Today officially concludes the longest week of my 21 years living. But that doesn't mean it wasn't long in a good way.

Monday and Tuesday were reserved for orientation for all the newbies in the teaching program. To be honest, the program it self hadn't been too impressive up to this point: Jumping through a lot of meaningless hoops, unnecessary paperwork, little to no information, things not happening when they were supposed to. All in all, very Spanish. So I was pleasantly surprised when I showed up to orientation and things looked semi-organized. Check in booths? A schedule of the days events? Those events actually taking place according to said schedule??? Very un-Spanish of them.

Orientation gave me a lot of good ideas about things I want to do with the students and it made me really excited to get started teaching. The free lunch didn't hurt either.

So Wednesday was the first day of school! The night before I had the usual butterflies. I made the hour and fifteen minute trek in a crowded metro and then a short walk took me to my school. The school is called Antonio Machado, who happens to be one of my favorite Spanish authors. Good start. It's located in a suburb north of the city called San Sebastián de los Reyes. It´s a pretty cute place with lots of trees and lots of mothers walking their kids to school.

I guess I should explain a little bit what it is that I´m actually doing. I´m not a true ¨teacher¨ in the sense that I´m not leading the class on my own. It´s a bilingual school in which the kids attend english, science, and art taught in English and all their other courses taught in Spanish. (This is a public school, by the way. Get with it crappy American education system.) So I am assigned to some of the courses taught in English for each of the grades. While there is another "teacher" there, I will lead English activities and pretty much impart as much of my English gift as possible. They call us "auxiliares".

My schedule kind of blows, big time. But there's really nothing that can be done about it so I'm trying to just get over it. Everyone who works at Antonio Machado is very nice. The teachers are mostly older and there are three other auxiliares who are all great. I teach four different grades: Primaria (3 and 4 years old), Primero (5 and 6), Segundo (6 and 7), and Quinto (10 or so). Let me just say how quickly I have fallen in love with these kids. And they clearly think I'm the coolest thing since sliced bread. Except, as my friend Sean pointed out, they don't eat sliced bread here. So it would be more accurate to say they think I'm the coolest thing since sliced ham. And THAT'S pretty dang cool around here. Of course their first reaction when I walked in was, "que alta!!!!" (so tall!).

One thing that is kind of a challenge is that I'm not allowed to speak Spanish to them, at all. In fact the program directors told us to lie and say we don't know how. The problem with that is that I clearly understand them. The youngest ones, primaria y primero, have class mostly in Spanish and they are just being introduced to English vocabulary and phrases. So they ask questions and things in Spanish, and I respond in English. It makes for a pretty fun conversation. The older ones, segundos but more so quintos, speak enough that class is held pretty much exclusively in English. Going into this I thought I would like the younger ones more just because I've worked with that age and they're adorable. But I'm actually finding that I like teaching the quintos. They speak enough English that they understand jokes or can make one themselves. They're also better behaved.

A couple highlights from the first days: In primeros and segundos they start everyday with a routine. The teacher asks, what day is today? Immediately like twenty hands shoot in the air and they're desperate to answer the question. Half the time, you call on one of them who looks like he will simply die if he doesn't get to answer it and he'll say, "mmmm.... I forget." I think that's hilarious. So anyway, Visi (one of the teachers I work with) asks what day it is (it was Thursday) and she calls on a student. He says, "Today is.... Tuesday." Noooo today's not Tuesday but that was a good sentence Daniel. Who knows? What day is today? Next kid tries, "Yesterday was Friday." I'm trying so hard not to laugh. Wrong on both counts. One more kid gives it a shot, "Tomorrow is Wednesday." Hahaha I've got some work to do.

The other highlight was in primeros where they are allowed to speak to me in Spanish. They were coloring their names onto a notecard and one of the students who's kind of a class clown called me over. (Side note: NO ONE can say my name here. It's impossible for them.) He asked me in Spanish if I was going to make a card with my name, too. I responded in English, "Yes, I am going to color one, also." He gets right up in my face (as much as a 6 year old can) and with a big grin he says, "Háblame en español!" I laughed and told him I couldn't speak Spanish and he smiled slyly and said it again, "Háblame en español!" Haha I gotta watch out for that one.

When school was over on Thursday I left for the metro and saw another teacher (younger than most) walking in at the same time. She said hello and sat with me on the metro. She teaches children at the school with speach impedements or learning disabilities. We ended up talking the whole way and I realized it was some killer Spanish practice that I need to have more often. So I'm going to try to get her to ride home with me everyday!

But the fun didn't stop Thursday! Friday was my day off so I paid my rent (ouch) and did some grocery shopping (double ouch). I also met my new friend Blair and her roommate Eimeir in Retiro park for a coffee. Blair and I met because we were both taking the LSAT here on Saturday. We met up a week ago to check out the test site ahead of time and listen to each other complain endlessly about how horrible the LSAT is. Retiro is one of my favorite places in the world. It reminds me of Golden Gate Park in SF but with less trash and fewer homeless people living there. So we enjoyed our cafe and tried not to think about what was to come tomorrow.

But it did come! The long awaited, dreaded LSAT. I wasn't too nervous going into it, but the first section was logic games which is my hardest portion of the test. It kind of shook me up a bit but I recovered nicely once I got to the reading section. All in all, it wasn't my best but it wasn't my worst. But really you don't know til you get your score.

Blair and I decided we needed a drink immediately after finishing the test, so we went down some small street and found a little bar. We walked in and were immediately swarmed (literally) by a bunch of yelling, drunk, college-aged boys. They bombarded us with questions (they could tell before we opened our mouths that we were Americans). Turns out they were participating in some sort of hazing or initiation or something for a Spanish fraternity of sorts. Blair is from Texas and I told them I was from California just because that's easiest. They were thrilled. What if I had said I was from North Dakota? "Caleeefornyaaaaa!!!" One guy asked me if I had seen the OC (bad TV show about Orange County) and if that was what it was really like. They were all very surprised to hear I don't surf. Another guy asked Blair if her dad was a cowboy.

Well that concludes my exceptionally long week/post. Next week I start practicing with a Spanish volleyball team here which should be fun. I hope everyone is well!

Besos