Segundo semana en Sevilla

(written on Sunday, could not post until today)

A week later things are much brighter.
WE FOUND A PISO!
We spent all Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday searching, we called about 50 numbers from ‘se aquila’ (renting) and went into about 8 real estate agencies and everyone said that they either had absolutely nothing, or just a one bedroom for a thousand euro a month. On Wednesday I met with my bilingual coordinator/boss/teaching partner Noelia. She is really nice and was very concerned that we had not found a place to live yet. So, rather than sitting and chatting over coffee, we set out about the neighborhood taking down more numbers, and going into more agencies. The numbers said they had already rented, the agencies had nothing. Finally, the last agency place asked what our price range was and we said no more than 900/mo and we wanted 3 bedrooms. They just so happened to have a place right behind the agency for 900, would we like to take a look? I was expecting all of the apartments in Spain to be old, and rundown and tiny, because that is what we were told to expect. NOT this place! After looking at it with Noelia I excitedly told the agency that the girls had to see this place and that they would be very interested. I RAN back to our hotel to get them, of course they loved it! We gave ourselves one night to think about it but basically as soon as we left we had decided. The piso is more expensive than we originally wanted but Noelia told us it was actually a really good deal for what we were getting. Not to mention the fact that we were getting desperate. We figure that spending half of our paycheck on rent was worth it because then at least we would be poor in a nice place! I have pictures of the apartment which we call ‘el palacio’. (the palace).
So yeah, Thursday we went down to the agency to sign the papers and pay them large sums on money and they gave us the keys! That night we had a little dinner party at our new house with some Spanish take out and Cruzcampo beer (the Spanish equivalent of Budweiser, its everywhere.) We slept at the hotel Thursday night because we hadn’t bought sheets or blankets yet, then Friday we check out of the hotel (not a second too soon, because Thursday was our last paid-for night in the hotel) and finished moving into our palacio! We had a little fiesta for ourselves Friday night and the remainder of this weekend we have just been resting. I am STILL sick with my cough/chest cold, so I am trying to finally take it easy to finally get better. We slept literally all day yesterday, and so far had been laying around today too. We had been going non-stop for 2 weeks straight, so once we hit the ground there was no getting up. Aw one bummer, we were so excited last night to make a cheap dinner (pasta, 1 onion, 1 can tomato, 1 eggplant) and to watch one of my dvds I brought from home, buuuut the stupid regional codes would not let us watch a movie on our sweet tv which came with the apartment! But its alright, Spanish tv will do just fine. I am going to keep loading up with the vitamin C and rest!

Monday my first week of school begins. I went one day last week, it was interesting. The population of students at my school is mostly gypsies (‘jitanos’). What this basically means that they mostly come from lower-income, less-stable homes. In the classroom this translates to basically chaos. They were sweet kids, but just all over the place. No one stayed in their seats, everyone shouting, about a 2.3 second attention span. Our first lesson plan than Noelia and devised went reasonably well, we used pictures of animals to learn some basic vocab. They liked it, although no one is quiet while anyone else is talking, but I guess it is what comes with the territory. I am mostly going to be team-teaching with Noelia, in her class which is 8 and 9 year olds. She said I could go help in other classrooms if I wanted but I have a feeling she does not only appreciate the extra pair of hands in her classroom, but I do not think the other teachers are as receptive to extra help from an extranjera (foreigner).

Well I think I am going to spend another glorious day resting and relaxing in my apartment! Oh yeah, we have a futon, so you can stay with me if anyone wants to visit!
Besos,
Mary Claire