, and there are different teachers in the morning and the afternoon.  Mariluz teaches in the morning, and Patricia, who showed me the apartment, works in the afternoon so she wasn’t there in the beginning of the day, but she came in later in the morning to take me apartment hunting.  I got a tour of the school in the morning which was practically empty because the teachers in Spain are on “huelga” which is a strike.  A lot of the teachers came in anyways, but the students technically have the day off so there were less than 20 students in school on Tuesday.

We went to a restaurant for lunch where I tried more Galician food, more pulpo, of course, as well as some new dishes.  There was a seafood salad, which wasn’t really my favorite, it was cold seafood in some seasoned oil.  We also had raxo which was some type of cooked meat.  I’m pretty sure it was beef, but not positive.  I really liked the pimientos which were cooked peppers that had been roasted in olive oil and salt.  It wasn’t that spicy at all, which I liked!  We also had tortilla Española, which varies depending on where you order it.  This had more egg, less onion and potato, which I prefer less egg and more onion and potato, and I like a drier tortilla, so not my favorite tortilla, but still good.  We went back to Patricia’s apartment for a little bit before the afternoon classes started since one of the bilingual teachers I will work with is there in the afternoon.  She turned on the tv and they watch a lot of American shows dubbed in Spanish.  Although I have to say Will & Grace is not nearly as funny without Karen’s voice.

After I met with the bilingual teacher, Patricia took me back to her apartment so I could take a nap while she finished the day at school.  After the school day ended we went to a café which has a beautiful view of the ocean.  They had Earl Grey tea and they also have wifi so I came back here to update my blog.  I'm actually the only person in here right now, although since it's 1pm in Spain, I guess that's pretty early for Spaniards.

Later we went to dinner and I tried more food.  We had jamon serrano, which I already knew I liked so I was happy to have that again.  Jamon serrano is very similar to prosciutto.  We also had more calamari, and two types of mariscos (seafood/ shellfish).  We had mejillones(mussels) in a spicy tomato sauce and almarines(clams) in a butter lemon sauce.  I ended up staying at Patricia’s apartment the first night since I hadn’t unpacked anything in my new apartment yet.

The view from my apartment

My arrival in Spain!

I finally have a chance to update everyone about my adventures in Spain.  I arrived Monday in Santiago de Compostela after a very long day of travelling.  The flight from JFK to Madrid was pretty nice, I had an aisle seat and there was nobody in the seat next to me, so I had plenty of room.  The on-flight meal was pretty good too, they even gave you metal silverware!  I tried to sleep on the plane but I was only able to sleep for about 2 hours or so, which was unfortunate since I left JFK at 7pm and arrived in Madrid at 8:30, but the flight was a little under 7 hours which meant I lost the night.

After my much smaller and less comfortable hour long flight from Madrid, I had arrived in Santiago de Compostela.  A teacher from the school was there to meet me, and I spent the day with her in Santiago de Compostela.  It’s a really interesting city because there are parts of it which are very old.  We saw the cathedral where St James the apostle (James the elder) is supposedly buried.  This cathedral is the second most pilgrimaged site in Christianity, and at the Cathedral there were many tourists and pilgrims alike.  There also is the University of Santiago de Compostela so there were a lot of youner people walking around.  The teacher explained to me that in Spain there aren’t campuses like in the US.  The academic buildings are all spread out through the city.  We also went to a gallery that had drawings by Picasso, but they were very different from the typical Picasso and I didn’t particularly enjoy it, also I was very tired at that point.  Unfortunately I was so tired I thought I was going to fall asleep standing up and I wasn’t able to really enjoy properly all that Santiago had to offer. 

We went to dinner around 6:30 in the evening and the teacher was worried that no restaurants would be open since it was so early to eat dinner.  Luckily we found one and had a traditional Galician meal.  I think it’s safe to say everyone would be shocked that I tried everything.  The first thing they brought us was our free tapas, which was calamari, which I already knew I liked, so that was good. Then we had croquettas, which are fried balls that are filled with some sort of chicken and creamy mixture which was pretty good.  Next was pulpo al gallego, which I knew I would have to try sooner or later since it’s one of the signature dishes in Galicia.  Pulpo is octopus.  What I wasn’t expecting was that the suckers would still be on the tentacles when they served it to you.  So that was a surprise, and an even bigger surprise was that I actually enjoyed eating it.  Not my favorite thing I’ve tried but not bad.  The final dish was a revuelta con langostina.  It’s pretty much scrambled eggs with shrimp and a vegetable common in Galicia.  I wasn’t a huge fan of this dish, mainly because I don’t like scrambled eggs.  I like eggs over easy and I like omelets that are filled with vegetables, but I really don’t like scrambled eggs, so I tried the revuelta but I didn’t eat much of it.  I was so tired I ended up going to bed around 9:30.  The teacher I stayed with lives in Santiago de Compostela, so the next morning we drove to the school in Laxe, which is about an hour away.  Most days the school is in session from 8:30-2.  On Tuesdays, it’s a longer day so class starts at 9:30.  We left Santiago de Compostela around 8:15 and it was still dark!  I think I have discovered the secret to the Spanish schedule.  The sun rises here around 8:30 and it doesn’t set until around 9, so it makes sense to wake up later and go to bed later.

Part of Old Santiago de Compostela

 Library for University of Santiago

The Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela

Adios America!

This is my first post, and the last post from the US!  I leave Sunday evening from JFK and Monday afternoon I will arrive in Santiago de Compostela.  So far, the biggest struggle in getting ready has been staying below the 50 lb checked bag limit.   50 lbs initially seemed like a lot of space, but I found it's really not.  I thought I had been doing a great job of only taking the necessities (I only packed two pairs of jeans!), and then my suitcase weighed  60 pounds.  Many attempts later and my suitcase is finally down to exactly 50 pounds, which means I will definitely be upgrading to 70 pounds when I return in June.

I'm very excited to go, but still a little nervous.  Monday I will be spending the day in Santiago de Compostela and then Tuesday, I will finally be in Laxe.  I really have no idea what to expect but I will be sure to keep you posted as soon as I have internet!

Laxe