The kids are very funny.

It is exhausting, due to having to spend just a lot of energy to deal with jumping, bouncing, yelling, ball throwing, face painting with chalk kids. But other than that, it's fine.

The first group is really sweet. Ana, Poli and Rafael. They must be 8-10. Terrible... I can't tell how old kids are at all, I am so unfamiliar with them. At one point I had three kids happily jumping up and down over and over. My fault completely as I asked them to demonstrate the word "jumping" in my vocabulary review. They took the initiative themselves though, to throw the green orange around, that I brought in off the street as an aid to a game.

The next group is about 13 - that is a little more obvious. + or - a year though. I thought they might be difficult, judging from the first day. Well, they are all difficult, because they all just want to yack and yell and bounce around. But there were two in this class that seemed like they might be at the beginning of being tough or mean boys, but today I don't see that. I just see one very sweet kid who is a bit shy but has a very secure sense of himself, and another who is cocky but still a child. The former strikes me as actually wanting to learn English. The latter as being one of those boys who I either might have had a fascination for or been afraid of at the same age. Pepe skids in the door cause he's got on those runners with wheels in the heels, that when you lean your feet back, it's like being on roller skates. I'd seen those for 3 year olds before but not for a 13 year old. He then tells me he wants to be an architect and likes design. At a later point in the class after pretending with Jaime to kick each other in the balls and doing various other noisy stuff, he starts painting his face as a cat, with the chalk, and keeps just saying "cat... cat... cat" over and over again and giggling. Jaime paints his face and then Pepe paints the other Pepe's face.

Jolly good time... ha ha ha. Except for the 3 other students who are quieter, and one of whom is much more serious. Well, I am very amused by all of this. I think it is genius and this is the stuff I should still be able to do except someone told me not to, too many times, and then I became an adult. Unfortunately, I am being paid by their parents to teach them something, though today I got the distinct feeling of being a kind of babysitter. Anyways, I am not and I am 100% certain that these parents are serious and want their kids to learn. Don't think I'm really the one to discipline them.... God help me.

I must change the name of this blog...

I am planning lessons for classes I will start tomorrow. Hopefully I survive. They should be nice kids.

A moment ago I heard a mumble, "just a little hole..." and then a loud drilling sound in the kitchen. Geoffrey is sticking a piece of construction re-bar into the kitchen wall to hang more pots and implements off of.

Yesterday I put my hair in pigtails and had only a big tweed flower on an elastic for one side, so Geoffrey tied the other side with plumbing tape. We went out to see some live flamenco in the Tabanco and a bar. We ended up at Los Tres Reyes, where we ran into the king of palmas, or so Geoffrey says. He was really cool and invited us for drinks. Then to the Feria - they have a second Feria now. We hung out with some people that got progressively more drunk and then I was just tired of it.

Angel, who is the owner of the apartment next door helped Geoffrey throw the escombro (junk) off the roof into a cuba (skip) yesterday. Angel (whom Geoffrey calls "Ankle") has been itching to help out somehow. Maria laughed when I revealed to her what was in the new pots in the courtyard. "Ha ha ha, he brought them from Extremadura!" She thought it was hilarious that Geoffrey had dug up a bunch of oak trees and brought them all that way.

On Friday we met Nada and Charles on Calle Higueras, a few houses down from where I first lived when I came here in 2010. They were looking at a beauty of a horrible run down house and wanted Geoffrey's opinion or just our moral support. The house was huge, and would have been incredible once. Lots of amazing character - old tiles, archways, wooden doors and windows. Old ceiling beams, a place for a garden, currently inhabited by garbage and cats - dead and alive. We went up to the rooftop of the Palomas hotel where I stayed when I first came here, and looked down on it. My Dad would probably pronounce it fit for nothing other than a wrecking ball, but Europeans think differently. It was totally charming.

That evening we went to see Nada dance at a nice hotel on the rooftop. Clara, another friend of friends alternated with Nada: belly dancing and bollywood. I was completely blown away by Nada's dancing: have never seen anything like it. She is extremely good - nothing like the Greek restaurant performers in Canada. Hers is true art and has something profound about it despite being nearly erotic, I suppose. Anyways, it had class and elegance, something like good tango Argentino.

The night before that we had Manuel and Pati over for dinner: chicken with olives in a cazuela - a clay pot.

Geoffrey has been stewing figs that mostly he gathered off the ground in Montanchez - at his friend's finca in Extremadura. We managed to get two 5 liter plastic jugs of local wine, and a third 2 liter bottle. We discovered it last time. An "expensive" bottle at 4€, is something I would really have paid $25 for at home. (The 5 liter jugs are 6€ each). We missed the farmer's market where we previously got amazing cheese, 5€ for a kilo, and had to buy similar stuff for double the price.

I am starting on my flamenco shoes and have made a toe cap sucessfully. I don't know about the rest though. I may have to have wooden lasts. I'll see...

Here are the sandals I made a couple weeks ago.