Halloween!

Friday was Halloween. Wait I should clarify that – at Virgen de la Cabeza the entire week was Halloween (this week might still be Halloween, too). We’d been doing Halloween activities and celebrating for a while.



I was the only teacher to dress up. For my black cat costume, I wore all black and made myself ears (using a black headband) and a tail. When I walked into the classroom the kids screamed and laughed with delight. Seeing an adult dressed up, with eyeliner whiskers drawn on my face, was a strange sight for them and they weren’t really sure how to react. Some of them had on orange shirts, but none wore costumes to school.



My only classes were 5A and B. Instead of holding class, they got to watch Tim Burton’s The Corpse Bride in Spanish (because they would not understand the English version). These are two of the worst behaved classes (5B is the worst), yet they still go to watch a movie instead of going to class like normal. The students were hilarious: one of them told David that they shouldn’t watch the movie in Spanish because most of them had already seen it and I wouldn’t be able to understand the movie in Spanish (I could).



During lunch, Erin and I went class-to-class distributing lollypop ghosts. We took lollypops and covered them with tissues, tied a string around them and gave them a face. Some of the kids really liked the ghosts, and the others just liked that we were giving them candy. I took pictures of my kids. All-in-all Halloween was successful. We made sure to do meaningful activities that taught the kids the vocabulary and customs related to Halloween. Almost every kid in the school made some kind of mask and many of them colored Halloween pictures or made clothes pin bats. I was pleased how our first American holiday turned out.

Contemporary Dance

So, in my searching for a good yoga class, I came across a free contemporary dance class. Erin was supposed to come with me, but she didn’t feel well. I figured I might as well try the class anyway. When I got there, the only other people were a mom and her ten-year-old daughter. A man showed up for a few minutes, but he couldn’t stay.

The instructor started by having us work on some techniques, the first of which was rolling around on the floor. We lay down on our back and practiced rolling onto our stomach by dragging our hand across our body and reaching for infinity (until we naturally rolled). Then we practiced walking. We tried a whole variety of walking: fast, like a model, skipping, bumping into each other, walking quickly toward the wall and stopping just in front of it, etc. After that we continued walking around the room and added hand motions. Then the man left and only three of us continued dancing until we had to dance solo for the others to give feedback/criticism. This continued for a good 20 minutes or so (with a song/tempo change).

The class was pretty pathetic and I will not be continuing with it. I’m also not that into contemporary dance. The teacher was another spiritual wack who thought that music was unnecessary because it should come from within.

Dinner Party

Later on Wednesday we had some teachers over for homemade pizza and candy apples. Two teachers, Ana and David, came from my school and three from Cecilia’s school. We made four different kinds of pizza: Hawaiian (ham and cheese), veggie, fresh tomato and pepperoni. They seemed to be a big hit. Erin and Cecilia also made candy apples, which were interesting. We bought Worther’s soft caramels and which they melted down and put on the apples with some M&M-like candies. This seemed to work except the candy and the caramel ran to the bottom of the apples and didn’t really stick to the top part. The teachers were all appreciative of the hard work because they got to try an “authentic Halloween snack.”

It was nice to see the teachers outside of school and to meet some new ones (from Cecilia’s school). We talked about our lives and the differences between the US and Spain. They told us more about Spanish customs. We also talked about the different schools and the kids at school.

We’ll probably have people over again, but I’m not sure that we’ll make more pizza. It was good, but we bought the wrong cheese, which didn’t melt and the crust was kind of dry.

Yoga: Third time is not the charm

So, I went to a third yoga class Wednesday night. I swear they just keep getting weirder and weirder. This one was a free trial class at the place which offers yoga and dance classes in the evenings. The center was just redone and looks really nice: the room for yoga had pillows and candles and the ceiling was a tent-like with tons of fabric hung from the perimeter gathering in the center of the room.

Because the class was a free trial, none of the other four women had done yoga before. Yoga is new to Priego, so this has been the theme in all of my classes. Before the teacher arrived I was sitting on my mat with my legs crossed. Not crossed in yoga position, rather crossed like we used to sit in gym class. The other women saw this as an amazing accomplishment and were shocked. I took that as a bad sign. When the teacher arrived, they told her about my amazing abilities and she immediately began to think of me as a yoga expert (which I am NOT).

She started the class (10 minutes late) by talking about her life and yoga as a way of life. We had to hear about her family and how yoga was not a religion, but a way of life and how yoga could change your eating habits and make you healthier. Some of her points were valid, except when she talked about cleansing her body by forced vomiting.

After listening to her ramble for almost 30 minutes, we tried to find our energy. We sat with our hands ½ an inch apart and attempting to feel something connecting our fingers. Then we tried it in pairs. I’m not really sure what I felt. I thought I felt something, but not quite enough to satisfy the instructor.

Next, we tried to see one woman’s aura. The teacher blew out most of the candles and turned off the lamps in the room so we could stare at this woman in the semi-darkness. I’m not sure if my eyes blurred so much from staring or I actually saw a glow forming around her head…The teacher wanted us to see her aura because “she’s been told she has a large aura.” I could not see anything around her. She tried pulling energy out of her, by bringing her hands near to her head, to see if we could see it connecting her hands and her head.

After all of this, she realized we only had ten more minutes in the class (no surprise there; she never shut up). So we worked on some breathing and relaxation. I was able to relax, which was nice, but I really don’t think the class was that worth it. Unfortunately, there are no more trial times and I would have to pay to continue.

Another Yoga Class

Last night I went to a yoga class at the really nice gym my roommates and I went to on Friday. This was probably the weirdest yoga class I've ever been to.

First of all, it was beyond packed. There were at least 20 people in the same room we we in for pilates. The pilates class had 7 and we were comfortable. The room can accommodate 10. Most of the people in the class were older and had never done yoga before. I was the only person to bring a mat with me.

Second, the class involved folding chairs. At one point we were in pairs and one person was against the fall with his/her legs spread wide and hands resting on the folding chair. The other person had his/her hands on the folding chair and was standing bent at the waist. Another "posture" involved one person on each side of the folding chair with a leg bent (foot on the chair) and one leg normal. The object was to twist so the entire chest was against the wall. It was a pretty good twist, but the posture probably should have been done on the floor.

We barely did 4 of these "postures." The instructor also showed us the most basic and supporter version of shoulder stand that I've ever seen. We were not able to do the posture for fear that we might hurt ourselves. I can do the entire shoulder stand series without support.

There was another American in the class. He has been living in Spain with his Spanish wife for the past 15 years. He was somewhat vague about why he was in Priego (her family lives here I think). He had done yoga before and was weirded out by the class also. Most of what we did was stuff that we would have normally done on the floor. I don't think I'll be going back to the class.

Fiesta del Membrillo

Saturady morning Cecilia, Erin and I took a bus to Carcabuey, a village near Priego. We were going on a walk for the membrillo (quince) festival. Our first stop was the center of Carcabuey where we had a breakfast of bread, olive oil and membrillo. The membrillo was good, the bread was way too soaked in oil for my taste. Then we walked along the olive trees to Zagrilla, another village). The walk took about two hours. Along the way, we were given free, bright yellow, t-shirts. When we got to Zagrilla we went to the festival tent where there was food (for sale), candy, homemade soaps and olive pate and jam. None of the food looked particularly appealing, so we ate the fruit we had brought with us. The problem was that we had to hang around for three hours because the return bus didn’t leave until 5pm. We made friends with a Spanish family. The daughter (who was in Sevilla) had done a camp program in the US and was placed in Sandwich, MA. Her mom was shocked that I had heard of the town and knew where it was. They live in Zagrilla but want us to go to their house or something (we have no way of getting there). We also were befriended by a British couple who live near Zagrilla. They bought a house four years ago and gutted the entire thing, had central heating (not normal here) put in and heated towel racks. We were invited in case we get cold in the winter. They go back and forth between Andalucía and England (80 miles from London) fairly often. On Tuesday they’re driving to Bilbao and taking a 36-hour ferry to the UK. While we were pretty bored during most of the fiesta, we amused ourselves by checking out the clothing on the Spanish people. One woman had red and white polka dot shoes and a red and white polka dot belt. The Spanish are very big on matching their shoes to their belt to their bag to their accessories. It can get really interesting, like when they match their umbrellas to their outfits.

We were pretty tired before our walk because we had gone to the gym the night before. We took a pilates class, which wasn’t that great and an abs/glutes/legs class, which was much harder and left us feeling sore. It was a free trial day at this very uppity gym. The locker rooms had a Jacuzzi, sauna, tanning booth, showers and tons of hairdryers. The gym had tons of machines and weights and stuff. Everything was new and shiny. There was also a bar, which had protein shakes, juice, coffee and, no joke, beer. I’m not sure if I’m going to join this gym or another one. I’m going to go to the yoga class to try it out, but I don’t know if I’m going to like it. I can’t seem to find any ashtanga classes here.

I’m also not sure if joining a gym is worth it because I can run on the streets. However, this is difficult because there is not a single flat street in Priego. Every street has an uphill or downhill part. The only semi flat streets are 5 houses long and not really worth running down because you get to the end of the block and have to run down a hill, or up a flight of stairs.

While at the gym on Friday, we saw one of the funniest sights….a woman was on the treadmill in heels. They weren’t very high, just some pumps. But still….she was wearing heels on the treadmill.

That brings me to a good subject: Spanish fashion. Men wear their hair in mullets, sometimes with a rat tail and other times just a mullet. Women match all of their accessories. Sunday Cecilia and I saw a woman with magenta boots on over her skinny jeans. She also had on a pink jacket, magenta scarf and she carried a pink bag. Children of the same family often match. It’s semi-nauseating actually. We also saw six children dressed in three pairs. Two girls had on beige jumpers over pink shirts. Two boys had on jeans with pink and navy rugbys. Two other kids (a boy and a girl) had on jeans and pink shirts with black and red writing on the shirts. The six of them looked hilarious. Twins at school always have on the same outfits.

Our shower.

We have a hand-held shower. The wall mount that was installed was useless because it made the showerhead shoot water out at a 90-degree angle (about 6 feet above the shower floor) aka above our heads. We had been showering by holding the nozzle and turning the water off between washing our hair and rinsing our bodies. This means that we only had one free hand to rinse the shampoo out of our hair, making it very difficult to actually get clean hair. On Sunday I used wire to put together my Halloween costume (I’m going to be a cat). The ceiling of our shower is a kind of openweave pattern that allows us to see through to the actually ceiling (there is an exhaust fan in between). I devised a system of rigging up the showerhead (using wire) and attaching the wire to the woven ceiling. This means we can now shower without having to hold the nozzle. My roommates were quite pleased at my handyman skills.