We each woke up like good little Spanish-Americans at the early hour of 9:30am. We each went into our bathrooms like clockwork and went to turn on the faucet... And... I wish I was exaggerating when I say we all realized at the exact same time that our house had no water. The faucets poured out air. My thoughts went back to the memory of me not telling my host family in Sevilla about their toilet constantly running. The karma gods were laughing at me as I brushed my teeth with a water bottle. How could we possibly be out of water already?? We only did three loads of laundry! And some dishes. And took some showers. Is this why the Spanish are so frugal with their water usage??
Later that day we learned that they were doing work on the water lines which resulted in the water being shut off. So karma was not blame this time.
Post water situation... I visited the school that I am going to be teaching in. School has already started for the students, however I begin teaching on Tuesday. My school is very small with each grade only composed of about 20-25 students. The school has grades Kindergarten to 6th grade, and I will be working in all of them with the exception of Kindergarten and 1st grade (I believe). With each class, I am required to teach Science in only English. This dynamic should prove to be very interesting with the younger students who don't know English that well. The school has a total of about 15 adults who both teach and manage the school from an administration perspective. For example, the gym teacher is also the secretary to the school. One major difference between American schools and Spanish schools is that when the students have recess at 11:00, the teachers all gather in the faculty room and feast on toast, fruit, and coffee. The Spanish use any excuse to take breaks, relax and socialize. It is wonderful! Like the rest of the people in Priego, the teachers in the school are so nice. One of my co workers already insisted on us borrowing his car to take weekend trips to the different cities surrounding Priego. The headmaster also offered to take myself and my friends out for tapas one day. I can't say I've ever gone out for drinks or food with my principal before in the States.
Being that it was Friday, this was our first night to experience the night life in Priego. Unfortunately for us, this also happened to be the first time in the last 31 days that it decided to rain. So our going out ambitions were crushed and we instead settled on wine and pizza. Hey, we left the house at least! On our early walk back (12:00am), we stopped in a random bar to escape the rain. This bar has such an old feel to it you felt the need to drink gin and tonics instead of wine or beer. (For me gin and tonics are the epitome of a classy old people drink that happens to smell and taste like a Christmas Tree). Not only was the look of the bar awesome, but our bartender split his time between serving us drinks and serenading us with the song "Stand By Me." Microphone and all. With some fancy dance moves mixed in. The experience was so great we all made the decision that we will be regulars at this bar.
As for our Saturday night.... let's just say I was truly Spanish when I went to bed at 7:30am...
To be fair, I was in a terrible mood. So going out was clearly the solution to fixing this terrible mood. Vodafone, the company I am using here in Spain for my movil, has made me want to throw my phone off the top of the mountain that I currently live on. And then hope that as it's falling down the mountain it slams into some Olive trees, and I never have to see it again.
Okay, that's a little dramatic but that's how I felt yesterday. Long story short: Vodafone was and still is having problems with their system. Which in turn leaves me with zero data. And when you're living in a house with no wifi/internet, you need data to be able to communicate with people. So in short, I had no data and couldn't talk to anyone or even use my phone yesterday (or today) rendering it useless. Sounds like no big deal right?? Try living without internet for a few days a million miles away from your friends and family and then get back to me. Oh and I got sideswiped by a car. That didn't help. And it was raining. And it was finally cold. Spoiled I know. Even Tina Fey couldn't bring me out of my bad mood funk. (Finished the book by the way and I highly recommend it!)
So back to our Saturday night.... Earlier in the day, we received an invite from our landlords to come over for lunch.
1. Our landlords are cooler than yours.
2. Again, I'm going to return to the States expecting lunch with all of my future landlords.
We enjoyed a huge spread of food with Antonio and Fele (our caseras), their son Pablo, and Pablo's BFF Mamen. I have to go into detail about all of the food we ate so below is the menu in the order of consumption:
First Dish: Cheese, Meat, Grapes, Olives, and of course Vino
Second Dish: Tortilla, bread, and more Vino
Third Dish: Paella, bread, and you guessed it.... Vino
Talk about food coma. And it didn't stop here. After eating our lunch at the house we went right next door to bar from Friday night. (Ran into our favorite bartender again.)
Fourth Dish: Café con leche
Fifth Dish: Gin and Tonic (Before you go judging me, it's considered a digestive here!)
Sixth Dish: A selection of 20 different desserts. Don't worry I sampled them all.
3.5 hours later, a little tipsy, and super full: we parted ways with them all.
Later that night... Pablo, Mamen, and an assortment of their friends came over our house for what could be considered our first ever accidental house party? After teaching our new Spanish friends the American version of the game "Kings," we left our house around 3am to experience the nightlife of Priego. (Yes, you heard correct. The nightlife here does not start until the wee hours of the morning.) After visiting Priego's three bars/discotecas, we called it a night and tucked ourselves into bed around 7:30 in the morning.
As for our Sunday, it was pretty eventuful. We spent most of our day sipping coffees and stealing the wifi in the bar. We also witnessed our first "festival." I wish I knew the name of what actually occurred. It was pretty cool because it was a public display of religion which would never happen in the States. The procession started with a marching band walking through the streets. Following the band were groups of children. As the procession continued, the groups of people walking by got older in age. So near the end, the people walking by were elderly woman dressed in beautiful black Spanish garments. For the grand finale, a group of about 30 men carried a MASSIVE statute of Mary holding Jesus. And last was another marching band. The entire town was out to watch the procession. It was definitely super neat to see.
The statue was HUGE! Look at it in relation to the building it is next to.
Hopefully, I will find time this week to stop in at one of the free wifi places here in Priego to blog about the upcoming events in my life. Besos!
