Island in the Sun/Shortest Work Week Ever

After the excitement of my first week of school, my roommates and I took a trip to Mallorca, an island in the Mediterranean, for the five-day(!) Dia de España weekend. Three of us left on a foggy, cold Friday morning, took the metro to the airport, and made it to our plane with about 5 minutes to spare. An hour later, we landed in the muggy, hot and humid city of Palma.

Palma is a mix of the old and the new, so on the bus ride to the city center, we would see things like malls right next to centuries-old fortresses. This trip wasn't too much about sight-seeing though--it was about getting out of our land-locked city and enjoying the beaches. We figured out the bus system (very unreliable, as the madrileños told us), but we got to our hotel without any major issues.

Prost!
In September, I had googled "Spain Oktoberfest," because I knew I wouldn't make it to Munich this year. This was the catalyst for this entire adventure. We had planned to get to the hotel, put on swimsuits, and head to the beach... but as it turned out, our hotel had a balcony overlooking the sea, and we had a bottle of wine. So... instead of heading to the beach, we sat out on the balcony and waited around for our Oktoberfest reservation.

A few hours later, we arrived at the Oktoberfest... and we were pretty much the only ones there, besides the waitresses in dirdls and few guys in leiderhosen. The festival tent was right up against the beach, so we took a beachside table and ordered three gigantic beers and currywurst mit pommes (curry-flavored sausage and fries). Our goal was to sample a lot of different German foods... and we succeeded, but only after we ordered the Bavarian Sampler Platter... a 25 Euro, 2-foot long wooden slab of every kind of meat imaginable. Our favorite was liberkäse, a loaf of ground pork with onions and garlic mixed in. It tasted like meaty bread. 3 L of beer (each) later, we stumbled back to the hotel and went to bed.

Exploring the Complete Unknown
For my Eurotrip last summer, Ashley and I planned out everything we wanted to do. How to get places on the metro, how to take buses places, how to walk from point A to point B. That didn't happen this time. With the first week of school bearing down on me, I did hardly any research on where we were going. With that said, we did a pretty good job of experiencing two cities (Palma and Alcudia). Because our hostel reservations were in Alcudia for the night, we met up with my other roommate, Will (who flew in on Saturday because he has only Mondays off), and navigated the bus system (again!) to the northern coast of the island. The bus ride only took an hour, and afforded great views of the island's mountain range.

When we arrived in Alcudia, the place seemed a little deserted... we didn't realize that it was the beginning of the low season. The low season, however, is accompanied by liquidation sales at all of the local shops (we were met with a giant LIQUOR LIQUIDATION SALE sign as we exited the bus). After picking up some weekend beach essentials, we made our way to the hostel. After checking in, we enjoyed yet ANOTHER balcony (albeit one with much less of a view), and then went in search of food. We ate at an Italian restaurant right on the water, and then returned to the hotel for some drinks to take to the beach. We then sat on the beach listening to music and hanging out all night, before retiring to the hostel.

The Morning After
The next morning, we woke up for the "free hostel breakfast" which is always the same three kinds of cereal, bread and fruit (if you're lucky). Unfortunately, it was cloudy and rainy that morning, so we went in search of more exciting breakfast options, which ended up being nachos and Guinness at a local Irish pub. The pub was having a pub quiz, so we vowed to go back that night. On our way to the pub, I heard "American," so I immediately blurted out, "WHERE ARE YOU FROM!?!" The students we met were 1. Staying at the same hostel as us 2. Living in Alcalá de Henares, a town a half-hour outside of Madrid and 3. Were really cool. We invited them to hang out with us later, once the sun decided to show. And how do you find Californians in a large hostel without knocking on every door? Sing the theme song to The O.C. as you're entering the hostel. They opened their door, and we invited them to party with us. It was getting sunny, the beach was becoming more inviting by the second, and we were ready to have a good time. The beach in Alcudia is lined with tiki-like umbrellas, really fine sand, and tons of German tourists. We had a great time laying out on the beach.

Questions and Answers
One of my favorite nights in Ecuador was the Pub Quiz at Finn McCool's, so when I found out that the Irish pub had a quiz, we had to do it. As it turns out, there was a Mexican restaurant next door... so we got some good food there as well... although most of us ended up getting burgers. The burgers were 8 Euro with a margarita included... awesome. The restaurant also offered to deliver the burgers to the pub when they were ready. The questions were mostly British-themed (British cities, etc.), but my team and I (the Slippery Hippos) still managed to answer 9 out of 12 correctly. We even won prizes for most creative team name---Guinness scarves that say "La pinta perfecta"--- The perfect pint. The rest of the night included shenanigans on the beach again.

Procrastinating at the Weirdest Restaurant Ever/Taking to the Sea
When we woke up on Monday morning, we definitely had a case of the Mondays. Again, it was raining, so all beach plans were put on the back burner. We had decided to go back to Palma, but the next bus wasn't leaving for an hour... so we went to a few places in search of breakfast items (we missed the hostel breakfast), and ended up at a restaurant called "Dakota Tex Mex." This restaurant was AMERICAN. Think Hard Rock Café, but instead of music, the theme is just AMERICA. They had a Michael Jordan statue, license plates everywhere, pictures of obscure movie stars... it was weird. But... they did have mozzarella sticks. Everything on the menu was named after a state or a city... the San Diego burger, or the Minnesota nachos. Most of the time, the state/city had nothing to do with the food being offered (New Hampshire guacamole?), but it was funny to see all of the places represented (Ohio Ribs, anyone?). During our brunch, the sun decided to show up again, which made us throw away all plans to go back to Palma and relax on the beach. After falling asleep in the sun for a while, Roommate Will woke us up and said that he found a place renting paddle boats for 15 E/hour. Sounds great! These weren't REGULAR paddleboats, though... they were giant boats with slides on them... powered by paddling. We hopped on board, and went out to sea. We were at sea for about an hour and a half before I noticed some rapidly approaching storm clouds... and then it started to rain. Hard. We paddled as fast as we could, and finally got back to shore. Enough was enough, we decided... we were going back to Palma for our last night and last hotel reservation.

The Palma Sampler Platter
When we got back to Palma, we decided to take a taxi to the last hotel. It was cold. It was rainy. We were tired... and we weren't waiting for another bus. We arrived at the hotel hungry and in need of showers. We took care of the shower part, and asked the concierge where the best seafood restaurant was. He told us it was 10 minutes "that way" (how Spanish people give directions), and we found it pretty easily... but the entrees were 45 Euro. No way, José (which might actually have been his name). We found a small restaurant with an offer for a tapas selection with a bottle of wine for 30 Euro. If I have learned anything from my travels (Barcelona, Mexico, Oktoberfest...), it's this: if a restaurant offers you a sampler platter, take it. They want to show off the selection, and you'll probably end up eating something you've never eaten before. The wine was delicious, and the tapas were even better. My favorite were the bacon-wrapped figs: who knew? We ended the night hanging out on the balcony wrapped in blankets and fighting sleep. After all, this was our last night of vacation.

Well, That Was a Bad Idea
Flights suck. Claustrophobia, kids crying, nowhere to sleep... yeah. All of the above. We shouldn't have stayed up so late before our flight, but we did. And now I'm stuck on a tiny airplane in a storm, thinking I'm going to die (not to mention I had drank a lot of tap water on the island, which messed up my digestive system). We made it back to Madrid (eventually), and high-tailed it to the apartment, where I slept ALL DAY. Keep in mind that we got back to Madrid at 10 AM, and I slept until about 6. The roommates and I decided to make macaroni and cheese, which I made WITHOUT A RECIPE. YES!

Going to "Work"
This week, I taught 4 classes and went to 2 meetings. That's it. At my job, I actually get paid to socialize with the teachers in English... it counts as about 1.5 hours of my 16 hour work week. Not bad. The kids are actually turning out to be really fun (although they definitely need some discipline), and I'm really connecting with the teachers. I'm really having a great time there. We'll see how I feel in a month.

And that's about it. I have to go to the bank now to open a Spanish bank account... so I can finally get paid! Adios!