TEFLees in Spain

The story begins at 2:15 on a Friday evening with me enjoying some cocktails at a friend’s Christmas party on the last weekend before break. While in the depths of what was most certainly a deep, intellectual conversation (screaming over the music), my phone rang.

“Charles!” I answered. “Ca va, mi ami?”

“Hi Matt. I think we’re downstairs from your party. Can you come get us? We’re in the metro, waiting.”

Puzzled as I was to why my roommate would wait inside the actual metro so late at night, I shrugged it off merely as another quirky Frenchism and hustled my way down. Being that the metro closes at 1:30 however, it came as no surprise when I soon found myself standing alone inside lavapies station – not a passenger, worker, or Frenchman in sight.

“Here, Frenchie, Frenchie, Frenchie,” I whistled, expecting Charles to hop out from around the corner. Yet irritatingly enough, the only response to my calls was an echoing of my voice throughout the eerily empty station. Assuming that Charles must have no doubt been mistaken with his English prepositions again, I figured he was probably just waiting outside somewhere, so I headed back towards the stairs.

Much to my horror though, I’d arrived at the exit just in time to watch in slow motion as the automatic gate click closed, blocking my only way out and shutting me inside, alone. So sensibly, I did the only thing one could do in such a situation: I grabbed the bars of the gate like a crazed inmate and from my underground prison, started yelling frantically at the passersby above, “Ayuda! Ayuda! AYUDA!” Though mostly ignored by the majority, I did at least manage to startle one couple into stopping. But instead of aiding in my escape, they just cocked their heads curiously like confused cocker spaniels, studying me as if I were an exotic beast in some bizarre zoo exhibit. “Oh look, honey - what a peculiar American! Notice how he shakes the bars and makes those grunting sounds. Do you have a quarter so we can throw him some peanuts?”

Realizing that this method was obviously doomed to fail, I stepped away from the gate, took a second to gather my thoughts, and moved on to plan B: find the other exit. Unfortunately, as I soon to discovered, the lavapies metro was made with only one entrance, so around every turned corner was a dead end. On the up side though, the lights were still on, I had the whole station to myself, and if worse came to worse, I figured I could just take a short jog down the tunnel to the next stop a kilometer away. Ridiculous, yes, but after several hours on the sauce, this is actually what I thought. Scary, I know.

As I wrote on a previous post, it’s inevitable that after half a year, unless you’re either a heartless savage or a stoic, you start becoming close to your students. And like I’ve tried to convey through most of my blogs, nearly all the times you share together during class are good. We laugh a lot, share travel plans, weekend stories, and family photos. We discuss politics, world news, and last night’s Real Madrid match. Usually, it’s all casual and fun. Usually.

So it came as an unwelcome surprise when this morning, one of my favorite students came in looking rather long in the face. “How was your weekend?” I asked meekly, hoping that what I at first glance deemed to be pain in his eyes was mistaken instead for midweek sleep deprivation.

“Not good,” he confessed with typical Spanish bluntness. “I was all day in the eye clinic with my wife. Many, many hours we waited. And many times the doctor made examinations of my eyes.”

Sitting quietly and not wanting to interrupt with corrections, I leaned in closer as an example of my attentiveness, and let him continue.

“The doctor, he say me that I must to have operation for transplant in the eyes, but this is very expensive. If I can’t pay, then in some years I will lose – how do you say?” he asked, gesturing with open hands around his eyes.

“Sight?”

“Yes. I will lose my sight,” he repeated, his face working to hold back tears, as if saying it aloud had all of a sudden made it real to him all over again. Not knowing what to say, caught off guard through my yawning and crabby early morning half consciousness, my heart now somewhere in my shoes, I was at a loss for words. Carlos? Go blind? How do you comfort someone who will lose their sight? What do you say? It’s OK? At least you’ll have the rest of your senses? Carlos is one of the most genuine, friendly, and cheerful students I have – this was the first time I’d ever seen him without a smile. What do I say? Still a bit tongue tied, I realized that there was nothing really to do but express my heartfelt regret.

“I’m so sorry Carlos!” I replied with meaning. What else was there to do? We continued on with the day’s lesson eventually, and he did perk up a bit by the end, but throughout the class and onto the rest of the day I couldn’t stop thinking that for all my complaining, pet peeves, and minor annoyances, I have it pretty good, living here. I’ve got my health, a steady job, and plenty of friends to pass the time with. I’ve got one mouth to feed – my own – as opposed to Carlos with two children. Humbled, I realized that my Monday morning moodiness fits nowhere into the grand scale of struggles, and just how much teaching English can have its way of putting things into perspective.

Another highlight of the castle was its store of rescued armory artifacts. Two rooms at its far end served to display various full bodied suits of armor, stainless steel swords and arrows, iron cast corroding cannon carcasses, and glass box displays of expertly crafted cross bows and antique archery equipment. As fascinated as all these weapons of war were to examine, it was eerie to think how many lives had been taken at the expense of their sharpened tips, and difficult to imagine trying to fight hand to hand not only while encaged in a constricting shell of clamorous, clanking metal, but to simply see anything at all through the narrow slits of the knights’ enormously globular helmets. The shadows of late afternoon were starting to stretch longer though, and so it was with a determinedly devout demonstration of self restraint that I begrudgingly obeyed the “NO TOCAR” signs pasted all over creation and turned to the exit – head down, hands in pockets, and ready for the last leg of our castle tour.

For the perfect punctuation to this picturesque day, we wound our way up the 152 spiraling stairs to the tower’s top terrace where we could see for miles on every side – a truly panoramic piece of optical opulence. To the south and west, a quiet village nestled itself cozily into the hills like a blanketed infant in sound slumber; to the north and east, a sleepy river snaked through thickets of trees, past the walls of Segovia’s town limits, and upwards towards the mountains; and everywhere we turned the landscape was awash in the glowing warmth of golden sunshine. While we stood taking it all in and regretting the advancing short hand of the ever-impatient clock, a light breeze carrying with it the springtime scent of budding blossoms played winsomely at our flapping shirt sleeves as we wistfully watched the shadows of a sinking Spanish sun deepen like puddles of twilight in a summer squall, splashing navy blue tiger stripes across the countryside and bringing with them the close of another beautiful Iberian afternoon.

All in all it was a perfect day. I was sad to say goodbye to Segovia, my new favorite neighbor, but thanks to Spain’s increasingly efficient system of high speed railways, it’s little less than a stone’s throw away. And although I won’t be making monthly visits, I can at least take comfort in knowing that whether I’m homesick for green grass and fresh air or just hungry for some roasted piglet, Segovia, like its aqueduct has proven, isn’t going anywhere any time soon.

The supposed inspiration for Disney’s Magic Kingdom Castle, the Alcazar was built on quite an impressive location. Sitting atop a cliff at the highest point in town, the castle perches protectively over its kingdom like a mother grizzly watching her cubs. The surrounding hamlets and hillocks seemed to be bowing towards the Alcazar as well, and it was almost as if the very land itself was sculpted for the sole purpose of paying it homage.

When we crossed the drawbridge over the dried up mote and entered the castle gates, I couldn’t help but feeling that I was walking through a portal into another time, and it was easy for the child-soldier in me to imagine being suited in armor atop a trusty steed, my battle-bloodied blade victoriously sheathed, returning home with honor after a successful conquest in the name of the king.

I was a bit disappointed to learn however, that this castle, like so many other Spanish landmarks, had been badly burnt during one of Spain’s numerous wars, and was now just a partially rebuilt replica of what it used to be. The outside at least, along with many artifacts, had managed to have been salvaged somehow, and although the inside did contain slight twinges of modern masonry, the time-traveling effect still remained on in full force.

Our view from the castle windows looking out over the red roofs of the village below was enough to cause temporary amnesia of this fact however, and the thrones and tapestries remained well preserved, too. The antique furniture and tiny suits of armor on display served as a comical reminder of how small people used to be in those times as well, and I laughed to think that the war heroes of yesteryear only came up to my chest. If only I’d been born a few hundred years earlier – too small to make it in the world of pro sports today, I could have easily been a battle proven warrior back then – knighted by the king, sending enemies of the throne into knee-knocking fits of trembling terror, and causing unsuspecting señoritas to swoon with a smile.

So we headed away from the aqueduct, pictures snapped and memories logged, in the direction of Segovia’s ancient cathedral. The gently sloping uphill walk took only about ten minutes or so, and we shortly found ourselves shivering in the damp darkness of the cavernous cathedral hall. Now, no matter how many cathedrals I’ve visited during my European conquests, the shear enormity of their size never ceases to amaze me. As I stood, neck craning and eyes squinting to make out the faint figures depicted on its many altitudinous apertures, I figured that from front to back, minus the gigantic choir lofts and pulpits occupying its center space, one could play a proper game of full-contact football, or at a stretch, a pickup game of summer stickball. Aside from these pre-modern Megadome fantasies, I took in the glowing golden altarpieces and intricately carved capillas, imagining with wonder the amount of time and money that must have gone into such a construction. If we’d taken just five seconds to examine each piece of artwork, I’d probably still be there today – no doubt jobless, dehydrated, and certainly not writing about it for your intellectual enjoyment. Regardless, we wandered around freezing through our t-shirts for about an hour or so before deciding to listen to our growling stomachs that it was finally time for our long awaited first taste of Segovia’s specialty: roast suckling pig, or cuchinillo.

To many this may seem a cruel endeavor, the slaughtering of innocent infant animals. My apologies to PETA. But to me, baby animals, adult animals, raw animals, small animals, fluffy animals, fried animals, happy animals, sad animals – everyone’s welcome to the palate party. My taste buds don’t discriminate. A bit barbaric, yes – but I’m an omnivore, damn it – all of the above simply spell delicious, and cuchinillo, the Spanish delicacy that I’ve for so long seen devoured by TV hosts on travel programs back home, was certainly worth the hype. Cute? I guess. Cuddly? Perhaps. Tasty? You bet your shorts. Would I like to pet one before I eat it? Well, let’s not get carried away, but we did have some laughs over the idea of a cuchinillo petting zoo before the meal was served. And when the food finally did arrive, it took all I had to keep from going face to plate like a county fair contestant in the no-hands pie race. It was therefore with a well-mannered exercise of sophisticated self control that, cutlery wielded and ready, I ignored the guilty gut pangs in my gullet and mother’s sorrow-sick sighs of sympathy, and, putting knife to piglet, crunched through. What ensued was a Graceland of gourmet goodness; a flavor phenomenon of paradisiacal proportions; in essence, the pinnacle of pork-dom on earth: an outer layer of crispy, khaki-colored skin giving way to a succulently savory, slightly salty white meat center; altogether so tender and delicate that the grinning camareros who quartered it tableside were able to do so using only the blunt edge of a dinner plate. It was a no holds barred display of carnivorous corpulence; a whizzing whirlwind of fork to mouth fiendery; the one negative about this delectable delight being that it had most certainly ended too soon. I could’ve eaten more – much more, and it saddens my heart (but not my waistline) to know that cuchinillo isn’t something I can order every day at my corner-side café. Regardless of this post-coital-like comedown, we dabbed satisfactorily at the corners of our now mollified mandibles, regrouped once again, and continued on to the day’s last destination: Segovia’s Alcazar.

One of the great things about this city, as any true gato can attest, is its central location and ease of access to surrounding small town tourist day trips. Although I haven’t exactly made the most of this opportunity (as it’s taken me the better part of a year to simply cross over to the other side of Madrid’s mountains), I’ll refrain from cursing myself for such procrastinations, and instead say that if anything it was well worth the wait. And while the arid landscape of central Spain has offered little exploratory motivation with its sullenness of sandy scenery, as I discovered last weekend when my folks came to visit, the grass is actually greener on the other side – of the mountains at least – and luckily for us madrileños, it’s only a hop, skip, and jump away.

So what lies beyond yonder hills? Well, Segovia, of course. Typically mentioned in the same breath as its twin daytrip counterpart Toledo, Segovia is a medieval island in a sea of green, with snowy mountain peaks looming quietly in the distance.

Not quite as closed in and quiet as the dark alleys of Toledo, Segovia’s airy streets were bustling with the comings and goings of tourists and locals alike upon our arrival; all life emanating outward from its pulsing center: the ancient Roman aqueduct. Now, I’d heard from people before about the “majesty and magnificence” of this freestanding architectural wonder, but I always shrugged it off as euphoria-induced, touristy hype. What could be so impressive about an aqueduct? Big deal – they had plumbing. Congratulations, Segovia. I bet you didn’t even have hot water. Your water pressure was probably rubbish as well, and I don’t even want to think about your filtration system. It’s not necessary to paint the whole picture, but let’s just say that that hunchbacked-dude who lived alone upstream at the top of the mountain is still laughing in his grave, so don’t get too cocky about it.

Cynicisms aside however, as soon as we stepped off the bus, we were, like a slap in the face, standing in the cool shadow of the aqueduct’s hundred foot high, multi-leveled stone façade. Staring down at us tauntingly and stretching off out of eyeshot in both directions, its smoothly symmetrical solid stone slabs seemed each to weigh a ton apiece as they rocketed impossibly upwards into the clear Segovian sky. The blocks were set so perfectly on this masterpiece of ancient engineering that I could do little more than stand, mouth agape, in perplexed amusement and deep thought. First of all, how much manual labor must it have taken to transport these massive quantities of raw rock? How precise must those cuts have been for it to withstand so many centuries of weather and wars? How’d they manage to keep the water constantly flowing so as to quench the thirst of the entire town? Whose big idea was this anyway? Little time was wasted in pondering these questions though – this was after all a day trip. The clock was ticking, our time was waning, and I still had a castle, a cathedral, and a cuchinillo to catch.

During the course at TT we learned about an interesting bit of terminology known as “first language interference,” or simply, “L-1 interference.” The definition identifies this phrase as the phenomenon created when a word in the student’s native language is wrongly confused with a word in the language they’re learning. It doesn’t have to be just a singular word however. It may be a phrase, an expression, a conjugated verb, or an idea as well.

For example, students regularly mistake their English prepositions in place of Spanish ones. “It depends of” instead of “it depends on.” “I have cold” instead of “I am cold.” “You laugh of me” in place of “You laugh at me.” Etc. etc. These are all classically common cases of L-1 interference that as an English teacher, summons up exhaustively redundant corrections that warrant at least two or three stress relieving pints at the end of the workweek.

In some cases however, these word confusions can be quite a bit more interesting, as happened today. While discussing the ever sensitive topic of religion, my students all agreed that the Catholic Church is looking at quite a bleak future.

“Religion causes many wars,” said one, to the consenting nods of the rest of the class.

“The church makes so much trouble with politics,” remarked another.

“Catholicism is helping to spread diseases all over the world,” the other student chimed in.

“How is it contributing to the spread of diseases?” I asked curiously.

“Because,” the student to my left explained, “of preservatives. They don’t have preservatives.”

“Preservatives?” I asked doubtfully.

“Yes, preservatives,” responded another student with confidence. “You can’t use preservatives and that is spreading AIDS and other diseases everywhere.”

“Also,” began another student, “when people get diseases the government has to pay the bill for their health care. That costs us all money!”

Preservatives? I wondered. So since Spanish food has no preservatives, does that mean I could get AIDS? I’ll never open another bag of Bimbo bread without fear again! Obviously, there had to be some kind of misunderstanding. Either that, or this was some type of common knowledge to which sometime during my education, I had somehow been left on the outside.

“What exactly do you mean preservatives?”

“Preservatives,” repeated the student to my right matter-of-factly as if I were an ignorant child, “for sex – so you don’t have babies.”

“Ohhhh,” it suddenly dawned on me, “the word in Spanish is preservativo, but in English it’s condom! There’s a big difference!”

It’s inevitable that after six months of classes I’ve started becoming pretty good friends with my students. This is my job however, so I do try and maintain a professional distance, but in reality, they come to class every day and we chat about our lives – pasts presents, and futures – and it’s nearly impossible to not become somewhat close after so many early mornings or dragging afternoons.

I’d like to think that my time with them is something they look forward to as a break in the monotony of their workweeks. This camaraderie is great for me, too. Sometimes if I’m having a bad day and it’s written all over my face, my students will just slyly suggest, “Let’s all go for a coffee instead of class!” and so we will. And always, despite my protests, they’ll pick up the bill. “No, no, no, Matt. It is our treat – we take you for coffee, it’s no big deal. Tranquilo!”

Another great thing about all these friendly feelings is the comfort level we have together. My students know their English isn’t perfect, and sometimes when they make mistakes we both feel okay about laughing at ourselves. I wrote a previous entry about the student who talked about killing ten bears in a weekend, but left out the conversation that followed which I thought was hysterical. After realizing that he’d meant birds and not bears, I went on to correct his pronunciation error.

“Jose Luis,” I managed through a fit of laughter, “it’s not bears, it’s birds,” I said slowly, enunciating the differences and pointing to my mouth to show him the different shapes to make for the correct pronunciation. “Say it with me now: birrrrrd.”

“Beeeeaaaar,” he repeated straight faced, looking me in the eye.

“No, that’s beeeeaaaar. Say birrrrrd.”

“Beeeeaaaaar,” he tried again, smiling.

“No,” I corrected, “Bird should sound like word. Try saying word for me.”

“Word.”

“Okay, now – birrrrd.”

“Beeeeaaaar!”

Barely able to hold back the laughter any longer, I shook my head and rubbed my face with both hands. “Jose Luis – it’s bird, with a “D.” Say it – birrrr-d.”

“Beeeaaaar-d.” He replied again, sending both of us finally into a fit of hysterics. “My pronunciation is horrible!” he then declared, making us laugh all the harder. After so many months of practice with this advanced student, it struck both of us as hilarious that at such a high level of English, he couldn’t say such a simple word correctly. I wouldn’t ever laugh at a low level student or any student for that matter – not out of spite at least. The thing about this was that I was laughing with him and not at him. And whereas Jose Luis may be able to give full on business presentations in nearly fluent English, he just can’t manage to get “bird” right.

Typing at my window this evening, I was struck with a sudden epiphany. You know that old saying about how you don’t really know what you got ‘till it’s gone? Well, I guess that’s true in some cases, but this has more to do with returning than leaving. As I was saying, while my fingers thundered over the keyboard, I was startled by the rapidly waxing sound of what initially sounding like the whup-whup-whupping cadence of a coming copter.

Turning to shield myself from this impending doom, I realized with a mix of disgust and relief that what I’d thought to be a helicopter was actually a pair of giant bats making a beeline for my open French doors, on a path straight for my head. As I raised my hands once again to block these rabid terrors I saw that they were, in fact, some other winged beast of Iberia.

Crouching back in my chair to keep a safe distance, I inspected them with kiddish curiosity. Midnight blue color. White racing striped wings. Fascinating beak-like protrusions where the faces should have been. Nervous twitchy hopping from their tree branch perches. Musical, whistling mating calls. Why do I feel like I’ve seen this before?

Memories of sunshine and flip flops started slowly coming back to mind, creeping in like the first thaw of – that’s it! Spring! Old Mr. Groundhog must certainly have seen his shadow this February after his long wintertime nap, and as the chirping birds and blooming flowers have now reminded me, the rest of Mother Nature is finally coming back to life as well.

The winds have retreated northwards, the clouds have thinned down to sparse wisps of distant white like the hairline of a 90 year old, and good ole Jack Frost has taken his nipping annoyances to the southern hemisphere, leaving us madrileños to enjoy our morning coffees under crystal skies and delightful Spanish sunshine.

You can see it in the people’s faces as well. Those typically terse old men behind the bar now serve up bocadillos with a twitching at the corner of their mouths that if you looked close enough, would almost trick your eyes into seeing the illusion of a smile. The people in the metro hustle around like the underside of an anthill, rushing to get outside into the sun. And, thanks be to heaven above, those tiny little “dogs,” or “rats with fur” as I prefer to call them, have finally shed those terribly tacky wintertime hoodies forced on them by their owners.

Ah springtime. Time to kick back, do some cleaning, dig out the Florida-boy flip flops from the back of the closet, and put on my shades – it’s gonna be a warm one today.

Okay so it’s the middle of March now and I’ll admit that regardless of the zeal with which I started this Spanish learning spring, I haven’t gotten as far as I’d like to on my language journey. With classes back in full swing and various writing projects in the way (not to mention a continual enjoyment of Madrid’s nightlife), my list of excuses has grown in Pinocchio-type fashion into a nose whose cross-eyed end juts blurrily out of eye shot.

My Spanish shortcomings aside, I can at least be comforted by knowing that my friends are struggling right along with me. And not only is there comfort in this knowledge, but I can also take confidence in the fact that a few are even farther behind me in their bilingual quests.

Let’s take last weekend for example. A few friends and I were at a café eating tapas, and after a couple rounds or two my roommate went to inquire as to the whereabouts of the restroom. As he approached the waiter, digging down deep in his thin mental Spanish dictionary to impress our friends with his nearly fluent word choice, he imagined the scene play out in his head. He’d begin with a perfectly pronounced interrogative sentence whereby the waiter would respond with a smile, an explanation, and some supplemental body language. This of course would be followed by some friendly banter that’d end with him being successfully pointed in the direction of the toilet. And finally, to punctuate this encounter, my roommate would then issue to the waiter a hearty slap on the shoulder, wishing him luck in all of life’s endeavors.

The reality, as it turned out, was quite different. Walking up to the waiter, my roommate coughed out a nervous “Ahem,” to first grab his attention. Instead of answering with a helpful smile though, the frowning waiter’s thickly unibrowed forehead collapsed into a wrinkled “V” of impatience, aggravated to be interrupted on his quarter-hourly cigarette break. And, turning to blow out a final whoosh of feathery smoke, the waiter with his empty hand on his hip and an upward flick of the chin, spat out, “Digame.”

“Donde esta tus sueños?¨ he asked, the words rolling from his tongue with assurance.

Instead of responding with an amiable point of the finger or word of polite encouragement however, the waiter raised his thick eye brow, pursed his lips, and folded his heavy, hairy arms across his chest in confused thought.

“Los sueños?” my roommate repeated with waning confidence.

You could nearly see the light bulb pop up over the waiter’s head as the communication gap was bridged, and, in typical madrileño response, he muttered some mumbled mumbo jumbo fast as a fox, raised a fat fingered knuckled towards the back of the restaurant, and sent my roommate on his way.

After what I now imagine to have been a very confused bathroom break, my roommate returned to the table with a serious, pensive scowl, and as soon as he sat back down asked, “What’s the Spanish word for bathroom?”

I pointed to the sign over the restroom like a first grade teacher during a reading lesson, enunciating slowly, “As–e-os. Dude, seriously, how do you not know this by now?”

Ignoring my mocking Spanish superiority however, he answered my question with another. “Then what does sueños mean?”

“Dreams,” the whole table responded in unison.

My roommate’s face then reddened and his lips widened into a smile like a child learning a new dirty word. “I think I just asked the waiter where his dreams are!” he confessed with a laugh and a gulp of beer.

And sure enough, as I turned in the waiter’s direction, I could see him brooding in the corner by the exit - scratching his head, biting his nails, staring skyward, and wondering with soul searching solace where his long lost dreams had gone.