NO MORE WORK this year

I am so happy I could cry. I've been paid for my private tutoring, I've been paid for the month of December and today was the LAST DAY of school this year.

Every grade put on a show for the rest of the students and then at 2 pm when the students went home, the teachers scoffed themselves on food in the teachers' lounge. Afterwards, there was heaps of food and wine left over and they pressed me to take boxes of leftovers. And a bottle of wine. I must look poor. They said whatever I didn't take they'd donate to a homeless kitchen. So actually I felt a bit guilty about taking the food because I'm sure the homeless need it more than I do, but I didn't feel guilty enough not to take any.

On Monday, Juan Carlos, Pablo and I had dinner in Calle Laurel as our Christmas dinner. We absolutely stuffed ourselves sick- normally five pinchos are more than plenty but we had nine each. The last one (in the photo) is foie, which was so incredibly tasty I could've eaten nine of those alone except they cost twice as much as the other pinchos.

And last night, some of the teachers from Cenicero and I went to a basketball match. It was supposed to start at 9 pm but the umpires didn't turn up so they had to call in new umpires and the game didn't start till 10 pm. The school board gave a gift of three bottles of wine to each teacher at Cenicero and Juan Carlos also gave me three bottles of wine from his family's vineyard. Plus I've bought a few bottles for Germany where I'm visiting my great-uncle and my friend for Christmas. I feel like I have wine coming out of my ears.

The other day, when I was at Cenicero, I had class with the infants after recess. I was walking towards the building when I heard this noise coming from the playground. As I got closer, I realised the kids were chanting something. And when I walked into the playground, I saw them all (about 30 in total, between 3 and 5 years old) lined up against the building hailing me, shouting 'CATH-RIN! CATH-RIN!' while bowing. And when they saw me, they all started cheering madly. It was the most hilarious thing I've seen in a long long time. I had no idea those tiny people could be so organised. I will admit I was very fond of them at that moment. Also because I knew I wouldn't see them again till mid-January.