Green Post-it Note

Some words of wisdom to all you post-it fanatics out there (lets not deny it, we know there are some **ehhem**Mrs. Walton**ehhem**):

Never wash white shorts with a Neon Green Post-it Note in your pocket.  It will leave a very profound color on one pant-leg for the small two inches of paper that we all love to write on.

To the island, I brought with me about five pairs of shorts-not much to begin with. Until the ´post-paintball war´ look comes into fashion soon, I think I am down one pair. I also had the phone number of my Rotary councilor written on there. …Only a minor significance.  >:^ [

Stupid post-it notes…Whoever thought of making them Neon Green, anyway. Yellow was a much preferred color.

Rotary Meeting

Yesterday night I met with the Rotary Canaria for the first time. We gathered in the basement of this classy old hotel and broke the ice by snacking on a variety of tappas. Tapas are Spanish bar foods, that you snack on in between meals. They are sort of like little appetizers, only they are not eaten before meals, and they can come in all different kinds of food (always bite sized): fried fish, calamari, bread with meat spreads, churizo (the best spanish sausage), tortilla española, olives, meatballs, etc., etc.. but they are so delicious and so very Spanish (a must try if you visit Spain).  After meeting all of the Rotarians, smiling excessively, and pretending how incredibly thrilled I am with everything, the meeting came in session. For about two hours they gabbed about god knows what.  I paid attention for the first half hour or so, just to know what was going on in case they asked me a question, not to seem like an idiot. It requires alot of concentration, at this point, to follow someone else´s conversations in Spanish (its different when you are talking and being interactive), but they pretty much argued about who would be charge of Andrew and I if we should have problems (we were supposed to have a councilor since before arriving). The man had found out that morning. After that, I tuned in and out when the topic seemed important. Thank goodness Andrew had brought with him a picture book of North Carolina. It kept me occupied.

I am actually impressing myself with how much Spanish I am understanding. I can take notes in class and tune in on conversations. School is so much better when I know what is going on. Also, (exciting news!!) this weekend, my class is going on an excursion to Hierro, another of the western Canaries!! It will be for a study pertaining to environmentalism, I beleive (Hierro is one of the two smallest and unestablished of the islands). We are leaving early friday morning and coming home on sunday. I am SOOO excited!! I want it to be thursday night right now. : )

After the Rotary meeting, Andrew and I talked about school musicals, and shared emotions from our favorite times of high school,  musical rehearsals. I felt sad thinking about it and wanted to cry. How ironic is this, his school did South Pacific AND Guys and Dolls, but he only participated in his past year´s musical, West Side Story, so we sang a little ´´Tonight, tonight,´ and ´Officer Crunky´(¿spelling?). I felt a little better.

I miss you, musical crew!!!!! BESOS!!!! (mwah!!)

Teachers on Strike and First time at the Discos!

My weekend could not have started more perfectly.  I had no classes friday because some teachers at school were on and their method of protest is not showing up for school. Only some didnt show up, but I lucked out, because not a single one of mine was there. Had there been only one, I would have had to wait around all day for that one class, but if you are over 18 and have no class, you are allowed to dign out and leave. Its not that uncommon, I guess the teachers do this every year. Everybody wants more money.

My remainder of my school day consisted of socializing with those who were waiting for classes where they had teachers or were too young to leave. I always love freetime like that with classmates, because during freetime is when plans are made and you share that kind of ´bonding.´ I stayed until about 11 or so, then went to the post office to mail a letter that cost around 6€ (so if you are wondering why I havent written to you, this is why). I browsed at the mall for a bit and got a bag of free goodies from a radio station trying to publicize.

I was invited to go fiesta during our free time today, which I was very excited about, because I had yet to check out the discos. I didnt want to go to the fiesta alone, so I invited Andrew. Transportation was a tricky situation that night, because Teresa was away from home for some lawyer business and wouldnt get back until late, and by the time I would have liked to leave the house to go to the fiesta, Ruben would be fast asleep, and Chris couldnt leave Ruben at home alone; so, I was also hoping that by inviting Andrew he could provide for me a ride when his host family took him, since we live fairly close and it would just make matters a lot less complicated. Well, Laura was in clothes that she didnt want anyway to see her in; what a a doll, I am so flattered that she cares what I think of her! Get real. Chris had a call for a cab.  The cab cost me nine euros.

My first time in a cab! How exciting! I didnt really know what to do, so I just pretended like I was in a movie; I felt to cool. The driver told me I spoke Spanish very well. : )  Andrew and I met around 11, then had quite a hike to the fiesta, but when we got there, nobody was there yet (eleven is VERY early for a night out in Spain). To kill some time, we took a walk and I bought my first legal alcoholic beverage! When we came back, people were there and getting ready to hit the discos. The place we were at in Las Americas is just a strip of dozens of discos, and while considering which one we should enter first, one club offered all of us one free shot if we went into theirs (they were trying to draw people because they had hardly any business). We accepted, of course. I guess it was a bad night for the discos because all the clubs-which are typically packed-were pretty empty. Our group danced together and I had a good time anyway, dancing is so much fun and I love the discos. I left around 2 15 (pretty early) because I told Chris I would be home around three (sailing school in the morning) and I didnt want to make a bad impression the first time I was out late, so I wanted to be a little earlier.

I was flattered the next morning when Chris knew, without me telling him, what that I had a arrived home around 2 30. I apologized for being noisy noisy coming in, but it wasnt that; I guess he had sort of accidentally waited up because he was concerned about me. : )

Dinner at Pascal

Teresa had a very close group of friends who keep a tradition of going out together about six times a year in order to maintain their intimate friendships because when you get older and involved with your family and life, you sometimes loose touch with old friends. What they do is get together and have dinner in order to plan these weekend trips, which they go on only for the weekend about three times a year, just their little pack of about 5 women, but, since I am special, : ) I got to join them for dinner. Little did I know I was about to partake in the most sophisticated meal of my life. We ate at a small italian place owned by a friend of Teresa´s, where dining is not intended for many people in the restaurant at a time, but rather for a more private atmosphere. The menu was not very large, but EVERYTHING on it could be considered an exotic delicacy and EVERYTHING is very expensive.

We started off with a glass of red champagne and bread with excellent garlic butter (that sounds inferior, but the butter was so good). We tasted a several spreads for the appetizers: salmon paste, goose liver (soo good, I shouldnt have asked what it was, but I was curious, because it was so delicious), follwed by escargot (not my favorite, but we got to use these awesome tools for eating them-there is a special clamp to pick it up, then special prongs to get out the snail…I wanted to keep the shell as a souvenir, but I didnt think that would be very classy, they probably wouldnt invite me out with them anymore), some kind of baked goat cheeze dish, garlic frog legs (yum-O!), I cant remember the rest (we drank this tasty red wine throughout the course of the meal, hehe) but there were seven or more appetizers altogether.

There were about six entrees, including chicken, beef, lamb, fish, (fancied up in ways that I cannot describe, so I will use their typical boring names), and Kuskus (sp?), which is an African dish of rice with raisins served lamb? in this juicy, sweet sauce…mmm. The appetizers were a little more exciting for me, because pretty much every single appetizer was something I have never tried, but always been curious about. We literally ate for hours, taking into consideration, everything was brought out one at a time, with time in between, but throughout the meal, you werent that full, because we had one of every dish, and split that between six of us, you had about two bites of everything, it was afterwords, laying in bed when I started to feel a little sick, and my stomach still doesnt feel very good. I dont think it was the amount of food, but the different ingredients that my body is not used to.

For dessert we had fruit tiramisu (mmm…), some sort of almondy fluff that looked like foam from a cappucino with a simular texture, mango pinapple cream pie, chocolate malt mouse which was so incredibly sweet that it was hard to eat, and couple of other things that were excellent, but not as special as the previous ones.

To top off the night, we drank this Portugese wine out of these tiny, dainty glasses. It was the sweetest wine I have ever tasted, it had so much flavor, you could only take one fourth of a sip at a time and then wait about five minutes in between drinks or it was overwhelming, but it was so good, and the perfect end to the meal.

Then again…Looking back at the evening, I wouldn´t really call it a meal; I think ´experience´ is more appropriate.

Los Atletismos

A few of my friends from school participate in a club of ´atletismos,´ and since I have been meaning to start a sport to add another activity to my boring schedule, I thought this might be a good opportunity to keep in shape while becoming closer with kids from school. Last week, a few Spanish kids explained to me what were atletismos, so, when they described it with ´many different activities and for girls and boys together,´ I was under the impression that it was a club where we play multiple kinds of sports, just for fun. You know, like one day is soccer, the next football, maybe a little rugby on Friday; so, when I showed up to the gym and everyone was out on the track getting ready to run, I got this horrible feeling in my gut like ´ugh, I thought I was done with this stuff.´ The team is all sprinters, basically, and it takes me about 18 seconds to run 100 meters because I have always trained for ´distance´ with Miss A, but I ran with them anyway. We didnt run much together, just a short warm up followed by some drills, but I was a little nervous because I didnt want to have to sprint beside them and look like a slowpoke. The drills were fun, especially because it was something I never got much of at track practice, but then they started doing jumping drills with the hurdles, so to avoid embarassing myself, I decided to run laps instead. I ended up running what I usually do here, 25 minutes or so, which is pretty much nothing considering what Miss Albert used to put us through, but when I stopped, everybody and the coach were like ´oh my gosh, you ran forever, you are so fast,´ and I felt so hardcore. : ) I guess they dont do distance running here.

In the end, atletismos was a bit of a dissapointment, but I went home having made a good impression and feeling good about myself, but I am not about to compete in track meets again. Whoo…nothing makes me more nervous. Yikes. So, today, I paid a visit to my instructor at the tennis courts and my next lesson is tuesday. : ) I am happy with my decision, although I was hoping to meet some new people at tennis but for the time being, I am the only one my age where I play; but, since tennis is only two days a week, I can still go to the track and train with the team if I have nothing to do, so really, I am reaping both benefits. : ) ahh. Estoy contenta.

Today I uploaded itunes and ripped CD for about 4 hours. I was a little sick of listening to the same 90 or so songs everyday since I left my house a month ago. My host parents have an awesome music collection of every kind of genre there is, which is so incredible perfect; I was getting very sick of my own music and I like mostly everything that they have (except for Fergie, who my host mom listens to sometimes).  My new favorite artist, hands down, is Marc Antony!!!!! and they only have ONE of his albums! Oh, I love this man, I think J Lo should become fat and ugly so they get a divorce.

Complaints about School

Usually, I try to post only the positive aspects of my experience, that way it makes things seem perfect here. But realistically, nothing is perfect, so here is what I have to say about my school:

I hate my school. It is filthy. You could not pay me 100€ to lay on the floor. At 11:30 everyday, we have what is called ´recess,´ in English, more or less. During this time, kids usually bring a sandwich or something small to eat (but not a full lunch, because that is after school around 3), and since the whole school is boundaries during this time, kids eat everywhere and hang out in all different places. I hate this, because there is ALWAYS FOOD everywhere! I wish they would set boundaries or make some rules so that I can walk down the hallway without having to dodge Boccadilla buns and juice spills. Its seriously gross and unsanitary. 

Now let me tell you about the cafeteria. If you forgot to pack a sandwich, or just prefer to buy one at school, you will have to dodge through a mosh pit of hungry bastards to reach the counter (which is only about 10 feet long) where two ladies are vending food to practically the whole school. If you succeed in reaching the counter it is about five minutes until they serve you. It is outrageous! If you are small, or just not very aggressive (this is my biggest problem) you dont stand a chance, because there is no line, so you just keep getting shoved back again and again. Ive only bought there three times, but once I waited twenty minutes to get my food, and then when I finally had it, there was no time to eat. But I have to say, they have some daamn good ham and cheese croissants.

Next are the bathrooms. When little boys are young, their mothers start to teach them to put the toilet seat up so that they dont get pee on the seat, right? Well, I guess the school is trying to teach the girls the same thing, because none of the toilets have seats. You have to sit on that little brim thing to take a piss and if you are lucky, your stall will have toilet paper. If you feel like washing your hands after that, you have to settle for just cold running water, because none of the bathrooms have soap or hot water and they dont have hand-dryers or paper-towels, so you have to use toilet paper is you feel like having dry hands (this is why the stalls never have paper). Also, they dont have garbage cans in the bathrooms, so when you finish drying your hands with toilet paper, it is popular to throw the paper in the sink. I bet the janitors use a lot of Drain-O. Oh, and this is all if you can make it to the sink, because the sluts like to clog up the sink area to stare at themselves in the mirror and put water in their hair (Fashion? I dont know, this must be some strange Spanish trend-I prefer the ´wet look´ to stay on the beach).

Its just so disgusting, I cant take it. I dont understand why they cant just buy a garbage can or install some hand dryers. Dont they realize that such a tiny investment will save them A TON of cleaning.

My school has no dress code. Girls come to school in sports bras and hooch shorts (like Daisy Duke´s) everyday. Fat, skinny, every body type, they like to show skin. Thank goodness there are very few chubby girls at my school. It must be from the ´Diet Bread´ that they get at the school cafeteria. I like that not alot of them wear makeup, because then I dont and this gives me more time to sleep in every morning. There are not really any ´bitches´ that I have met, its just that nobody is very friendly. The social groups are weird, because they dont have ex-curriculars like we do to sort of classify cliques, so everyone is casual friends, but I am still trying to figure out who hangs out with who outside of school. Also, the boys and girls dont really associate at all. The ones that do, you can tell have some sort of romance going on. Mostly, boys hang out with boys and girls with girls, and I am okay with this, because the boys are all pretty much all pricks here. Not that I have had any bad experiences with any, and there are a few that are very cool and I like, but to me it seems that boys dont give girls much respect, and the only attention that girls get from boys is for sex. So, if you want a boy to talk to you, you just have to come to school half naked. No problem.  I haven’t met any that I am interested in yet, and I am pretty much boy crazy, all the time.

Classes are miserable. The whole period is always talk, talk, talk from the teachers. If only I knew what they were saying it might be half interesting, but they all talk so fast. For the first time in my life, I wish to have homework, and a projector screen with notes to copy. I am thinking that kids that come to America for exchange must pick up the language alot faster, just because they are always forced to do these stupid little busywork reading and writing assignments that we all hate so much. Here its more like take notes on what the teacher is saying that you think is important and you are on your own to study for exams, something I am absolutely unmotivated to do because it seems practicly  pointless. A lot of times I just study Spanish during class.

The teachers are also very impersonal with students. There is almost no communication during and especially outside of class. For me, at Badger, it was normal to see a teacher in the hall and start a conversation. Here, I have done that a few times, and they seemed so surprised and almost excited to have received that kind of attention from a student. Some of them really like me for this, and I really like some of them because they seem very cool, but others, I am not so fond of. My English teacher likes me the most. hah. Go figure. She reminds me of Mrs. Rocknik. hahaha. Crazy.

Its weird, there are so many contradictions in comparison between my school and the stereotype that European high schools are so much more efficient. I mean, sometimes, teachers just don’t show up for a class, kids have no grades except for exams, which they dont get any homework to help them study for, and they dont really have many options as far as classes go. On the other hand, the teachers get alot more respect, nobody (except for me) sleeps during class, and they all learn important information and study. I dont understand it, but I guess something must be right. Either way, I greatly prefer American schools.

Fiesta Adeje

This week is the week of the Adeje Fiesta´s. They started last Friday and go all through the week until Sunday. Friday night Teresa and I went to watch this concert. It was a female singer and she had a great voice and could sing Flamenco like crazy. I think I am going to try singing some Flamenco at voice lessons! Saturday night there was this incredible parade, no kidding it was the best parade I have ever seen! There were gymnasts with flames and belly dancers, men on skates, and acrobats on these crazy stilts with balloon hats that were five feet high, there were bands and a Brazilian drum-line that made me feel like my heart would explode it was racing so fast, everyone in the parade had outrageous costumes and makeup and every single group was so much different than the one before it was so exciting I didnt want it to end! After the parade, Teresa, Ruben and I ate carnival ´Papas,´ which are baked potatoes cut in half and stuffed with olives, tuna, cheese, corn, ham, and something else that I cant remember, all topped with ketchup and ranch dressing (the thing weighed about five pounds). Sounds disgusting, huh? Yeah, it looks gross too, I was a little hesitant, but it is actually pretty tasty, but I dont think I could eat one on a regular basis. For dessert, we had crepes with nutella. Now, this was my first time trying both  crepes and nutella, and (OHH my goodness!) if you have not tried one one or the other, stop reading this blog this moment and go eat a crepe. Im not sure if they do, but I hope they sell Nutella in the States, but I really hope so, because that stuff is goooood.

Teresa took Ruben home a little after, and I found some friends from school. When Teresa got back, we danced with her friend, her friends daughter (about 15), and her friends incredibly sexy brother who is somehow only 26. Mmm, talk about a Spanish hunk. ; )

Sunday night I was very tired but Teresa wanted to go watch this band that started at 10, but I decided to go and I am so glad that I did, because they were so good. They had this choir of singing guitarists, about 25 of them on the stage. Some had regular guitars, but most were those little Spanish ones, and each of them had a different funky percussion instrument. Each person was wearing all white so that when stage-lights changed colors it was very dramatic. They had a great oboe player and the singer was fabulous. She had great stage presence, her energy made the crowd really get into it, and her voice was soo strong. The show was phenomenal. If they hadn’t been so good, I would have for sure fallen asleep.

On top of this all, admission is always free, and the stage is ususally occupied with some act. Its really nice the way they put so much time into organizing all this. Check out my photos if you havent, here is the link. http://www.flickr.com/photos/14315816@N02/ There are not that many photos from the parade because I filmed alot of it, and the website (I dont think) lets you have films posted. I dont know, there is plenty to look at here.

Tennis lessons and Babysitting

So I havent written for several days, because I had two really bad days in a row. I cried just a little, but I dont like to post negative blogs, only the kind that will make my readers jealous ; ) so I need not explain. Things are better now, and I had an good day yesterday. I also have school off today, because it is a National Holiday.

Yesterday morning I got out of school because my host mother and I needed to pay a visit to the office in control of residency, which is located in Santa Cruz (the same place I went shopping the other weekend, about one hour away in the North of the Island). In order to be legal there is a bunch of paperwork that needs to be done within three months of the arrival date on my visa, and paperwork takes time, so it is best to start early (I learned that this summer when applying for my visa). Not fun. I guess so many people hate to deal with the amount of papers that Spain requires, that the majority of them just remain illegal, haha. We were missing one paper, so my host mother has to drive back up there once more after we wait 15 days to retreive the paper from the police station and after the police visit our house to prove that I am living in their house. The system is pretty much a vicious cycle.

We got home earlier than expected from Santa Cruz but my host mother told me I could stay home for the rest of the day, but I decided to go to school. After school, I stopped in  Panderia (bakery) and ate this great pita type veggie sandwich, then took the Guagua home, because at 4 o clock I had an appointment to try tennis.

Tennis is probably the most fun sport in the entire world. I honestly had so much fun at lessons, and my instructor, Emilio, is so awesome. Next week I am trying this athletics group in Las Americas with some girls from school. They dont compete and they arent a ´team,´ just a club who gets together several times a week to play varieties of sports. It sounds like a great time and it will be very social, but I dont know what to do now, because I liked tennis lessons SOOOO SOO much and I can only do one. I was hoping that tennis lessons would be wiht a group of kids (my whole purpose of playing is so that I can get out and make some new friends), and I had lessons one on one with the instructor. I am hoping that after the first lesson, I can be with other kids, but i have to find out for sure. If not, I dont know what I will do.

After practicing tennis for an hour, Teresa´s sister, Marisol (her name translated means Sea ´mar´ and sun ´sol,´ I love this name!), picked me up so I could babysit her two little girls (ages 5 and 3, i think) while she was at ballroom dancing lessons (this lady is so cool). Her kids are adorable, we played ´luz rojo, luz verde´ (red light, green light). Kids are so much work. I was pooped in thirty minutes. Time flew by and we had fun, really the only problem I had was when the three year old had to pee, and I tried sitting her in the toilet and nothing happened. I was so afraid my hands would slip and she would fall in. Her sister was trying to show me this jar type device, but i didnt know what to do with it. Thank goodness her father got home shortly after so there were no warm, wet underwear incidents.

When I was dont babysitting, I went for a short run by the beach, since I was right there, and I arrived back to the house just in time for Teresa to give me a ride home. We stopped at her parent´s place to say hi, they have the cutest apartment. After that we went home and ate dinner, and I watched Harry Potter in Spanish.

Tonight, Ruben, Teresa and I are going to the first night of the fiesta´s to hear a band play. Yay! my first fiesta! Im very excited for this.

El dia de los Padres (The day of the Parents)

After blogging yesterday, I could still hear voices in the living room, so I came back downstairs prepared to converse a little more and then say goodbye to Teresa´s parents, only to be greeted by more strangers. Teresa´s parents had left some time ago and now Christian´s parents were here for a visit. whoo…four parents in one day, my cheeks were starting to hurt from smiling.

Both Chris´s and Teresa´s parents live elsewhere and come here for the winter months of the year to pass the cold months in the sun. Christian´s dad lives in France when he is not here, and he had with him Chris´s step-mom, who is French, has always lived in France and speaks, well, French. Now, as I said before, Chris speaks several different languages, including English, French, Flemmish, and Spanish (and i think a little German); Chris´s father also speaks all of these languages, except trade Chris´s ´little bit of German´ for alot of German and a little Spanish. When making his aquantance, I was a little confused why when I greeted him in Spanish, he returned my answers in English. From then Chris´s father and I spoke only in English. Since Chris´s stepmom speaks only French, everyone must peak to her in French, making me the only person in the room who is unable to communicate with her. When Chris and his father talk, they speak Flemmish, so they could be ´talking smack´ about every single person in the room  and we would all be totally oblivious. Since I prefer to have a half way intellegent conversation with Chris, we usually speak English, whereas I feel Teresa is more understanding  the learning process of language (or I just feel more comfortable sounding like an idiot in front of her) I always practive my Spanish, every time I talk English to her, I get a response in Spanish.  It was so ridiculous! Five poeple socializing in a room the size of a dorm and we are averaging one language a person! haha! This goes down as one of my favorite 30 minutes ever, or at least the most amusing anyway.

Anyway, both of my host parents´ parents are great. I really enjoyed talking with Chris´s dad (he even talks English with an American accent), and Chris´s stepmom is very sweet, judging by her body language, that is.

 ; )

Setting sail for the first Time and Lunch with Teresa´s Padres

Sailing school was so great today, because I actually got to go on the water! I was surprised at how much I remembered from last week, as far as preparing the boats. I was getting frusterated becuase these two girls (about 11 and 12) have been going for, like, five years and they never know what to do. They are pretty much useless. They actually almost tipped their boat today (this is AFTER sailing right into the swimming area and almost hitting a person, and before nearly running into the rocks). They are pretty lazy too, they dont really help the little kids.

Anyway, I think sailing is terrific, I want to say I would do it all the time, but Im not sure how soon I would get bored with it. Today, I went out on the big boat with my cool instructor and four kids. With the bigger boats, there is more to operate, to though it may seem like a lot, someone always has a responsibility (although Its not hard to handle more than one thing at a time if you only had two, per-say). I love the sailing school kids, they are all so fun and adorable, and with sailing, since there is much work involved, there is always a need to help one another, so they sort of have this bond, and nobody is shy with one another.  Im almost glad I am the oldest one. Its so entertaining watching the little kids follow behing the motor boat on their little ´Optimists´ (these are the one-man boats for the more experienced youngsters). I need that on my camera. Emilio, Teresa´s nephew who is staying with us for the weekend, tipped his boat today, but everything was fine. I am so excited because their is this sweet yellow and orange and red striped one man boat this this guy took out today, and I was in love with it so I complimented him on it, and it turns out he was just trying it out, and that it is intended for a person of my age and weight, YESSS!! I cant wait, because it looks like alot more fun to sail solo. How the solo sailboats work is there is only one sail, the Mayor (in spanish), instead of two, so its alot easier and less to maintain.

Teresa cooked lunch today, and After sailing school, we met her parents at the beach and they came over to eat with us. They are so sweet and nice, just like Teresa, and I have a feeling they have a good opinion of me, as well. ; )

I want to try and find a fiesta tonight, since tomorrow is fiesta day, and there is no school. I havent been to the discos yet, and I am dying to go. Wish me luck!