Hitchhiking

This past week and a half started off with good luck and continued rolling. Late for my first day of classes in my new (and way improved) Spanish school, I fidgeted with my pen at the bus stop. A lady pulled up.
"¿Anyone going to Moncloa?" she asked in Spanish. I was. So was another guy. She needed to pick up at least one person to be able to use the carpool lane. I got a free quick ride, arrived early to Sol (where my school is), ate a nice second breakfast, came to class a few minutes early, and got the best seat in the class (second row, far left).
Later on that week, I went to Alberto´s mom Eloisa´s house. For the first time, I really followed the conversation through and through. Before, I had made sure to have a prominent role in any conversation so that, if I needed someone to define or repeat words, I wouldn´t be interrupting. This time, I sat back and listened, to see if I could. The conversation centered around the question of whether women´s equality, while just, had made family interactions more complicated. I caught the drift, I caught the nuances, and I caught the details, almost as if I were listening to a dinner conversation back in Santa Monica.

Lately, I´ve been going out a lot more frequently to the Madrid bars during weekdays, but last weekend, after months of clubbing and bar-hopping, I had my first stay-at-home movie night. My Venezuelan friends live in Spain, and I came over to their house with a few others to play basketball and watch Jarhead. (Speaking of which...kind of a mediocre movie.)
It was a journey to get there, though. Their house is even more in the suburbs than my host family´s. I overshot, and ended up hitchhiking a ride with José, a shy Spanish guy who wore braces and, as if inspired by the improvements made to his own mouth by the orthodontic correction, was studying to be an orthodontist!
The Monday after the weekend, I had an interview for a teaching job at an English school called Tutordidact. Victoria, the friend who had recommended I apply for a job at Tutordidact, was coincidentally at the school before my interview.
"Nervous?" she asked.
"Cold as ice," I said.
Yeah right. But I got the job! The school provides the clients and the resources -- the books, photo-copiers, and folders -- but from there basically gives teachers full independence. It´s what I need right now: the full reign and responsibility that will make me get good at teaching quickly backed up by resources and experienced teachers with good advice. My first permanent client is the director of a company that owns multiple golf courses. (And if that weren´t intimidating enough...he´s a beginner, in my opinion the hardest type of student to teach.) And I´m substitute teaching Victoria´s classes (she´s in Canada for Christmas) -- two groups at a renewable energy company.

This weekend, Victoria, Steffen, Erika, Victor, Cesar, and I went to Ávila. We had been to Segovia about a month before, and Segovia had been beautiful and incredible, with an intact Roman aqueduct, a castle that looked straight out of Disneyland, and a gorgeous Cathedral. We expected Ávila to be similar, and it was nice, but basically all it has is a very old city wall.

Through all this, I´m still giving lessons to Oscar, the coolest Madrileño I´ve ever met. At this point, we split our time between paid classes, conducted mostly in English, and chilling, conducted mostly in Spanish. At first, this arrangement was a little awkward. Friendship and business don´t naturally mix. But I now just stop counting hours when the lessons seem to have ended and the chilling sessions seem to have begun. And the truth is, I´ve probably learned as much Spanish culture and slang from him as he´s learned English from me.