December in Madrid

Well..it's certainly that time of year- its a few weeks before winter break and everyone is getting restless and excited for the holiday. Madrid is pretty this time of year, with all the Christmas displays and lights- its certainly quite festive. I certainly prefer the springtime when its warm and sunny, but there's definitely something beautiful about all the festive, winter decorations. Its pretty hard for me to believe that two years ago, when I was studying abroad, I would already be going home by now (actually, it was exactly 2 years ago, on December 13th, that I left Spain and returned to the US- WOW). On the one hand, I feel like I've been here a long time- i feel quite settled into my life here and it more or less feels like home. At the same time though, I can't believe I've already lived here for three and a half months (AND that i still have six more months!)

This whole experience is still a bit unreal- its like having two different lives at the same time. On the one hand, I'm still the same person here that I am back home and of course, I still talk to my family and friends back in the States. At the same time, I feel like the life I have here is so different from my life back home, like this year is just some strange pause from "real" life....it's a strange feeling for sure, one that I'm having trouble expressing (as is probably obvious right about now). Anyway...thats probably enough philosiphizing for now- on to other things...

School has been pretty busy lately. Our Global Classrooms project is taking up a lot of my time, now that we have our topics and countries, we have been working with the students a lot to begin to teach them about the topics. We were given two topics to work with (Children in Armed Conflicts and Trafficking of Wild Animals), so some students will be debating one, and some will be debating the other.

I have also had to do my first round of actual evaluations, which is rather tough! On the one hand, I don't want to be too easy on the kids, because I want to show some of the slackers that they are only going to earn the grades that they deserve. Also, I want to kids to know that I DO in fact have some real authority, because sometimes they tend to forget that! At the same time, I feel bad being really harsh (the Spanish grading system is different than the one in the US; there is much less grade inflation, so really low grades are much more common). Anyway, I'm trying hard to find a good balance, as always...

This past weekend, although I did have a bunch of work to do, I also had a chance to enjoy many of the fun things that Madrid has to offer. I had a REAL Spanish weekend experience, and went out every night! (which takes quite a lot of stamina, when you stay out soooo late, I've come to realize...)

Each night I spent time with a different group of friends, which was really nice (my Fulbright friends, Ruth and my Spanish friends, and some new friends!) The new friends included a girl that Kelly and I met in Sevilla...she lives here in Madrid and invited us out with her and her friends. Even though I already have a nice group of friends here, its always nice to meet new people and find new things to do. I hope we will hang out with them again- they were all really nice. Actually, some of them are poets of sorts and invited Kelly and I to a poetry recitation (I guess like a poetry slam?) that they are participating in tonight. So, we are planning to go; I figured-its something different to try out.

I also finally made it to the Prado Museum this weekend (for the first time!) For those of you who don't know, the Prado is one of the biggest, most famous museums in Madrid, kind of the equivalent of the Louvre in Paris or the Met in NY. I had been meaning to go for weeks now and finally got around to it! It was really fun- saw a lot of the Spanish greats (Velazquez, El Greco, Ribera, Goya etc) and also lots of other 16th-19th century art. There was also a special exhibit on Renoir, who is one of my all-time favorite artists, so I especially enjoyed that. We also had a nice warm spell this weekend, so it was nice to be able to walk outside a little less bundled up than I am used to.

I can't believe i only have two more weeks before winter break (and before my family comes to vist!) I can't wait!! These will be a busy two weeks but after that, two whole weeks of vacation to look forward to!! Wooo :)