Edinburgh is fantastic. I can’t articulate how nice it is to be back in an English speaking country, and to be catching up with one of my girl friends from Cadiz. Last Wednesday might have been the busiest day of my life. Being either masochistic or slightly neurotic, or a mix of both, I set my alarm two hours early in order to run through my checklist before leaving for work. The first bullet point on that checklist is my passport. Although I am quite organized, I have this habit of hiding things from myself out of fear of losing them. I write the whereabouts of these things on a note somewhere and then misplace the note, subsequently losing everything. Money, checkbooks, keys and my passport fall into this category, and I hide them in forms similar to the matryoshka doll. Envelope inside of box inside of bag inside of pocket inside of suitcase is where I found my passport. Needless to say my system sucks because my suitcase was the last place I thought to look for my passport. And believe you me, it was stressful. I even checked under my mattress, as if I were hiding a snickers at fat camp. “Nik, you weren’t robbed, you were looking for your passport,” the note I should have left myself for when I return home.
Sporting 5 different layers of clothing and feeling more like a hobo than a traveler, I made my way to work, excited for Christmas caroling with my students. The only problem was that I didn’t coordinate with the teachers ahead of time about which class I would be walking through Barbera with. Thinking it was a safe assumption to meet with ciclo medio (the middle aged students in primary school), I waited at the train station for them to arrive at their scheduled time. Seven trains and forty-five minutes later, I deemed it safe to assume their plans had changed. Unfortunately none of the other teachers gave me a heads up about this change in plan, which really disappointed me because I missed all of the Christmas fun and instead came to the school seeing everyone returning early. Following this let down, I got to help parents and teacher aides put together trays of chocolate and sweets for the students and visiting parents, which was hilarious. The Spanish are really into a drink that they call “chocolate,” which is a sludgy, thick mixture that they also dip sweet breads into. The dessert itself is overrated, but imagine putting together trays of chocolate and sweet bread for 1000 people; chaos. At one point we misplaced a large container of chocolate and thought that the sixth graders wouldn’t be getting any.
Following caroling and chocolate drinking, I went around to different classes, wishing all of the students a Merry Christmas. Everyone was so cute with their matching “Escola Elisa Badia” (“Elisa Badia Primary School”) hats and telling me how they were going to spend their holiday vacation. “I’m going to egg houses,” confided Jorge, one of my rambunctious sixth graders, who ironically spent the previous afternoon with the Director (Principal) of the school for bad behavior.
Then the teachers had their Christmas party. We all ate lunch in the theatre, celebrating the holidays with champagne/cava, beer, wine, and sweets. It was a really fantastic lunch and a lot of fun. I received a naked fireman calendar in the invisible Santa gift exchange, which is the coolest gift I’ve ever received in a gift exchange haha. Marta and I put on a small show for the teachers, “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” but in Catalan so I could show off what I’ve learned here in Catalonia. As a prize, Marta gave me a caganer, the figure in the Catalonian nativity scene, of a shephard defecating. Best prize ever.
I left the party early, but in my defense I attended the party for four hours. I ran home to Barcelona to catch a bus to the airport so I could celebrate the holidays in Scotland and I'm not sure that I'll be ready to go back to Barcelona on Wednesday. It's really beautiful here in Edinburgh, minus the persnickety thirteen year olds toting Louis Vuitton handbags.
ITINERARY/RECEIPT - All times are local.
GOING OUT
From Barcelona (BCN) to Edinburgh (EDI)
Wed, 22Dec10 Flight FR6267 Depart BCN at 21:35 and arrive EDI at 23:10
COMING BACK
From Edinburgh (EDI) to Barcelona (BCN) Wed, 29Dec10 Flight FR6266 Depart EDI at 17:25 and arrive BCN at 21:00
