So little working hours but yet so busy

Well, it has been about a month and haven't sat down to write a blog. So here it goes. I am really enjoying my time here in Logrono. Everybody here is in more of a routine and time just keeps flying by faster than ever. Each week seems to get done faster than the next.

Here is a typical week for me here. On Mondays, Ben and I don't have classes so we are either gone on vacation or taking a nice day to relax. On Tuesdays, I start class at 9:00 am at the Primary School. Each Tuesday I have different age groups each hour. I sometimes get very confused on how old all the different classes are. Also, at that school I work with the ages of 3 - 12 year olds. The three year olds love to repeat what I say even though they have no clue what I am even saying. I guess I must be kind of interesting, new and different to look at. I work from 9:00-11:00, 11:30 - 12:30 and again at 3:00 - 4:00. They take very long lunch breaks at the Primary Schools.

On Tuesday evenings I tutor two different families. I tutor a 6 year old boy and an 8 year old girl from 6:25 - 7:25 PM. I then walk across the street to go tutor two boys ages 8 and 13 years old from 7:30 - 8:30 PM. Tuesdays are my super long work day!

On Wednesdays I start my week at the Institute (or high school level kids). I work on Wednesdays from 12:10 - 2:25. It is 3 different classes but yet it feels like so long to teach. I guess being at the high school age means it is not cool to want to learn English from an American.

Every Wednesday afternoon from 4:00 - 5:00 I tutor a 13 year old boy Pablo. He is very easy to tutor and is even willing to walk to our apartment so that I don't have to walk very far twice on Wednesdays.

Thursdays I work from 8:30 - 1:30 PM at the Institute. I have two classes of 16-17 year olds and two classes of 15-16 year olds. Fridays I work from 10:45 AM until 1:30 PM.

Even though I work only 12 hours a week and tutor for 3 extra hours I seem to keep myself very occupied. I love to go shopping at the local supermarket to find good deals on food, trying the local food, taking walks around the city, watching and learning new things on Spanish television, and also meeting up with friends for coffee with milk (cafe con leche). I also have to make time to do the necessary laundry most weeks. Saturday and Sundays we try to go discover something new in the city or travel around Spain.

This past Saturday night we went out with friends and I realized that I sometimes don't match what the people are wearing here. I was told that my cute gloves I wear in North Dakota look like big oven mitts and that my 'cool' shoes from North Dakota look great for hiking in snow in the winter in North Dakota. So after hearing that, I decided to venture out this morning and find new shoes! I bought a cute new pair of shoes that I can wear. They were on sale for 12 Euros which is about 18 US dollars. They are sure not like my good old brown boots I have been wearing for the past 2 months here that I love so much! I have decided that I am going to spend a little extra money here on the clothes and shoes. Those are some things that are specialties here in Spain.

On November 2 - 5 Ben and I went to San Sebastian. It is a city on the northern coast of Spain about 2 hours away from Logrono. It has very beautiful beaches and I hear it is super crowded during the summer months. Unfortunately when we went it was too cold and cloudy to enjoy the beach. The cloudy weather though did make for great photos and we were able to explore around the city a lot. San Sebastian and the northern area of Spain is known for their political demonstrations. During a climb up a mountain to see a huge monument of Christ we were able to see one of the demonstrations from far away. You will see a photo I took of it below. It was very loud even from that far away. I have posted some more photos from San Sebastian on the blog if you click on the link to the left. Here are a few that I really like from San Sebastian... Hasta luego!