This is a quick little post I'm hoping some of my friends in the education field will enjoy. I'm on a roll this week! By the way, I'm trying to post the videos from now on via You Tube or Vimeo. Let me know how they work. Wednesday, the boys did not go to school. No, it wasn't a saints day or national holiday....rather, all the teacher's and obreros in Spain conducted a HUELGA, a strike. At 23:30 and I could still hear the blow horns and fireworks going off in the distance.
It was a little nice to sleep in the morning of the huelga a bit, I must admit. We covered a little lectura, matematicas and Owen worked on his cursive (he says it's easier than printing!). By the way, cursiva is the way all children write here from the get go. Later on, around 5th grade they work on "letra" which is printing....exactly opposite of what the US does for writing. Anyway, after a little colegio en casa, we decided we better add a bit of culture to our day, so we strolled down to the Gran Via where the huelga was to take place.
I was glad I had heard of this event a couple days prior. I had a feeling it might be kind of crazy so I stocked up on pan, leche and a couple other items we have to get every other day. Some of you who live in Tahoe know how that feels when a big storm is coming. You head down to Safeway to stock up, knowing mother nature is ready to take her course and confine you to your abode for a good 24 hours. That was kind of the way I was feeling the day before.
It was a good idea I made this choice as everything was closed! So, the huelga was not just the public service employees but EVERYONE! The streets were quiet and all the metal, pull-down doors closed at every cafe, bar, mercado, tienda, zapateria, panaderia, carniceria, banco, you get the point, you name it. Everything was quiet until we descended upon Reyes Catolicos and Gran Via where hundreds of protestors were chanting phrases like:
"mas trabajo, menos policia"
"terrorismo es capitalismo"
"dinero para el obrero, no para el banquero"
Let's see you all get out your dictionaries and translators for those phrases! After a short Civics lesson, here's what the kids were able to decipher from it all.
So, I'll leave you with just a couple quotes for this blogito....
"I had the best dream last night...I was a WORD BENDER!!!!" (Owen loves the movie Airbender and had a dream he could bend Spanish words the way he wished....love it!)
"So why don't our teachers in America ever go on strike like this when they're unhappy at school?" hmmmm....
"This is a little scary."
"It's BATIDO time!"
"Oh, I wish I had my twin tips!"
"Mom, when we go back to America it's going to seem like we live in a mansion!"
"Ven, Mama!"
"Mira, Mama!"
"Pero, que haces, Owen?"
Last but not least, for those of you aching to know the inside scoop on the trompos I've been talking about, here's Myles to give you the betta. He actually set this up to send to his papa but we'll share it with you too...
