Villalba

Today we took a stroll round the lovely nearby town of Villalba. It is a about 10 minutes on the 681 bus from Alpedrete. It has everything you need, cinema, Mc Donalds, Pizza Hut and a fantastic little shop called Shana which is extremely similar to Berska back home. We are currently sitting in La Tabernita de Mimo enjoying a cold drink while we decide what we would like to eat for dinner.

First Day of School.

Wednesday was an early start.  Colin came down to our apartment for breakfast and we made our way to Montessori School which is literally 3 minutes from the apartment. The Head Master Adrian was there to greet us with Clive, head of the English Department.  Clive showed us where the staff room was where we can grab a cup of tea in-between classes. He brought us into his office and explained that we would be working with three groups, Year 8, Year 9 and Year 10. The ages range from 11-14. Year 8 and 9 are located in the other site at Los Fresnos, it’s a 15 minute walk away. He asked if we would like to sit in on a class with Year 10 as they were doing essay prep with their teacher, Beverly.

 

Beverley welcomed us in to her class. The students were reading out the introductions of their essays. Some essays were inspired by images and photographs. As we listened we were immensely impressed.  Initially we were worried that the language barrier could hinder our project. We can confidently say that it will certainly not be an issue.

 

Once the students left we chatted with Beverly and Clive in their office while sipping on my first cup of tea since Sunday morning. Clive gave our timetables. We will spend the reminder of today an our classes on Thursday sitting in on lessons. On Friday we take the reins.

Our First Day

On Monday we met the Adrian, the Head Teacher of Montessori  school. We had a chat about what we would like to do during our time in the school and Adrian was really enthusiastic about having us here. He explained that the English department were having a meet later that afternoon and he would discuss our intended project. He asked if we would come back Wednesday morning at 9am.

 

 

 

Food Coma

Just finished our delicious lunch in La Tabernita de Mimo. The portion size is extremely generous as you can see from the photos. We shared potatas Bravas, ensalada tomate con sal gourde and croquetas de jamon. It was basically grilled tomatoes, roast potatoes with sauce and ham croquettes and it was absolutely fabulous!! It was our second time to eat here today and we will certainly be back again. Now, we are heading back to the apartment for a siesta....do as the locals do :)

Food, glorious food!

We are having lunch today in La Tabernita de Mimo.With the help of Google Translate we have managed to order our lunch in Spanish Photos of our lunch to follow 😁

How to get to Alpedrete

We left Dublin at 16:20pm Irish time on an Aer Lingus flight. We landed at 19:45pm. Madrid is 1 hour ahead of GMT. Once we collected our suitcases we made our way to the Metro station which about a 20 minute walk from the baggage claim.

 

The Madrid metro is clean and extremely efficient. We waited no more than 2 minutes for a train on the pink line that took us to five stops away to Nuevos Ministerios where we then changed from the Metro to the Cercanias Renfe. Renfe is like the Spanish version of Irish Rail. The train journey took an hour and took us to the station in Alpedrete. 

So it begins......

Hola! Wendy and Jamie here. We are two students from the Creative Writing and Cultural Studies class in Inchicore College. We have travelled to Alpedrete in Spain to work in a local school. We will be spending three weeks facilitating creative writing workshops with students.  We will use this blog to document our time here in Alpedrete and to highlight the differences between Irish and Spanish culture. We will update the blog regularly with anything new and interesting we find during our sauntering around town.