Farewell 2009

It snowed about two weeks ago in Logroño. Enough to make snowmen and snowballs. I made a snowball as a present for Beza and put it in the freezer, where it still is. Maybe in July we'll take it out and throw it, by which time it'll probably be ice and hurt a damn lot.

Beza and I went to Barcelona on the long weekend at the beginning of December. It was nice to get away from Logroño just for a few days but I'd forgotten what it's like to be in a huge city with a big crush of people. And Sydney never feels so crowded because the streets are much wider and it's more spread out.

Tomorrow is the last day of 2009 and I'm feeling ambivalent about my year. Was it a good year? Did I become wiser and did I learn anything new or was I too busy having fun? Or did I not have as much fun as I should have had?

Here are five highlights:

1. Beza. There many wonderful people in the world but it's not often that we get to know one well or the extent of their wonderfulness.

2. Travelling with my parents. During the month-and-bit we travelled together, I was reminded of how great my parents are and how much I love them. It's easy to forget when you're far away from someone how important they are to you.

3. Camino de Santiago. It was like being a turtle, where you carry your house on your back. And the only thing you have to worry about is the blister on your toe.

4. My nephews. I got to spend time with them in Sydney and they're hilarious little people. And I have a new one that I'm excited to meet.

5. Our flat. There are only two places in the world where I feel comfortable peeing with the door semi-open- my house in Sydney and my flat in Logroño. And we have Methuselah.

I suppose having five highlights is good. Some people only have three and call it a good year.

Some bummers include:

Total neglect of my writing. I haven't even written as many blogposts as I'd like.

Death of our two goldfish. Surprisingly traumatic.

Not being able to attend the wedding of my first close friend to get married. It made me sad that I couldn't be as involved in the lives of people who matter to me because we're in different parts of the world.

One lesson I learned:

When in doubt, make tasty food.

Kings Of Convenience and codeine

Two Saturdays ago, we went to a Kings Of Convenience concert in San Sebastian that was awesome. Afterwards we went for pintxos.

Started back at work again last week and after just one class (the other class was on an excursion) I started to feel sick. Luckily I didn't have to work on Tuesday so I rested, but after Wednesday, my cough came back and my head started hurting.

On Friday I invited a few friends over for sushi and teriyaki skewers and on Saturday, Beza and I went to watch Millan play ice hockey. We went to one the Sunday before as well and his team won both matches, yay! I always think the players look like animals in a pet shop window, when they're penalised and have to sit in their little boxes for two minutes. Kind of cold and depressed with messy hair.

Then on Sunday I woke up feeling like I felt when I first started getting sick ie. horrible. I measured my temperature and had a slight fever so I went back to the doctor and he gave me more codeine stuff.

I took the medication before going to work and about an hour later felt incredibly dizzy and sick in the stomach. They were like the flu symptoms I experienced two weeks ago, which I attributed to the virus but which I now suspect are from the codeine. Then I went home and threw up. Very unpleasant. Beza bought me these pills you can take which line your stomach and stop you from feeling queasy and they've sort of worked but I've been put off taking my medication.

I think I would rather have a permanent dry cough than feel like I'm about to vomit.

I've also had this constant headache that only goes away when I take panadol. (And then comes back about four hours later). On Sunday I woke up at about 3 am feeling like mini people were banging on my head with their mini hammers. I hardly ever get headaches and they never last long but this one's been bothering me for more than a week now. My dad said he's got the same thing, a constant headache, and he never gets headaches either.

I think it's a particularly malignant flu this year. I blame the children for giving it to me and their parents for sending their germy kids to school.

Sickness in the house

We are both sick. On Sunday, I woke up with a massive headache but I thought it was because of the beers I drank on Saturday night (we went to an Oktoberfest party), even though I only drank a few beers in four hours.

Then I started to cough and my temperature went up. So on Monday I rang school to say I couldn't go and went to the doctor's. He prescribed me a cough medicine (with lots of codeine), a paracetamol (with lots of codeine) and an antibiotic that was ridiculously expensive. He also told me not to work for the next six days. Beza kindly went and bought my medicine for me because I was too sick to get up and when he came back from work at 6.30 pm, he said he was getting cold shivers and his muscles hurt.

The next morning, he also woke up with a fever. So he called work to say he couldn't go and made an appointment for the doctor's. We spent the day on the sofa sleeping with Flight of the Conchords on TV in the background.

His doctor gave him the rest of the week off as well and since then we've hardly left the house. Luckily neither of us have had much appetite so we haven't run out of food yet.

By the way, the sofa in the photo was free (and is very comfortable). We found it on the side of the road in our street one night. At first I was worried that someone had died in it and that's why it was getting chucked out, but then we discovered a big rip in one of the cushions, which we've covered with a big piece of fabric.

Methuselah and pets

When we first moved in to our flat in September, we bought two little fish. One was black with googly eyes and we called it Hoover because it used to suck up the stones at the bottom of the fish bowl instead of eating its fish food. The other one was orangey gold with black fins and was adorably round (ie. fat). We called it Glitter because it was nice and glittery.

Hoover used to hide behind the plastic plant and when Glitter swam by, it would leap out and chase after it. They got along very well.

Anyway, about five days later Glitter went to meet his maker and the next day Hoover followed him to fishy heaven. I was devastated. I fell into a deep depression. Was it my fault? Were they just too young? Did they not like us? Why? Why?

On the 1st October, we bought a turtle. Beza wasn't too keen on a turtle- he said they were depressing to look at, but I told him they were less predisposed to death.

We called him Methuselah, in the hopes he'd live as many years as the biblical Methuselah. The first few weeks he didn't eat anything. I'd throw in a mini shrimp and it would be floating there the next morning. I'd change it for a fresh shrimp and the same thing would happen.

He started getting skinnier between his carapace and his neck started getting wrinklier and he seemed to be sleepy all the time. So we bought him a water heater and about a week later, when I threw in a shrimp, he turned around, looked at it and chomped it up. It was the highlight of my week.

Now we've started giving him ham and fried pig snout as well, which he seems to enjoy. This morning he ate 12 mini shrimps, which, being the size that he is, is about the equivalent of 12 good sized bread rolls for humans.

One night I accidentally turned off his water heater and when I went to feed him the next morning, he swam really slowly and stiffly, like he was half frozen. It was pretty cute.

The mystery of the missing residency card

A note on white stockings: Today on the way to the bank, I saw a woman strutting around with very sheer white stockings with a spirally pattern. She looked like she had some weird skin disease on her untanned legs. Does anyone really think walking around dressed as a skin disease is attractive? It's like people who wear skin coloured tight clothing- it just makes them look naked. Not nice.

Anyway, back to my residency card. I wrote a post back in April about the lack thereof and two weeks ago, I finally discovered what happened to it. I went to the Foreigners' Office (the 'fo I like to call it and yes it does sound, quite appropriately, like you should add a 'mo' at the beginning of it) to renew the card because you need to do it every year. The guy at the office, who was quite nice, asked me for my old one so he could photocopy it, to which I replied that I never received it.

He looked at me horrified and asked 'But what did you do when the police stopped you in the street?'

'The police, um, have never stopped me in the street.'

He scurried away to the back office and presently returned with an envelope and his manager/senior. Apparently they'd sent it to the wrong address because back in 2006, more than two years ago, I lived in the same street, but at a different number and they never bothered to check if I'd changed address. Which I had, and which I'd written on the form. And the kind person who lived at my old address had returned the letter to sender. And the manager/senior had the gall to ask my what I was so busy with that I hadn't bothered to come in to check the status of my card. To which I indignantly replied that I'd been several times and every time, they'd told me there was a delay and it would be ready soon. And by then it was almost time to renew my card anyway, so there was no point.

The woman was like 'Well, we sent it to you. Look, here's the date stamp.' Obviously it doesn't matter that they sent it to the wrong address. They could send it to Mongolia and it would be my fault if I didn't receive it.

So. I am now awaiting my renewed card. Fingers crossed for that one.

PS The good news is, you need to pay an admin fee on the pickup of the card and since I never picked it up, I didn't have to pay it.

Hello, goodbye Taiwan

Taipei International Airport: Stepping off the plane was just like my first experience of stepping off a plane in Taiwan when I was seven. Hot sticky air and suddenly, as soon as you enter the terminal building, a rush of coolness and the smell of air-conditioning.

For some inexplicable reason it made me feel really homesick. though for which home I don't know. I had a mini panic a few days ago, when I realised I'd just settled back into things in Sydney and already it was time for me to leave again. I always thought it would get easier with every time you have to leave a place, but it seems to get harder. It's because now I know that your family and friends matter the most and while you can bring memories, photos and souvenirs with you, those family and friends stay put. Being in Sydney and speaking to Álvaro via skype with a webcam, and being able to send messages makes me so glad we live in these times and we're lucky enough to have this technology, and that we don't have to catch a five week boat to travel across the seas.

Still, I feel privileged to have such great friends both in Australia and Spain. Managed to catch up with most of the people I wanted to catch up with in Sydney, and ate lots of tasty food. Also hung out a lot with my nephews. Oliver has become very preppy, with his woolly Ralph Lauren vests and his babycinos, but in a cool way. I was quite sad to say goodbye to him this morning, but I like how children don't seem to be aware that when you leave, you could be gone for a long time. They give you a hug, say goodbye and run off to do their own thing.

Next stop Bangkok (for an hour).

End of holiday (for this month)

The parents left on Saturday for Amsterdam and Beza and I went to see them off.

Then to cheer me up, we went to my second hand bookshop in Madrid and I bought a few cheap books and felt better. I'll see my parents again in a few weeks anyway. But I still felt a bit sad, after spending a month with them travelling around Europe.

I think we had the most fun in Slovenia, which was as breath-taking as it was back in 2006, with the people still as open and friendly, and in Spain doing the Camino de Santiago (although Mum had a few problems with her knees). (Photo: Lake Bled, Slovenia, in a rowboat we hired)

Italy was definitely nowhere near as good as it's hyped up to be. I've been there three or four times now and I'm sorry to say every time it strikes me more as a country that's getting left behind. Yes, there's beautiful architecture, art, scenery and maybe twenty, thirty years ago, it was the best option on the country-to-visit list, but now that we can go to places not so accessible a few decades ago, with equally beautiful things to see and people more culturally interesting, why go there?

But then again, I've never been particularly interested in Italy and I've never really understood the people who are. I blame the Super Mario brothers who have cheapened the image of Italians to pizza-making moustachioed men that say 'Mamma mia!' with their over-exaggerated accent.

It's been a bit exhausting so much travelling. We hired a car in Italy, which made going around Tuscany a lot easier and also one in Spain so after arriving in Santiago, we popped over to Porto and

I learnt how to drive a manual car on the wrong side of the road. (Photo: Arriving in Santiago)

Bit stressful, driving in Spain. I killed the battery about five times on my first attempt to start the car and in the cities, I panicked a little with all the cars behind me and kept flicking on the windscreen wipers instead of the indicator lights.

In Porto, we went to the beach and I now know why beaches in Portugal are not famous. I've swum in cold oceans before, but here, after two minutes you really have to get out because it doesn't matter how fast you move, you still freeze.

We've had a lot of luck, travelling around in Spain. When we stopped over in Vigo, it was on the day they had som huge festival, with aerial displays and activities at the beach, so we had a look. My dad reminded me of a 5 year old boy, he was so mesmerised by the planes doing loop-the-loops. And when we stopped in Llanes, it was the day they brought their saint down from the hilltop so we got to see the procession and people dressed up in funny costumes. (Photo: Luther with a plate of snails in Llanes)

Now I'm just floating around Logroño, with nothing much to do. I've gone to the gym, I've looked at flats, I've eaten and drunk and read and slept. Been very relaxing. Fingers crossed, we'll be able to move in somewhere by the 1st August.

Back on the camino

When we arrived back in Spain, in Barcelona last Sunday, I nearly cried with joy. And when I arrived in Logroño and Beza was waiting at the bus station, I nearly wept for joy again.

I think my love of Spain is infectious. My parents are completely in agreement that Spain is ten times more beautiful than Italy, the food is way better (and more importantly they don't rip you off by making you pay for bread or service), the people are heaps friendlier and Italian ham has nothing on Spanish ham. And if anyone disagrees, they've obviously never tried good Spanish ham. Even the coffee is much better and everything is cheaper.

We're now on the Camino de Santiago, and will arrive in Santiago tomorrow. Looking forward to seeing what the hype is about.

Eating meat is fun

Busy, insane week. Said goodbye to my flat in my barrio in Logroño for the last time on Friday night. It was a bit sad- I've had some good times and some wonderful memories there. Also said goodbye to Pablo the flatmate, but he'll be back in September for exams so we've arranged to catch up then, hopefully with Juan Carlos as well.

On Saturday Beza's brother got married and I got invited along to join in the festivities. The wedding was in a beautiful church in a tiny village in La Rioja. Some of the villages in La Rioja are extremely dubious, populated only by ten old bachelors and the local baker but this one was very picturesque, with a leafy park where they set up tables for the wedding feast. I have to say it was one of the funnest and coolest weddings I've been to. Eva wore hippy flowing clothes, no bridesmaids/grooms, minimal flowers and their friends sang the songs during the service. (Photo: With the married couple, the legendary hippy uncle and Beza)

On Sunday morning at 7 am, took the six hour bus ride to Barcelona for my flight to Prague. The parents were waiting for me at the airport and after nine months apart, it was great to be with them again. I had no idea there was so much meat to be had in the Czech Republic and at such cheap prices. Beer too. In the five days in the Czech Republic my dad must have drunk about six litres of beer, which may not seem much to some, but my parents are wine drinking folk who shun beer.

From Prague we headed to Brno which has a fascinating Capuchin monastery with naturally mummified bodies of past friars and the Mendel museum. After about five or six consecutive meat-only meals, we had lunch at a vegetarian restaurant where you pile up a plate and they charge you based on weight.

We're currently in Budapest, Hungary which is also amazingly meat laden. The only thing with Hungarian food is that it seems to be lactose-intolerance unfriendly. (Photo: Luther with view of the Danube River)

Home- but not for long

Arrived back in Logroño on Sunday night, pretty exhausted from too much fun.

Highlights of the last two weeks (very tough choice):

1. Beza surprising me by arriving early in Burgos.

2. Santo Domingo, which was a lovely town.

3. Food- free tapas in León, queso de cabrales and cider in Llanes and the amazing pintxos in San Sebastian.

4. Going to the beach for five hours, four days in a row with awesome weather, in Llanes/Poo and San Sebastian.

5. All of the camino de santiago minus the blister.

My last night in this flat will be Thursday. I'm not too sorry to say goodbye- we had a good relationship while it lasted but then it started breaking down and tried to electrocute me once. And it's getting damn hot in my room, even at night time. (Photo: Luther overcome by so many pintxos in San Sebastian)

Land of lions

In Leon! Eight days and 180 kms later, I've arrived in Leon with Beza.

He met me in Burgos on Friday. I was going to go to the bus station to meet him at around 6 pm, but I called him at around 3.15 pm, while sitting in a cafe in Plaza Mayor eating lunch and he said he was just leaving work in Logroño to have lunch. So we were chatting happily and suddenly he said 'Look to your left.' And there he was, coming towards me.

Apparently he asked to leave work early so he could catch the 1 pm bus and surprise me.

On Saturday we caught the bus to Sahagún, then walked to El Burgo de Ranero (a village of about 250 people). It's been a great week, though we got rained on this morning. The first few days were sunny and hot. I got up at around 5.30 every morning and started walking at about 6.15. I've met an insane amount of Germans, some Dutch (including a man of about 70 who started in Holland), French, Spanish and a few Koreans. And a New Zealander. Surprisingly, no Australians and no English, though I did meet an Irish guy.

Later in the week, Beza and I are heading to the beach up north. He has family in San Sebastian so we get free accommodation with his aunt.

What happened in the torre

Santo Domingo is famous for its cathedral and tower, which is one of the only ones separated from the cathedral building. There was a saint (Domingo) who performed a miracle with a roasted rooster crowing or something, which is how the village got its name. In honour of him, in the cathedral up high they have two live white roosters on display. I wonder if they actually have eight or nine roosters on rotation so they're not cooped up in the cathedral their whole lives. I also wonder what they do with the roosters if they die or get old. (I suspect they eat them.)

Anyway, so I decided to climb up the tower, which is about 70 m high and not a very good idea after four hours of walking with a 10 kg backpack. I nearly died halfway up. At the top, I met an old man, who started talking to me. He said he was amazed I could speak Spanish and invited me to a coffee in the Parador. Then he gave me a mini tour of the cathedral and explained the history of the gothic part and the roosters before taking his leave of me. He said he had to go before he fell in love with me and his wife got angry at him. Hilarious.

People in the villages are really friendly. When I went into the pharmacy to buy some blister bandaids, the pharmacist also said he was amazed I could speak Spanish. He said he almost had a heart attack when I walked in because he couldn't speak word of English and didn't know how he'd communicate with me.

Day Two, Camino

Yesterday was a bit of a stress and in comparison, today has been fantastic.

Had a stressful weekend. It was my last day of work on Friday, which was actually very cruisey, because the first and second graders had an excursion to the Science Museum in Logroño and the principal asked me if I wanted to go so of course I said yes. We played in the park afterwards.

But then on Saturday, I tried to book accommodation for Eastern Europe with my parents and realised I needed to transfer money in my bank account. Except I'd forgotten my password, tried to reset it, called up and finally got it to work only to be told I needed another password to transfer money (what kind of moronic, albeit secure, system is that?), which I couldn't remember either and this one I needed to reset via telephone but the office for that was closed.

Gave up and went out with Ana and Beza to have a cocktail instead. Then on Sunday, I packed some of my stuff and took it to Beza's house because I have to move out of the flat by the 19th June. We had lunch with his parents, who cook awesome food. His dad goes to the mountains once a week to pick wild mushrooms and makes scrambled eggs with mushroom that are the best thing I've had in ages.

When I came home, booked the accommodation (realised I actually did have enough in my account), which took almost three hours. Then packed my backpack for the camino.

Left home yesterday at about 9 am. Again, some internet guides said it was 26 km but it was more like 30. So it took longer than expected and when I arrived in Nájera, the guy at the front desk of the pilgrims' albergue said all the beds were taken. Then he checked and said there was one left. It was basically a huge room with 100 bunks but much better than sleeping in a school basketball court which is where they put the pilgrims who arrive too late to get a bed. It's also free but you can donate if you like.

Today, left at 6.30 am and arrived at 10.45 am and was the first to check in. Today's albergue in Santo Domingo is a palace.

Hail on the hilltop

On Saturday, Beza and I walked from Logrono to Alcanadre. The guides gave varying distances, from 32 km to 40 km, which was a pain in the arse because we had to time our walk to arrive in Alcanadre by 4.08 pm, which was when the first train back to Logrono was (the second and last train was at 7.25 pm).

We ended up arriving at about 4.20 pm, just missing the train and had to catch the train to Calahorra and a bus from Calahorra to Logrono.

But it turned out that it wasn't so bad after all, considering what other horror might have befallen us.

On the way to Alcanadre, we had to climb up a small mountain and when we reached the top, we saw this huge black cloud hovering over the horizon. It was about another two hours to the village and we hadn't seen signposts for the last six or seven kilometers, so thought we were lost.

Just when we were about to give up, we saw a beautiful yellow arrow on an abandoned barn marking the camino. (The Camino de Santiago is pretty well signposted and it's hard to get lost but we were doing this stage in reverse, which is a lot more complicated that it sounds.)

On Monday, when I read the papers, it turned out the massive black cloud we saw was the biggest hailstorm to hit La Rioja in decades. There were hailstones half a metre high in Alcanadre and surrounding villages and most of the wine crops were 100% damaged, which means no wine next year. Windshields, windows and glass doors were broken, the blinds and corrugated roofs had holes punched into them and everything was devastated.

I'm not sure if anyone was caught in the storm but I suppose it would've been quite uncomfortable to have hailstones the size of cricket balls pelting at your head.

A meringue is a beautiful thing

I made this meringue (and about 20 others but without the decoration) on Sunday morning. It was surprisingly simple, although because I didn't have an electric beater, I had to beat it by hand and now have a sore right arm. I don't know how the people used to survive without electricity. They probably didn't make meringues.

Afterwards, Millán was playing in an ice hockey match so we went to watch him. The weather has been weird- it changed from sunny to rainy every five seconds yesterday. So I left the house thinking it would be hot and sunny, in shorts and thongs and nearly froze in the ice rink.

More Camino de Santiago

On Saturday, we did another bit of the Camino de Santiago, from Calahorra to Alcanadre. Again we were going to do two days and again we just did one because the weather report said it would rain. (Photo: in the playground in Alcanadre)

This time we started a little later because it was only 22 km. It was supposed to take about four and a half hours, so when we arrived at 3 pm, after three and a half hours (and including a half hour break for lunch), I actually thought we were in a different village.

We entered a bar to ask directions to the train station, which probably wasn't really necessary because it's a village with a population of 350 people and maybe seven or eight streets. There were five old men sitting round a table chatting or reading the newspaper, and when I entered the bar, there was a dead silence and all the people turned around and looked at me, like they'd never seen an Asian person in their life.

When we started there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the sun was scorching. Both of us ended up getting pretty sunburnt, even with sunscreen but now people can't make fun of me for being so pasty. And for once the weather report was correct. It started pouring down rain at about 6 pm with huge chunks of hail.

Macmillan, soccer and tortilla

On Wednesday, Macmillan, the publisher of the primary school textbooks that we use, held a series of talks to publicise their new textbooks and market their readers a little.

It was absolutely awesome. In the talks, the speaker talked about activities you could do with kids and every time he needed a volunteer, I was the first to put my hand up, because I love this sort of thing. Some of the teachers attending probably thought I was a bit crazy, or hyperactive and over-eager but I got free stamps for volunteering, so ha!

Afterwards, I met up with Beza to watch the all-important Barca vs Chelsea soccer match in a bar. It was a great match. Chelsea were winning 1-0 and Barca was down a player because of a penalty but in the last two minutes they scored a goal and the bar went crazy. So now they're in the finals which will be played at the end of May and I bet there'll be people waiting in the bars by 4 pm to nab some decent seats.

We went back to my flat to make dinner because the bar was just down the street from me and Beza kindly offered to make tortilla. So I started making homemade soy icecream while he fried up the potatoes and onion. While I was boiling the icecream on the stove, he asked me 'Is that it?'

I thought he was asking me if it was icecream so I said yes, and the next thing I knew, he'd grabbed the saucepan and poured it all into the potatoes and onions. My shriek of anguish almost cracked the glass in my flat. We ended up eating the eggs he hadn't used for dinner but I was incredibly upset that I had no tortilla and no icecream.

On Friday, I decided to recreate our unsuccessful tortilla. IIt was tasty-ish but lacked an egg, so it sort of fell apart. I've been told that if I learn nothing else in Spain I have to learn how to make a decent tortilla.

Cooking and bureaucracy

I've been in cooking mode lately. So far (aside from the risotto, sushi and empanada) I've also made pizza with homemade pizza base, homemade spaghetti with sauce, chocolate macaroons, carrot cake, banana bread, burritos, choc chip biscuits, anzac biscuits, cuajada...

Last weekend I made teriyaki skewers with homemade teriyaki sauce and raisin bread.

I'm not very good at Spanish food because it's so cheap and easy (and tasty) to eat out here but I have two awesome Spanish cookbooks that I'm going to conquer.

Yesterday I went to the Oficina de Extranjeros (the Government office for aliens and yes I think they actually use the word aliens in their official text) and was given a ticket and told I had to wait more than two hours.

This debacle started at the end of October when I applied for my residency card. They told me they'd send me a letter within a month and I'd have to go in with an ID photo and get my fingerprint taken. At the beginning of January after returning from holidays I still hadn't received the letter so I went in to the office, waited almost an hour in queue and got told they were delayed with lots of paperwork but I should get a letter within three weeks. Three months later (and five months after I was supposed to get the letter) I still haven't received anything.

You'd think after a five month wait, spending two hours in queue isn't too much. But frankly I don't give a damn any more. If they've already sent me the letter and it got lost in the mail, they can damn well send me another one if they want me to have my card so badly (which I sincerely doubt) and if they haven't sent it yet, I'm not going to wait two hours to be told to wait another three weeks.

Meanwhile, Friday is another public holiday and with one thing and another, I'll only have worked two days this week. With a working week like this, I can put up with shitty bureaucracy.

The Camino has begun!

Last weekend, Beza and I walked from Alfaro to Calahorra, which was about 25 km, as part of the Camino de Santiago that I want to complete some time this year. From Alfaro to Logroño isn't part of the popular French route of the Camino de Santiago, but I wanted to walk through La Rioja since it's been my home for nearly two years.

Also (and more importantly), there was a festival of vegetables in Calahorra, which is apparently famous for its greens. So I thought I could kill two birds with one stone- start the walk and eat some pinchos in Calahorra. We were going to walk two days but the weather forecast said it would rain on the weekend so we just did Saturday, caught the bus early in the morning to Alfaro and returned to Logroño in the afternoon.

As usual, the weather forecast was wrong because it didn't rain, but it was less wrong that normal. Usually if it says it's going to be sunny, I put on a scarf and extra jumper just in case. And the last few times it's said it's going to snow it hasn't. But on Saturday it was very cloudy and extremely windy.

We stopped halfway to have almuerzo in Rincón de Soto, a village famous for its pears (don't know why- I didn't see any). Almuerzo is a Spanish concept that I don't quite understand but like a lot. It's like brunch, at about midday except people also have breakfast and then afterwards, at about 2.30 or 3 pm they have lunch. Which means they eat three meals before they hit dinnertime.

The wind was blowing against us the whole way and about half an hour after we left Rincón de Soto, we could already see Calahorra in the distance, which was very encouraging at first but then took another two and a half hours to arrive at.

Still, we had some awesome pinchos. My favourite was the one in the picture- ostrich meat with brussells sprouts and carrot on a potato puree base.

Beer and waffles in Belgium

For some reason I couldn't sleep so ended up sleeping maybe 3 hours and was very nasty to be around on Wednesday. Plus our plane was delayed and I was hungry but refused to buy overpriced prepackaged semi-plastic food at the airport. I started biting Beza and I think he was quite happy when our plane finally arrived. (Photos: Mannekin Pis; Jannekin Pis)

Things improved in Brussels. I thought we'd booked an upmarket hostel but it turned out to be a fantastic guest house and the owner was really friendly and helpful. Visited Mannekin Pis, his less aesthetically pleasing sister Janneke and had our first waffle and first litre of cherry beer.

Went to Ghent the following afternoon. We were going to stay but couldn't find cheap accommodation so caught a train to Brugges and stayed the night there instead. Brugges was so idyllic it was almost scary. Like a picture perfect village in some horror film, where all the people are friendly and there are horse-drawn carts (which there were in Brugges) and picturesque houses and suddenly all the children turn evil and decapitate the neighbours. (Photo: in Ghent)

The weather was basically shit the whole time in Belgium except on Saturday which we spent in Antwerp. In the morning we went to an open market and had snail soup (well, I had snail soup and Beza watched with disgust) and in the afternoon we went to a legal graffiti park and had a picnic of horse jamon (like pork but leaner, very interesting) on bread.

The most disappointing thing was we only managed to fit in two waffles each in five days because we were too busy eating/doing other things.

And on the way home, the plane was delayed again so we missed our train and had to catch one three hours later. Which then broke down in some God-forsaken village for an hour and a half. And had to backtrack for some unfathomable reason. BUT we went back to the station on Monday and got a full refund on our tickets, ha!

Bilbao for Easter

I had a fantastic Easter break. A few days out from the school holidays I felt like I was going insane and if I had to tell another kid to sit down and shut up (not that I actually do that- it's not in my job description- I just stand there looking at the ceiling patiently until the class quietens down) I would pull out my hatchet and splice someone's head open. Plus there was a bit of tension in the flat, with some certain person not liking the way other certain people were doing things. (Photo: pintxos in Bilbao)

On the Wednesday when school finished up, JC also went home for the holidays so I had the flat to myself and I ran around screaming with glee.

Some of my friends were going to a refugio in the mountains, which I was going to go to as well with them but there was a pretty cheap deal in Bilbao for 2 nights and a Murakami and a Cai exhibition at the Guggenheim so Beza and I went. Just as well- it was Andres's birthday on the Saturday so when we called to say happy birthday, he told us it was raining and about to snow. Plus there's no running water and no toilet.

Ness and Cyrille were coming to Spain on the weekend and I totally forgot Ness had told me she was going to Bilbao before visiting me in Logroño so when we arranged to meet, it turned out we'd both be in Bilbao. So we met up on the Saturday night, had some pinchos and travelled back to Logroño together on the Sunday. Stopped over in Haro for lunch, waited an hour and a half at a restaurant, till about 4 pm for lunch and I got incredibly cranky. I started eating the toothpicks while waiting, I was so hungry. But really, if the waiter says there's a 20 minute wait and you end up waiting an hour and a half I think you have a right to be pissed off. Still, the food was great. (Photo: On the way home from Bilbao, we took a detour to a beach)

Ness and Cyrille left on Monday and on Tuesday, Beza and I went to Zaragoza with Rubén because our flight to Brussels left mid-morning on Wednesday and he'd kindly offered to let us stay.

When Rubén told us his flat was big and his flatmates friendly but that it smelt of old shoes or someone anti-anti-deodorant, it wasn't an exaggeration. His flatmates are really nice but it did smell a bit of... something. But very cool guys. We paid a visit to El Pilar, one of the most famous/important cathedrals in Spain and I saw my first confession box ever with a real live priest inside.

Roman markets and other matters

A few weekends ago, Juan Carlos invited us to his place in Calahorra for lunch. It happened to be the weekend that they were putting on a Roman market in the village so it coincided quite nicely. (Photo: falcon at the market)

Pablo and I caught the bus up early in the morning and had a look around the market which was fascinating. They had an aviary with vultures, falcons, eagles and owls and cheeses that looked like giant pebbles. While we were waiting for JC to finish work, they put on a gladiatorial demonstration. Apparently in Hungary or Romania there's an actual gladiatorial school, where they teach the guys how to use tridents, nets swords etc. One guy got cut on his belly but JC said last year, some guy got his finger cut half off and another one was rushed to Emergency with blood pouring out of his neck.

Afterwards, we went to his place where they had a vegetable patch, an outdoor fire and hunting dogs and his parents stuffed us with about 10 kilos of meat of spare ribs, sausages, chorizo, cutlets and chops as well as salad, homemade bread, shrimp, canapes, flan, fruit, cake, donuts, coffee, beer, wine... On the way home on the bus, Pablo and I both fell asleep from our gluttonous afternoon and nearly missed our stop.

Cooking and other things

On Friday I made a mushroom and chicken risotto and an endive and goat cheese salad.

On Saturday I had dinner with Ana's uni friends who are also English teachers and are absolutely hilarious. I made some chocolate and coconut macaroons, which I called wombat droppings because that's what they looked like. Later we met up with the guys and had drinks. The putting forward of the clock one hour was absolutely painful (not that I slept one hour less, just when I woke up, I had one hour less of the day to do things. Not cool.)

And then today we had a flat meeting to discuss issues with the flat, except it was mostly Pablo saying what he had issues with and JC and I going 'Ok. Ok.' Well, anyway, the good news is he's going back home next Tuesday until the 20th.

The man from Brussels

I'm going to buy bread from a man from Brussels, who will be six foot four and full of muscle. When I ask him if he speaks my language, he'll just smile and give me a vegemite sandwich.

No, but really. I'm going to Belgium for semana santa, yeah! Belgian waffles and Belgian chocolate, here I come.

Speaking of Belgium, there's a cerveceria just down the road from me that had a huge Hoegaarden sign lit up outside, probably being the only cerverceria in Logroño that serves it on tap. Anyway, last week when I walked past, I noticed they'd taken down the Hoegaarden and put up a Foster's sign.

Everyone who talks to me about Foster's, I tell them it's repulsive, which is why we export it and never drink it ourselves. But actually, had one and it's not that bad. I just think it's such a shame our export beer is so average.

They fell like flies

Thursday was a public holiday here and also Father's Day but I was still supposed to have tutoring with four kiddies.

Then the first one rang me at about 11 am, telling me they were taking a day trip so not to come. I rang the one who came right after, to see if they wanted to move the time earlier, and she said 'Oh, didn't I tell you? I'm not going to be home today, so you shouldn't come.' While I was deliberating whether to cancel the last two, the mother called and said 'Well, the weather's so good today, and since it's Father's Day, we're going on a family trip, so don't come.'

I had a five minute party running around my flat cheering, then rang and told Beza the good news. He, like many other Spaniards, had a puente (which is when the public holiday falls mid-week and you have the rest of the week off, like a bridge between the public holiday and the weekend. But as my friend pointed out, I have a puente every Monday so I shouldn't complain if for one day I have to work when the rest of the world doesn't).

We decided to go to the Parque de la Grajera, which is a park with an artificial lake, about 20 minutes by bus from Logroño. I whipped up some hamburger patties, packed a towel and sunnies and we bought some bread. When we got there, the whole carpark was packed with cars and there were people everywhere. It was like Myer in the city on the first day of sales. But most of the people were congregated around the restaurant/bar and we managed to find a nice quiet spot ie. without any bratty children screaming or playing ball and after lunch we took a siesta in the sun.

When we went to catch the bus back, the bus couldn't stop because some people had parked in the bus stop area.

On Friday, I had to work again. We had another cutting/colouring activity which was as much of a debacle as the last one. Seriously, if by the time you're in Year 6 you still don't know the meaning of the word 'cut' you deserve to be cut up and roasted like a turkey. This time, I didn't say anything about colouring in, I just handed out the paper and said 'Get your scissors... (holding up a pair of scissors)... and CUT along the lines.' As I walked around the room supervising, half of them were colouring in and I had to say 'NO, CUT.' And the other half asked me 'So do we colour now?'

After the fifth child who asked me that, I seized a pair of scissors and a piece of paper, marched to the front of the room and shouted at the top of my lungs 'EVERYONE, LISTEN! YOU CUT WITH. YOUR. SCISSORS. DO. NOT. COLOUR. IT IS S I M P L E,' demonstranstrating by massacring the piece of paper I was holding. The first graders got it right- the sixth graders must be wrong in the brain somewhere.

WELCOME, SPRING!

Unlike Australia, where the seasons start on the first of the month, in Spain Spring is actually supposed to start on the 21st March. So we're technically still in Winter but the weather has been fantastic for the last week. (Photo: picnic of sushi, salchichones, fuet, aceitunas and pan)

I had my first 5-day weekend since the beginning of February this weekend, so I got to completely and utterly relax (and yes, I know most people are stoked to even have a 3-day weekend so I'm not complaining). On Friday, because the weather was so good, I made some sushi and we took it to the park and had a picnic.

And then we had a mini-siesta in the sun. To celebrate the start of Spring, I wore my thongs for the first time since September. And after 10 minutes I already had oozing blisters. (Photo: Beza eating sushi with wasabi and chopsticks)

Allen also sent me some DVDs including Summer Heights High which I watched on Sunday. I'd forgotten what a genius Chris Lilley is.

Ruben moved to Zaragoza for work about a week ago, which I was pretty sad about because it was nice having him living 5 minutes walk from my house. But he came back on the weekend and we had icecream and beer and kalimotxo (but not all at the same time). At least on the positive side, if I want to fly anywhere on Ryanair from Zaragoza, I can always stay with him for free.

With all this good weather, I've been in cooking mode. On Monday, Beza came over to translate an official letter I had to write and as a thank you, I made empanada for dinner. Except it was more a Catherine quasi-empanada because I ran out of pastry so had to make an open-faced pie. And I used the recipe from the cookbook my friends gave me for my birthday but as usual, I was missing some ingredients so had to substitute. So it ended up being very unlike a traditional empanada.

Yesterday, being St Patrick's Day, Andres, Beza and I went to an Irish pub and had Guinness. Actually, it was the same Irish pub that Breda, Mel, Em and I went to three years ago. And they still had the deal where they gave you a free Guinness hat if you bought two pints of Guinness, and they again ran out of hats by about 10 pm. I wore my only green item of clothing, a green dress, but it wasn't very noticeably green. And Andres and Beza wore their Celtic football club shirts which they bought from Scotland. I reckon we were awesome.

Birthday haul

I had the best birthday in a long time. (Photo: Wall Street, Saturday night)

Some of my friends were already sending me birthday messages a few days before and on Friday night, Beza and I had dinner at an Italian restaurant. It was nice to not be alone at home feeling miserable about getting older at the moment I turned 25 (although I'm never home on Friday night anyway).

Then on Saturday, had dinner with all my friends who were in town. I'd only told them on Friday that I was thinking about having dinner, so I thought maybe about seven or eight of them would turn up but they all showed, which really made my day. The only problem was I had an issue with my bank account, where I couldn't withdraw money so I was left with 4 euros on the weekend of my birthday. I'd wanted to shout drinks but I couldn't even do that, because it felt wrong to borrow money from a friend to buy birthday drinks for everyone. And they got me awesome presents too.

Beza made a portrait of me in my Carnaval outfit, Bola made me a CD, Javi and Laura gave me jewellery, Ana a shirt and scarf and the guys chipped in and bought me cookbooks and awesome cooking stuff. I used the cake mould on Monday to make a cake for the teachers at Cenicero.

And Monica made me a video which made me laugh and cry and my family sent me Aussie food. I felt completely and utterly spoilt.

Then on Monday night Juan Carlos, Pablo and I went to an Asian buffet where we stuffed ourselves for two hours straight.

Nightmare trip to Madrid

I went on a school excursion with Years 5 and 6 to Madrid last week from Wednesday to Friday, and basically everything that could go wrong did.

It started at about 9.30 am, half an hour into the trip, on the bus, when a girl threw up from carsickness. Then, at the albergue, all the teachers were in one room and it turned out we had to share a bathroom with another room, of four boys. And none of the girls knew how to make their beds. The boys were actually pretty good. We broke a student's bottle of medicine and one of the teachers had to go to the pharmacy to convince them to sell her another one without a script and in the meantime, we went to the Planetarium. About five minutes after we arrived, we realised we'd left the diabetic girl's food on the bus, so another teacher had to go and buy some more. Then the other remaining teacher was playing with the kids and dislocated her shoulder.

We were supposed to see two films at Imax after the Planetarium but the albergue said they closed the kitchen and dining area at 9.30 pm sharp, so it was a choice between dinner and the film and the teachers decided dinner was probably slightly more important.

After dinner, one of the girls started coming out in hives. She checked her antibiotics and realised it had some ingredient she was allergic to. And the next morning, when we woke up, one of the boys had vomited in the sink from all the junk food he'd been eating all day, and he hadn't even bothered to clean it up. I'll never understand why he didn't throw up in the toilet. SO much more hygienic.

In the morning, the teacher's dislocated shoulder was killing her so when the kids went to the zoo, I went with her to Emergency. We all walked to the zoo together, and apparently where the albergue was is the most infamous red-light district in Madrid. At 9 am, we passed quite a few hookers. The kids flipped out and wanted to talk to them but the teachers threatened to torture and behead them if they went anywhere near them.

Spent 5 hours in Emergency, waiting. Seems like Sydney isn't the only place with hospital issues. Missed going to the Prado as well, but it was actually very relaxing being without 28 hyperactive students. And the weather was fantastic so while I was waiting, I walked around the area a bit and sat on a bench in the sun. I was so re-energised when we met up with everyone again but all the kids were buggered from walking around all day. And the diabetic girl had very low blood sugar levels. Went on a short tour around central Madrid to learn about the Austrias, then back at the albergue after dinner, we played camp games with the kids.

Friday morning, we went to the mountains north of Madrid for a bushwalk. It wasn't too difficult but all the kids were going 'I'm tired, my legs hurt, I'm hot, can we stop for food now? I need to pee, are we almost there? When can we head back, when's lunch?' It was hilarious. And one girl was hypoglycaemic and nearly fainted.

I left them at about 3 pm because they were heading home without passing Madrid while I was spending the weekend there. It was an awesome trip, and I had insane fun, what with all the unfortunate events, so was a bit sorry not to be going back with them on the bus.

Met up with Iñigo, whose place I was crashing at, and Diego at about 6 pm and started drinking straight away. They took me to a student bar with some students who'd started drinking at 3 pm. Ahhh, uni life. Beza was catching the bus down from Logroño after work and arrived at about 9 pm, then we had dinner and went out. But I was pretty buggered after 3 days with the students, so came home pretty early while Iñigo and Diego stayed longer. At about 5 am, when they came home, Diego thought it would be hilarious to sit on my head.

Beza and I spent Saturday just walking around. There was a second hand bookshop I wanted to check out, and ended up spending two hours and 40 euros there. Had pinchos of bacalao, calamares, jamon, bacon and lots and lots of beer. Also went to my beloved Asian supermarket and stocked up. Diego was supposed to catch a plane to Lyon for work that evening, but for some reason missed his flight so came back to the flat. He's hilarious.

On Sunday, went to the Rastro, then a Bacon exhibition at the Prado which was FANtabulous. All in all, was a great week.

Carnavales fever

I now have six little kiddies I'm privately tutoring. The youngest one turned four in December. I also meet up with my friend on Thursday afternoons at the pub to practice English and then afterwards head off for my Thursday night pints in the old part of town. They've been putting on live jazz music at a bar for the last few weeks on Thursday nights and I've been a few times, which was pretty cool. (Photo: With Javi during Carnaval)

They also ran this cinematic cycle of phantasmagoria every Tuesday night for five weeks. At one of the cinemas, they showed an old film in original version with Spanish subtitles for the bargain price of 3 euros. I missed the first two films, but went with Ana and Beza to see The Other, A Matter of Life and Death and The Haunting. Afterwards we'd always head to Laurel for dinner. Unfortunately it finished up this Tuesday. But Bola joined us for The Haunting and is considering doing a cinematic screening every Tuesday night at The Pad/El Piso, which would be awesome.

We thought all the films were horror/suspense/thrillers and ten minutes into A Matter of Life and Death, we turned to each other, completely bewildered, because it's less horrific than a Disney film.

Two weekends ago was Carnavales. The teachers at Cenicero got dressed up as native American Indians. We spent an afternoon at the school cutting up cloth to make our costumes and then painted them ourselves (except I cheated and got Beza to help me because he studied something arty at uni and if I may say so myself, my costume was the best). It was insanely fun.

All the students dressed up as well and at recess they had a parade and some parents prepared hot chocolate and biscuits for everyone. Afterwards the teachers went and did a wine tasting and had lunch at a swanky, delicious restaurant.

Then we went back to Logroño and had more drinks. On Saturday night, went over to Beza's place, had dinner, watched Tropic Thunder on DVD and got dressed. I went as a Japanese schoolgirl while he went as a Dutch pianist, complete with fully functioning mini-keyboard. Javi dressed as Wolverine, Millán as an astronaut and the rest of the guys as Rafael Nadal, which was hilarious. They bought these musclemen costumes off the internet, cut off the right arm and bought ridiculous wigs. Unfortunately, Adres, whose idea it was, had the flu so couldn't come out and Jorge went out on Friday night and spent all Saturday throwing up, so didn't join us either.

Generally, the costumes were nowhere near as spectacular as in 2006, but it was still an insane night. Some guys dressed up as Wall-E with glowing lightbulbs for eyes. Theirs were probably the best costumes on Saturday night but it would've been a pain in the arse to get into the bars. The prize for overall best costume this year has to go to the little boy at school who dressed up as a transformer.

Iceskating, La Ola and Shakespeare

Two Fridays ago, Andres, Millán, Peky and I went ice skating. It was my week of bad mood, brought about by having to relearn how to live with the Canarian again. But after ten minutes with the guys, my grumpiness evaporated and I've been cheerful since. I'd forgotten how much they make me laugh. It did also help that the Canarian had to go home for five days last week, so since Wednesday, I had the flat to myself.

After skating, Millán, Rubén and I went to see La Ola (The Wave). It started at 10:45 pm, which is usually when movies finish in Australia. I really enjoyed it, the kind of film that makes you think afterwards. It's about a German teacher who simulates an autocracy in his class as an experiment and it goes out of control.

Last Friday, Andrés, Beza, Sevi and I went to see El Mercader de Venecia (The Merchant of Venice). I understood most of it, more than I expected, which was a pleasant surprise. The only thing was there were these old people in the audience with really bad wheezing, continuous coughs, who just kept up a chorus of coughing. Honestly, if you're so sick, stay at home. And despite the reminder at the beginning to turn off all mobile phones, there were three or four instances when mobiles went off. Vibrate mode was invented for a purpose people- use it. However, I did really like going to the theatre with the guys (who occasionally whispered inappropriate comments that made me crack up).

Yesterday, I found this photo of myself, taken some time this weekend, in a tractor. I have no idea who took it, where I was or what I was doing in it. Totally bizarre.

There was an old lady...

I thought a nice way to teach the kids animals would be to tell the story of the old lady who swallowed a fly. So I drew this A3 sized old lady, made it into an envelope with a hole where the mouth is and drew and cut out all the animals.

It was hysterical- some of the kids got absolutely devastated when the old lady swallowed the horse. They were screaming 'No! No! Poor horse!' I thought one girl was going to start crying.

On a totally different note, I find this joke about hairy Spanish people inexplicably hilarious. A Spanish boy comes home from school crying 'Mummy, mummy, all the kids laugh at me and call me hairy.' The mother shouts 'Cielo santo! The dog just talked to me!'

The kids were describing animals in class today, and one boy said 'Monkeys are hairy.' I thought of this joke and started giggling uncontrollably. I had to excuse myself and get some water, I was laughing so hard. And everyone was looking at me like I'd gone insane.

I continue to be a nasty bitch in class. There's this one girl I detest in 6th grade because she's always talking or whinging or saying 'What? What?' because she wasn't listening the first time. Anyway, I didn't photocopy enough sheets for an activity, so I didn't give her one and after I handed out the sheets, she said 'Where's mine? I didn't get one.' So I said to her 'Tough luck, mate. You don't deserve one, you never concentrate anyway.'

I ended up getting her to go downstairs to photocopy more, but after everyone had started the activity, so she had to sit there for a few minutes twiddling her thumbs. Last time, she had some trinket she wouldn't stop playing with, after she'd been told several times to put it away. So finally the teacher grabbed it and chucked it in the bin. She got so pissed off and screamed 'I'm going to tell my mummy!'

And the teacher shouted back 'So what? Go tell her then! And I'll tell her how you never do as you're told.' Everyone in class burst out laughing and started applauding. It's times like this I have great admiration for this English teacher.