Working in BCN:

Well, where do I start about working in BCN? I’ll start with the FACT that no one in BCN works. People get up later than Americans by far and then they have this two hours siesta/nap/long ass lunch thing every day that they do decide to actually go into to work. I start my work day at 2pm in the afternoon at a business called Kone. I believe they make and sell elevators or something like that. Side blip: Marc told me that in the near future like say 10-15 years every household and business will have to have a lift/elevator and the city is fronting the bill. This is a huge deal here because old people don’t die (I’ll get into that later) and the buildings are so old and tall and it’s going to be quite a feat to equip every business. Back to it. Mondays and Wednesday I have 3-4 women who are pre-intermediate which means nothing but they know some vocab, some grammar, and cannot speak to me conversationally. The women are nice but this is their break/siesta time and they much rather talk in Spanish or Catalan then listen to me rattle on about countable and uncountable nouns. On Tuesday s and Thursdays I have pre-beginner which means they said in their own Spanglish way “we are on level zero but below.” Actually they were saying zero in Spanish and pointing below the table and pointing to themselves. One of my first lessons I was assessing their level and I played the game I Like…, I don’t Like… and the one older gentleman said he liked mas mas mas mas mas woman. I corrected him and said if he liked that many chicas then they were called women not woman! He also let me know that he didn’t like men. That class went well. Next class we we’re practicing adjectives and the word pretty was taught during the lesson. Another older man in the class looked at me and said como se dice professor en Ingles…I said teacher. He went on to tell the class and myself that “The teacher of English is pretty.” It was funny the first ten times but when him and fathertime kept at it I was about to lose it…then the class was over! Adios. My classes are only an hour and the people are usually late because time in BCN doesn’t exist (again later discussion) so even if I have a shit class it’s over before I know it. At night I go to people’s homes and teach their children and some of the parents. Mom asked me, “Don’t you feel weird going in to someone’s house and teaching and then walking out with money?” At first I was like this is sort of weird but as soon as those Euros hit my lil fingers it was no longer weird! The kids I have all differ in ability but are around the same age s; age 5-11. I swear I have a 5 year old genius girl Imma (pronounced EEEEmmma). She was doing her colors and reading and writing when her mom came in the kitchen and informed me that her daughter cannot read yet…but she was reading and writing for me. Anyways, the kids are all angels and they are so cute I could eat them with a spoon. The parents are all very nice and the ones I teach really want to learn which is refreshing and rewarding. Having that horrible 8-6 job at home was so daunting with no rewards and I definitely think this is more rewarding, but hell it’s a lot of work. Lesson plans don’t write themselves and pictures of all the Barca football players don’t cut themselves out of newspapers and magazines. I always knew my parents had hard jobs being teachers but you can’t really understand until you’ve done it. Tomorrow I start with a new family of two girls one 5 and one 7 who speak not one word of English so I bet I’ll add another section tomorrow night entitled something like oh shit, kill me, I hate kids, or what the Hell is high school musical??!!