El Día Primero
*The photo to the left is one that I Googled and I had to use a translator to create the title. It simply goes to show how much work I need to do.*
I finally arrived at Barajas Airport around 11:15am! Everything just happened so fast. One moment, I was a month away from arriving to Madrid and the next moment I was en route to Madrid with horrible gas from the airplane pasta dinner they served on my flight. I honestly don’t believe that I am actually here. I feel like Jim Carey on the Truman Show; as if they flew me around in circles over the Atlantic while creating a set that I will live in for the next year.
Anyway, after arriving to the airport and (surprisingly quickly) getting through border control and baggage, I finally set out to go meet my new family. When I walked out into the “Arrival Hall”, there was a HUGE crowd of eager people with signs, balloons, and flowers, waiting for their loved ones to emerge from the baggage claim. I expected my host family to be in that crowd, and as I walked out, I scanned the crowd to make sure I didn’t miss them. I’m not sure why I thought my family wouldn’t have been able to spot me at first. I might have been one of the only black girls in the ENTIRE airport (okay, I may be exaggerating). In addition to that, I was amongst the tallest women there. I mean, you can’t miss me, so even if I hadn’t seen them, they would have definitely seen me.
After finally realizing that my host family was not within that initial crowd, I decided to walk up and down the arrival hall to see if they were waiting elsewhere. They were nowhere to be found. I had no cell phone or wifi service, and no way to contact anyone at all.
After about 10 minutes of looking around, I was torn between feeling excessively regretful (what the hell was I thinking? Flying to Madrid where I know nobody but a host family that i’ve never met?!?!) to feeling paranoia (what if there’s a creepy man watching me, waiting for the perfect moment to snatch me up and take me to their home and make me their little African American sex slave????) to feeling completely relaxed (Don’t worry they are on their way. God is on your side. If they don’t not arrive for some reason, just take a cab into the city, relax, and find a cafe with wifi and try to get in contact with someone you trust). Sometimes my mind goes through strange bouts of angst when i’m in uncomfortable situations, but I have come to find out that the only way I can grow is by making myself uncomfortable.
Anyway, I digress. I decided to continue to scan the area. After standing around for about 5 minutes and there they were! My host father and 2 kids were rushing towards the arrival crowd when we both spotted each other! It was such a relief to finally see them all. Once we gave hugs and said our hellos, we made our way to the car!
The little girl was so enamored by me while the little boy seemingly wanted nothing to do with me. She kept looking up at me and smiling and asking me questions in english while occasionally turning to her father saying “Cómo se dice…?” I was surprised at how well they both spoke english, and even slightly embarrassed that I could barely understand their spanish. In the 20 minute ride to the house we talked about everything from the American and Spanish education system to Spanish history. I felt an overwhelming sense of comfort being with them.
We finally arrived to their beautiful house in Madrid’s suburbs. The little boy immediately ran to the living room to play his Kirby video game while the father and little girl gave me a guided tour of the house.
Their house is BEAUTIFUL, totally my style architecturally and decoratively. They live on a quiet, gated street and their house is very open to the outdoors. (i’ll post pictures…eventually.) The architecture of the house is very maze-like and unconventional. All of the artwork in the home has a story to go with it, and the home kind of has it’s own quirky, lived-in, modern charm to it.
AND THE LIGHTING…WOW. If I was a selfie kind of girl, this home would be heaven. There is a perfect amount of natural light during they day, where there is no need to have any lights on anywhere in the house, and the actual lighting fixtures are not only one-of-a-kind and innovative, but they produce beautiful, almost stage-like lighting. I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS HOME!
After getting settled and presenting my family with their gifts which consisted of American movies, books, and snacks, we relaxed on the patio while drinking tea and playing card games. The weather and the scenery was perfect. Finally, the host mother came home from buying hangers for my closet! It was great to meet her. She offered to allow me to come with her and the little girl to the market to buy fruits and vegetables.
A quick picture I snuck (I didn’t want to seem like a tourist) while we were waiting to buy olives and other fruits and vegetables at the market.
After looking around with the girls and buying tons of food from the local outdoor market, we rode back home, and I crashed. Between the jetlag and strange sleeping patterns on the plane, my body was exhausted.
A couple of hours later I woke up to an empty, quiet house. I looked around to see if they had all left. The father was on the patio reading a newspaper. He then told me that the mom and kids went to her grandparents house to go hang out and swim in their indoor pool (#fancy), and that I was free to help myself to some food or hangout in the house. I then went into the fridge and grabbed some strawberry yogurt and went to hangout in my room. It was at that moment that I realized, “I actually live here.”
Around 8pm, the mother and kids came back to the house, and they told me that we were going to go into the city to have dinner. (One thing to know about Spaniards is, they do thing very late, especially in the summer. So it was completely normal that we left the house at 9pm with the kids to go hangout in the city and eat dinner.) Once we arrived in Centro, they gave me a small walking tour of the city, while simultaneously looking for a place to eat. The city was PACKED with all types of people, young people in going out attire, old people with walkers, families with small children, EVERYONE. It was amazing. At 9:30pm the city was bustling as if it were 3pm on a Saturday in Times Square. There was even this huge square where they were playing salsa music and people were eating tapas, drinking beer and dancing. I was in love!
Once we finally found a place to eat (the crowded nightlife comes with its flaws), we sat down and had what seemed to me (and my American standards) to be a small dinner. What i’ve also noticed in Spain so far is that everyone eats the same thing, for the most part. You don’t really order your own food, but rather, multiple dishes for everyone to pick, choose, and share from. We ordered croquetas, fries, an omelet, fish, and some type of pork slices.
At the dinner table the family was, naturally, speaking spanish to each other. It was then that I confirmed, “I don’t know a lick of Spanish. I learned nothing in school. I can’t follow anything they are saying.” Slowly my excitement had turned into a sense of detachment. You never really realize how important communication is until you cannot. Being that I lack the talent of small talk, and struggled to identify with the context of the conversations, I could not find a way to ease my english into their spanish conversations. So most of the dinner, I sat, smiling and nodding, as if I knew what was going on the whole time (all the while feeling really uncomfortable and awkward).
Once dinner ended, we walked around the city more and got some frozen “JO-gurt” from a place called Smöoy. (I still find it funny the way spanish speakers pronounce their J’s, Y’s, V’s, and H’s when speaking english.) Anyway, we walked and talked some more. The kids were beginning to get sleepy and as a result, more clingy. As we walked back to the car they would lean on their parents or take my hand. It was so cute and made me excited to have a family of my own.
Though I felt a bit uncomfortable with the small language barrier, I had an amazing first day. Everything went just as planned, and I am really excited to spend the next year here in Madrid with this amazing family! Now all I need to do become fluent in Spanish, take more pictures, and experience more of the country and its cities! Tomorrow we leave for a place called Ruidera in “deep spain”, where my host mother’s family owns an estate. I’m looking at this trip as a bit of an orientation to my work as an au pair, and I am really excited. So until then, adios y besos!