White labels, You haven’t heard none of this

Yeah, I know I haven’t updated in about a week or so. I’ve been busy, or tired, or sick, or any other excuse I find suitable here. Yes, sick again. For the third time in six weeks. I think it’s a combination of being in a new climate, being exposed to new germs all the time, working with kids (Who are, might I add, the most filthy fucking things on the planet, god bless ‘em. Have you ever smelled the sweet, rotten fruit stink of 8-year-olds after a day in school? Absolutely revolting.), and the constant temperature fluctuations here. And yes, I know I’m bitching about living in Spain, but you can’t always keep your happy happy. Besides, that makes the good times that much better.

And I don’t have any pictures, because I keep forgetting to take them. So, this will be all rants and/or raves.

Went to the port on Saturday night. That’s where all the discotecas and the she-males are. The Frenchies and I got into some shitty club named “Backstage”, except the locals all pronounce it “Bah-cah-stay-jah”. The gimmick of this nightclub (and it’s a shitty one) is that they give you a card/nametag when you enter with a name of one-half of a celebrity on- or off-screen couple. The point is you go around all night mingling, trying to find your other celebrity half. Cheesy fucking gimmick, I know. I luckily got “John Travolta”, my favorite actor of all time. But I was then confused. Do I search for (as if I actually was that interested in finding this other person) Kelly Preston? Uma Thurman? Olivia Newton-John (god, I hope so)? Karen Lynn Gorney? Kirstie Alley? Whoever the chick was who played his girlfriend in Welcome Back, Kotter? The options are literally endless. Okay, not endless, but definitely infinite. So, being the confused slacker that I am, I promptly left to go next door to the extremely more comfortable “Golfus”, which is an all-jungle/jump-up club with 1 euro beers where all the pseudo-gutterpunks hang out at. All I know is, the next day I had cuts on my knuckles and I couldn’t hear anything for about 6 hours.

Yeah, the port generally sucks ass, using the parlance of our times. Palahniuk has a character that says he doesn’t like nightclubs because they fuck with his biorhythms (Tyler Durden, I think). I would have to agree. The heavy bass usually just gives me the feeling that I need to empty my bowels.

Alright, now I’m just entertaining myself. With that said, here’s a couple of pictures of the feral cats that hang out everywhere here:

Oh, how intimidating! Oh, how fierce!

Mothers, lock up your children! Beasts I say, beasts are on the loose!

Yeah, I still wouldn’t touch one to save my life.

Take Lyndale to the horizon, Take Nicollet out to the ocean

Spanish Graffiti, pt.3 -

So, there’s a lot of new construction going on in Tarragona, especially near the beach and port.  This evidently infuriates the anarchists/socialists/people seeking an independent Catalunya state.  They think it’s yet another attempt to push down their effort to keep their history (i.e., Catalan being outlawed during Franco, their “forced” entry into the Spanish nation and government oversight).  Yeah, they’re kinda weird here about their independence.  There’s tons of these stencils at every construction site.

These five are from a big mural on a wall separating yet another new construction site on the Rambla Nova.

Yeah, there’s a lot of Banksy rip-offs around here, too.  The last in the line is a Scuba diver, if you can’t see it.

And Picasso rip-offs, as well.  At least that’s a little closer to the culture here.

Ha, more crazy socialist messages!  Crazy kids with your Marxist love.  That’s the current Spanish prime minister, if you didn’t recognize him.  If you haven’t read about this, do.  It’s pretty funny, I think.

In other news:

- So, I dreamed last night that I convinced the Frenchies that the hip new music in the States is called “Frying”.  And Frying is basically people recording bacon being cooked and remixing the sounds into a sort of house-like music.  I guess I told them this just to see if they believed it, but they loved the idea.  They loved it so much that they decided to start making their own version of Frying.  And when they played me some of what they made, I was so impressed that I decided to start doing it, too.  My lie turned into a whole international music craze, with me getting wrapped up in my own practical joke, as well.  So yeah, that was a weird dream.

Obey, Marry and Reproduce, Pray, Obey

So for those that didn’t know, I’m actually in Spain to teach English to kids in a primary (elementary) school. I’m not just some damn college-grad tourist that’s backpacking around and staying in hostels for a month or so. I don’t have a big enough backpack or wallet for that…

Let’s start at the beginning (I was in a rush to take these, so they’re not the best pictures):

From the front

Main entry hall

The room I’m in the most, the (English) Language Lab

From the front of the class

So apparently, all of their teaching materials are from England. And apparently, an eraser is called a “rubber” there. Yeah, I had to tell them what that means in the States. My profesora thought it was pretty funny, but still is teaching “Can I borrow your rubber?”. It still makes me feel dirty when a kid asks me for a rubber.

A test for the 3rd graders. This is actually pretty advanced shit for them. Most of what I teach is basic vocabulary. Colors, animals, parts of the body, numbers, alphabet, etc.

2nd Floor Hallway

The 4th-grade Classroom

Ha! “Vote Daniel for Delegate. The future is in your hands.” How precocious. That kid is an ass, too.

La sala de profesores. (Teacher’s lounge)

Alright, time to show the pitiful pati (playground):

No actual playground, just a lot of dirt and concrete to get hurt on.

One of the four soccer goals.  None of them have a net, so the kids spend most of their time chasing after the ball.

You can’t see it to well, but that’s the older kids’ soccer field.  That’s where only the elite 5th and 6th graders play soccer.  Hilarious how nothing really changes between countries, as far as schoolyard (and classroom) dynamics go.

Where are kids supposed to go in this town, I don’t know

We (the Frenchies and I) went to Port Aventura on Saturday. It’s an amusement park in the middle of nowhere of northeast Spain, with a whole section of what they think was the Old West (what they called the “Far West”). The experience was, to say the least, surreal.

This picture is because I was told there isn’t any pictures of people on this blog. To be honest, I don’t like taking pictures of people because they always pose somewhat like this. Not a very good picture. From left to right, Cecile (one of my roommates), Francois and Guillem (her French friends visiting for the weekend). Not pictured, Fanny (my other roommate).

Francois and Guillem mooning the cameras on the “Grand Canyon Rapids” ride. It was actually pretty hilarious, because all day they worked up the nerve to do it. Man, the day I don’t think two French kids mooning a timed camera in the middle of a theme park in Spain is funny is the day I jump off a bridge. The lady at the photo booth took the picture off the screen right after I shot this.

As you might have noticed, they still had all of their Halloween decorations up. I guess the park has Halloween from the beginning of September to the middle of November. They don’t actually celebrate Halloween in Spain, but they love the visuals of it. It’s mostly for the kids’ amusement.

What I get for free, you have to buy

Strange Observations of Spain, pt.2:

- In the supermarket, all they play over the PA are pop songs of the late ’70s and early ’80s. I hear at least one Billy Joel song or one Elton John song every time I go. But it is good to know that Asian restaurants here are the same as the U.S. All they ever play are Britney Spears, Whitney Houston or Mariah Carey.

- For some reason, the ’80s are just coming back here. I’ve seen two all ’80s-music clubs just in this city alone. Athletic stores have prominent displays of headband-clad mannequins with leg-warmers and those spandex teddy-type things on. Little kids with lines shaved into the sides of their heads, wearing day-glo green plastic sunglasses. I feel sorry for them, really. They love American fashion here, but when the dipshits who decide what currently is in pick tragic retro shit, the Spaniards have no idea how stupid it really is. They probably think we’re crazy, but they just go along with it. Like the American public, I guess…

- The car industry here is the exact opposite of the States. They think that Hondas or Toyotas are cheap pieces of shit, and that the new Chevys or Fords are well-built machines. The people I’ve told that I used to drive a Honda look at me like I was crazy. They say, “Why?! They’re like little plastic toys. Not like this new Ford Focus I bought. That thing will run forever.” I don’t have the heart to correct them. And I’ve never seen so many riced-out Chevy Cavaliers in my entire life.

But you don’t really care for music, do you?

Went to Barcelona last weekend. It’s full of statues and really old stuff.

Gaudi’s Sagrada Família church.  One of the most impressive buildings I’ve ever seen, church or otherwise.  This photo in no way does it justice.  The front has such extreme detail that it’s easy to see why it’s taken 125 years to build (and will still need another 20).

It was big city with big buildings, for the most part. Their Metro is one of the best I’ve been on. And it’s only an hour away from me by bus or train.

People be careful not to crest too soon

Spanish Graffiti, pt.2 -

(Warning – Socialist messages may be contained within.)