A Road Map

Since I've written quite a few retrospective blogs in a short space of time, and since Blogspot publishes them in reverse-chronological order, which I find a bit confusing, I decided to make this guide to the things that have happened recently, with links to the corresponding blog posts. Just click on the word that's bigger than the rest in each line to go to the corresponding post!

1. Natalie and I took a trip to Segovia
2. There was a general education strike and a manifestation/protest march
3. We celebrated Halloween at my school
4. I went on a field trip with the 5th and 6th grade classes
5. I took Charlene to many different places all around Madrid
6. Charlene, Amanda and I went on a day trip to Ávila
7. I've been spending more time in Malasaña, a neighborhood which is playfully referred to as the "Brooklyn" of Madrid

Malasaña: Hipsters, Hare Krishna and Pianos

Recently, I have been spending more and more time in a neighborhood called Malasaña, and it's quickly becoming one of my favorite parts of the city. Although it is right next to the neighborhood I lived in during my last stay in Madrid, and not too far from my current house, I somehow had never managed to really acquaint myself with the area before. 

Malasaña is fondly called the Brooklyn of Madrid by many people here. It is full of trendy bars, cafés, boutiques and bookshops that each have their own unique and elaborate decorations. Some of them have themes - American-style bakeries, Parisian-style cafés, Mexican-style bar/restaurants - and some of them are just eclectic mixes of different styles. Each of them looks like it was made explicitly to be Instagrammed.

The area also has a good deal of history. One of its main plazas is called the Plaza del Dos de Mayo, or Plaza of May Second, because it housed the artillery barracks during an uprising by the people of Madrid in 1808 against Napoleon and the French army, who had been occupying the city for more than a month. In fact, the whole neighborhood's name is taken from Manuela Malasaña, considered a heroine (or perhaps more of a martyr) of this battle because she was executed by French troops in the aftermath of the revolt.

A statue in the Plaza Dos de Mayo

Speaking of military history, there is also a giant complex at the edge of Malasaña that once housed the royal military barracks, and which has now been converted into a cultural center. Inside, there are concert halls, a contemporary art museum, special public archives, and a public library. This last was of particular interest to me, because the library apparently specializes in musical resources and actually has a few practice rooms, some of which even have pianos!

The street entrance of the Centro Cultural Conde Duque

The interior courtyard of the Centro Cultural Conde Duque

Unfortunately, the piano rooms are nearly impossible to reserve, because whoever signs up gets to keep their registration for an entire year and then renew it! The only way you could possibly get a spot would be if someone moved, died OR failed to show up during their appointed time. For every absence, they give you a penalty, and after a certain number of penalties they take the room away from you. But the man said that this does not happen terribly often. However, they did say that if I came by and there happened to be a room available, I would be welcome to play until the person who had reserved it should show up. 

To our great luck, one day my friend Natalie and I were in the area anyway and decided to check it out, and there was indeed a room available! Needless to say, we were both thrilled to be playing again, and actually got to stay for about an hour without getting kicked out (Natalie actually majored in Music Technology and Pedagogy!).

Playing the piano in the library

One other awesome - albeit somewhat random - experience which we had in Malasaña involved the ubiquitous and universally generous Hare Krishna. Just like the Hare Krishna group which gives out free food to penny-pinching college students every Thursday on UNC's campus, there is a Hare Krishna group here with a restaurant/temple combo where they serve delicious food. It isn't free, but it is very cheap - only 6€ - and they give you massive portions; on top of which, you're welcome to come back for more! It is without a doubt the best value meal I've had in Madrid.

And yet, the great value of the meal was only half of what made the experience so unique. We arrived early because we had read a review online saying that it would get crowded quickly; but we were so early that they had not even started serving yet, and were instead about to do some chanting in preparation for the meal. Since we were already there, we figured, "Why not?", took a seat on a cushion on the floor, and joined in as the devotees chanted their songs - which are not difficult to learn - to the accompaniment of harmonium, drums and bells. It was actually surprisingly calming and soothing! 

As with all Hare Krishna I've ever met, everyone was really friendly. We talked with a Spanish mother and son who sat down at the table with us while we were eating, and it turned out that they had lived in Atlanta for a while! It really is a small world after all.

Ávila

While Charlene was here, she and my friend Amanda (who also went to UNC) and I took a day trip to Ávila, a small town near Madrid with lots of history. Apparently its "heyday" or Golden Age was in the 15th century, and it has been a sleepy city ever since. Thanks to this, many of the buildings from this era are still extremely well preserved. It's 12th-century fortified walls still surround the historic center of the city, which contains many old buildings, from a large cathedral to a Roman-style basilica, all from the 14th or 15th centuries.

One of the largest gates into the historic town center

Part of Ávila's medieval walls

Cathedral of Ávila

Roman-style Basilica

Interior of the Basilica

What's more, the city is built atop a hill, so when you go to the edge and look out, the views are pretty spectacular, with blue mountains rising in the distance. The train ride from Madrid was one of the most beautiful trips I've ever taken.

View from the edge of the city

Ávila is most famous for being the birthplace of Saint Theresa, who was a very important figure in the Spanish Renaissance, writing a great number of mystical texts about her intensely passionate religious feelings. There are therefore many churches and monasteries which were in some way related to or influenced by Theresa.

An altar to Saint Theresa in the cathedral

A picture of one of Saint Theresa's mystical visions - being pierced by the arrow of Christ's love

A church built adjacent to the house where Saint Theresa grew up

Ávila is also well-known for its sweets and desserts, especially one called yema. Yema simply means (egg) yolk, which is intuitively its main ingredient. It has a texture somewhere between marzipan and merengue and is very dense and sweet. I thought it was delicious! But I was even more excited when we found another monastery a bit outside of the city center (thanks to my Smart Phone) which sold treats made by nuns. They had some called Corazones de Santa Teresa, or Hearts of Saint Theresa. According to the box, they are a mixture of marzipan, yema and pine nuts. It is impossible to describe their flavor, but they were - pun intended - truly divine!

The yema (right) and another almond cookie

Saint Theresa's heart(s) - perhaps my favorite nun treats so far!

Charlene's Visit

At the very end of October, my friend Charlene came to visit me for about a week and a half. For those of you who do not know her, Charlene has been one of my best friends since high school - we met at Science & Math - and was also one of my house mates during my last two years of college. She is currently doing the same sort of English-teaching program in France, and was able to get a pretty cheap ticket to Madrid during the ridiculous two-week break which she had from work!

Visiting the Plaza Mayor

It was great having Charlene visit, for a number of reasons. Obviously, it was really nice to be with one of my very best friends - someone who truly knows me and has known me for a very long time. I have many friends here and a few very close ones, but there's just nothing like those relationships that have developed and grown over a long period of time.

It was also great showing her around the city. She works in a very small town in France, so she was already easily impressed by all of the big-city wonders of Madrid. I enjoyed seeing the city through her eyes for a bit, since my time living here has made me overlook a lot of Madrid's small charms and take its beauty for granted.

Watching the sunset from the Egyptian temple

We managed to see a lot in the short time she was here. Here are a smattering of our adventures:

Museo Cerralbo

This was a really neat house museum that I had never even been to before!

100 Montaditos

We went for drinks/tapas at the very cheap and very popular chain restaurant "100 Montaditos," or "100 Little Sandwiches." If you are a young person in Madrid, this is a more or less obligatory stop on the list of things to do in Spain!

Nun Treats

I took Charlene to a convent in Madrid that is right in the heart of the tourist district, yet incredibly well-hidden in a tiny plaza off a small cobblestone street. The nuns there make delicious sweets - mostly cookies - which you can buy. While the food is excellent, it's really the process of obtaining it that makes the experience. Beside the closed door is a buzzer like the ones you see on apartment buildings where you have to ring to be let in. Except instead of listing different apartment numbers, this one says, "Priests/Nuns." So we buzzed the nuns.

After much buzzing, when the (not particularly friendly) nuns answer the door in rapid-fire Spanish, you ask if you can come in to buy dulces, or sweets. They will let you in and, after walking through a rather confusing courtyard, you go down a narrow hallway where you find a turntable with a sort of menu next to it showing the different treats available. You tell them through the wall what you want and they send it around the turntable; then you put your money on and send it back around. The sweets are delicious and the experience is unforgettable!

Another wonderful thing about having Charlene here was that she got me to try a lot of new things and explore a lot of new places. This even applied to things as simple as going to a different grocery store, which I had never done simply out of habit and because it was a tiny bit farther away from my house. We tried new restaurants, went out dancing at new clubs and walked through parts of the city I had never visited. Leave it to Charlene, who is all about trying new things and having new experiences, to push me out of my boring routine and into new situations! I'm so glad she was able to come and visit, and especially that she got to stay for so long!

Field Trip to Valdemingómez

The day after we put on Halloween shenanigans for the kids, I got to accompany one of the 5th and 6th year classes on a field trip just outside of Madrid! While the kids were not particularly thrilled about this trip - which was to a recycling center - I was excited about riding in a bus and maybe seeing a different side of the city. And the trip did not disappoint!

Valdemingómez itself was obviously not that interesting. It could have been, if they had actually told us more information and if I had been able to talk to them and find out more about different things - the recycling process, etc. - but they already had a rather juvenile program planned with a video and some games that, even for the kids, were not particularly stimulating.

The kids playing a game at the recycling center

What was truly fascinating (to me) about the experience was, indeed, riding on the charter bus. When we were almost to Valdemingómez I decided to get out my phone and see whereabouts the city we were. I was completely taken aback when I saw that we were in a part of the suburbs which I had always thought was incredibly far away. And it's true that, by metro, it would have taken nearly an hour to get there; but by bus it took right around twenty minutes!

Some pictures around the center!

This didn't turn out super well, but the center was up on a hill and actually had quite nice views of some mountains off in the distance

This just really gave me a new perspective on how big Madrid really isn't. While there are a ton of people in its greater metropolitan area - 6.5 million and counting -  you can drive almost all the way across the main part of the city in under thirty minutes! It just reminds you how much more compact everything is in Europe as compared to the sprawling nature of many cities in the U.S.

Here is a map I made showing a few things around the city and where they are in relation to one another.

Halloween

Although Halloween is obviously not historically a very important holiday in Spain - or much of Europe, for that matter - it has been gaining popularity here over the past years thanks to the influence of American media and pop culture. It was still, sadly for us, a far cry from Halloween back in the states, but we had fun nevertheless!

Perhaps the best part were the Halloween celebrations we had at my school. The coordinator told us we could do what the other assistants had done in the past and decorate one of the classrooms with some paper pumpkins, laminated skulls, cardboard ghosts, and other fun decorations they provided, and then prepare some spooky-themed activities to do with each grade level. While the kids were apparently not allowed to dress up, we came in costume, and our coordinator gave us candy to hand out when the kids first arrived.

Charlene wanted to come in and help out, which was awesome, because she had some great game ideas and, since the kids were completely out of control, it was helpful to have an extra person to try and keep them in line!

When the kids first came in, I was hiding behind a fake coffin in the corner of the room and Charlene and Katherine (the other assistant at my school) told them a ghost story about how we had all been at school late the night before, decorating the Halloween room, but that I had decided to stay after the rest of them left. The neighbors had then heard strange noises and seen weird flashes of light, and when they got there this morning, they hadn't been able to find me...

At that point, I started shaking the coffin and knocking on the chalkboard, and then sprang out in my bird mask shrieking at the petrified children. Some of them jumped back a foot on the mat to get away from me and were shrieking in genuine terror. It was hilarious!!!

The rest of the activities were much more harmless - watching videos from Youtube, playing games that involved moving like zombies, ghosts, cats or witches until the music stopped and you had to freeze. I was sad before Halloween came because I figured I'd be missing out on all of the festivities and decorations that make up the Halloween spirit in the States, so getting to do this was a wonderful treat! It also brought back many memories of the joy of being a kid during Halloween in the States.

So Many Strikes

Over the past few weeks, there have been a number of strikes by workers in different public sectors. The transit workers were on strike last week, and the street cleaners are on strike this week, which has shown how frighteningly disgusting Madrid would be if no one were out there emptying public trash cans and cleaning off the sidewalks every day.

Really hoping the street-cleaners' strike ends soon!

In addition, the day Charlene arrived, it just so happened that there was a general educational strike going on throughout Spain. I still had to go into work, but only two full-time teachers and three administrators showed up. The whole thing was so well-organized that they even sent home notes with the kids requesting that their parents not send them to school that day, and indeed only about thirty kids showed up from all of the grades combined. Needless to say, it was a pretty easy day - we just had to keep all of the kids entertained and occupied.

The goal of the strike was to impede the passing of a new law which had been proposed to revamp public education in Spain. I'm still not 100% sure what all the law was intended to do, but some of the things I heard were:

• Making [Catholic] religion mandatory in public schools (it's currently optional)

• Imposing even more drastic budget cuts on the public school systems, which have already suffered severe cuts over the past few years

• Apparently initiating a new style of teaching which encourages competition, partly by instituting more rigorous end-of-year testing at the end of every grade level

Essentially, EVERYBODY is extremely opposed to this law, and so much so that another stipulated goal of the strike was to force the current minister of education, José Ignacio Wert, to resign.

In conjunction with the strike, there was also a protest march later in the evening, which happened to commence on a main avenue not far from my house...

As soon as Charlene arrived, we dropped her stuff at my place and headed down to join the march. It was actually kind of fun - instead of acting super bitter and angry, most people just seemed to be enjoying coming together to support a common cause. Lots of school groups seemed to have met up beforehand in order to march together, shouting slogans they had prepared against the government and for better education. We wound up behind a group of people playing upbeat riffs on marching-band style drums. This was the first protest I've ever been a part of, and it was certainly an interesting experience!