I'm in the midst of some dizzying travel for the easter break but I'm thoroughly enjoying it. I tried posting earlier today in airport but my 15 minutes of free time ran out just in time. In that post I was trying to get a few remarks in about how fun traveling has been and how I should not have made claims about posting more often without knowing the quality of my wifi. It seems to be faster now though, I've switched rooms in the hotel and it seems to be having some impact. I'm off to unpack and repack for a weekend trip to northern Spain. Time for some good eats! Until the next time

Another "era" comes to an end this Saturday as I move out of my 2nd host family's house. It was a fun two and a half months but like all good things it must come to an end. So I'm packing up my bags on what will be the first leg of a multi leg journey that will take me through the vacation we get for Semana Santa. The things you can do with 12 days off is pretty amazing (once you get past the equally amazing amount of money you'll likely spend) and you can dash off to a variety of places. But first, updates.

I'm all packed up and ready to get on to my next location. I think the next host family should be just as awesome as the previous two and the son of the family is one of the kids I teach in my extra after school classes so there will already be some familiarity. I can say that moving is much less stressful when you live out of a suitcase or two. After college I remember having a TON of stuff and thinking what can I do with all of it. I sold a good amount of items and donated quite a few as well and the rest is sitting in my car waiting for me back home. I miss you cammy cam (that's my toyota camry for those of you who didn't know). I have even managed to shed weight while I've been here, in reference to my luggage of course, and I'm curious to weigh my bag at the aiport to see if I truly made any headway. My mom did an awesome job keeping me stocked at some crucial moments during the trip so my hat is off to her, she's got some surefire souvenirs and hugs coming her way in a few months. I think it's good that I had this experience traveling because yes indeed those travel blogs you see are true when they say that you really don't need a lot of the "things" you have. Memories trump possessions about 99.9999999% of the time I believe. I can appreciate having a much smaller carousel of clothing options but when all of your clothes are your go to clothes, it feels pretty cool.

So now onto the good stuff. I planned out a little journey over the 11-12 day break because I thought hey, "even though the weather isn't so great now, when will I ever have 12 days off to travel again...IN SPAIN!" So I got to scavenging the interwebs for deals on travel and flights. I knew I wanted to get back to the Emerald Isle so that was an easy starting point and then I said hey there will still be a week left after that trip. So I went to Skyscanner, I recommend that every traveler do this, and I typed in flights to ANYWHERE. The cool thing about this website is that you can look at flights by ascending price to destinations anywhere on the globe. Granted the best deals are often not conducive to enjoyable travel, they do actually exist. I chose to head over to Paris and then back to Spain for a jaunt up to beautiful San Sebastian. I was feeling pretty good about myself for finding cheap flights but then the reality of hostel/hotel stays and bus/train fare reared it's ugly head. I put my head down, closed my eyes, and just started typing in my memorized from overuse card number until I was set. The damage was done, not too bad, but still a bummer when you see that your plane ride is the same price as a train ticket. Oh well travel trumps these petty snags. I'm gonna take a bajillion pictures to counter the pain it caused me. I love me a good sunrise if you haven't guessed already. 

Itinerary:

Staring off in Dublin/Cork and hopefully I can see anything I missed from the first trip. I'm definitely going back to St. Stephen's Green for two ok three main reasons. 1. The mall is awesome and has wifi where there is also food 2. There was an amazing and cheap candy cart 3. Did I mention the food 

Then it's off to Paris to brush up on my french skills and visit with an old friend who's doing it big and studying abroad in France. I couldn't pass up the chance to swing by and say hello. Also I've been wanting to see the tower for a long while now and seeing it in person should be pretty darn cool.

Then for the most lengthy part of the trip, travel wise, I fly back to Barcelona then take a 7 hour bus ride up north to San Sebastian, but in this little diamond of a town they have what I hear to be the best Pinchos for miles around and some pretty incredible views as well. Fingers are crossed that the rain takes a break for that weekend.

Me on the bus ride up most likely:

San Sebastian:

Let's just say there will be pictures to follow. Until the next time

Spring Time: (ish)

So far spring has gotten off to a pretty rough start. I went in with high hopes this year, thinking Spain, beautiful weather, feeling great and having a good time. Instead it's pretty much the opposite at the moment. There is lots of wind and rain, not much sun at all, the schoolchildren got me sick and I have to switch host families again. Although, on the bright side Easter break is only a few weeks away and that should be a nice way to transition into a better weather situation. Spain needs to step its game up though, I dunno if this doom and gloom motif is gonna cut it. 

I think my last substantive post left off talking about life being pretty good and the routine of school and life beginning to wear a little big. I mean I'm not complaining about the situation I'm in, I chose it, and it's an awesome eye opening experience. That being said it's still not perfect just because I'm living in "sunny" Spain. I have to switch host families again this week for reasons unknown. I'll have to get the answers to that one Sherlock Holmes style, or I guess I could just ask, but option A sounds more fun. I hope it wasn't something I did but I'm pretty sure some came up with the family and now I'm peacin out. So packing up again and something I've realized over the past year after packing up all of my earthly possessions so many times is that I really don't like it. It's just not that great so maybe I'll do some GoProing this time round to up the fun factor. And again on the bright side it does give me a chance to see what I need to keep and what purchases may not have been used as much I probably would've liked, dooming them to the discard pile. Spring cleaning rears its head again and no matter how hard you try it always seems like you have just enough stuff to know exactly what stuff you don't use.

So yes I am sick for the second time in my time here, which I think is pretty darn good considering the unbelievable amount of germs that one is exposed to when you work with children. It was a weird build up this time. On Thursday I felt fine then for dinner had some strange pig meat (from now on only bacon for me gee I miss America) and my stomach then felt funny. Next day woke up and had a sore throat then off the the school AKA the germ breeding ground and it was done deal after that. They lure you in with their cute faces and seemingly innocent intentions. What you don't know (or do but there's that cuteness again) is that they haven't washed anything since they arrived at school that day. And I mean haven't washed anything. Washing up to a 3-6 year old means playing in the water fountain thereby putting the entire school at risk. I guess you can't hate too much though because we were all these little germ mongers at one point or another. So in the end after months of avoiding it they got me and they got me good. Usually if I even have a inkling that I may be sick some time in the sun and some rest will squash the threat. However now with the weather just going haywire with blustery winds that cut through pretty much any amount of clothing you have on and no sun to give me some additional energy, my body hey man can't win em all and thus my weekend got a lot worse.  I have to give props to all the teachers out there that work with these little people, they carry with them so many day ruining aspects it's almost unreasonable we have to teach them. In the future, matrix style intelligence download and skip to middle school, all I'm sayin.

I'm feeling a little better though. It's Sunday now and hopefully by tomorrow I'll be back to almost normal. It's also raining now so I don't think it'll be sunny again for a while at least I'm getting my germ resistance built up now, would not want this in the summer. I'll use today to begin thinking about packing and what I may want to discard. I think I've been pretty good about what I've kept and things I've bought while here plus I've already given away some things and thrown away old shoes so it shouldn't be so bad. 

As for the crises I mentioned last time as far as the economy and Russia trying to stir the pot as much as possible over in the Ukraine things seems less terrible than a few weeks ago. Yes there is still rioting in Madrid and problems pretty much everywhere but at least the threat of a war has faded considerably. 

I guess all it took to write another full length post was being terribly ill and confined to my room all day. It feels good though and hopefully I'll have more decent pictures to share next time I sit down at ol grandpa mac for an update. Until the next time

Spain Day 158:

Wow almost 160 days in this place. I wouldn't exactly say the time is flying but any time you're involved in a cool new situation time seems to put on its best impression of the flash and try to blow right by you. So updates. Let's see here. I feel like between this blog and the journals I keep my writing is definitely at an all time high. Even though I've said a few times on here that I hoped to update it often and stay on top of things sometimes life just gets in the way. Plus why deal with a slow computer when you can just put pen to paper and skidaddle. So many apologies to my two or three readers (including myself) the blog has definitely lacked intensity but when you're learning two languages, and piano, and playing soccer, and teaching at times some knucklehead kids the blog can take a back seat. Plus Game of Thrones was right, winter came and boy was it not nearly as fun as summer. I'm pretty excited to have Spring come back around considering I got here when Winter was just about to begin. And southern California simply does not prepare you for these things called seasons.

As for everything else, life is pretty good. The host family is cool as is the norm and these last few weeks have definitely been more routine like than before. Or maybe it's just finally beginning to wear on me that I've been doing the same routine for so long. I guess watching U.S national holiday come and go while you still have to go to work is a not so subtle reminder that having holidays like that is pretty sweet. Not to say that Spain is without the occasional holiday, in fact we just had one for Carnival and it was greatly appreciated.

Now for some no reflection/recap material.

Living in the EU definitely gives you a more close up view of how the cogs in the European machine really fit together and how crises on this part of the glob affect everything. I didn't really appreciate the economic crisis in Spain until the past weekend when I researched economics for a powerpoint I put together. The situation is pretty bad and makes me think that despite the trouble we have in America it's still a bit better than here. I mean 25% unemployed, that's crazy. No matter what age group you assign that number to, it's a crazy statistic. Then, the housing market was in shambles and now it's a little less shambly, but there is still a long way to go there. Basically, I'm figuring out a lot about this crazy world and how crazy important money seems to be. I know that money can't buy happiness but I was literally staring at a 5 euro note the other day awing over how much power paper has over us. Just something to keep in mind I guess, and also serve as a reminder to not let money rule you. It's gonna come and it's gonna go, in varying amounts for each person of course, but even the rich have to remember to put value on the things that really matter. I dunno how much quality time you can spend with, in, or around the new Benz but I'd take time with my family any day. So that about sums things up. Had an urge to write and maybe that'll be my guideline for a while. Writing when the spirit moves me sounds like a good plan to me. Until the next time

P.S

And another thing, Spain really has brought the goods for my trip. I get to live in a place currently fielding a monarchy, fighting for it's independence, weathering the worst economic crisis in its history, all while getting front row seats to a potential war. Vamos!