14N Huelga (Nov. 14th Strike)

I ended up having Wednesday off because the two teachers that I work with on Wednesdays decided to participate in the strike. It was nice to have a mid-week break.

We woke up to the sounds of helicopters flying around getting video of the protest. After breakfast we decided to go on a walk about to check out the protest.

It was a beautiful day for a protest. Sunny and warm.

This protest is significant because it is for the entire country of Spain and I believe Portugal and Italy decided to have a strike on this particular day too. It is called a general strike because it was not specific to one business or line of work. From small pubs to schools to pharmacies to Starbucks, anyone and everyone could choose to go on strike.

This is the second general strike the labor unions has called for in the last 8 months. It is the first time in history that a general strike has occured multiple times in one year. The strike is for the huge cut in social provisions such as health care, welfare, education and unemployment benefits. 

There was a march in the morning and one for the evening. Someone handed me a flyer explaining that everyone was to meet at fuente cibeles at 7:30pm and they were planning to stay there until 9am the next morning. Fuente cibeles is near all the government buildings so whenever there is a big strike or protest going on, people usually end up there. It is also where the three main roads through Madrid converge so it can be frustrating for drivers because the roads end up being completely blocked off for quite some time.

Overall it seemed to be a peaceful protest. Lots of whistles being blown, flags waved, stickers being stuck and flyers being thrown into the air. 

At one point, we saw people grabbing the road blocks used for construction and placing them across the road to block traffic. They had a taxi cornered and a few people took out their stickers and plastered them on the taxi’s windshield. The police officers had to remove the barriers so that the cars could get through. I believe they eventually had to close down the road because of all the people.

After walking around a bit we decided to head back home and enjoy a relaxing afternoon at home. 

We thought about going back down to fuente cibeles at night to check that out but I didn´t feel like leaving the apartment so we stayed home. I later heard that isolated groups of protestors were starting fires and throwing rocks at policemen which resulted in the use of rubber bullets. So I was glad we didn´t go back down. 

People posted signs such as this one on their businesses: "Closed for general strike"

Fliers were everywhere!

We think the police lined up here because the business behind them was open and they were being heckled by protestors. 

The red stickers were advertising the protest and they were posted everywhere!!

People were pulling out the garbage cans and construccion blockades to block traffic. 

This taxi was a victim of a walk by sticking of stickers. 

Do you see the fliers in the air? This women stood here for about 20 minutes tossing fliers in the air!

Activities at school

School has been going well. In addition to teaching classes, I have joined the school choir! I was trying to set up a time to meet with one of my teachers to talk about the plans for class and when I suggested during the break he said he had choir practice! I told him I didn't know the school had a choir and he said anyone could join and I should talk with Nacho, the director. So I went and talked with him, sung some scales so he would know where to place me (soprano or alto) and gave me the sheet music. Right now we are working on Christmas music. The choir will do a show during Christmas time. I am not sure when or where yet but it should be fun! Teachers and students alike are in the choir. I had my first practice last week. We are singing Noche de paz (Silent Night) and a couple of other songs I don't recognize. One of them though is similar to Away in a Manger but it has a different tune.

Also, on Fridays one of the teachers has started an oragami class during the break so I have been attending those classes too. Last Friday we learned how to make a shirt. It is pretty fun.

I am enjoying getting more involved in my school and getting to know some of the people better too. 

Relaxing weekend at home

Our last few weekends have been pretty busy with travel or errands around Madrid. This weekend we decided to take it easy and do nothing! So far we are off to a good start. I got home around 1:30 on Friday and we hung out and had lunch and then went to the store Taste of America. I was excited to go here because supposedly they have some things that are common in the States but not so common here, like baking soda and Crisco. Well they had these items but everything was so expensive!! For a container that had maybe 4 cups of Crisco it was 6 euros. Ben found a box of vanilla wafers for 8 euros! We ended up just getting the baking soda. Next we went to Corte Inglés and looked around. I wanted to go check out the Christmas display stuff but we ended up in the supermercado where we bought some churros to make later that night and a chocolate bar that Ben wanted. The chocolate bar ended up not being very good. He thought it had cookie dough in the inside but when I took a closer look at the wrapper and actually read what it said, I realized it was some sort of whipping cream filling.

After dinner we made some churros and hot chocolate and watched some Friends.

So far Saturday we have watched Friends and Ben played some video game on his computer and I played Oregon Trail on his ipod. Later tonight he is going to try to play League of Legends at an internet café with his guy friends back home and I am headed back to Corte Inglés to find the Christmas display!

Sunday we will go to church and maybe head back to the Prado Museum.


The churros turned out really yummy! The hot chocolate here is good but kind of bitter so when you dip sugar covered churros in it, it tastes nice and sweet.

 

Playing our games. :)

Tapas for lunch

Sevilla Day #4

We woke up early today because there were a couple of things we still wanted to see. We walked to another part of town to see where a very old part of the old wall that used to surround the city is still standing. It was pretty neat to see. We also wanted to see Alameda de Hércules. It was raining pretty hard by the time we got to these places so we didn’t stay long. Although it was raining it was still about 70 degrees! We couldn’t decide whether to wear our rain jackets or not. Once we got back to the hotel we packed up and went downstairs to hang out. We thought we’d bought tickets to leave Sevilla at 2pm but the tickets were for 4pm. We hung around the bar for an hour and a half or so and then decided to go see if it would be possible to get on an earlier bus. We showed up and for 2 euros we could change our tickets to leave at 2:30pm! Our bus left in half an hour. We were quite happy.
It was raining pretty hard outside and a lot of the fields and olive tree orchards were starting to flood. It was kind of cool to see.

The bus we were on was extremely old and whenever we went uphill the water on the roof would all slide to the back and leak inside the bus! I was dripped on a couple of times but the guy across from us had it so bad he opened up his umbrella and propped it up so he wouldn’t get rained on.
After about 3 hours on the road we hit some traffic. Ben started his stop watch to keep track of how long we sit in traffic. After an hour and a half he quit keeping track of time. When we hit traffic we were still a good 2 maybe 2 ½ hours from Madrid so we were hoping it would clear up soon. No such luck. We finally get to where we thought we were being held up. Part of the road had flooded with about 3 feet of water. Once we got through that we thought traffic would pick up again. It didn’t happen. Another hour and half later we drove by an accident. Finally after the accident traffic cleared up and we were back up to speed. We had a 30 minute break for food and gas and then we were back on the road. What was supposed to be a 6 hour drive turned into 11 hours. We got into Madrid by 12:45am and made it home by 1:30am. Fortunately Monday is my short day so I didn’t have to worry too much about not getting a ton of sleep.

Overall, Sevilla was a beautiful city and we really enjoyed our time there.

Alameda de Herculeus

 

This church was by the old wall and they actually still use the bells! It is hard to tell but they are ringing them in the picture. 

 

The old wall.

 

This is the kid who had to use his umbrella. He is wearing a good too!

Sevilla Day #3

Sevilla is also known for their flamenco. Flamenco came from Andalusia, the southern region in Spain. Flamenco is a genre of song and dance that includes cante (singing), toque (the guitar playing), baile (the dance) and, palmas (the handclapping).

As we were planning to come to Spain, one thing I really wanted to do was see a flamenco show. I also wanted to learn flamenco but after seeing the show, we could live here for 10 years and take classes everyday and I still don’t know if I could do it. We had heard of a flamenco museum that also has shows. We headed to the museum in the morning to check it out and buy tickets. On our way to the museum, we walked through some of the smaller plazas and the less traveled areas of Sevilla. It was a pretty walk. The museum was fun. It was nice to learn a little about flamenco before seeing a show.

After the museum we went to the Archivo de las indias. When the New World was discovered, Sevilla became a major port to do trading because the river came right into the city from the ocean. Merchants started to do trading in the court yard of the cathedral but the priests were not happy about that and complained to them. The merchants built a new building right across from the cathedral so they could carry out their trading. Eventually, another city along the coast became easier access for ships so merchants stopped traveling to Sevilla. The trading building was abandoned and eventually turned into living quarters. Then, one of the kings decided that Spain needed to centralize the documentaries and discoveries of the New World. People set out to look for a building that would suit these needs and they found the old trading building. This building fit their purposes and Spain began to centralize all information pertaining to the New World to this building, El archivo de las indias. The archives contain a lot of important documents, including correspondence from Columbus and Cortés. We also saw manifestations from various countries in South America claiming independence from Spain. It was pretty neat to look through.

After the museum we went to Parque Maria Lisboa. It was fun to walk through and very pretty. 

That evening we went to the flamenco show. It was absolutely amazing! If you don’t know what flamenco looks like, youtube it right now! The speed at which their feet and hands move at times is unbelievable. It is a beautiful dance to watch. What amazed me was how they used their clothing as part of the dance too. Mainly the women do this when they wear the longer dresses but the man would incorporate his vest into the dance too. I told Ben that not only would it be hard to learn the steps and moves to the dance but then to have to learn how to move with the dress and when to kick the train out and to what side and how to do it so that it falls perfectly and not all folded up would be very difficult. Needless to say I very much enjoyed the show. However, I also enjoyed watching the man sitting next to me every once in a while. A British couple sat down next to us and like us they came early to get good seats. As soon as the man sat down, he fell asleep. I figured “Well hey, there is 30 minutes till the show starts so he is just getting in a little cat nap.” I think I saw him open his eyes twice throughout the hour long show. It was so funny! First of all, why would you pay to go to a show if you don’t plan to stay awake for it? Second of all, with all the tapping and clapping and thigh slapping involved in flamenco it sounds like a thunder storm! Add in the guitar player and singer and it is a very loud show. How the man managed to sleep through that is beyond me. He did however add some extra entertainment to an already very entertaining show. If I had been his wife I would’ve been elbowing him every 5 seconds telling him to wake up and enjoy the show!

After the show we were headed to a tapas bar when we walked by the cathedral and saw that there was a service going on. We walked in the back door because it was one of the areas we were not allowed in during the tour and we wanted to see what it looked like. The hall was pretty big and there were quite a few people there for mass. After a minute or so I leaned over and asked if it was inappropriate that we were in there. He whispered back "Extremely" but didn't move to leave so I thought maybe I had heard him wrong. We stood there a couple minutes longer and then left. I asked him if he had said it was inappropriate for us to be in there and he said yes. I laughed and asked why we had stayed and he said it was because he wanted to see what was going on! We continued on to the tapas place after that.

For tapas tonight we found a place that fries fish. Ben was very excited for this place and it was actually quite good! Fortunately they had the menu in English too because I do not know my fish Spanish vocabulary. We learned bacalao is cod fish.

It was raining pretty hard again so we didn’t get to see Plaza de España lit up at night. It will have to wait for another trip when I come back to eat pringa. 

Some of the plazas we wandered through on our way to the flamenco museum. 

We saw some more Audis. 

The Flamenco Museum. Most of the museum was videos you could watch but one part had clothing and trinkets from famous dancers.

These are the combs the women wear in their hair.

The red dress was worn in an opening ceremony for the Olympics.

Archivo de las indias

Parque Maria Lisboa

We saw an albino peacock!

The museum of archaeology. We didn't go in though because we were museumed out by this point. 

The flamenco show: 

I loved this one!

The end.