Friday, March 20

Scott's been working hours throughout the day, but then making time to take off during the day to explore a little bit.  He'll have this luxury for another week or so, and then the onsite project work should be in full swing and he'll be at work leaving home at 7am each morning and returning around 6pm each night.  

On Friday, Scott worked all morning and then joined me to pick up the kids for lunch.  The boys are picked up 15 minutes before Rosa.  

While we were waiting for Rosa, a fire truck tried to
drive down the narrow street in front of the school.

To do this, the post in the middle of the road needed to be put down.
The fireman tried multiple keys to open the hideaway compartment.
Finally, after 10 minutes or so, the correct key was found.

And the truck proceeded down the street.
Our guess is that the firetrucks practice going down each of the streets,
so that they're ready if there's a fire emergency.

The phone drama continues.  At lunchtime, we checked out the Metropol Parasol that's next door to the kids' school.  It turns out that upstairs is a playground that is mostly shaded.  The kids had fun playing there and eating their picnic lunch.

Then we dragged them on our errands.  First stop was to our bank where we picked up our new ATM cards and signed more paperwork.  While there, the kids helped themselves each to a calendar.

Next stop was to the phone store.  Our cell phone application was DENIED.  Ugh!  The way we understand it is that in the states we have a credit history that can be looked up by our credit scores.  Here, the credit history is often based on bank accounts and since ours is not even a week old, we have no Spanish credit history.  Back to the drawing board.

Before bringing the kids back to school, we treated them to an ice cream snack.

In my research earlier in the week, I'd found a secondhand phone and games and videos store that was super helpful.  So, after dropping off the kids, Scott and I ventured in (after first visiting an Orange network store) and learned more about phones and sim cards.  They directed us to a Movistar location to learn how to buy the sim cards and we learned that we needed our passports, which we didn't have with us.  It seems that we need our passports for a bunch of things here.

At this point, Scott went home to do some work and I did a quick grocery shop in the basement of El Corte Ingles (a large department store in Spain).  There's a special place in my memory for El Corte Ingles because I had the chance to consult with them for 2 weeks, many many years ago (perhaps 1997), in their Madrid headquarters.

Then Scott and I returned to pick up the kids and bring them around for more errands.  This included first trying to buy the sim cards at the Movistar place and being told to get the phone first.  The phone people said to get the sim card first.  Anyway, Scott and I finally bought cell phones at the phone store and then went to a photo place to get pictures taken of the kids.  These photos are needed with their school paperwork.  As the pictures were being taken, the camera battery was dying.  Luckily, there was just enough juice to snap all 3 kids and print out their pictures.  

Then, with the phones, we went back to the Movistar sim card seller.  At this point there was only one person working and we were 2nd in line.  It probably took at least 20 minutes for our turn and then at least another 20 minutes to buy the cards and have all of the paperwork set up.  Finally, we went home, fed the kids, and got them dressed in pjs just in time for our babysitter to arrive.

She was the owner of the babysitting service we'd learned about the previous weekend, Ludonanny.  She was wonderful.  She was prompt, immediately engaging with the kids, and she brought an arts & crafts activity along.  We told her the area of town where we wanted to go and she shared some ideas on places in the area to check out.  

We started at The Merchant because both Scott's alma mater and mine were playing in the NCAA basketball tournament that night and this bar said they'd try and get our games on the tv.  When we arrived, they'd lost their signal and never figured out how to get it back.  But, it was a neat bar.

Then, we walked around and stumbled upon the area the sitter had suggested.  It's a great stretch by the river with ~5 restaurants and bars next to each other with both indoor and outdoor seating.  We think it's on Calle Genil.  At 9:30 at night it was quite the party scene and only just getting started.  We had a great outdoors dinner.

When we returned home, the kids were happily sleeping, the apartment was tidied up, and Isabel was sharing even more suggestions on great places to go both in the city and on day trips.

Wednesday, March 18

On Wednesday, Scott finished up with meetings and was able to join me from 3-5pm while the kids finished their school day.  We decided to just wanter and we ended up in the Santa Cruz neighborhood.  Here some of the streets are so narrow that Scott calls them hallways.  Check out some of the sights we saw while stolling.  We finished our date with a beer/wine at an outdoor cafe near the kids' school.

Statues at the Western end of Alameda de Hercules.  This plaza is nearby our apartment and has fountains, sort of like a splashground.  I imagine we'll visit here often over the summer as there are no public swimming pools in central Sevilla.  May look into a public pool that's an easy bus ride away.  Also, Alameda de Hercules has 2 playgrounds and multiple restaurants by the playgrounds.  It's a place we plan to go to in order to have drinks or dinner while the kids are also happy because they can play.

A delivery van barely fitting on a narrow street.  This is not one of Scott's "hallways".  Note how narrow the sidewalks are.  When a car comes down these streets, they wait while the pedestrians step into a recessed doorway so that there's room for the car to pass.  Often cars have their sideview mirrors turned in so that they can fit.

A beautiful doorway we saw along our walk.

Looking up at the church from the doorway.

Tons of the doorways are extra huge, but then have these regular-sized doorways inside them that can be opened for everyday use.

Historic landmark from the 16th century

One of the narrow streets in the Santa Cruz neighborhood

View of Real Alcazar from the Cathedral

Statue with a boat dedicated to Christopher Columbus

Bakery where we grabbed croissants for breakfast (per Rosa's request)

Random street

Differences in Spanish life that we've found harder

While I think we're adjusting fairly well to life in Sevilla (and enjoying it quite a bit), there are some things that are a bit of a challenge.

1. dog poop - It's everywhere.  While some people clean up after their dogs, it doesn't seem to be a common habit.  We like walking while looking up at all of the amazing architecture, but we're finding that it's often best to look down so as to not step in the stinky stuff.
2. graffiti - It's also everywhere.  We're not sure why.  Often it's on garage doors and doors that look like garage doors that lock up businesses when they're closed.  It's such a juxtaposition to the old and gorgeous architecture.
3. meal times - We've found that Sunday nights are a good time to have the kids eat dinner early and go to bed early after the later hours over the weekend and in prep for the school week.  While we're trying to adjust to the Spanish ways of later meal times, it was challenging for us on Sunday when we wanted to have something to eat while we were out and about but it was past lunchtime and snack time (around 5pm) and not yet dinner time (starts around 8 or 9pm).  We're trying to be very understanding, and we clearly just need to keep on learning Spanish ways or just plan to cook at home on Sunday nights.
4. laundry - no dryer

Back home we have a high efficiency and oversized washer and dryer.  And I do about one load of laundry/day.   

Here, it's just a small washer in our kitchen.  And I'm doing about one load/day.    

But, I need to hang up the clothes to dry.
Here's a view of he washer to the outside clothes lines.  

And here's a view hanging out the window of the outside clothes lines.  While it's nice using the sun to dry the clothes, it's a bit uncomfortable to lean out to hang them.  Plus, I fear dropping items and then having to go down 3 or 4 flights of stairs and asking the neighbor on the bottom floor if I can go in and retrieve our items.  

Luckily, we've found a drying rack at a corner store.  These stores are typically run by the Chinese.  We're not sure why.  And we thought at first that when we were directed to Chinese stores that it was closeminded people.  Apparently it's just that the Chinese have the market for these stores.  They sell umbrellas, pencils, pens, markers, paper, tupperware, pots, pans, plates, laundry baskets, cleaning supplies, and some basic food items.  Anyway, I'm happy to now have an indoor drying rack to hang the smaller items that are more likely to fall and the more intimate apparel.  Plus, after absolutely gorgeous weather last week, we've had a bunch of rain this week (it is the rainy season) and to get the clothes to dry they've needed to be out of the rain.

Monday, March 16 - cell phone research

While Scott has his US phone turned on for our duration here, since his work contacts all use that as his work phone, I've been without a phone.  So not only do I want to get one, but Scott also should have a local number for this local project.

The company Movistar is the one that has coverage on the airbase where Scott's working.

After many unsuccessful attempts to find Movistar on Saturday when we were with the kids, I managed to find at least 3 store locations on Monday as I journeyed around the center of town.  I met Belinda, an employee, at the 2nd one and she was incredibly helpful.  Our conversation was 100% in Spanish (thank you Mom and Dad for paying for my college education and letting me major in Spanish).

She taught me that there were multiple steps to setting up a no-contract mobile phone with Movistar.

• Visit #1 was learning what was needed
• Visit #2 Scott joined me after we had set up our bank account and we brought in our Spanish bank account information and our passports.  At this visit we also selected our phones.  We're trying to go with basic internet-compatible phones that we can use while here.  Back home, Verizon will want us to stick with their phones.
• Visit #3 - we're now waiting for Movistar to approve our application.  We're not sure what this approval involves.  We hope to have word today that our application is approved and that we can pick up our phones and start sharing our local number.  

People seem to use WhatsApp here and I look forward to getting on it with the various people I meet.  In fact, yesterday I met a very international mom at the school, who has a daughter in the boys' class, and she said that there's a whatsapp group for just the class.  

Fingers crossed that we'll have local mobile phones soon.

Monday, March 16 - bank research

We believe that it'll be easiest to pay the monthly school tuition and the monthly rent with a Spanish bank account.  Our research before arriving in Spain taught us that we'd need to go to the police station and get a foreign SSN (for lack of a better translation).

But, my research on Monday found that we could get a Spanish bank account without one since we're here for less than a year.

We put the paperwork in action and we're now hooked up with one.  Now we're trying to link paychecks (or at least expense checks) to deposit there.  One step at a time.

To share a bit more, it was:

• visit #1 to find out what paperwork was needed (passports and a copy of the lease) as well as 100 Euros + to open an account
• visit #2 - bringing that paperwork and money.  The bank attendant was incredibly helfpul and actually spoke in English.  Usually I'm finding that while most people can speak English about as well as I can speak Spanish, they're nice enough to let me practice my Spanish.  For the bank, it was great to have the English so that we could both understand it.  I have enough trouble understanding it in my native tongue.
• visit #3 will be to pick up our ATM cards and sign more paperwork
• visit #4 will be a visit when we move back to the states to close the bank account

Monday, March 16 - gym research

In addition to finding a school, finding an apartment, getting here, and setting up our kitchen, etc., we have other things to set up.  

Gym

In the past few months I had found that I was really enjoying kickboxing at my gym.  On Monday, with my first few hours to myself in Sevilla, I went on a hunt for kickboxing gyms nearby.  There were 2 to checkout.  The first one only has evening classes and that doesn't work well with my schedule.  Rather, I'd like to work out while Scott's at work and the kids are at school.  The second one, Boran Gym Jaramillo, was very welcoming when I rang the bell in the middle of class.  I was given a copy of the schedule and told that I could try a class for free.  And that's what I did on Tuesday.  It was GREAT!  It was my first time doing muay thai.  Luckily, I had some background thanks to Carrie's boxing classes and Gwen's kickboxing classes (that were a predeccessor to muay thai).  I wore shin guards and learned a ton of blocking moves.  Wednesday was class #2 for me at the gym when I wore arm holds and learned yet more blocks.  And yesterday at class #3 I was learning a lot of back and forth attacks and blocks and what to do when stuck in a leg hold.  All in all it's been an amazing learning experience and a great way to have extra Spanish exposure.  

The gym is about a 10 minute walk from the school, and I'll either be going there after school dropoff or just before lunch/siesta.  The walk is 20-30 minutes from the apartment.  I'm still trying to figure out the best way for this route.  And there are so many short streets, that I need more time to learn my way around.  

Missing my Easton coaches and classmates (Gwen, Kelsie, Erica, Isaac, Gabriela, Ryan, Julie, Eli, Tracey, Aimee, Toph, Gel, Lori).

Monday, March 16 - first day at the new school

Monday morning we were prepared with clothes picked out, morning snacks packed, and backpacks ready by the door.  In fact, we were so ready, that we arrived at school a good 15-20 minutes early and they didn't quite know what to do with us.  Typically you drop off the kids and then they know where to go and what to do.  But obviously this wasn't happening on day 1.

This was our first day up so early
(we woke up at 7 and left the apartment a little after 8)
and we didn't realize that it can be cold in the morning.

Cody is ready with his orange pants and backpack to go onto the patio and start playing with other children.  This patio is one of many where the kids have PE and recess.

Cody is smiling and as happy as can be in line ready to go upstairs with his class.
Devon is ready, but not quite as smiley.
At least he's wearing his favorite "holey soft pants with pockets".

Rosa started school an hour later on the first day since her class had a Spanish exam first thing that morning.
After dropping off the boys, we went to the school papeleria (paper and book store) and bought the kids' PE uniforms and books.  They only wear PE uniforms 2x/week on their PE days.  Otherwise, they can wear what they want.  At the store there was pink colored paper (de color Rosa) that you could buy.  It's of the Iris brand.  Arco de Iris is rainbow in Spanish.  Rosa loved seeing her name next to cousin Iris' name.  So did we.

With a little more time before we had to drop Rosa off at school, we popped into a panaderia (bakery) around the corner and had a morning treat each.  It was a chocolate donut for Rosa, a croissant for Scott, and a cafe con leche for me.

Back at the school in the waiting area, Rosa enjoyed sitting on Scott's lap while waiting for a teacher to walk her to her new classroom.

All in all the kids seem to love school.  They just wish that their friends and teachers from Denver were here with them.

Rosa is excited that her class is learning cursive writing.  She's wanted to try it since she was 4 years old.  She's also realized that it's good that math is in Spanish as it's easy to understand numbers in either language.  She has recognized, though, that the Spanish write some of their numbers differently than Americans do.  Rosa was welcomed to her class with an actual welcoming committee consisting of 2 boys and 2 girls.  And her desk is pulled next to another girl's desk, Sofia, to help out Rosa.  Rosa makes girl #9 in the class as opposed to the 15 or so boys in the class, so the other 8 girls are very happy to have her.  And, one of the girls is having her birthday party next weekend and inviting all of the girls in the class, including Rosa, to attend.  What fun!

The boys also have a bounce in their step at school.  They are enjoying the super nice teachers, the recess, snack, arts & crafts, etc.  Plus, every single student in their class is super welcoming to them and keeping an eye out for them.  There are about 4 students, in addition to them, who are native English speakers, so this also helps.  At pickup we met 2 of the moms, one originally from South Africa and the other originally from England.  Though both have been in Sevilla since ~2002.  So far we've met their Spanish teacher, English teacher (from Scotland), English Para (from Ireland), and French teacher (from France).

Their school day is from 8:45/9-1 and then 3-5pm.  On Monday I brought food and we went to the Plaza del Duque playground to eat and play.  It was empty when we got there with the exception of one mom and her daughters.  Amazingly enough, she's American and here for a few months.  And her girls are super close in age to our children.  We look forward to more play time over the Easter Week (Semana Santa) break.