London calling...

Greetings to anyone who still cares enough to check and see if I've updated this blog. I'm currently in London (Herford, England... to be exact) where I'm spending Christmas with my uncle's sister Jill and her family. I'm loving England so far and having a blast with Jill's sons, Luca and Sammy. Here are a few highlights of my first 2 days in the UK:

Me in front of Buckingham Palace... Jill and I went to see the changing of the guards.

Here's London Bridge at night --- gorgeous, huh?

Classic telephone booth picture

The absolute best part about being here is experiencing England through the eyes (and words) of a 3 year-old and a 6 year-old. A few anecdotes:

-On the car ride home from the Greek in-laws house last night, little Sammy started telling me a story about a man he saw in the grocery store the day before. "He was truly massive," Sammy began. "Do you remember, Mum? He had on a proppa suit and everyfing and he was about 65 meetahs tall." (I needed to write it out phonetically for effect.) And yes, a 3 year-old used the words truly, massive and proper.

-This morning, the same little Sam woke me up and asked why I wasn't yet playing with him at 8:30 in the morning. When I told him that I would play with him after going to the bathroom, he proceeded to pound on the bathroom door to make sure I wasn't "sleepin in the bathroom." This came one day after he barged in on me when I was fresh out of the shower and proceeded to brush his teeth, reminding me about the importance of dental health. "Yo teef aw vewy impotant," he began, "you have to brush fo two minutes, dat's what me dad says."

-I took Luca to the park today to play since Sam was sick and couldn't leave the house. I tried to keep up with Luca, who was riding his bike, but finally I had to yell to him to wait for me. Luca's response: "It's not my fault you didn't bring a bike and Sam's is too li-ul fo you." I proceeded to chase him to the playground where he asked me if I could teach him to play "proppa" basketball.

So it's about 12:08 am on Christmas morning and I will likely be woken up in approximately 6 hours, so I best be going to bed now.

Merry Christmas (or Happy Christmas, as the Brits say) to all!

Love,

Karey

A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

Hey everyone, I am FINALLY updating my blog today after a very eventful week... Happy Thanksgiving to everyone in the States!

So last week on Thursday, Aunt Maria came from London to visit me for a few days. It was so great to have family here again, and it was fun to see some more of the city with her. The weather was gorgeous and we ended up walking around Retiro Park and checking out a few different restaurants and bars, which were yummy! And I finally got to take someone to my favorite Cuban restaurant and even found a new Cuban bar (complete with a VERY tall transvestite). Here are a few pics of our weekend!

This week was also packed with Thanksgiving preparations and celebrations at school. Here are some pics of Thanksgiving at the Artica School.
Pretty cute, right? I do love my preschoolers, even though they are exhausting! I am pretty sure I will be changing schedules in January to work with older kids, and I will definitely miss these little guys. I'll still go visit them and stuff, I'm sure.

Oh, and for those of you who have heard about/met Diego... he got in a fight with a plastic chair on Friday. I literally had to hold him in my lap for 5 minutes to keep him from kicking and slamming his little plastic seat. Oy.

Well, I clearly don't have nearly enough room on here to blog about our Simmons Thanksgiving tonight so I'm going to do a separate blog about that...

Adios, guapos!

5 Little Pumpkins

Here are some pics of Halloween at my school. My parents even came in to help me and were pretty much a hit! The kids are dressed up as gypsies selling chestnuts in honor of fall... just an FYI!Here's me helping Diego play "Pin the nose on the pumpkin"

I'm reading "Happy Halloween, Biscuit" to some 3 year-olds and Javier and Rocio are watching my mom take pictures.
And this is our performance of "5 Little Monkeys" --- and their favorite part: "NO MORE MONKEYS JUMPING ON THE BED!"

My 4 year-olds singing their poem, "Pumpkin, Pumpkin" with their awesome masks.

Samuel, Joaquin and Rodri are apparently too cool for my Halloween dancing... and happier hanging out with my parents at the cookie/sticker table!

Diego and my mom cuteness, Part 1


Diego and my mom cuteness, Part 2

Veinte y seis

Here's a look at my 26th birthday in Madrid... enjoy!
Here's Cordae, Giovanna and I on Friday night at La Comedia. I should have known we would end up there at least ONCE on my birthday weekend! (Please note the black shirts and glasses)

And here are the birthday shots Giovanna's husband, Aaron, bought for us. Straight-up rum... yuck.No, your eyes aren't deceiving you... that IS hookah at the table next to us.

Steve, Nina and I at Malatesta for my birthday dinner!
This is me blowing out my candle next to my pizza-dough/nutella birthday cake! YUM!

Caitlin, Nina, Cordae and me - dancing at Dreams in Madrid.

Turning 26 is grounds for a cartwheel contest, no?

This is my best attempt at an angry face when I was racially profiled at AK Bar and couldn't get in at 4am... and I really had to pee. Happy Birthday Me!

So as you can tell, my birthday was a great time. I got home around 5am and proceeded to sleep for 4 hours and wake up to go see my parents, who had arrived safely from Boston around 6am... when I called the concierge to check in on them around 9, he told me that they had gone shopping and would be back in a few hours. My parents are so self-sufficient.

We've had a great first couple of days touring the city. They're coming with me to school tomorrow to help with the kids' Halloween parties. I can't wait for another person in my life to experience the madness of Spanish preschool. Good times.... I spent the past 3 days making 150 pumpkin masks so that my students can perform with them tomorrow and probably rip them/drool on them before the end of the day. YAY!

Can't believe October is almost over! It's starting to get cold here (tear) but I'm excited to see how they do-it-up for Christmas.

Keep reading, everyone! I'll try to be better at updating.

Love you!

That is NOT what I thought waving the white flag meant...

So I went to a REAL bullfight today. I was able to witness first-hand just how seriously Spaniards take their bullfighting. Some interesting tidbits...

1. The picador (a man on horseback) uses a pica (lance) with a steel point to weaken the bull's neck muscles so that its head is lowered for the kill. Often the bull will ram his horns into the horse in retaliation.

2. One of the matadors was so entertaining that the entire crowd stood up and waved white flags at him. After a quick consultation with a Spaniard, we learned that this means the crowd wants the matador to do a victory lap around the ring and he will receive one or two of the bull's ears as a prize. (ew)

3. The Ventas Bullring in Madrid is the biggest in Europe.









and here I am, getting ready to see my first bullfight!!!












Now, there's no need to worry. I have spent my free time doing some slightly less violent things here in Madrid. For example...

I have eaten lots of yummy food. This is the cake Cordae, Lindsay, Nina and I downed at the Food Festival at Plaza Santa Ana. Mmm...








I have gone dancing with my Simmons friends.









I have seen Scottish bands play at small, semi-sketchy venues in downtown Madrid.









AND I have appreciated the incredibly "talented" street performers at Plaza Mayor.













All part of the culture of Madrid. I'm having a blast and I promise to keep updating as long as you keep reading!

:)

It's the little things

It's definitely the little things that make being here so much fun...

Like finding tea with a very suspicious brand name...
Like rummaging through about 30 different animal puppets at the mall to find the one that wasn't scary (spider), random (cow with 3 udders), or way too hard to say in English (ostrich)

Like getting ragged on by an old lady at the bus station for wearing flip-flops on a 75-degree day... and seeing her reaction when she realized I spoke Spanish (and then of course becoming her BFF on the ride home).

Like having a random stranger take your picture at the park and come up with THIS:
Like THIS GUY (at a regular bar, people):

Like finding the humor in really unfortunate events (that's a re-enactment of her stolen purse and the trash can it is probably lying in after some gypsy took her stuff):
Having a blast in Spain, everyone. After a bout with the flu, I am back in action and trying to plan some fun weekends! Going to see my first bull fight this weekend - eek! Mom and Dad are coming on my birthday for their tour of Madrid! November hopes to bring a trip to Scotland and my attempt to cook a Thanksgiving dinner for my roommates.

Sorry these are so dreadfully short, but I've been really sick and busy with work and school. I hope to have some more interesting blogs soon!

Love and miss you all.

You can cut the flowers, but you can't keep spring from coming. - Pablo Neruda

Hi everyone! It's taken me a few weeks but I've finally created a blog for you all to read about and see my crazy adventures in Europe over the next 9 months. I'm settled into Madrid and my new job teaching Spanish pre-schoolers... exactly as frightening as it sounds. You'll read more about them I'm sure.

So my pictures are a lot more exciting than my babbling so let's check those out.

This is the Plaza Mayor in downtown Madrid. It's full of cafes and street performers and is lit up all night and bustling with tourists and Spaniards alike.

Next we have the Royal Palace, where the King and Queen of Spain used to live. I guess the new king has a mansion somewhere. Can't imagine it's bigger than this.



Facing the Royal Palace is the famous Cathedral, in this picture I took from the Templo de Debod, a park on the west side of Madrid.

Templo de Debod - Egyptian temple donated to Spain in the 60's. Prefect place to catch the sunset.

A few weeks ago I took a day trip to Segovia, which is about 1 1/2 hours from Madrid. Here are a few shots of the gorgeous city. This castle looks like it came out of a fairytale. And I climbed to the top of it!



Here is the Cathedral Alcala in Segovia. I couldn't take pics inside so this is all you can see.

Well, this has basically been all pictures and no blogging so I'll try to get better at that for my next post.

Things to LOVE about Spain:
1. They love food. So much that they take 2 hours to eat their lunch.
2. Everyone is friendly (caveat: even the gypsies)
3. Nightlife is diverse and accessible 24/7
4. Table taps and swearing are totally socially acceptable.
5. Dollar stores are in abundance and carry just about everything you could ever need.