Spain

You know you studied abroad in Spain when…

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I received this from a friend whom I spent a wonderful semester in Spain with.

1. The mullet – made for men and women alike.
2. You know what a croqueta is.
3. You’ve eaten more fish and veal in one week than in your whole US life.
4. You have seen people in 50-degree weather in winter coats and scarves.
5. When you know how to the use the metro when the map is in Spanish.
6. It only took you an hour to get to Madrid from your house.
7. You have stolen Internet.
8. You watch a dog take a crap on the sidewalk and the owner doesn’t clean it up.
9. You have encountered numerous people haciando un pis in the streets.
10. You have encountered tiny children wandering the streets alone.
11. You know what a doner is.
12. You got drunk off wine.
13. You are a huge fan of the Menú del Día.
14. You stayed in the Madrid until 6am waiting for the Metro to reopen.
15. You’re life span has been shortened 5 years because of the second hand smoke.
16. You have seen a cigarette box that says “smoking can cause a slow and painful death”
17. You have learned that deodorant is obviously not necessary.
18. You have had a staring contest with a stranger in the streets.
19. You’ve watched Simpsons, multiple, multiple times.
20. You have trouble speaking both English and Spanish.
21. You’ve left the house to go out at 1am.
22. You have never been to a store between 2:30 and 5:30.
23. You have fought with the lock on the door and have only won half the time.
24. You have gorged on scrambled eggs at the hotels.
25. You’ve had bread everyday for every meal.
26. You have a lisp…
27. You know what joder means.
28. You can take showers in a 2 ft box called a shower.
29. You jump when you hear the words, vamos a comer
30. Your dinnertime is about 10:30.
31. You know what El Corte Inglés is, and where to find it.
32. Fútbol is amazing.
33. You root for Barcelona or Madrid…
34. You have seen porn on TV news.
35. You know what a turron is.
36. You know and love tortilla francesa.
37. You have seen buildings that are older than our country.
38. You know who Velázquez is, and how to say it.
39. You have seen pizza boys on Mopeds.
40. You’ve been surprised to see a “big” car.
41. Sidra, delicious sidra.
42. You have seen old people out at 2 am
43. You know the difference between tengo calor y estoy caliente.
44. You have been stopped in a plaza and asked if you speak English.
45. Vale, pues, venga.
46. You write on graph paper and not lined paper.
47. You have learned the true meaning of a cell phone bill.
48. Yelling is not yelling…it’s just excited chatter.
49. Personal space = 0 cm.
50. You know fichas are a rare commodity.
51. You know what a puente is, and LOVE it.
52. You know where to find cheap tickets for anything!

Surprisingly true. I don’t think I need to explain any more than that.

easyJet – Is it really easy?

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Yesterday I took my first flight as an easyJet passenger, from London Gatwick to Madrid’s Barajas airport. Since the rest of Alma’s CRL group was flying out of Heathrow earlier in the day, I got on a National Express bus to the Gatwick terminal. Since my flight wasn’t until later that night, I had to wait in the check in area of the terminal for a few hours, since easyJet does not allow check in until two hours prior to departure. After a couple hours of sitting on the floor (due to the severe lack of seating in Gatwick’s busy airport) I checked my 1 piece of luggage weighing less than 20kg (44lbs) and proceeded through security with my one carry on and checked the screens for my departure gate. The screen said “please wait” and since I had about an hour and a half to kill, I walked around the duty free shops of the waiting area and had something to eat. Now I suppose that this entry could have and probably should be entitled “Don’t fly out of Gatwick”, but I don’t know which experience was least pleasurable.

Around my boarding time, I checked the screens again to see what gate my plane was to be departing from. The slot still said “please wait” so I took a seat across from the screens, still in the passenger waiting area. After fifteen minutes, the screen had changed to “delayed until 20:40.” After more waiting and more delays, the flight which was supposed to depart at 7:30pm, still had yet to depart at 9pm. Finally the screen said proceed to gate 16, where I encountered a mass of Spanish teenagers returning home from vacation in the United Kingdom. We passed through the checkpoint to sit (yet again), waiting to board the plane. Since I had checked in early, I was part of boarding Group A, which meant that after the special boarding people, I was in the first group to board the plane and select our seats. Unlike other airlines, easyJet does not assign seats, but rather lets the passengers choose their own seats once aboard the plane.

Fortunately, I was one of the first passengers from Group A on the plane, which meant I was able to sit near the front next to a window. Even though we had departed late and I was exhausted from the previous week’s busy CRL sessions, I could not fall asleep – a rarity on my part.

Thanks to Bose and their noise canceling headphones, I barely heard the child crying for most of the flight two rows ahead of me, but it did not block out the constant announcements from the pilots or flight attendants. First it was drinks, then food, then easyJet shopping and finally some scratch and win lottery cards to be redeemed on future easyJet flights.

Thankfully we quickly arrived in Madrid, a full 2 hours late and I jumped into a taxi to take me to the city center to check into my hotel (which was quite nice by the way – Hotel Plaza Mayor, Calle Atocha, 2 Madrid).

So, in light of recent events, I will be avoiding all travel from Gatwick and using Heathrow instead and will opt for paying just a little bit more (than the $110 easyJet ticket) for the usual flight service. Unless, I find a stellar, ridiculously cheap deal…

Maybe it was just a bad night to be flying easyJet.

CRL goes to England

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We’re two days into Alma’s Center for Responsible Leadership and Wroxton College, in Wroxton England and they are keeping us wickedly busy. We literally begin every morning around 9am and have conference-like sessions until 9pm. Of course we stop for meals and the obligatory morning coffee break and afternoon tea break – both of which I have a glass of English water. Sorry, I will not be coming back a tea drinker.

Besides the super long days, everything has been interesting. Some of the sessions, like “Negotiating Industrial Relations” with representatives from the Trade Union and Employers Federation or the UK Chemical Industry panel haven’t been quite interesting as others that have dealt with peacebuilding after conflict, globalization impacts on the local world, agriculture – small farming, or immigration of Muslim people to the UK, but for the most part they have been somewhat informative and valuable. I guess the not-so-interesting sessions are good for practicing my English accent. 😉

As for now, it’s just a few more days here in England (with another trip to Oxford) and then off to Spain before a quick return to Alma on the 16th.

Oh and by the way, the address to the school and homes in the tiny village of Wroxton goes as follows:

“Wroxton College, Wroxton, Near Banbury, Oxfordshire” and then a string of letters & numbers for the zip code. How funny. I would never think to write on my address Dearborn, Near Detroit. 😉

¿Y tú, qué sabes de Madrid?

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From the Puerta del Sol blog:

There’s an increasing number of “pedias” on the Web, and now we have Madripedia, which aims to become the biggest ever Madrid-based encyclopaedia (in what’s probably a limited field). It follows Cordobapedia, which has done the same thing for Córdoba since 2005, and which now has 3,700 entries (Madripedia only has 850+ so far). So it’s over to you! Any experts in cocido madrileño out there?

An article from Spain’s newspaper, El Pais, (in Spanish) about the Madripedia.

visit Cordobapedia
the new Madripedia