Fun with Falling Furniture

So the time has come to share with you my latest Spanish adventure. Let me begin by saying I hope no-one has to repeat it, because it really wasn't fun.

I will set the scene. My little Ikea, almost kids', bedroom here in Madrid has a single bed pushed up against one wall. Over it, standing almost 7 feet tall, is a piece of furniture which has 4 cupboards at the top. It stands on 2 legs, one at either end of my bed, and the legs are probably about a foot across, and maybe an inch and half wide. Since I arrived here, I haven't put much in them, because I am not 7 feet tall and therefore can't reach them easily.

On Sunday evening, I came home with a bagful of goodies from my friend Hannah, who is leaving Madrid and had donated some things to me (thank you, Hannah!). Not being exactly brimming over with spare space, I decided to put just a couple of them in the cupboard over my bed. I can just about reach the cupboard handles so I reached up and opened the end cupboard.

Or at least that's what I tried to do. All I remember is that as I glanced up towards the cupboard to decide what to put in there, I was confused as to why the entire unit appeared to be getting bigger and closer to me. Cue something of a strangled scream as I realised that the whole thing was falling - on top of me. I at least had the presence of mind (I think) to get to the floor as fast as I could, which I'm pretty sure is the only thing that stopped it actually crashing into my head.

A couple of seconds later, and having heard the scream and the crash, my flatmate Kiran appeared in the doorway with a horrified look on her face, to find me in a heap on the floor, surrounded by the contents of the cupboards, most of the things from my table, with the massive unit leaning at a 45-degree angle across the room. Fortunately, my room isn't all that wide and the opposite wall had stopped the unit in its tracks, otherwise it would have continued its downward journey unimpeded and landed on me anyway.

I rather quickly noticed that the opposite wall wasn't the only thing that the unit had ended up crashing into. One of the cupboard door corners was wedged quite firmly straight into the keyboard of my laptop, like a dagger sticking out of a dead body.

In this technological age, as you can imagine, I was actually more concerned about the laptop than about whether or not I was still in one piece. Given the disastrous history of that laptop, I wasn't honestly surprised that it had suffered yet another attempt on its life.

With the help of most of the family in the next flat, I was extricated from underneath the offending piece of furniture, it was pushed upright again and after a lot of pushing, shoving, moving of other furniture, and the ingenuity of Jorge from next door, it stood up without any assistance, albeit still a little wobbly (as was I, by that point).

That's the exciting bits of the story pretty much over with, you'll be pleased to know.

The rest of that evening and most of the next day were taken up with phone calls between me and the landlady, her husband, the landlady and her insurance company and the computer repair centre. Rather surprisingly, we discovered that this flat is not covered for accidental damage to anything by anything. The contents are covered solely for damage due to flood, fire or theft. Now to me, that was a shock. I would have assumed that in order to rent out a flat privately an owner would be obliged to arrange comprehensive insurance cover, particularly in case something belonging to the owner in a furnished flat, somehow damages something belonging to a tenant, or even actually injures a tenant. I'm still staggered to find that it appears not to be the case. Given the hoops that landlords in the UK have to jump through in order to be allowed to rent out a property (electrical inspections, smoke alarm installation, fire extinguishers etc etc), it seems nigh on irresponsible that here someone can pretty much rent out their house/flat to private tenants without any formalities whatsoever to safeguard the health or safety of the tenants.

The laptop is now at the repair centre locally awaiting a decision on its fate (inexplicably, it did actually work after the incident, but 6 of the keys and the space bar were pretty much unuseable) - the landlady is paying for the inspection and the repair if that's possible and if it's not, she is paying for a replacement computer.

The piece of furniture has now been screwed to the wall behind it, which frankly, should have been done when it was installed - both the landlady and her husband have said precisely that. Which does beg the question "Well, if it SHOULD have been screwed to the wall, why wasn't it?" I'm guessing that will be an eternally unanswered question.

The room is finally sorted and things are back where they should be.

The only extra surprise has been the quite startling number of bruises that have appeared on me over the course of the week. I went from thinking I had come away entirely unscathed, to now looking as if I was beaten up. One example is in the photo at the top of the page. The rest of the bruises are on my back, my thighs and (be very grateful for the lack of photographs) my buttocks! I also ache all across my neck, shoulders, back and arms, I think from lifting the damn thing off me and then pushing it back to an upright position. It's a lot heavier than I had ever realised!

November really hasn't been my month all in all!

Thankless task

Out on my balcony a minute ago, I witnessed one of the most pointless things I've seen in a long time. Anyone who has been to my flat, will have seen the dinky little house across the road, the single-storey abode which appears to house a family of about 5 people, a giant TV, and wouldn't look out of place in a shanty town.

The roadworks that have been going on for months now have all but consumed this tiny dwelling, and I can only imagine what it's like to live in there, with pneumatic drills and cement mixers just inches from the doors and windows. Given the stupendous amount of dust that the works create, which reach my 4th floor balcony and cover everything in a film of brick and concrete dust, the effects on that house must be incredible. Right at the moment, they are literally working right outside the front door, and when I saw the little old lady who lives there just now, valiantly trying to sweep her front doorstep, I could only feel sorry for her. I feel she needs her 5 minutes of fame, so here she is:

Peace and quiet amongst the chaos

I finally found myself a little haven of peace and quiet in my local area of roadwork chaos.

Just a 5 minute walk from my flat, is the local library (Biblioteca Pública Municipal Tetuán). I'd walked past it a few times without realising what it was - it doesn't exactly advertise itself well - you only find out what it is after you go through the main doors from the street!

In fact, it's like 2 libraries. Downstairs is obviously the original - it's kind of dark, dusty, low-ceilinged but is, at least, full of actual books! It reminds me of the one I belonged to when I was a kid, wandering between the shelves, staring up at the ones I couldn't reach, picking up anything and everything and reading the blurb, only to carefully slide it back where it belonged. There's a tiny selection of English books, only 3 shelves, and they're a real mishmash of stuff. Half of it belongs on an English 'O' Level syllabus (do I have any readers who wish I'd said GCSE? I don't think so!) - Shakespeare, Dickens, the war poets - frankly not things I generally want to read in my free time. And the rest are a random concoction of thrillers, romance, slightly off-the-wall strangeness, translations of some Spanish books, things by no-one you've ever heard of. My reading is certainly going to be varied in the next few months, but I don't think it's going to take me long to exhaust the supply. Being the serial filer that I am, if I find something in the wrong place, I can't resist putting it where it's meant to be!

Book of choice at the moment? Gertrude and Claudius by John Updike. It's a kind of prequel to Hamlet (my favourite Shakespeare play) - it's pretty good so far!

The second floor is clearly very new. Upstairs you have magazines, CDs, DVDs, 6 computers with 45 mins free net access (inexplicably unavailable in the mornings of 28, 29 and 30 of every month) and a quiet reading area. Through from that is the study room - my current haunt for peace and quiet if I'm trying to study Spanish or lesson plan, or just scribble my thoughts.

Peace and quiet might actually be an understatement. Deathly hush is closer to the truth! Even full, which means probably nearly 60 people in there, it's pretty much silent. There's a slight hum from the overhead lights and from the individual lights on each 6-person desk but otherwise, there is just the occasional noise from people simply being alive! Papers being moved around, the opening and closing of zips on bags and pencil cases, water bottles being sipped from, but not much else. Last time I was in there, I hadn't eaten all day. Suddenly, my stomach rumbled - about 10 people looked over at me. It had sounded like the beginnings of a small earthquake in the silence. Chastened, I lasted another 10 minutes then slipped out to find some food. That's a mistake I won't make again. The users are, as you can imagine, mostly students surrounded by pages and pages of notes, trying to write dissertations but there's a good few other people studying languages, or perhaps revising for the very difficult Civil Service exams. If I'm lacking in inspiration, I tend to just people watch, imagining what they're all doing there.

Now that there are 3 of us living in the flat, and I have lots of lesson prep to do, it has become my little hideaway where I actually get something done. Any complaints? The chairs are bit uncomfortable in the study room, and I wish it was open at weekends. But Monday to Friday, 8.30am til 9pm isn't bad. I just wish I knew why they feel the need to employ a security guard!!

If you're really thrilled by the idea, here's their website: http://tinyurl.com/yzvh8ru . Don't get too excited!

Conde Hermanos

Having treated myself to a guitar a few weeks ago, I finally made it down to the shop that the guy I bought it from had recommended.

It was an experience. It was a proper guitar shop! Dark, dusty and filled with half-built guitars that the owner makes himself. He's about 150 years old and, needless to say, speaks no English. In I marched, completely unprepared, ready to get a case, some new strings and theoretically to ask him to replace one of the tuning heads at some point.

After much gesticulating, the case was easy enough though it took many repetitions of "menos cara" til I got the cheapest one he sold. The strings should have been easier but turned out to be more difficult. Had I spotted the big display of them under the dusty counter I could have pointed, but the charades were much more fun. The tuning head I just couldn't fathom at all. He got what the item was that I was on about, but trying to explain that I wanted to take the guitar in and get him to fit it, failed dismally. He got a huge box of tuning heads out and I just bought one to get it over with! By this point, his equally ancient wife/assistant had come out from the back room (where presumably they hide the bodies) to "help". Debbie was finding the whole thing very entertaining.

In all the excitement I completely forgot to buy a capo, so a few days later, I had to go back in there on my own. As soon as I walked through the door, he said "Ah, hola, .........." something else very fast in Spanish! Then he shouted to his wife "That English girl's here again". I don't know if he just assumed I wouldn't understand cos my Spanish had been so appalling the first time. Still, I got a capo and a very big smile out of both of them!

It was just as well I didn't ask to give one of his handmade guitars a try, cos I'm sure I would have had to buy it!

Now I just need my huge stack of music sent over from the UK and I'm sorted.

Damn dawn delights

Sunrise from the window of the Ministry of the Environment, before my class!

In the words of The Monkees, and if I had my way, "the six o'clock alarm would never ring".

On the 21st of September 2009, I "officially" became employed again. Yes, I'd had private students before the summer, but now I had a real job. With a contract (though I've not actually seen it yet!), and proper pay - hurrah - minus tax - boo!


The day before my first class, I did the sensible thing and made a reccy out to the Ministry of the Environment, to time the journey and make sure I could find it. Easy enough. 5 stops on the Metro and a 7 minute walk down one straight road! Even I can do that. Having found it, I decided to take a stroll back a different way and to a different Metro station. The area between Nuevos Ministerios, Rios Rosas and Cuatro Caminos is really nice. If I were to move, I'd quite like to go there. During my wander I found a cool looking wine shop, the very posh Scuela Italian de Madrid, a Pilates centre, a million pastelerias with their tempting window displays, a great little travel bookshop, a couple of tempting restaurants, the beautiful Antigua Hospedal de Maudes (now some kind of council building) and my absolute favourite - a kitchen furniture/equipment shop called, in a particularly un-PC fashion "ForLady"!!!


Anyway, work! It's going pretty well, if I say so myself. My 2 students at the ministry are a director and a sub-director. The director is nice but scary. She's clearly something very, very high up and has an office that wouldn't look out of place in the White House. I'm meant to teach her every Monday and Wednesday morning at 8.15 but so far she's cancelled every Wednesday due to work commitments. I only get paid for a cancelled class if they cancel with less than 12 hours' notice - damn. The sub-director, however, is absolutely lovely. She's happy, bubbly, smiley, enthusiastic, does yoga and belly dancing and seems to find pretty much everything I say funny. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and taking that as a good thing!


As I said, the only down side is the early morning start. Alarm goes off at 6.30 and I'm out the door at 7.20. It's kind of weird being back in the normal working routine and going to the Metro station with all the other commuters! My Metro routine is to listen to my MP3 player all the way there, then pick up a free paper as I exit the station so that on the way back after class I can listen to more music, but read up on the news in Spanish. It's a hilarious free paper - it carries the important stories but mostly it's about Madrid and its suburbs. In that great way that those kind of local publications do, it has amusing stories about, for instance, a car being abandoned on a street corner in one of the suburbs. If that's the most exciting thing that happens there, well......!!


Getting into the Ministry has at least got easier and faster. On my first day, the security desk didn't have the requisite authorisation email about me and they wouldn't let me in! A couple of frantic phone calls to the school didn't help as it was out of hours so I just got the machine. Finally, I went back to the security desk and asked if I could at least phone my student on the internal phone to explain that I was there, I had actually turned up and that I would see her at the next lesson. The security guy rang her office, and 2 minutes later, I was in! I guess he rang the student himself and if she's as important as she seems, she probably just said "Let my teacher in!"


So, there it is. I'm working. I even got my first pay cheque on the 1st of October. It's all gone, of course!!!

Debbie's birthday decadence

September 27th not only saw the end of the reunion, but Debbie's birthday! Yay!

A small affair, due to various people being out of town - Debbie, Moira and I celebrated together. We met at Cafe Delic in Plaza de Paja, a plaza that I discovered was a total nightmare to actually find! Despite looking very easy on a map, I walked round and round (round what turned out to be the outside walls of the square!) for about half an hour, trying to find the way in. Finally, with the help of Moira on her mobile and her map which actually had street names marked (always helpful) I found them.

They were just reaching the end of a mojito each (which when the bill came and they turned out to be €9 each, I was glad I'd missed!). Being a birthday, cava was the order of the day. The waiter initially looked a little dubious as to whether they had any or not, but then came back with 3 very cute, individual bottles (much more reasonable at €3 each), 2 proper champagne flutes and a short, fat tumbler (no, not the acrobatic kind from the circus!). He apologised for not having 3 champagne glasses! As if that mattered. We were tempted to decadently swig it out of the bottle but propriety won out in the end.

Despite the desire for another cava, we decided to resist and walked all of 10 metres to Viva La Vida, a vegetarian food-sold-by-weight buffet restaurant we'd heard so much about but never been in. WOW! What a revelation! Like veggie heaven. First, the place itself is beautiful - all hippy and mad decor. But the food is just amazing. There must have been around 30 different dishes to choose from and that was just the savoury stuff. There were various croquetas, polenta cakes, pastas, fresh veg, salads, roasted vegetables, falafels, you name it, it was there. Loads of sauces, and pots of toppings (sesame seeds, pine kernels etc). Basically, you choose a size of plate, load up whatever you want and they weigh it. It's €2.10 per 100g. Now admittedly 100g isn't very much depending on the density of the food on your plate, but we threw caution to the wind! My plate cost €18 which is probably more than I'd spent on one plate of food since I got here. But to hell with it. It was absolutely delicious and it was more veggie food than I'd seen in 6 months. I may just move in there.

The desserts all looked good but I was so stuffed I could only manage a tiny little biscuit thing that cost me all of 67 centimos!

With that I took my leave of them, at a very civilised 10.30pm and headed home ready for my 6.30 am alarm call for the start of week 2 of teaching.

So - on here at least, happy birthday again Debbie, and no, I haven't forgotten I owe you a present. Forthcoming when the bank balance allows!

Raucous reunion

The weekend of 25-27 September saw the long-awaited reunion of at least half of the group from the Vaughan Town I did at the beginning of August.

Marta, Nacho and I had become the unofficial organisers of the whole thing, so come the Friday morning, I found myself with a long piece of paper containing the names, mobile numbers, planned arrival times, accommodation details and who knows what else of the group. They were arriving by various methods and all through the day - apart from those of us who live in Madrid of course.

First to touch down was Roz who came into Barajas and then found her way to the lobby of Kim's hotel to wait. Then Kim arrived - we had a very girly, screamy reunion of our own as she came out through arrivals, and then headed off to her hotel. Or we would have, if she'd had any idea of what it was called or where it was! Now I realise I had become the weekend organiser, but I wasn't aware that that stretched to knowing where she was staying or how to get there. With the help of various people on the street and finally Roz, we made it.

We spent a lovely afternoon after she'd checked in, first at La Mallorquina (great tea/cake shop on Sol) with Pedro, who was moving to Dublin the next day. It was great that he could manage to catch up with just a few of us before going to his own leaving party in the evening.

Over the course of the evening we managed to track down/meet as planned with: Carlos (known to me as Luis, long story), Mercedes, Margarita, Maria V, Nacho, Marta, Ana Belen and Geraldine. Oh, and Marta's brother and Margarita's husband! We moved around the area near Plaza Mayor for most of the evening, from bar to bar, attempting to eat but in 2 places failing, once due to no room and once due to no food! The travelling finally caught up with people and we drifted off.

On the Saturday, people went out in disparate groups. Kim and I met Roz, Geraldine and Marta at Plaza Espana and we went for a lovely walk all around the Temple of Debod, Palacio Real, Jardines de Sabatini, had a late lunch, sat in the sun, talked a lot and generally chilled.

In the evening, 12 of us made it to dinner at Bardemcilla (owned by the Spanish actor, Javier Bardem). What a great place! Google it - even the online menu is funky! Margarita's husband came out again, and this time Maria Angeles came and brought her husband along too. Halfway through the evening, we had some bad news and some great news.

The bad news was that one of the Anglo participants on the program had been involved in a really bad car accident 5 weeks earlier in Ibiza, and had been in hospital there ever since, with a severely injured pelvis and will have to learn to walk again. Poor Ali. We've heard from her since and she's very positive, bless her!

The good news was - JOSÉ LUIS was coming - as a surprise guest! Without a shadow of a doubt, the loveliest, most gorgeous, most popular (with both sexes!) guy on the whole program, and I know everyone else would agree. He'd said he wouldn't be able to make it due to work commitments, but he drove all the way down from Santander, with a work colleague, to come to the restaurant! The reaction from our table when he walked in probably made people think some film star had just entered! It was really good to see him, and his work colleague (Haagen from Germany) was equally lovely and entertaining! After dinner, we all headed to Chueca and took over a huge corner outside a great bar, that was full to overflowing with drag queens and various same/mixed/indeterminate sex couples and groups. We talked and drank til the small hours but finally admitted defeat!

On Sunday, most of us met up again, this time in the lobby of José Luis' hotel. The majority went off in search of culture by way of the Prado and the Thyssen. Roz and I, being the uncultured heathens that we are, went to the Retiro and just sat in the sun and chatted for a couple of hours. Roz then headed off on the train to Alcala de Henares to visit other friends and I went to find the rest in the Thyssen gift shop (generally the only bit of an art gallery you can drag me into!)

We went for lunch nearby and then it was time for everyone to head their separate ways. The usual 30 minute goodbye scene took place on the street and it was over!

It had been a lovely weekend, full of laughter, chat, fun, silliness, seriousness (Margarita had a totally life-changing experience the week after our program and is clearly very, very happy - good for her!), and a reminder of what good friends we had made on the program.

Whatever other nonsense might be going on with those programs at the moment, the fact remains that they're great experiences that always result in new friends being made, some programs more concretely than others. This was just one of those very special programs.

So thank you to everyone who made the effort to come, thanks to those who couldn't come but sent messages, and to the rest - see you sometime in the future. There is talk of this becoming an annual event so we'll keep you all posted!

Lazy, lazy, lazy blogger

I know, I know, I've been really bad and not blogged for ages. I could come up with various excuses but I won't.

So get your reading heads on - it's a quiet night here in the flat and I'm recovering from last night, so what the hell. Several blogs to be blitzed.

>>>>>>>>>>> TBC!

Blognotes Inc.

I was flicking through the little notebook I carry everywhere with me and found loads of little entries marked "For Blog". None of which have been. So here is a somewhat random selection of stuff, some of it from right back when I arrived! And exactly how I found them in my notes:

- El Corte Inglés - important to have accent on Inglés otherwise it means a groin wax!
- Guy on Metro asking for money by thrusting a note in your face. Can't speak at all or just can't speak Spanish?
- César - at Quiet Man - chat about paganism. Emailed me. Oops, who is he? Can't remember.
- C/de la Huertas - Veggie deli, Moroccan restaurant, Karma Indian, lots of stuff, v touristy, prob not cheap.
- Esto no sierve para nada - This is good for nothing!
- Spanish don't really do birthday cards!
- Little local veggie restaurant (Ceres) full of workmen at lunchtime. (Not sure if I thought this was a good or bad thing!)
- Nacho's "other" friend = Jaime
- Why can't I buy just one potato?
- Terramoto = earthquake. Maremoto = seaquake. What the hell is a seaquake?
- Keep being asked question/directions especially at bus stops. Do I really look Spanish?
- Why don't Spaniards seem to sweat or smell in this heat?!
- There are almost as many travel agencies as hairdressers.
- Ferreterias - key cutting places. Millions of them. Do the Spanish lose their keys a lot?
- In 39 degrees, I suddenly understand the need for shutters on all windows and doors.
- Ugly Naked Guy on balcony opposite. Stares a lot. Maybe we should flash him!
- Guy in the little convenience store across the road knows what I want the minute I walk in. Predictable?
- That's 2 entire buildings near me they've knocked down now in 3 months.
- Great city. Apart from the dog poo.
- I should really have found a job by now!

Not scintillating, I realise but they were starting to annoy me every time I flicked through my notes. So now it's done. Blogged. As planned. Well, not quite as planned. I'll shut up now.

I'll just walk in the road, then!

Just recently, the roadworks etc right outside the flat have been looking like coming to an end. October, they promised us. I'm not convinced but at least it's improving!

However, I now see that they've just moved.

Calle del Capitan Blanco Argibay, the fairly main road near me is becoming impassable. First they dug up the pavement on one side, completely, so everyone had to use the other pavement.
Now, rather spectacularly, not only have they dug up some of the useable side, but along the part they haven't dug up, they've just put up scaffolding. There is a whole stretch of the road with nowhere for pedestrians at all.

So we're taking our lives in our hands and walking in the fairly narrow road, full of taxis with their horns blaring, psychos on scooters who never seem to look where they're going, and buses that are almost the same width as the road.

Frankly, if I keep making it to and from the Metro station in one piece, it'll be a miracle.