Children can be morons

Had a massive headache this morning, went to school and had to deal with screaming kids for 4.5 hours. Don't know if it's just that I'm sick and in a bad mood, but I swear children are getting dumber and dumber.

I gave them a cutting and colouring activity to do and repeated MANY MANY times in English AND Spanish that they should first cut, then colour. I showed them my completed craft and explained how it worked so they wouldn't make mistakes. Half of them immediately started colouring and another quarter started cutting the wrong things. So I had to repeat 'No! Cut first!' And then they looked at me blankly and asked 'How?'

What do you mean how??? You grab a pair of bloody scissors and you cut along the bloody dotted lines. If there are no dotted lines, DON'T CUT. These are 9, 10 year old kids. If they were younger, I'd understand that maybe they haven't developed the motor skills or the concentration to listen to instructions for twenty seconds. It's so simple and logical. a) Cut along ALL the dotted lines. b) Colour in. I hate to say it, but some of them are a bit retarded. One of the girls made a mistake, scrunched up her paper and asked me for another one. I was like, 'No. Why should I waste another piece of paper on you just because you're stupid? You'll probably screw it up again anyway.'

Yes, perhaps I was a bit nasty today. Well, I don't care. I'm going to bed.

The weekend has begun

My five days of nothingness has come round again. Which is something, because I'm in a bad mood.

Both my flatmates have returned. Juan Carlos got back on Monday afternoon and the Canarian got back yesterday afternoon. With JC back, it meant I had to be a bit better at washing up because if I don't do my dishes, he does them for me when he washes his own. With Pablo back... It's been so pleasant without him around (even if the flat did get a bit messy) that now I don't know how I'm going to get used to living with him again. Shit.

It's not that he's a bad guy, he's just got these bloody irritating habits.
a) As soon as he stepped into the flat yesterday, I woke up from my siesta because he'd already started his tuneless singing. There are some people who don't understand tone very well. He doesn't seem to understand it at all which must be a skill in itself.
b) But just to make sure he properly woke me up, he came and knocked on my door. When I didn't answer (because I wanted to keep sleeping), he opened my door and looked in. If I don't answer, it's because I'm not there, or I choose not to answer. Either way, LEAVE MY DOOR ALONE.
c) He looked me up and down, touched my stomach and said 'Looks like you've gained some weight over Christmas eh? Is that a belly you've developed?' I was like 'FUCK. First, don't ever touch me again. Second, you never tell a girl she's gained weight whether you're joking or not.' Of course I didn't say that, because it seemed a bit rude after a month of not seeing him. But honestly, was he born under a rock or something?
d) I went to the last ice hockey match and then we went out afterwards and when I came home, the flat had been cleaned and mopped. Well, it's not like he's got anything better to do with his time.
e) I got up this morning at 7 am because I had to see the Chinese team off at the airport in Bilbao, and he was already up, in the living room watching television. Reading/jogging/painting etc. are hobbies. Watching TV is not. It's a brain-numbing, intelligence-destroying, torpescence-creating pastime. Especially with the shit they have on Spanish TV, which is (if possible) worse than Australia.

And I was looking forward to a peaceful weekend with the flat to myself again because JC's gone back home for the weekend. And they're doing some shit renovation work in the flat next door and they start at 9 am so I can't even sleep in. I am thoroughly PISSED OFF, especially since I've had cumulatively about 12 hours sleep in the last four days. Will repeat, I am PISSED OFF.

Sub20 ice hockey world championship

The championship is being held in Logroño this week. They started on Saturday and end on Thursday. Sub20 stands for Under 20s, rather than the temperature in fahrenheit as I'd first thought. (Photo: With one of the Chinese officials and the Chinese flag- treachery! Treachery!)

Back in December, when I went to the gym one day, the woman at the front desk asked me randomly if I could speak Chinese. I said yes, so she told me I should volunteer to help out at the tournament. She explained that there'd be six countries, including China, competing and I'd be able to help out translating if needed. By my calculations, that was over 100 young, buff male hockey players so I was like, sure (with a big grin on my face).

So on Saturday, they asked me to accompany the Chinese team around while they were training and playing their matches and help them out with anything they needed. I turned up at 9:30 am, after 3.5 hours of sleep, still with alcohol in my system and had to switch between Chinese and Spanish for the next four hours. I haven't had to speak Chinese since about 18 months ago and thought my head would explode. Luckily, Millán was also volunteering, along with his hockey teammates and he'd told them I'd be there so a few of them came up to me and were very friendly and helpful. Afterwards, I went home, had a siesta and got a panicked phone call at 6:30 pm from the woman organising the volunteers, saying 'Your team has arrived! Where are you?' No one had told me I was needed in the afternoon as well.

The Chinese team played their first match against Spain on Saturday night and got slaughtered. Still, I got to sit with the players and trainers right next to the rink, which was really cool. Millán told me it was a bit dangerous because there's no protective glass so there's the potential a puck might come flying and knock out your teeth.

I also went in this afternoon while they were training, but they didn't need anything so I went to the gym. One of the volunteers introduced me to one of the chief members of International Ice Hockey Federation, who was working out on a bike, and told him to ask me if he needed anything, since he couldn't speak Spanish. He was from Slovenia, and we had a nice chat about Ljubljana, Sydney and his leg injury.

It's been quite nice speaking in Chinese with the Chinese officials, although with their Beijing accent, I don't always understand what they're saying. And they told me I had a funny accent, ha! I think every language has a different flow, and Chinese is quite soothing.

Snow at last

When it snows or when it's night time and the streets are hazy from the fog and yellow streetlights, it's so silent and peaceful. But when it's just damn cold and grey, I feel like turning off my mobile, unplugging the phone and hiding in my bed till Spring.

It snowed on Friday, and for once, instead of hiding in the teachers' lounge, I went out at recess and threw snowballs at the kids. They threw some back at me but the principal, who was on yard duty told them off, haha hahaha. I had an awesome time. Some of the midgets throw really hard. But I throw harder.

On Thursday night one of the sockets in the flat disconnected from the wall for absolutely no reason and started shooting out sparks for a while. I think some of the cables had come loose and the fridge stopped working as well. So I rang my dad who suggested I kill the power switch in the flat just to be on the safe side and go to bed. The next morning, I got dressed in the dark and when I got to school, realised I'd put on my jumper back to front.

On Friday night, despite the cold, I went to The Pad and played Singstar with my friends and they cruelly made me sing in Spanish to songs I'd never heard. We braved the cold, went to the bars for a few cubatas and then Bola and Carlos took me to a bakery that starts baking at about 4 am and we bought chorizo pan, croissants and snails pastries.

So it was a pretty good week, just the fact I had to go back to work on Thursday and couldn't think of anything to prepare for the classes (so didn't) and the freezing cold that made it a bit gruesome. Also, after a week of going to bed at 8 am and waking up at 5 pm, it was INSANELY difficult to wake up at 8:30 am. (Photo: Entering the school grounds, 15 minutes late)

Penultimate day of holidays

Friday night/Saturday morning: Bukky Leo & The Black Egypt and Tony Allen concert with Beza.

Saturday night/Sunday morning: Vetusta Morla, Magnifico and Joe Bataan y Los Fulanos concert with Rubén, Sergio and Sergio's friends. Then we met up with the guys in Mayor for our usual weekend fun.

Sunday night/Monday morning: Chulito Camacho and Method Man concert with Beza, Millán and Sevi. Chulito Camacho was OK, but all his songs were about marijuana and everyone around us was smoking so much that we were engulfed in this pot smog and I started feeling very hungry. Method Man was IN-SANE.

Monday night/Tuesday morning: Today is a public holiday so we also went out last night. It's the day when the three kings of the Orient bring presents to all the children in Spain. Last night, there was a parade through Logroño which I went to see. I expected it to be more religious, but it was surprisingly secular, and the point of which, admittedly, I didn't get. Some floats came down the street, some guys on horses, the three kings (on horses dressed as camels), throwing candy at the crowd. I was horrified to see a float of High School Musical. Ugh.

And I was surrounded by kids. But it was quite fun. Apparently they throw away about 2 tonnes of candy every year. Afterwards, met up with the guys and had pinchos. Everyone had said that it would be a quiet-ish night, that we'd have dinner, maybe a drink or two, then go home, so I expected to be home by 1 am at the latest. At around 6 am, I finally stumbled home, and went straight to bed. (Photo: Costume from the parade. If you look in the mouth, you can see the guy's head.)

Tomorrow the rest of Spain goes back to work but I still have one more day of holiday. It's depressing how fast the holidays have disappeared.

New Years Eve

I was so happy to arrive in Logroño on the 30th I nearly hugged the bus driver. I didn't know I could miss it so much. On the 31st, I was having New Years Eve dinner with Beza's family and he told me I'd stuff myself so not to eat anything that day. (Photo: Beza's dad gave us all these Christmas hats to wear.)

At around 8 pm, most of the guys met up to have celebratory pre-drinks in San Juan (a pinchos street, like Laurel but smaller). Because I'd only eaten a slice of bread that day, taking Beza's advice, after the second drink I already felt like if I drank any more I'd pass out. We went back to our respective places at around 10 pm. Most of the guys were eating with their families- NYE here is surprisingly familial.

I did end up stuffing myself. Beza's parents kept telling me to take more, so I was like, OK. I think his mum was a bit surprised. She cooked fantastically. There was an entire piglet, spliced in half and roasted in the oven, plus prawns, meat, salad, vegetables... At midnight, there's a tradition of eating 12 grapes in the 12 second countdown to midnight, which I didn't know about, but was cool.

We headed to The Pad afterwards where everyone was meeting and had drinks till about 3 or 4, then headed to the bars. At some point in the night, Rubén, Beza and I lost everyone else, so we went and had our own party at La Moon which we had to pay for for the first time EVER. Talk about milking it on NYE.

Ended up getting home at about 9:30 or 10 am, more dead than alive. There's a music festival on at the moment, so yesterday we went to a concert of Tony Allen.

Breakdancing to Tchaikovsky

Today we popped over to Den Haag in The Netherlands, to watch Lily's and Daniel's cousin perform in The Nutcracker. It was a bit of a trip, three and a half hours with seven people in the car, but totally worth it. It's been a while since I listened to Tchaikovsky and it made me remember why I like his music so much and why I love watching ballet.

In the second act(?), they had some kids breakdancing to the music. There was this one kid who was apparently only 5 years old, spinning on his head and doing handless somersaults. Insane.

When I arrived on Thursday night, we had dinner and made plans to meet up with Lukas. Lily and Daniel were both tired from a week of non-stop eating, plus they'd visited their grandfather in hospital that day, so they didn't want to make a big night of it, but Lukas said he was up for it if I was. It was my only chance to go out in Cologne with him, because he was on call all day today and then working the rest of the days I'm here, so I said yes. I later regretted agreeing to it.

The four of us went for drinks in a cafe/bar in town, then Lily and Daniel dropped us off in the clubbing street. Unfortunately, the good clubs were closed so the one we went to was a bit dodgy and smelt like vomit. Still, it wasn't too bad (except for the vomit smell).

We'd arranged for me to crash at Lukas's because although Lily had told me she was happy to pick me up, it's not very nice to wake up at 3:30 am to drive in the freezing cold. I warned Lukas in advance that when I drink, I need to eat something. He assured me he had Polish sausages that he could cook. I'd forgotten that usually when guys say cook they mean microwave. But the sausages were insane, bursting with fat and tasty, tasty goodness.

He also opened a bottle of red that one of his patients had given him, which was also very good (apparently a rich patient) and we finished the bottle. This was after some tequila shots, beer, cocktails and red-bull-and-vodkas (which Lukas ordered- I NEVER drink them). And the next morning I remembered a) why I don't drink tequila or RB and vodka, b) why four years ago in Sydney I'd sworn never to go out drinking with Lukas again and c) that Polish people are crazy and Polish/German people are worse.

In Sydney, when Lukas was doing his prac, he used to go to the hospital for 12 hours, go back to his place to get changed, meet me in the city some time in the evening where we would proceed to dance and party, then at 5 or 6 am he would catch the train straight back to the hospital to start his next 12 hour shift. I think he did it three nights straight until I told him I was too exhausted and couldn't take it any more.

I was having lunch with the extended Nass family the next day, so was supposed to be back at their house by midday. Actually, I woke up feeling not too bad, because Lukas had offered me his bed while he took the couch, so I'd slept pretty well (though too little) but as the day progressed, I got worse and worse. The only blessing was that Romanian food is very fatty so I absolutely gulped it down. I might've freaked out the relatives by the way/amount I ate.

I felt SO rude because everyone was speaking Romanian/German and I was incapable of sustaining a conversation with the people who could speak English. The best I could manage was a forced smile when someone directed a comment at me. Five hours later, nearly passing out from exhaustion, I told them I had to leave. They were also going to some friends' house that evening for more food but I couldn't do it and went to bed at 9 pm.