Ibiza

Ibiza is an island in the mediterranean sea that belongs to Spain. It is invaded every summer by Germans and the English. It has a few municipalities on it, the main city called Sant Jordi or Eivissa and is where the airport is located.
I decided to go here for the weekend, arriving on Saturday morning and staying until Sunday night. It turned out that this was one of the last weekends that all of the island´s hotels and attractions were still open.

Here I am next to a canon along the walls of the old-city of Ibiza (known as the Dalt Vila)

 This is the hotel that I stayed in in Santa Eulalia on Ibiza. It was the last night of the season so it was cheap 23€ a person. I think there may have been 25 guests in the entire hotel.

 I decided to roll up my pants and get my feet wet in the sea. It was well worth it!

 Saturday evening I went to Sant Antoní and decided to take in the sunset next to the famous Café del Mar. It turns out it is free to sit on the dock next to the café and drink a pop from a grocery store, while enjoying the music from the café and watching the sailboats go by.

 The following morning on Sunday, I went to see El puerto de Sant Miquel. This small port was beautiful. I would love to return in the summer and sit on the beach for a week.

 In Sant Miquel there is a cave called La Cova de Can Marçà. Apparently it was used by pirates to store their goods. The guide also told us with great pride that the cave had been altered and that they had added stalagmites to make it more interesting...below is a picture of the man made waterfall inside. I would not recommend spending the 9€ I gave them to get in.

 Turns out the 9€ I paid to see the cave wasn´t a total flop, I did get to see this view of the water from the walkway. It was so clear and blue. Again, I want to come back here in the summer and sit on the beach to take it all in.

 On the way back to Ibiza town from Sant Miquel I stopped at Can Caus to see some of the traditional products of the island. Shown below is a sandwich made with Sobrasada (raw meat with onion and spices). The sandwich and the glass of vino...1€

An Interview with Brian

Gemma (the English teacher at school) thought it would be a nice idea for the students in grade 6 to think of questions to ask me about Canada and then use those questions and answers to create a mural. Half of the students worked on this while the other half thought of questions to ask me about myself. We split the latter group in two and filmed it. And here are the interviews.

Escola Banùs

English in red
La escuela donde enseño se llama Escola Banús (en catalán) y está en Santa Coloma de Gramenet, en las afueras de Barcelona.
Querría poner unas fotos del colegio en el blog para que veáis como es y como son los alumnos. The School where I teach is called Escola Banús in Catalan and is located in Santa Coloma de Gramenet a suburb of Barcelona. I wanted to put some pictures of the school in my blog so that my friends could see what it is like.

 El aula de Gemma, la profesora de inglés. Aquí damos las clases de inglés del primero hasta sexto. Tenemos muchas ventanas en el aula pero lo malo es que entra mucho ruido de la calle y del patio.
This is the English classroom. Gemma and I teach grade 1-6 in here. There are 6 big windows to the patio outside (shown below). It is quite noisy because the kids have PE there.

 La vista del patio de la escuela desde el aula de Gemma. Aquí vemos los niños en la clase de educación física. En la escuela no hay un gimnasio, los alumnos tienen que salir al patio para practicar los deportes.
The view from the English classroom to the patio below. The school doesn´t have a gym, so this is where the kids go fro PE.

 Los alumnos del P5- una chica con Densel el pato del libro de inglés.
Students in P5, preschool age 5, this particular student is holding Densel the Duck- a character from the text we use. 

 Un alumno con Cookie- el gato-protagonista del libro de inglés.
Another student from P5 with Coookie the Cat- the main character of our book.

 Y el otro personaje del libro- el canguro Lulu.
And one more with Lulu  the Kangaroo.

 Estamos aprendiendo los miembros de la familia de búhos y el cuento del Baby Owl.
We´re learning the words for family members in English.

 Aquí contando el número de búhos en el árbol de la familia.
We´re counting how many owls there are in the owl family....well actually we´re singing it, but I decided not to video this...if you´ve heard me sing you´ll know why. Below is a link for the owl family video we put in Youtube. The kids acted out the story from our book.
El enlace abajo es un vídeo de los alumnos presentando su obra de The Owl Family.

Aquí unos alumnos del sexto pintando un mural con información sobre Canadá. Antes de pintar me habían preguntado unas cosas sobre Canadá y luego pusieron las respuestas aquí (la comida típica, el clima, las fiestas, y tal)
Lastly, some of the older kids are making a large poster to hang on the wall- highlighting all the information they learnt about Canada- it´s cold, we ate lots of maple syrop and we all speak both national languages...ahem. 

Jooo que lío

This is a fun video that describes my latest experiences in Spain with the oficina de extranjeros and the ayuntamiento- still waiting to be able to pass in my forms.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZGHPpEmH14

Barcelona Y Madrid

For my English speaking friends see below :)

Voy a intentar escribir en castellano para algunas entradas del blog-para mis amigos aquí en España y por todo el mundo, y luego debajo en inglés, porque los parientes siempre se quejan porque no comprenden nada del castellano.
Llegué a Madrid al final del mes de agosto para participar en una orientación del programa de profesores visitantes. La orientación tomó lugar en Colmenarejo, que es un pueblo en las afueras de Madrid. Nos explicaron todo del programa y nos dieron mucho tiempo para conocernos. Afortunadamente encontré un amigo que se llamó Matthew que ya tenía piso en Barcelona. Me dijo que podía quedarme en su piso unos días hasta que encontrara otro. Me ayudó encontrar un piso también, en casa de una amiga suya ¡Qué suerte he tenido!
Bueno pues, ahora estoy muchísimo más tranquilo de tener un piso en un buen barrio al lado de la estación de tranvía que me lleva al colegio.
El cole...tengo que acostumbrarme a muchas cosas nuevas, como mis experiencias docentes son unicamente del instituto no sé como voy a enseñar los niños del preescolar o los de los primeros ciclos de la primaria, pero ya veremos. Estoy un poco preocupado, pero a la misma vez emocionado de tener esta oportunidad.
Voy a enseñar los 3 niveles del infantil, o sea, los niños que tienen 3,4 y 5 años.
Las profesoras de la escuela son muy majas, me acogieron todas el primer día, que fue el martes, porque lunes fue festivo en Santa Coloma. Pensaba que iba a trabajar principalmente con la profesora de inglés pero parece que voy a trabajar con casi todas las profesoras.
Hoy llevé unas guías didácticas a casa para leerlas para preparar unas lecciones, y aunque todo esté escrito en catalán puedo entender más o menos las ideas principales de las lecciones. Algo muy interesante aquí es que los profesores utilizan más estos libros que vienen con los textos- algo que en Canadá está un poco mal visto...también la guía no solamente da unas ideas generales sino un guión completo si fuera un actor preparándome para un papel de una película. Pero la verdad es que este guión me ha tranquilizado muchísimo. Como os podéis imaginar, estoy un poco nervioso para las primeras horas con los niños, como no tengo nada de experiencia con esa edad....pero bueno, ya veremos.

Hey everyone, I decided I would try to write a little in Spanish to see if I could do it, and even today after having to deal with the red tape of the Spanish immigration system I have the energy to do a blog entry.
There won´t be any photos in this entry, I left my camera at home. I guess I do have the one from my cell phone, but we´ll see.
So after the orientation in Madrid, I came to Barcelona. I had the good fortune to meet another visiting teacher named Matthew who is here in Barcelona as well and had a friend who was looking for a flatmate. So now I am living here in the other apartment, and it is great! It has a pool and air conditioning.
Things at the school are going great and I feel really welcome there. I took home some of their teacher guides to have a look at before the first day with students, which is going to be on Monday, September 12th.
Ohh yeah! By the way, I am teaching in what is called Infantil, which means basically preschool. So having only ever really taught the older students in high school and junior high, I will now be teaching 3,4, & 5 year olds. Our textbook is called Three in a Tree and features a cat named Cookie. In the teachers´ kit there is a puppet of cookie that I will get to use along with a kangaroo named Lulu who has a pouch that the students can put flash cards into. Right now I am imagining that everything is going to go wonderfully and that they won´t be crying all of the time, nor will they be wiping their dirty fingers on me, or clinging to my legs or anything... we´ll see.
If you remember any fun songs that you teach children of this age, please add them in the comment section so I can add them to my repertoire of ¨teaching materials¨. If you don´t have time for that- send a quick prayer upwards for me! :)

Vacaciones en Francia: Segunda Parte

After our first week in France (in Bretagne) we headed off to Strasbourg and the Alsatian wine country. Alsace is a region along the German border and many of the towns still bear their original German names. I believe this is called toponimia (thank-you Paz)
In any case, it was very different from Bretagne, but still a beautiful area with lots of things to do and see.

The Cathedral of Strasbourg

 Close-up of the doorway with the virgen and baby Jesus

 The plaza in front of the cathedral. Typical Strasbourg half timbered houses.

 The astronomical clock inside the cathedral

 Complete with cuckoo type figures.

 Climbing the stairway to the lookout point on the roof of the cathedral. I might be smiling in this picture...but if you know me and heights...

 Feeling better at the bottom of the stairs- I made it!

 ...then proceeded to open a san pelligrino and have it spray all over me.

 We encountered a Fète de la Bière and decided to check it out.

 It turned out to be a good time. Live music and people dancing. The food was good too. This looks like it might be some sort of dialect of German on the coaster. Brewed in Schelige a pleasure for all. ...at least I think that is what it says.

 This was a giant marshmallow rope- how could I say no?

 The european parliament is located here in Strasbourg.

 La petite France-a quaint neighbourhood of Strasbourg.

 The laundromat that I used to clean my clothing- thanks to the genius who figured out how the system actually worked... ;) It was not your usual insert coins press start... :(

 After touring around Strasbourg we headed to the wine country and spent a few days at a B & B in St. Hippolyte a little village along the Alsatian wine route. Above are Pinot Noir- apparently they turn redder as the season progresses.

 Here we are for a stroll through the vineyards-followed by a giant meal in a restaurant in another small village.

 We visited a stork rehabilitation centre- didn´t see them delivering any babies though-maybe they were on vacation too!

 Here I am learning more about the various types of grapes used to make wine in the region.

 A baker is cutting a piece of walnut & raisin bread off of an enourmous loaf.

 Picture taken from a hike to one of the trois châteaux that were in the area.

 We made it up to this one, and took some pictures. In the background-behind me you can see one of the other castles.

 There it is again-along with the beautiful  countryside.

 A picture of St Hippolyte- where our B & B was located.

 Before our return to Paris for the final week of the vacation we took a ride on the BatoBus or boat tour through the canals and river of Strasbourg.

Vacaciones en Francia: Primera Parte

During the first part of our France trip I arrived to Paris where we stayed in Montmarte. We only stayed for one night and part of the following day, although we did manage to do quite a few things before our train left at noon. 

 Making it up the hill to Sacré Coeur was well worth it. It is quite a beautiful church, both from the outside and inside as well. Luckily since we went so early there were very few tourists.

 We had breakfast at the Galeries Lafayette, which is a fancy department store, that has an equally fancy grocery section in the basement. These were some of the tempting treats that I did not eat- although it did not take long to give up finding lactose free meals and snacks :(

 Upon leaving Paris, we took the train to Rouen, and then drove in a rental to a number of locations- including Juno Beach, and Mont St Michel (see below) a sort of monastery & army fortress. It was really quite interesting to tour around Bretagne- the tides come in so quickly and change the landscape drastically.

 Inside the Mont St Michel

 The tide making its way in. Look out!

 On the southern shore of Bretagne is a town called Carnac which contains megaliths- which are enornous rocks that have been placed into long rows- there are also other structures similar to Stonehenge. Bretagne is also known for its celtic roots-like many parts of the UK and Ireland (and Galicia).

 The sheep here in Carnac are responsible for mowing the lawn- and enhancing the photographs of tourists.

 The shores of Bretagne were quite beautiful and awesome. This photo was taken along the Côte Sauvage, on the way to Quiberon, a small port with ferries to Belle-Île a famous vacation destination for many people.

After leaving Bretagne we continued on to Strasbourg in the province of Alsace, along the German border. Photos to follow.