highlights (and lowlights) of granada

For my first weekend excursion from Marbella, I chose to head to Granada. It's less than 3 hours away by bus, and there were a couple of other girls from my CIEE orientation heading there for the weekend as well, so I figured it was a good time to check out what the city had to offer.

When I arrived, I had the good fortune of bumping into my friends as soon as I got on the bus to head to my room for the weekend. We made plans to meet up for tapas and drinks later that night, and they headed off to their hostel nearby, while I went to go check in with my AirBnB host.


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my culinary adventures in spain - eating out

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I've been surprisingly underwhelmed by the food here in Spain. Before coming here, I imagined that I'd be in absolute gastronmic glee over all of the delicious food available. Not exactly the case. But still, I've had some delicious and some very inspiring experiences with food that are definitely worth sharing.

EATING OUT

Tapas
The Spanish are best known for tapas. They invented the whole concept of small plates eaten / shared with friends over rounds of drinks. They've even made a verb to express the act of having tapas - tapear. Almost every Spanish restaurant offers a selection of tapas along with larger portions called raciones. However, there are two things that have left me feeling lackluster about the whole tapas experience: 1) every restaurant generally has the exact same selection of tapas (oh, look, they have croquetas!), and 2) none of them are prepared exceptionally well. They're not bad, mind you, but compared to my hyped-up expectations, they're not that great. Yet, thankfully, there have been exceptions:

In Sevilla, La Morena de Andalucia (aka, Dominique) showed me her favorite tapas restaurant, Duo. Located on the Alameda de Hercules, this little bar serves up some more creative twists on traditional Spanish tapas. The higher quality of the ingredients is noticeable as well. So far, this ranks as my #1 restaurant meal in Spain.

@ Duo Tapas in Sevilla. foreground: pulpo a la gallega; background: carillada

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a week in the life of an english language auxiliar in spain

Monday

7:45am - Head out the door and down the hill to meet my ride at 7:50. On Monday mornings, I ride to school with Pepe, a biology teacher at IES Vega de Mar in San Pedro de Alcantara. On the 10-minute drive from Marbella, we talk about our weekends and other pleasantries. It's good practice for both of us. Pepe tries to speak in English, I try to speak in Spanish. Hilarity often ensues.


8:00am - We arrive at school and enter the Sala de Profes (aka, the teacher's lounge, aka 'club profe'). After a round of 'holas' and 'buenos', Pepe and I head straight for our mugs to prep our morning coffee. We take turns treating each other. (Coffee isn't free for profes. It costs .50€). I sit enjoying my coffee (and if lucky, my take-along breakfast) and listening to the rapid-fire convos between the other profes.

arriving at school

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