Salamanca Sojourns

By the end of the summer I will have been to Salamanca four times with different groups of children and one time for evening adventures. I don’t know whether this makes me a local expert or that I’ve just done too many camps in the area.

Salamanca is a beautiful city with many sights to see as well as a good cultural vibe. Highlights of my day trips to Salamanca include:

The first stop is usually the new and old cathedrals. This is one of main attractions in Salamanca. Be sure to find the astronaut on the north face of the cathedral. As a result of refurbishments in the 1990s and the loss of the original drawings, the architect got a little creative and inserted an astronaut on the east side of the north door.

The university and the wall in the Patio des Escuelas: This is where the famous frog is located. Apparently if you find the frog you will have good luck in your studies.But I think that anyone who has the patience to find a frog the size of your hand on a huge wall is bound to be a good student.

The 15th century painting El cielo de Salamanca : If you are visiting the frog you can take a couple of extra minutes and see this wall painting nearby in the Escuelas Menoras patio.

La Casa de las Conchas: There is a rumour that one of these shells has solid gold behind it.

Plaza Mayor: After seeing the historic sights of Salamanca this can be a good place to enjoy an overpriced lunch or just admire the symmetry of the plaza. It is also quite spectacular at night.

Convent of San Esteban: If you are interested in architecture and are willing to pay a couple of euros this can be a nice addition to an otherwise free tour.

 

Side Note on Santiago

   After finishing the first session as a teacher in Alba de Tormes, I along with four other staff members had the responsibility of taking the kids back on the bus to Galicia. Galicia is the most northwestern province of Spain, directly north of Portugal.

After dropping some kids off in Ourense, our final stop was in Santiago de la Compostela. We had to stay overnight in the town to pick up the next group of kids in the morning. In the meantime we took advantage of our time there to see a few of the sights.

The main reason people come to Santiago is to see the cathedral. This 12th century cathedral supposed to be the most beautiful in Spain. Unfortunately when we were there it was closed for the day, but even from the outside it is impressive. Santiago is also the end point for the Camino de Santiago. El Camino started out as a religious walk by Saint John but it is now an international event. Every year people walk and bike el Camino which begins in France. There were lots of people in the town for this reason.

Since there are so many people in the town it is great for tourism and tacky souvenir stores. All of the area surrounding the cathedral is littered with these types of stores. We went into one and sampled some local desserts, cheeses and wines  – all very delicious!

The last thing not to be missed in Santiago is sampling some of the delicious seafood – most notably the pulpo (octopus). The octopus dish from Galicia is rumored to be the best in Spain. But even if you don’t want to try octopus, all the seafood is super fresh from the coast and melts in your mouth.

Vacation in Valladolid

 After finishing work in Alba de Tormes, I spent three days in Valladolid with some of the staff I worked with last summer in Spain. Valladolid was convenient because it was only an hour and a half away from Alba and because one of the staff members now lives there.

Some may criticize Valladolid for being too industrial, too modern and too boring, but I had a fantastic time! Valladolid is the capital of the Spanish province of Castilla y Leon and a great place from which to see some of the 300 castles that are in the province. As a city Valladolid pales in comparison to the beauty of Salamanca, but there is still plenty to do.

When planning reunions or gatherings of any sort it doesn’t matter where you are, but who you’re with. Had I visited the city by myself it probably wouldn’t have been so fun. Valladolid is one of those places that you need to know someone to get the most out of your experience.

We visited downtown Valladolid (which is quite nice and architecturally quite diverse), the Coca Castle (the red brick castle featured above), the Peñafiel Castle (the boat shaped castle to the right) and a couple of pueblos.

One of the most unique things on this trip was in the town of Peñafiel. In the town they had a local bullring with buildings that looked like they belonged in a cowboy-western movie. Apparently the folks who live in these buildings have to allow people to watch the bullfighting from their balconies for free during the event.

We also had time to do a quick wine tasting of some wines from the Duero river region. Some of these wines are the most expensive in Spain. The wines were good, but here in Spain they have a weird custom of chilling their red wine which makes the wine lack flavour and body when you first pour it.

If you have a car, the province of Castilla y Leon is definitely quite accessible and worth a visit. Just because it appears to be mostly green and brown fields and lacking in landscape it shouldn’t be overlooked.

 

 

Monastery Monitor Moments

After completing my first two weeks out of six  weeks here at the San Jeronimo monastery in Alba de Tormes, I’ve realized there are several universal truisms about summer camp whether they are held outdoors in Canada or in a monastery in Spain.

In my opinion there is no such thing as a ‘camp kid’ and a ‘non-camp kid’ – every kid can enjoy and benefit from a certain type of  camp. Kids learn how to get along with others, how to pack a suitcase, how to set pranks, how to avoid getting caught for said pranks, how to take a shower etc

In the same way the more often you work as a monitor the more you realize that kids and camps are largely the same all over the world.

There is always the smelly kid, the sick kid, the spoiled kid, the clueless kid and the annoying kid at every summer camp. Sometimes these are not necessarily different kids.

Being a monitor isn’t as easy as it looked when you were 12 years old.

Nap where you can and when you can.

Being on lunch duty when there is soup and/or beans is the worst.

You will see pee, blood, vomit, tears or any combination of the former.

Think twice before dying your hair purple (or having someone cut it) even if its sounds like a good idea when it is suggested by someone else.

Good ventilation in the kids’ bedrooms can’t be overrated.

Camp food is filling but not always healthy or tasty.

The relationship between when monitors wants kids to be in bed and when the kids want to be in bed is an inverse relationship. In the morning the monitors want the kids out of bed and the kids want to stay in bed. In the evening it’s the reverse.

Next month I will be staying here in Alba de Tormes working as a English teacher with two different groups of children from Galicia. Being a teacher is a little bit different from being a monitor, you see a little less blood but just as many tears. However generally the above truisms are the same for teachers at summer camp as much as they are for monitors.

Wonderful Working Holidays

This is my third summer on a ‘working holiday’ in which I spend part of my summer working and the other part travelling. I’ve discovered this is the one of the best ways to travel for students. 

1. You earn money – It’s always fantastic to get a little cash so you can travel longer and further. Even if you aren’t earning a lot of money, every bit helps. Furthermore in a lot of temporary jobs (fruit picking, summer camps etc) your accommodation is provided, so this allows you to save more money.

2. You learn more about local culture – You work with the locals so you learn all the inside tips for enjoying your visit to the area. If you want to learn the language working holidays are a great way to immerse yourself in a language. You learn all the slang words and expressions that are not taught in a formal class.  

3. You have a home base  – Travelling to many cities in one trip can be draining. In summer 2007 I visited 25 cities in three months. For the weeks I was changing cities every two or three days, I felt quite tired afterwards. Also if you do short day trips or weekenders from where you are working you don’t need to lug a huge backpack (or suitcase) around!

Even working at the same camp two years in a row, you meet different people and see different things.  I love the Spanish lifestyle -  eating lunch at 2pm, taking a siesta, enjoying an afternoon clara (beer and lemon soda), doing some shopping,  then going for dinner at 10pm and going out to bars at 12am. My experience would not be the same if I was only a tourist and not working here .

Approaching Adventures

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After finally completing my travelogue of NYC, this is just a quick update on my upcoming travel plans. I will be leaving the continent of North America June 22nd to call Europe home for the next year and a bit. My first stop will be Berlin for a few days before starting work in Spain. Like last summer I will be working first in Pueyo de Jaca and then in Alba de Tormes. In August I will also be working in Alba. Then beginning in September I journey to the land of Dostoevsky, the Kremlin and the Trans-Siberian Railroad – Russia. I will be teaching English in the small town of Reutov (just outside of the Moscow Ring Road). More details  to come!

Vitoria and Paises Vascos

I had a wonderful 2 days on an express tour of the Basque Country. I saw the three main cities Bilbao, San Sebastien and Vitoria. Each city has its distinctive qualities and I agree with my host that together they would make a fantastic super-city. Bilbao used to be an industrial centre (and still is) but now they are trying to sell it to tourists by calling it modern. The coolest thing to see there is the Guggenheim Museum – I didn’t go in because several people have vouched it’s not worth it - but I did see its fantastic exterior. The old town is quite pretty as well but not as nice as San Sebastien. i can see why San Sebastien is the capital of tourism in the Basque Country - it is very picturesque and has great beaches. I spent a lovely afternoon polishing off my tan on the beach called la concha. During this express tour I was staying in Vitoria - the capital city of the Basque Country which doesn’t offer much for tourism, but is a great starting point for cool car trips in the region and it has a pretty good night life. This part of Spain is a lot greener and a lot colder than the rest of Spain – I definitely would come back and spend more time seeing it in depth.

More of Madrid

I’m back in Madrid after successfully completing two summer camps. I’m here for two days before I leave for Telford to visit the family. If you count all the different times I’ve been to Madrid I’ve been here 8 times – but if you count the number of days it is only the equivalent of about three weeks.

Madrid is not like Paris in the sense that there seems to always be more touristy things to do, but that certainly does not mean it is boring. There is always something going on each time I come here – the Eurocup 2008 finals celebrations, Wimbledon 2008 celebrations, EuroPride 2007 or just a average Monday night in Sol. It could truly be called a city that never sleeps – these days Madrid is so westernized that most stores and people don’t take a seista and still manage to be at bars until 7AM.

Now I don’t come to Madrid to see the Palace or the Prado, I come to enjoy the food at La Finca de Susanna or a good cerveza con limón.  It’s also great to know people in the city, so they can take you to El Rastro on Sunday morning for the best flea market shopping in the world. Or to a street full of Irish pubs for a pint of Magners. Or even just some some leisurely midweek shopping.

It has definitely crossed my mind, to move to Madrid after graduation and teach ESL for the rest of my life (see earlier post) After talking with the English teachers from Red Leaf who live in Spain and teach English, the lifestyle seems pretty good and they really enjoy it.

I’ll miss Spain for the next few weeks, but I’ll be back for one last night before heading home to Canada on September 1st.

The More You Teach the More You Learn

Everytime you get in front of a class you are there to impart some of your knowledge to the students, yet they always seem to teach you something at the same time – from swear words in a foreign language, to reminding you to have something prepared in case they finish early or new games to play. The kids here here in Alba are so much better behaved and really want to learn English compared with the spoiled rich kids I had in Pueyo. It makes coming to class a pleasure.

There are definitely some days that I consider permanently becoming a travelling ESL teacher for life. Everyday would be an adventure, something new and exciting - certainly no ”metro, boulot, dodo” existence. I could see the world and do something I love. But then there are the days when I have to deal with little shits for students, who just ruin it for everyone else. On those days I just want to give up teaching and never deal with kids again. That’s why I think if I take a break after undergrad for a year to teach it will be the best of both worlds. A short break to feel rested and refreshed before going back to ‘real life’ and getting a ‘real job’!

Adorable Alba

I am now in Alba de Tormes, a small town just south of Salamanca. It takes about 20 mins by car. It is wonderful – mostly because we only have 55 kids and not 93. Most of the staff that was working in Pueyo is working here in Alba as well, so we are having some great laughs. We are staying in a monastery called San Jeronimo. it is a very old building complete with a bell tower that is falling apart. In the mornings I teach multimedia (computers) and diary time and in the afternoons, I supervise activities at the pool and kayaking. One of the advantages of doing 2 camps is that by now I can come up with activities instantly – it’s almost instantaneous. I’m tired from working hard, but I am having a blast and am exploring a new part of Spain (Castilla y Leon). I’m still looking for a job for August, but worst case I will travel in Eastern Europe for a month! Stay tuned for pictures