Thanksgiving Festivities in Cordoba

Its hard to believe that this was my second Thanksgiving out of the country away from home. Its so much easier the second time around and I almost feel completely accustomed to life here in Spain. As much as I missed not being able to celebrate this day with my family at home it was great to be able to celebrate with my friends here in Cordoba who I have surprisingly only known for a few months.

Since we all had to work on Thursday we weren't able to have a traditional Thanksgiving dinner that night. So instead we went out to a Chinese restaurant for an open buffet to satisfy our homesickness with some good food.

On Friday evening we prepared a traditional Thanksgiving dinner at Laurel's house for her birthday. There were us 4 Americans and then we all invited friends, coworkers and roommates who we wanted to take part in this special American holiday. Everyone brought a dish to share. We had almost all of the traditional Thanksgiving dishes minus the turkey which was substituted with chicken along with some typical dishes from other countries. I made a green bean casserole and stuffing. The stuffing was a big hit and it seemed as if no one had seen or tasted anything like this before. Needless to say there was plenty of food and it was definitely a success.

Below are some pictures from the night.

The Presentation

The other American Auxiliaries

Me and my Co-worker, Henry

So many Desserts

What I've been up to in my school

Hola Todos!

Everything is going really well in my school. I'm finding the longer I work here as a Language Assistant the easier it is becoming for me to prepare and teach my weekly lessons. The hardest part is probably remembering all of my students names. I have already been working at Grupo Cantico for almost two months and I can finally say that I almost know all of their names, however there a few that I still don't know. It makes it hard only having each class once or twice a week plus the fact that they aren't typical American names makes it a little harder.

About two weeks ago the history teacher, Rafael, who I have been working with since the start of the school year had his last day. He was only a temporary substitute teacher taking the place of another teacher who had been sick. His departure from Cordoba was very sudden. He told me the day of that it was his last day at Grupo Cantico. (I think because it wasn't definite when the other teacher, Maria, would be starting). It was a little sad to see him leave since I had gotten used to working with him and he probably is one of the few younger teachers at my school. However, I have enjoyed working with his replacement. She has quite a few years of experience teaching and has a good level of English so we have worked well together as well. The day before Rafael left I went out with him in the city which was nice. I'm sure I'll see him again if I go back to Malaga; the city where he is from.

Around the same time we had a big lunch at my school to welcome all of the new teachers. It was at the end of the school day for only the teachers and we were all expected to bring one dish or drink to share. It consisted of many different typical Spanish dishes. The amount of food supplied was incredible. I felt like a special guest. Everyone was serving Henry (the other Language Assistant) and I each of their prepared dishes. As you can imagine I had more than enough to eat. I brought brownies for dessert that I had made from a mix. To say the least everyone was in love with them and was asking me for the recipe. The plate of brownies went very fast and next time I will know to bake more. It was great to meet and get to talk to some of the teachers who I hadn't really known before. They are all so welcoming and accommodating to my needs. One of the teacher's has offered to take me to a soccer game next time there is a home game and a few of them want to play tennis with me.

Along with my obligations of preparing and teaching classes every week, I am also responsible for updating the school website with a personal blog about myself and where I am from. It took a little a while for me to learn how to use the site. Last week I was finally able to post my first blog and I hope to stay up to date with them as important events, holidays and traditions take place in the United States. Below I have included the site for my first blog entry. Compliments of Rick Katzenburg I have used his photos to show Amherst in the fall because they were just so beautiful and capture New England in the fall so perfectly.

http://www.juntadeandalucia.es/averroes/centros-tic/14700730/helvia/bitacora/administracion/admin_pubs.cgi?wAccion=modifica_data&wIdPub=132

On a side not, last night I was able to meet up with two of my sorority sisters, Christina Tierney and Leah Puening, who are studying in Salamanca for the semester and are on a big group trip to the South of Spain. Their group stopped in Cordoba for the night. So it was great and so crazy to be able to see some fellow Thetas who I haven't seen for so long. Its always nice to have people from home to meet up with especially when your in a foreign country.

There is a taste of what I have been up to at my school as a Language and Culture Assistant so far.

Malaga

Two weekends ago I went to Malaga for Halloween weekend with the three other Auxiliares from Cordoba: Angelica, Laurel and Kimzey. Malaga is on the southern Coast of Spain in the Andalusian Region about a 2 in a half hour bus ride South East of Cordoba. It was great to get away from Cordoba for the weekend and see something new. However, I got a little sick once I got there which kind of put a damper on things but I still enjoyed myself.

We arrived to Malaga late Friday morning and spent the afternoon walking around and exploring the city. We were so excited to be on the coast that we made it one of our first priorities to find the beach even though it wasn't exactly bathing suit weather. We definitely made the right choice of going to the beach our first day because it only got colder and more windy has the weekend went on. The beach was so nice and peaceful. There were little patches of grass with pine tree for us to sit on which worked out perfectly since we didn't bring our beach towels. We sat there for a while admiring the water which we touched with our toes but was too cold to go much further. We then continued to walk along the beach; there were few people on the beach this time of the year which allowed us to really enjoy it.

The Castle and RomanTheatre

Angelica and I in front of the Alcazaba

The Beach

Me, Angelica and Kimzey

That evening we had an Argentinian Barbecue which was put on by the cooks of our hostel upstairs on the terrace. It consisted of a salad, platter after platter of different types of grilled meat along with grilled zucchini and egg plant all accompanied by a delicious sauce. It made me want to go to Argentina and experience this type of food. It was a great opportunity to meet many of the people at our hostel from different parts of the world.

Unfortunately I woke up Saturday feeling quite sick and I couldn't participate in a free walking tour of the city with my other friends. I was able to venture out into the city later in the day and see more.

Pablo Picasso grew up in Malaga so on Sunday we visited his house which is situated in the same plaza that we were staying in, Plaza Merced. It wasn't anything too impressing; it definitely had been re-renovated quite a bit but was still cool to see. We then visited the Picasso Museum

which had a lot more to offer than Picasso's house.

The Cathedral

Sunday night was Halloween so we all dressed up like people from the 1960's. We went over to an Auxillary's house in Malaga for a little party and then went out to some of the bars around the plaza we were staying in.

All in all it was a good weekend. I think I would like to go back in the Spring or Summer when the weather is nicer and we can go to the beach.