A Suddenly Social Weekend in Priego (Day 3)

Just a pretty picture of Priego...



Sunday we met Alex, the only non-American English teacher to come to Priego, and went to the mercadillo, an open-air market. Alex is from Poland and she didn’t speak any Spanish when she arrived. She wants to be an English teacher in Poland, but first has to do an internship in another country, which is how she wound up in Priego. The mercadillo has everything from clothing to olives to produce; today there was a man selling dogs. We’ve made it a weekly activity because it’s really the only way to get out of the house on a Sunday. Cecilia bought some tights for three euro and Alex, who had never been there before, bought some earrings. I got tomatoes. All of Priego goes to the mercadillo. Last week we saw the librarian there. This week we saw one of our gym instructors and, as always, a handful of our students.

There was also a special exhibition at going on….prize pigeons were on display in the event hall next to the market. Yes, you are reading that correctly. Pigeons were judged (out of ten points) in various categories such as the shape of their eyes and feathers. The other girls were somewhat grossed out by the exhibition, but I thought it was hilarious. It made me think of the rural animals exhibition I saw in Buenos Aires. The people that raise these things are so proud of them. We have dog and cat shows in the U.S., I like that people in other countries have pigeon shows.



After our shopping excursion, we stopped and had a drink/tapa at a café along the road that leads to the mercadillo. The tapa was awful- little hot dog pieces with a few breadsticks. My orange juice was good though. We sat outside, which was awesome because I sat in the sun, at the end of November wearing jeans, no socks, and just a long sleeved shirt (no jacket, no scarf). I know I complain how cold it is in my apartment, but when the sun is shining, it’s really nice out. Our final stop was at a roast chicken place. On Sundays, the people in Priego buy whole rotisserie chickens at take-a-way restaurants (there are a bunch all over town). Erin and Cecilia wanted a chicken and fries (the standard, and grossly soggy side dish). We went home, had lunch and took naps before cleaning the apartment.



When we don’t go to the mercadillo for groceries, we go to Mercadona, one of the two grocery stores in town which is open during siesta hours. This is the meat aisle there. I usually have to cover my nose and mouth as I walk through this area because the smell from all those legs of ham is so strong it makes me want to vomit. They keep the spices right next to the meats which drives me nuts because I’m always there looking at spices.

A Suddenly Social Weekend in Priego (Day 2)

Saturday morning we woke up and Cecilia and Erin finally got to try churros and chocolate. A common breakfast treat here, churros are fried dough that people dip in cups of liquid chocolate (more concentrated than hot chocolate). We’re always to busy on school mornings, so they had been trying to get some each weekend. The problem is that the churro carts are only open in the mornings, probably just from 9 or 10 until 12 or so. We never seem to walk by one when it’s open. They said it was well worth the wait. I had a bite….not my thing.



We also went to another church. It was one of the ones I had tried to go to the previous week, but was closed by the time I got to it. This church was so small; it could probably only fit 20-25 people inside. Even so, it was ornately decorated, much like the other churches in Priego. We then walked around some more and went home to get ready to go back to the peña.



Saturday at the peña was much more crowded because many of the members of the flamenco society had come to listen to the professional singer. Mari Cruz was so excited to see we had come back. After we went to say hello, she told an entire table of people that we were Americans and we had come the previous night and it was so wonderful we came back. At another table a woman from our gym was clearly delighted to see us. We had never seen her with make-up on and it took us a while to figure out who she was. She came up to us and kissed our cheeks and then went back to her table to tell everyone about the Americans from her gym. (Here it’s custom to kiss people cheek-to-cheek on both cheeks.) We stood near the bar and watched the first part of the show.



Then during an intermission, everyone went outside to the courtyard and was given a plate of (free!) paella, which was absolutely delicious. Mine had shrimp, clams, and calamari in it.



We went back inside for more music and this time we sat with Mari Cruz and some of her friends. The singer was so into his music that his entire face would turn red and we swore his bulging neck was cause his necklace to break. He also stomped the ground so hard I though his wine glass (which was on a stool in front of him) was going to smash to the ground. This show was different from the first one in that the men were sitting on a small stage on Saturday and there were many more people in the audience. Even though the quality of the music was better on Saturday, I liked the atmosphere of Friday night better.

Saturday evening we went to Mari Carmen’s apartment, which is actually down the street from Erin and my school. She has a really nice place. It’s much newer than our apartment and her kitchen is huge with a dishwasher! She had prepared a ton of food and there were a whole bunch of people at the party. It was especially nice because everyone was older (late 20s, early 30s) and no one smoked inside the apartment (rare for Spain). Her friends had also made foods and brought them. They were interested in talking to us and told us all about the places they live. Almost all of them are originally from Priego, but live in other parts of Andalucía. We were at the party for a few hours and then went to a bar because everyone wanted to get a drink (Mari Carmen only had beer and tinto de verano, which is a wine cooler). The Spanish are very social and like to go out for “una copa” (“a cup” aka a drink) all the time. We didn’t stay long at the bar because we had plans for Sunday morning.

A Suddenly Social Weekend in Priego (Day 1)

As of Thursday we had no plans for this weekend. Then, we got an email from Christine, another English teacher from the states, inviting us to go to the peña flamenca. Peña is a term used for an intimate show/demonstration of folkloric music (it’s very common in Bolivia). Here in Priego, every Friday night members of Priego’s flamenco society go to the peña and sing flamenco songs. The place is a small bar underneath a house on one of the main nightlife streets. Low ceilings and white walls covered with flamenco-related pictures and flat sculptures give the place a really intimate feeling. The bar area is really small and very limited in selection. An old, greasy man owns and runs the bar. He wasn’t at all warm and welcoming, but you almost didn’t want him to be.



When we first arrived there were a bunch of people at a birthday party for the boyfriend of one of Cecilia’s co-workers (Mari Carmen). We said hi to her and she invited us to her house the following night for a birthday party she was throwing. Suddenly we had plans for Saturday night.

Also at the peña was a teacher from Christine’s school. Mari Cruz is in her 50s and is the girlfriend of the president of Priego’s flamenco society. She was so excited that young Americans were interested in flamenco and wanted to experience her culture. She talked to us about our lives here and in the states and all sorts of things. She bought us ham and breadsticks (a common appetizer here) because she wanted us to try them. There are many different kinds of ham in Spain and the one she bought us was one of the best. It was a nice gesture and I felt obligated to try some. I won’t be repeating that again soon: it was salty and greasy although not quite as much as deli ham.

Mari Cruz invited us to return to the peña Saturday afternoon for a professional show. A singer and a guitar player were coming from Córdoba to perform. Usually, the peña only has music on Friday nights, but this Saturday event was a special occasion. We gladly accepted the invitation and thus filled our social calendars a little more.

The actual music Friday night was really good, especially for “amateur” singers. Even though we didn’t understand 99 percent of the words in the songs, the emotion of the flamenco singers transcends words. They get so into the music and it’s really fascinating to watch. We sat across the table from the guitar player and the singers (the birthday party group had left and there were only two other tables being occupied). The intimacy of the setting was refreshing and it was nice to feel so welcomed by them. Part of flamenco is clapping to the beat, but it’s not nearly as easy as it sounds. You’re supposed to cup your hands a certain way and the other people there tried teaching us how to do it. (I have little sense of rhythm….but I tried).



After the show, we went to a bar with two of the guys (they’re both our age) and a bunch of Americans. One is a bullfighter, or at least he’s trying to be. Bullfighters need lots of sponsorship, both monetarily and in the form of an apprenticeship. So, he has to have another job alongside the bullfighting. The other, Juan, was the guitar player at the peña, which we later found out is own by his family.

The Gym and Some Notes on Spanish Fashion

My roommates and I go to the gym almost every day (Monday-Friday). We got a deal when we signed up as a “family” and we go each afternoon because: A) it’s warm; B) the showers always have hot water and great pressure (and we don’t have to pay for oil or water); C) we enjoy the classes. The gym also provides us with an interesting place to people watch.

First, let me back up, we chose the nicest gym in town. It opened in May and has tons of brand-new machines. There are stair masters, treadmills, walking treadmills, ellipticles and stationary bikes, and those are just the machines upstairs. Downstairs there are a few more machines and tons of weightlifting machines and free weights (I’d tell you about them if I knew what they were). There are also three rooms: one for yoga (it was awful; there were chairs involved), pilates and karate; another for spin class; and the third for aerobics, bosu, and toning classes.

Our instructors are hilarious. The woman who teaches some of the aerobics class (including step) is in her 40s, and her wardrobe is stuck in the 80s. She wears nylons under capri workout pants with tight little bra things. Her hair is kind of wavy and always all over the place. When we went to the gym party at a town bar she was dressed in all white: a little white stretchy dress, a white denim jacket and white boots. Another instructor, whom we refer to as “face piercing,” is partial to the single-color outfits as well. We gave her this nickname because she has a piercing through her face right above her lip. This is a very fashionable piercing here in Spain: one of my 5th graders has the same one. Today when we got to the gym face piercing was in the locker room blow-drying her hair and getting ready. We figured she was getting ready to leave the gym and go home. Oh no. She was blow-drying and straightening her hair to go give classes and hang out at the gym. She was doing all of this while wearing only a thong – no bra or top, just a thong. The third instructor teaches our spin classes along with some of the toning classes and the bosu ones. He’s less interesting because she usually wears all black.

The other Spanish people in our classes are also rather funny. One of the first days we were at the gym we saw a woman on the treadmill in pumps. Okay, the heel was only about an inch, but she was still wearing heels, and looking completely ridiculous. A few guys in our spin class wear hard-core biking outfits and make faces at themselves in the mirror. They’re really serious about spin. In the locker room, women go to take their shower wearing nothing but thongs. They’re naked under their towels (which they hold up in front of themselves), but they’re still wearing their thongs. Today, one woman in our spin class had on nylons under her workout outfit. That’s a pretty popular look: nylons under clothes (like shorts and capris). Kids wear capris and boots to school; you can see their tights or nylons in the four or five inches between the boots and capris. The other day we saw a little boy wearing nylons under his shorts. His younger sister was dressed the same way.

Relating lessons to Priego

In my second-grade science class, the students are learning about animals. This week they were discussing the different classifications of animals (wild, farm and domestic/pet). So, as an activity, I made a worksheet with animal pictures and names at the bottom and blanks where they had to write the name of the different animals in each category. For example, under farm animals they had to write “cow,” “horse,” “pig,” etc. There was some confusion as to what qualified as a farm animal versus a pet. This is due to Priego’s rural setting. The edge of Priego is about six blocks from my apartment (really, you’re never far from the town line). When I walked to the cemetery the other day, I walked past a house with horses in the front yard. It’s easy to confuse farm animals for pets when people have horses practically in the city. To solve this conundrum, I told them to think of pets as animals their moms would allow inside the house.

Even so, one of the girls was convinced that giraffe and elephants were farm animals. I asked her if there were giraffe or elephant in the countryside around Priego (where almost all of the farm animals can be found). She looked me straight in the eye and told me, “yes” these animals live around Priego. She refused to believe me when I told her that they were wild animals.

Today in fifth grade we were talking about Thanksgiving. I gave the students a reading assignment for class time: journal entries written by people on the Mayflower. They were short, simple passages about the Pilgrims’ lives. One of the lines was about the Pilgrims arriving on Cape Cod. To explain Cape Cod I told them that it was a region in one of the states. I equated this to the Súbettica which is the mountainous region in southern of Córdoba (where Priego is situated). I asked the students about the Súbettica and one kid looked at me and told me that it was where Cabra (a neighboring city) is. David just looked at the kid and told him he was wrong and I was right.

I try to make the lessons make sense to the students, but they still refuse to think. It’s really frustrating. Today, two 5th grade girls got yelled at by the vice principal/resource director. One had asked David if she could go to the bathroom (he said yes) and the other walked out the door when he wasn’t looking. It’s really hard keeping track of the students when they all run around the classroom talking to each other and throwing things out. Anyway, girl two went and followed girl one to the bathroom, except they didn’t go to the bathroom on their floor. They went upstairs and stood outside the 6th grade classroom making faces. Well, the vp/resource director caught them and dragged them back to their classroom where he proceeded to ream them out for having left their floor. After he left, David yelled at girl two for leaving without having asked permission. He then announced that no one would be allowed to use the bathroom for the rest of the class. Kids are not disciplined here. The teachers focus on individual students rather than the entire class, so it is possible that one kid (out of only 15) slips out of the classroom. After students answer a question on an activity or do anything, they want the teacher’s approval. They’re almost incapable of doing an entire worksheet without pausing to see if they’ve done number one correctly. Even if I do an example, they still won’t continue until I’ve checked number two, then number three and so on. I’m trying various methods of correcting papers. Today in second-grade English I made them do the entire activity and then we corrected it out loud. The other day in their science class I did the same thing. Slowly, I’m trying to change the way the classes I’m in are run. I can’t stand working when students are turned around talking to other students, or asking me to correct each problem/blank, or running circles in the classroom, etc.

Sunday wandering

Sunday morning (really early afternoon) we walked over to the market to get clementines and tomatoes. Cecilia and Erin really wanted to try churros and chocolate (fried dough and liquid chocolate which is warm). The chocolate is not like hot chocolate in the states, it’s much thicker. We were, once again, too late for churros. They’re really only available in the morning. After 12-1pm, you actually cannot buy them anywhere. It’s funny how here people have a set schedule and they actually stick to it. In the states, yes places have their schedules, but I’m much more used to being able to get food at all hours.



Sunday afternoon I walked around Priego to take more pictures. I wanted to get one of the Barrio de la Villa (the old part of town with white buildings) from below, which Lonely Planet describes as a “cake with white frosting.”



After that, I finally found the cemetery in town, which was not nearly as “scary” as David had said.

Paella with the prof.s

Saturday morning I walked around Priego by myself for a few hours. I went to a few of the overly decorative baroque churches and took lots of pictures. Shops are only open in the morning on Saturdays (and not at all on Sundays). Business hours in Priego are 10a-2p Monday through Saturday and 5:30-8 Monday through Friday. Some places, like banks, are only open during the morning Monday through Friday. This means that we don’t really have time during the week to go places because we’re at school all morning. During the afternoons we usually go to the gym because that’s when our exercise classes are.







I was somewhat surprised at the amount of people who were out Saturday. There were lots of people in cafes, at the produce market (which is really tiny), eating churros (fried dough), and at the castle. We still haven’t been to the castle or to the Carnicería Real (old meat packing business) because we’re waiting or our residency cards which grant us free entrance.



After visiting a the churches and wandering around, I met Cecilia and Erin at the Ayntamiento (town hall and central meeting place in Priego). We were then joined by David (English teacher) and Lourdes (secretary/music teacher). We went to a bar and met up with Sole (science teacher) and Guillermo (gym teacher). Maria Jose (principal) and Jose Maria (vice principal/resource teacher), who are married, arrived later. We had a drink and some tapas (this was around 2pm). The tapas were pretty good: lightly fried eggplant sticks, meat stew (I ate a carrot) and fried pinwheel sandwiches with ham in the middle (I did not eat these).

From here we went to a neighborhood restaurant (there are tons all over Priego) where we were joined by more people (Sole’s husband and Guillermo’s friend). Sole had organized everything and ordered paella ahead of time. Mine was seafood paella and everyone else had meat and seafood mixed. We were at the restaurant for about two hours and then went to another bar and had a drink and stood around talking. The Spanish like to take an event like lunch and drag it out to an all-day affair. The entire idea for this meal started because Lourdes asked me what we were doing this weekend and I told her we were going to go to the market and probably eat paella after. She decided she wanted to come and started telling other teachers and somehow we got a group of 11 people together.



It was a ton of fun to hang out with the other teachers and the paella was delicious. They are all interesting people and really funny. Lourdes tried convincing everyone that Portugal was shaped like a face (I think Lisbon might be the mouth or nose or something). We talked about difference between the US and Spain and various phrases that we use here or there.