Friday, October 30, 2009
A small bump in the road
As you can see from my previous entries, things are awesome here. The past two weeks I really came to appreciate how good I had it. Between work, the foundation that I hooked up with here as well as ever trying to meet people and learn more Spanish, I was never bored. Everyday had its own version of excitement. The excitement (as well as my luck) seems to have caught up with me though as I have spent all of this week fighting off a fever and other flu-like symptoms. Obviously, this explains my silence on the blog posts the past two weeks. When I bounce back to normal, I will have much more to tell as I am starting to envision a stay in Spain of maybe longer than just one year. However, all plans and activities are on hold until I can leave my bed without feeling like I am going to collapse - unfortunately, that last comment is not being dramatic either. It has only been today where I felt that walking more than 10 feet was detrimental to my health. I hate being weak...
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Comfort and discomfort
For the early part of the week, I took two stabs at meeting new people one of which was potentially successful and the other not so much.
First for the one that didn't go so well...my idea was that in volunteering with Ice Hockey in Harlem in New York I met many contacts while doing a good thing. I will always remember my time there and will definitely go back to it if I can. Having such a good experience I thought volunteering with kids here in Spain would also be a good idea. The university hooks people up with volunteer opportunities through its ayuda social program. I signed up for it, interviewed for it and was placed in a program at a rehabilitation school for kids. Little did I know but found out when I got there that the kids were severely mentally challenged and my task was to try and help them play a simple game with four other Spanish volunteers (university undergraduates). May I say first that it is an incredible thing that the university sets up. Those kids definitely enjoy the hour that is spent with them and they like the sport. That said, I was extremely uncomfortable because I'd never been around kids like that in my life before and really didn't know what to do. I felt like I was more of a waste than anything else. No when I feel like that my guy reaction is to persevere and get comfortable except my time is limited and I can only do one volunteer project and the other thing, the potentially successful one, has me much more excited so I am going to chase that up.
What is it? Fundacion de Profesionales Solidarios is a Spanish organization that tries to promote the cause of international development by hosting local culutral activities in Pamplona, conferences in Spain and runs international programs in the Congo and Nicaragua primarily. There is a staff of 6 people and a team of 60 collaborators. I was very interested not only in the cause, but also because it is the perfect complement to my job. My job is very top-down. It approaches poverty by trying to solve it on a policy level by affecting the lives of millions people. The organization is very bottom-up. It tries to life people out of poverty by affecting 100 or so lives directly. For that I think it is a perfect fit for me. I have an interview tomorrow to see exactly what a non-native Spanish speaker can do for them so I have my fingers crossed.
In other news, this weekend was a holiday weekend here in Spain as they celebrate their culture on October 12th. I spent the weekend in Barcelona which was great. We rented a car, saw cool sights even though we stayed for cheap overnight in a bungalo that was the equivalent of a trailer park. Still, pictures are the best way to tell how much fun a trip was and I hope you'll see from mine that I enjoyed Barcelona for the most part (except when I was hungry which is when I really look pissed in the photos because...I was). Anyway, I'll post the link to the photos soon. I haven't had a chance to upload all of them to Photobucket yet.
First for the one that didn't go so well...my idea was that in volunteering with Ice Hockey in Harlem in New York I met many contacts while doing a good thing. I will always remember my time there and will definitely go back to it if I can. Having such a good experience I thought volunteering with kids here in Spain would also be a good idea. The university hooks people up with volunteer opportunities through its ayuda social program. I signed up for it, interviewed for it and was placed in a program at a rehabilitation school for kids. Little did I know but found out when I got there that the kids were severely mentally challenged and my task was to try and help them play a simple game with four other Spanish volunteers (university undergraduates). May I say first that it is an incredible thing that the university sets up. Those kids definitely enjoy the hour that is spent with them and they like the sport. That said, I was extremely uncomfortable because I'd never been around kids like that in my life before and really didn't know what to do. I felt like I was more of a waste than anything else. No when I feel like that my guy reaction is to persevere and get comfortable except my time is limited and I can only do one volunteer project and the other thing, the potentially successful one, has me much more excited so I am going to chase that up.
What is it? Fundacion de Profesionales Solidarios is a Spanish organization that tries to promote the cause of international development by hosting local culutral activities in Pamplona, conferences in Spain and runs international programs in the Congo and Nicaragua primarily. There is a staff of 6 people and a team of 60 collaborators. I was very interested not only in the cause, but also because it is the perfect complement to my job. My job is very top-down. It approaches poverty by trying to solve it on a policy level by affecting the lives of millions people. The organization is very bottom-up. It tries to life people out of poverty by affecting 100 or so lives directly. For that I think it is a perfect fit for me. I have an interview tomorrow to see exactly what a non-native Spanish speaker can do for them so I have my fingers crossed.
In other news, this weekend was a holiday weekend here in Spain as they celebrate their culture on October 12th. I spent the weekend in Barcelona which was great. We rented a car, saw cool sights even though we stayed for cheap overnight in a bungalo that was the equivalent of a trailer park. Still, pictures are the best way to tell how much fun a trip was and I hope you'll see from mine that I enjoyed Barcelona for the most part (except when I was hungry which is when I really look pissed in the photos because...I was). Anyway, I'll post the link to the photos soon. I haven't had a chance to upload all of them to Photobucket yet.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Groin pulls, The Dark Knight, Madrid!, But not quite...
Week started off well. I played in a soccer game with a group of 10 other guys. They were all quite good and I enjoyed just trying to keep up with them. The problem is that I couldn't. As you know, Americans suck at soccer. The Spaniards, on the other hand, can dribble like the ball is glued to their feet. When I tried to imitate them, bad things happened. The first time I passed it to other team. The second time I ran into my own player, and, the third time, I pulled my groin. That ended that.
If you remember this time last year, The Dark Knight was finally winding down from grossing the buckets of money it did over the summer. A year later it is not forgotten, but it is certainly old news except to me. I love it and watch it every chance I get. So I was quite excited this week when the TA that I work with announced that he was going to put The Dark Knight on his projector and make a movie night out of it. He lives with a Spaniard who has girlfriend visiting quite often. The four of us got together and watched the movie. With his projector, the screen was nearly the size of all. We were all in lounge chairs. It is effectively a home theater. I was in heaven.
The morning after the movie I was really excited. A friend of mine from AMR, Jason, told me that he was coming to Madrid for the weekend and that I should come to meet up with him. An old friend + weekend in Madrid was a no brainer to me. So I went ahead and bought bus ticket and booked a hotel room for the night. I worked the rest of the day very much anticipating how much fun it would be.
But the following day my boss came in and told me that it was going to be a long weekend because we had to crank out a proposal to submit to the university. I was a bit annoyed that I had burned my money...that's life though.
I sucked it up and worked quite hard during the entire weekend. On Saturday, my boss took me to lunch at one of the nicest restaurants in Pamplona. Red meat, red wine and sorbet. Wasn't a bad lunch break. Also, because I worked with him all weekend I learned a lot more about what he was going to need me to do and what his plans are for the center. It reaffirmed some of the things I thought when I first took the job. I am going to be in touch with phd's all over the world and try to coordinate research efforts. I am going to be expected to explain sophisticated research to senior level people at foundations and governments who just don't have the time to listen. I also being playing with PowerPoint quite a bit. I am content though. Everything is very interesting and I am happy to be here.
It is only a question of time before I go back out to Madrid.
Hasta luego...
If you remember this time last year, The Dark Knight was finally winding down from grossing the buckets of money it did over the summer. A year later it is not forgotten, but it is certainly old news except to me. I love it and watch it every chance I get. So I was quite excited this week when the TA that I work with announced that he was going to put The Dark Knight on his projector and make a movie night out of it. He lives with a Spaniard who has girlfriend visiting quite often. The four of us got together and watched the movie. With his projector, the screen was nearly the size of all. We were all in lounge chairs. It is effectively a home theater. I was in heaven.
The morning after the movie I was really excited. A friend of mine from AMR, Jason, told me that he was coming to Madrid for the weekend and that I should come to meet up with him. An old friend + weekend in Madrid was a no brainer to me. So I went ahead and bought bus ticket and booked a hotel room for the night. I worked the rest of the day very much anticipating how much fun it would be.
But the following day my boss came in and told me that it was going to be a long weekend because we had to crank out a proposal to submit to the university. I was a bit annoyed that I had burned my money...that's life though.
I sucked it up and worked quite hard during the entire weekend. On Saturday, my boss took me to lunch at one of the nicest restaurants in Pamplona. Red meat, red wine and sorbet. Wasn't a bad lunch break. Also, because I worked with him all weekend I learned a lot more about what he was going to need me to do and what his plans are for the center. It reaffirmed some of the things I thought when I first took the job. I am going to be in touch with phd's all over the world and try to coordinate research efforts. I am going to be expected to explain sophisticated research to senior level people at foundations and governments who just don't have the time to listen. I also being playing with PowerPoint quite a bit. I am content though. Everything is very interesting and I am happy to be here.
It is only a question of time before I go back out to Madrid.
Hasta luego...
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