A French Themed Weekend

Let's start with Friday, I headed up to Girona to see La Sam and L'Adam. We went to a bar to see Adam's housemate's art exhibition, which was pretty cool and we sat and talked in Catalan with a small group. We then went back to Sam's flat to get ready to go to a fancy dress erasmus party, Sam was Dali, Adam was Zorro and I sported my Muskeeter outfit. (here commences the French theme) We all wore fake moustaches and decided to head round to the flat for a couple of hours and a glass of cava. This did not happen, a glass of cava turned into a bottle and some rum and coke and staying out until the club closed.... When we needed to be up at 8.30 the next morning.. and had forgotten to set an alarm... oopsie. Arrival of Supererin, who wakes up, without an alarm at 8.25 :) Major points go to my body clock for making sure we got the bus to Perpignan.
We had a lovely day in Perpingnan, there isn't much to do and they don't really speak Catalan, despite the fact that the flag is everywhere but is was a nice day out; and it was interesting to see the major difference between French Catalonia and Catalonia in Spain. The fact that Perpignana is FRENCH Catalonia (French first) and Catalonia in Spain is Catalan first and foremost.

I then got the bus back to Barcelona and watched the match in a bar with Katie before collapsing from exhaustion.
Today I did about 500 words on my DELC310 for French, taking me well over the half way word count (2300) yay! I then went to meet a group of friends to go to the Picasso museum as it is free on the first Sunday of the month. However the queue was insanely long so we didn't go in, instead we went into the Design Hub of Barcelona which was pretty strange, a lot of modern art such as dismantled chairs and garden hoses... It was different. We then went and had some tea and I bought a Catalan book for 2 euros. Then we had empanadas, yummy, before heading to the cinema to watch The Artist. It's a silent movie about silent movies. It was amazing, I was a bit unsure about going but I really enjoyed it.
Now I'm going to have a bit of a read and settle in for the night before school tomorrow.
Adios
x-x-x

The weekend is here!

My weekend has started and it's lovely and sunny and about 17degrees, not too shabby for the first of March. :)
Yesterday I went to the Natural History Museum with school, it was pretty fun but unbelievably tiring, looking after a group of year ones for the day really took it out of me. Afterwards I had Catalan class, where I struggled to keep my eyes open to be honest, I was absolutely shattered. The highlight of the day had to be when the children decided to stage a demonstration against the teachers; we had said that they had to sit down for a few minutes after lunch before being allowed to play on the park; so about 90 5/6/7 year olds were marching round the park chanting "jugar" (to play) until we eventually let them go on the playground. A nearby cafe owner found it absolutely hillarious and it made me think that the culture of protesting in Spain really does start young...
I am currently waiting for the ministerio to pay me for last month's work, then I cna buy some pretty summer clothes to wear in this lovely weather and when I head down to the south :) I'm getting really excited about my upcoming travels, I sometimes feel like I'm not doing enough here during the days, as I tend to be reovering from the weekends! But I'm going to try and get a bit of studying done this afternoon, so hopefully I'll feel a little bit better about myself then.
On another note; here are is an example of the restaurant videos I spent so long doing with my year fours, they are on youtube and are now up on the school blog, so if anyone has a desire to watch them all then feel free:
http://englishroquetes.blogspot.com/

That's it from me for now. Hasta luego!

The weekend I met Don Quijote

I spent this weekend in Madrid and Toledo and had an absolutely amazing time. :) I flew down to Madrid on the Friday and met Jess, my friend from secondary school and college. We met in Retiro park and spent ages chatting and walking around, we then met Kate and Dan for a spot of lunch and some day drinking before heading back to Retiro park to go on the rowing boats. We enjoyed it so much that after our first go we went back on again, with Sangria, it was perfect, sitting on a boat, with my friends on a lovely sunny day, it may as well have been August, it didn't feel like February.
After a Chinese take away and an early night Dan, Kate and I headed to Toldeo, in Castille La Mancha for the day. It is a really beautiful town and very tranquil, it was nice for us to all get away from the hustle and bustle of the city for a while, we then headed back into Madrid where the evening took a turn for the weirder...
exhibit 1:

We witnessed a group of men lift up and transport (very very slowly) a giant wooden frame, for some unknown reason. Only in Spain! So after seeing this when we sat down for wine and tortilla the craziness continued when we were approached by these guys:

Yep, that's right it's Don Quijote and Sancho! They were leading a bar crawl and stopped off at our bar, they then returned by themselves later, it was all a little crazy to be honest, speaking in true Spanglish with these too was utterly mindblowing.

Sunday was a laid back day, we had a lay in, then headed to Retiro for another go on the boats, before I flew home and went to watch Barca win at a bar with some friends.

Today school was pretty normal, then I went to the gym, with my trips to the hot sunny south coming up I feel I need to get my beach body in shape. :p Off to Catalan class soon, should probably finish the homework before I leave.......





Time is slipping away like sand through my fingers....

I'm writing todays blog as a break from my packing (I'm off to Madrid and Toledo for the weekend). I just can't decide what to take, so rather than getting myself into a fluster I decided to update the worldwideweb on todays school time adventures. Today I only worked one hour, again with year 4, my timetable has compeltely gone to pot the past few days with the other English teacher being off sick. Most of the group have now mastered the basics of "O'clock, quarter past, half past, quarter to..." except for a few who can't tell the time in Spanish, so I can't really expect them to be whizzes at it in another language. I then palnend my lessons for next week and eventually (after an hour of trying) managed to get the unusually slow internet to send my project of "at the restaurant" videos to the Catalan government. Once they are up on the school blog I will link you guys in to the work that I have been doing.
Last night after my catalan class I enrolled for the next level of the course, which providing I pass the exam in a couple of weeks starts immediately after my current course, without a break. It also runs until the 14th of June, so I may miss the end of unit test depending on when I need to leave Spain to go to France. I can't believe how quickly this year hoas flown by, I don't want it to end. IIf I have to leave Spain as soon as my palcement finishes, I've only got 5 weekends left here where I don't already have plans; and three of those weekends will be taken up with trips and actvities that are planned but don't have definite dates yet.
Thirdyearabroad.com have published an article I wrote about being an English Language assistant; if you're interested then take a look:
http://www.thirdyearabroad.com/work-abroad/teach-abroad/item/1084-being-an-english-language-assistant.html
I was really pelased when they asked me to write something, hopefully I can help soemone out on their year abroad choice.
I think that's updated you all on everything.
I'll blog again on Sunday when I get home from Castille la Mancha/Madrid and the Barca match.
Hasta Domingo!
x-x-x

Year 4 overload!

Today I spent the entire day working with year fours, which was a bit of an overload, for the first to hours I was helping to teach them how to tell the time in English, the only problem is that some of them don't even understand how to tell the time in Spanish or Catalan....
Over lunch today I spoke quite a lot, which is unusual because I usually can't get a word in edgeways! Everybody was saying how well I speak Spanish which gave me a boost, and on Monday I was approached in Spanish by someone wanting to know how to get to the airport; maybe I'm starting to look like a Catalan? Also at lunch today one of the teachers was whistling, when I said I couldn't whistle people were shocked, I quickly said that no English people can whistle, this got me a few laughs; and even more when one teacher actually believed me! Bless her, she said "Oh really is it to do with how you pronounce things or something?" Most gullible award ever goes to her. :)
Then in the afternoon I was invigilating their end of unit exams, it seems so weird watching 10 year olds sat in an exam, although to be fair it was pretty short and easy, even the class teacher has said she would be shocked if anyone failed.
This evening I had my Catalan class, I have a speaking exam on the 14th of March at 8.30pm.... that's when you know you live in Spain. I also discovered that I am a master of Catalan tongue twisters much to my surprise.
That's about it, I'm getting excited to head to Toledo and Madrid this weekend.
Fins Dema!
x-x-x

The flu continues to strike....

All the teachers at my school have been going off sick with the Flu due to the cold snap we had a few weeks ago and it has final hit my tutor which means that my timetable for this week has completely changed and as I will be spending the whole week with Isabel, the other tutor, so I will be spending a lot of time with the year 4's again. Today at school I recorded the final still life voices for the year 4 project and then with year six we started to record some pieces they have written using comparatives and superlatives.
After school I went to the gym, which made me feel amazing and both the classes were really fun. Then I went round to Rosa's house to make pancakes as it is also traditional in France to make pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. We had a couple each and then we started making some for her to take into school tomorrow for the kids to try. She needs to make 40 and I reckon we got about half of them done before we both had to leave to go and teach our respective private classes.

I also managed to flip a pancake dozens of times in order to try and take a photo, I felt like a whizz! 

My private class was ok today, the girl I teach was a little under the weather, I felt sorry for her and we played a game in English for a little bit longer than usual today.
Now I'm going to do my Catalan homework for tomorrow and write an article for third year abroad, if I'm not too tired.
For anyone that is interested here is a picture of me and some people from my Catalan class when we went to the Caixa Forum yesterday.

An extra long weekend

So as you can probably gather by the title I got an extra day off this weekend! I wish I had Mondays off every week, but I do usually only work 4 days a week, so I can't really complain, yet only working 3 is a bonus. Today I had a lie in to recover from carnival weekend then I met up with Gavin and we went on the Camp Nou (Barcelona's football ground) experience, there is a museum documenting the history of the club, then you can head into the stands/next to the pitch/press room/changing rooms. It was a really good trip, it was only 16.50euros and we were in there for over 2 and a half hours (even if online it says it only takes an hour!) I bought a Barca shirt which I will be wearing with pride at matches and when I visit Madrid. :p
This evening I went on a trip with my catalan class to Caixa Forum, a converted cotton factory which now houses temporary exhibitions and artwork. It was interesting and a pretty cool modernist building, very different to the factories we have in England. I also understood the entire tour without many problems which I feel means my Catalan is improving.
Tomorrow I'm back in school, I feel that getting up early will hit me, but oh well that's the life of an ELA for you!
Hasta manana!