Coming back to Spain was very bittersweet for me. The first time I came here was back in 2005. My sister Sheri had just finished a summer session of classes in the city of Toledo and I met her in Madrid. We traveled for roughly two weeks and visited the cities of Toledo, Madrid and Barcelona. It was my first time out of the country and I was scared of trying new things and seeing new places. I spent the majority of my time feeling homesick and missing my boyfriend at the time. When I came home I was full of regret for not having more thoroughly enjoyed the little time I had spent abroad. I promised myself that I would go back and make sure to not take the experience for granted no matter what happened.
So in 2008 I went back to Spain. This time for not just a few weeks but six months. I took advantage of the amazing study abroad program at the University of Minnesota and did the same program that my sister did; the Study Abroad Program in Toledo, Spain. The program made the adjustment into the country very easy. All the difficult things were taken care of for us. In addition we lived in the dorms with other Americans and were able to share all of our experiences, both good and bad with our fellow peers and really feel like someone understood where we were coming from. Studying Abroad in Toledo became the best and most amazing experience of my life. I enjoyed every single moment of it and savored it to the last minute in the county. I did not want to go home and wanted to stay in Spain for the rest of my life. 2008 was the year I fell completely and utterly in love with Spain. I loved everything about it, the culture, the language- the accent, the food, the music, everything. Being abroad in another country also really opened up my eyes to the amazing places that can be explored outside of the comfort of my city in Minnesota. I visited numerous cities in Spain, wanting to truly soak up the culture to its fullest. I went to Segovia, Salamanca, Sevilla, Córdoba, Granada, Málaga, La Ciudad Real, Valencia, Oliva, San Sebastián and of course Madrid and Toledo. So ever since 2008 Spain has been this perfect memory in my head. A place of comfort, almost like my second home. I knew as soon as I came back from studying abroad that I had to find a way to go back.
So here we are now in 2010. I found a way back to my second homeland through the Auxiliares de Conversación. A scholarship through the Spanish Ministry of Education. Auxiliares are essentially teaching assistants for subjects and classes in the english language. I was assigned to a public 4th-12th grade school in Madrid. My school is named Instituto Gómez Moreno and has roughly 700 students. I am a teaching assistant for kids of many different ages and levels of the english language. The youngest class I teach is age 12 and the oldest class has students up to the age of 18. The English Department in my school is relatively small- there are only about 8-10 professors. They teach every different subject in english and myself, or my fellow Auxiliar at the school, Cassandra, are there at their side to help with lessons, questions, and pronunciation.
I arrived on October 23rd. I flew into Madrid around 9:30pm and had to take a taxi to a hotel that I stayed in the first night. Plans to stay with another Auxiliar in Madrid for my first night fell through so I literally had one day to search for a hostel in Madrid and finding one for a Saturday night was impossible. Thus, I stayed in a hotel my first night. Expensive yet comforting. The next morning I moved to a hostel in the center of the city. It was cheap- 13 euro a night but I had to share a room with 4 other people. The next morning after that- Monday morning I braved the metro alone and went to my school which is located on the outskirts of Madrid. It was about a 45 minute commute there with transfers on the metro. I arrived at the gate surrounding the school and had to be buzzed in. Then the front door was also locked and also had to be buzzed in there. I asked the front desk for the director of the English Department who was in charge of the Auxiliares at the school. Little did I know there would be two José Marías! Luckily, I was directed to the correct one and he greeted me in english and showed me around the school. It was overwhelming and I was still super jet lag but I managed to get through the first school day.
The first week in Spain was a blur with numerous highs and lows. The biggest stress seemed to be the fact that I needed to find an apartment as soon as possible because living out of a suitcase was not ideal. I also had a long list of things to do such as applying for a temporary residence card, get a bank account and get a cell phone. Coming back this time around required me to be more independent and fend for myself. It wasn't like study abroad where they take care of everything for you. I had to find an apartment in a foreign country and simultaneously get in the routine of my new schedule at school. I felt pushed to the limit of my patience to deal with such a situation. Before coming to Spain I felt I was invincible. I had convinced myself that since I had traveled once before alone around a foreign country that I could handle anything. Wrong. I guess I would describe my first week in Spain as pretty miserable. For the first time I felt homesick and missed the efficiency of the United States. Having to be independent in Spain and deal with adult situations made me realize how efficient the US is and how INefficient Spain is.
A week and a half in I finally started to stabilize. Instead of having extreme emotional highs and lows I knew that I needed to stay in the middle. This is the only way to adjust. Because lets face it, the adjustment period is the most difficult and painful period there is. Im finally starting to adjust. Its a slow process but I'm slowly getting there. I've found an apartment which was the most difficult and stressful feat, I've gotten a cell phone and started my application process for my temporary residence card. Im also starting to get the hang of being in front of a class of spanish kids who are all staring at me and feel confident with what I am saying. This is not the time to be intimidated or else you are sure to fail.
In my two weeks so far abroad I've learned a lot about myself. I've learned that in order to succeed you must keep trying no matter how hard and impossible it seems. I've learned that there are positives and negatives to every country. I now see how naive I was about having this idealized vision in my head about Spain. I also learned that I must not spend my time here being frustrated and homesick. I must look beyond all the stresses of being independent in a foreign country and simply experience this experience. To enjoy this experience while fondly remembering everything I left back home. Because those things will still be there when I return.
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