Today is a somewhat exciting day, as I am going to be moving into a new apartment. It will be cheaper and the people who I will be living with seem to be more friendly as well. I've spent the past few hours packing my possessions into bags, and there is nothing quite like the feeling of knowing that I have so little in the world that I can just set it on my back and go (so little here at least, I have a few more duffel bags full of stuff stored away in Minnesota). I still have a few hours before I am due to meet up with my new flatmates at the new apartment, but I am full of energy and excitement. I really enjoy this feeling. It is not quite the same as being on the road, but it is a transition, and I do enjoy these little changes through space in a similar manner to big trips.
Since returning to Albacete in early January I have been busy. I have taken on an additional class at Monkey Business, so that now in addition to working in the mornings at the high school, (from which I get home anywhere between 1:30 and 3:00, depending on the day) I am working four hours (from 4:00pm to 8:00pm) on Mondays and Wednesdays and I am working three hours (4:00pm-6:00pm, and then 8:30-9:30). It is pretty exhausting, especially since I go to a mediocre-quality (but free!) Spanish class Monday and Wednesday from 8:00pm until about 9:45. This makes Mondays and Wednesdays quite full, and makes me which that there wasn't such a gap between the classes I teach on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I am earning the money I need, though, which is good: I don't want to be in debt forever. If I keep up this rate for a few months I should make a good dent in my debt, and potentially have a little bit stored away for the summer. All in all, most of my life has consisted of working during the week, and doing a lot of reading online, running, and solo language practice during the weekends. I have been using italki quite a bit to practice my writing and to ask language based questions (mostly in Chinese, but some in Spanish). It is a pattern that works. Although I would certainly enjoy working fewer hours and socializing for one or two hours more each week, I know that I need to take advantage of being able to earn money while I can, since there may be times (potentially this summer/autumn) when I will not be able to earn as much as easily, so I want to build up a buffer for that possibility.
"Why not go out on the weekends?," one might ask. A mixture of reasons: the standard "I don't know anybody here" excuse is my main one, but my desire to save money affects that decision as well. My recent preference for going to sleep at or before midnight makes it kind of pointless to go out, since parties get going late here. My attempts to hang out with co-workers have mostly ended in my discovery that they go to other cities for the weekends to spend time with friends/family there, and finally the feeling that "I am gonna be leaving in a few months so why bother" is also present. Fortunately, although I enjoy socializing, I am not the kind of person who is made miserable by spending time alone. Sometimes I feel neutral about it, and sometimes I am quite excited to get home and practice writing, to study, or to watch a particular movie. This is something that I think my co-workers don't really understand. They were asking me the other day why I don't have a Spanish girlfriend yet (the first level answer being: "because I am not making that a priority", which by necessity leads to the second level answer of "because I don't want one"), and when I explained that I didn't have the time (read: I wasn't making the time) they didn't understand. They all get off work at 2:00pm, with the rest of the day free, where as I feel as though I only have my weekends free (I do have a few hours on Tuesday and Thursday between classes, but I don't feel that I can do much in that time since it is so limited). With this schedule going on, life seems pretty similar from day to day, form week to week. I can only think of one event/musing that really does seem blog-worthy.
This past Friday, a co-worker of mine had a birthday party. The first part of the party was a lot of fun: just socializing in Spanish, munching on snacks, making myself understood suprisingly well, and understanding a surprising amount of what was being said around me as well. I really enjoyed that, since I don't often get to socialize with people (aside from the brief socializing that happens at work). The food was tasty and the conversation mostly held my attention and kept me focused. When I learned that we were going to play Trivial Pursuit after dinner I was super excited. From what I recall, I excel at games like this. I have such a random and wide knowledge of so many different subjects (although I only have a depth of knowledge in a few) that I have a good record of succeeding at random quiz-like competitions. I always wanted to do more Pub quizzes in Beijing, where they abound. The language and cultural differences made it so challenging as to be impossible for me, though. I didn't realize how hard it would be! There were only about three or four of the questions that I understood throughout the whole game without having someone repeat it a few times or being able to read it for myself. And even for the few time in which I understood the question, the subject of the information was often completely foreign to me. Things like What famous match was the first played between these two teams in 1929?, or Who was José Luís Aztiazarán the president of when he left the Royal Society? For me, lacking the cultural knowledge that is assumable widespread here due to being raised elsewhere, there was only a single question which I both understood (after having it explained to me) and knew the answer to: What is the only animal in which the male gives birth? Seahorse is the answer according to Trivial Pursuit, but I remembered from elementary school that the female actually gives birth and the male stores the young in a pouch, making the Trivial Pursuit answer wrong, which thereby makes my "knowing" of that answer questionable. The whole experience was variously boring and frustrating, but it served as a great lesson in humility: I often consider myself such a global and multi-cultural person, and yet what I really know is so incredibly little.
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