An Orthopedic Surgeon's View on the USA

Tonight I went and saw an orthopedic surgeon and traumatologist to see what is really going on with this stupid lumbar, sacro-illiac region of my body, often referred to by me as my hip. Well, first I went and saw a general doctor and she referred me to this guy cuz he's much more conservative than the rest. She says basically that he is not trigger happy and doesn't resort to operating right away like some of the others. Well, after missing the first appointment due to yet another miscommunication between me and my Spanish-speaking boyfriend, I was finally able to make it. In Spain the doctors and such work in the morning, then take a break like just about everyone else during the siesta hours, 2-6 in the afternoon, and then resume business until God knows when to accomodate and respect the siesta hour and everyone else's schedules that revolve around it. So my appointment was for 8pm on a Wednesday evening. That in and of itself feels strange.

Anyhow, I rode my bike to the appointment and had trouble finding the place because like many doctors in Spain, they work out of an apartment. So, once I found the place I was asked for my insurance card by the receptionist, she swiped it and I signed the receipt before the doctor even saw my face. I was told to wait in the waiting room where I read fashion magazines in Spanish while thinking to myself how I wish I gave a crap about looking good, cuz DAMN these women look so beautiful and fashionable.

Then, he called my name and tried his best to pronounce it and of course, asked where I was from. When I told him I was from the United States, that's when I wished I would have stuck to my original plan of saying that I was from Canada whenever anyone asked. Since last year I had heard so much negativity about my country, I thought about doing a social experiment to see that if I said I was from Canada, instead of the U.S., if people would still be so negative. Well, needless to say I strayed from the plan and the doctor gregariousy spent the first 20 minutes of the appointment sitting across his desk from me telling me everything that he didn't like about the United States.

Apparently he had travelled to the U.S. a few times for things involving medicine but only for short periods and without speaking much English. He said he spent time in Atlanta, Georgia and San Francisco, California and I'm not sure where else. He started with, "you know what I didnt like about the U.S., is that you guys work too much, working all the time. You guys only care about the dollar. You don't care about literature, museums, or art. The only thing you guys care about is the dollar." Then, he said "you know that the Ku Klux Klan still exists in the U.S.? I couldn't light up a cigarette there but you can hang a black person." Then he said, "you know the people there don't even know where Spain is? When I would say "Spanish", they would ask me if I was from Mexico or South America. They thought Spain was in South America." At this comment, I couldn't help but think that with his strong accent and lack of English, by saying Spanish(meaning of Spanish decent), they thought he was talking about the language (Spanish) and therefore asking him where he was from. OR we're are just that ignorant about the rest of the world, like many like to think here in Spain. They feel so offended that someone might not know where Spain is when it's such a small country on the other side of world from us and "Spanish" means both a nationality AND a language. Anyhoo, what else??? Oh and he said, "but the worst part for me was the food. I would see these American movies where the cute boy falls in love with the cute girl and they go out to eat at a really nice restaurant. Well, I looked for those restaurants and couldn't find anything." He said he was in San Francisco and didn't find any good food. For me that just says something about one's taste (or stubborness) in food because as far as most people are concerned, that I have met at least, San Francisco is known for its wonderful selection of international food. So, I said "Did you try any Asian food there because San Francisco is known for having a lot of good Chinese and Japanese food?" And he said "Well, thats the thing, I don't like Chinese food."

So, anyways after the 20 minute schpeal about all the things he didn't like about the U.S., he asked me what was wrong and why had I come to see him. I explained about my hip and about the fact that I have had this pain for 10 years, more or less, but never had the kind of job where I had health insurance (something I view as a problem with the U.S. but he didn't seem to. lol.). Hence, I was not able to get an MRi (can you say expensive?) to actually see what was really going on inside. I basically told him that I would like to get an MRi done while I was here in Spain with full coverage insurance and he said without hesitation "okay" and wrote out the prescription/order to have it done. As simple as that. Gotta say once again that so far that has been the most impressive thing about Spain for me...fast, no non-sense, patient-oriented health care. I am so thankful for that.

Needless to say, I left with mixed feelings. On one hand, so happy to have had a doctor listen to me and to finally be able to have this MRi done and on the other hand, sad about how the world views the United States and wishing that everyone could see all the good people and wonderful things that I know the U.S. to be. But trying to convince anyone of that who only sees a small portion of our horrible media coverage and has never lived there is an act of futility. Luckily he was a very nice doctor and I just have to look past his over-bearing opinions and focus on the good he is doing for me as a physician. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, right?

Nothin like a good ol' fashioned flip out

This year instead of 1 elementary school, I have shared hours with 2 different elementary schools in the center of the city. Unfortunetely at my new school(Colon), nobody seems to have any sense of classroom control or respect for teachers. The teachers let the children walk all over them and continue to say "I guess we just have to have patience" or "I just don't know what's wrong with these kids" or "Am I doing something wrong here? Because the kids just don't seem to care about anything." It has been nearly impossible for me to teach English here because the kids constantly interupt, talk amongst themselves without a care in the world, are always getting out of their seats, constantly asking stupid questions just to ask them, and acting like completely helpless little babies. They seriously have no concept of respect for teachers or for the person who is talking/teaching. In fact there is so much noise in the classroom that I leave each day feeling a little more deaf, with tension in my jaws and like I am not able to make an ounce of difference in these children's education.

Luckily at San Lorenzo, my other school from last year, the teachers have much more of a presence and are constantly riding the students to keep them in check. You can see that there is a healthy fear of the teachers/authority figures there and it is reflected in their knowledge of English. I teach the classes but the minute someone steps out of line or is acting up, the regular classroom teacher puts them in check. So, there I have been able to reap the rewards of being a language teacher and I feel completely respected as well as useful.

Meanwhile back at Colon, the children get out of their seats so much to ask me rediculous questions over and over again that I cannot even make it through one phrase of teaching without saying "go back to your seat" 5 times to 5 different students. Basically it gets to the point where I just stop and stare at them while they carry on for 45 minutes talking, lauging, fighting, tattling, complaining and whining. I have NEVER seen anything like it in my life and in the U.S. I work with kids with actual problems. These kids come from the best neighborhoods and Colon is supposedly one of the best bilingual public schools but to me it is a frickin joke.

Today the regular teacher, completely exhausted and sucked dry from these kids, left me alone for a minute to talk with a parent. I was trying to start a new unit on plants and the madness started all over again. While I am introducing the new words, several kids come to the black board to tell me "tonterias", kids start fighting and complaining about belly aches and playing every card available to them to manipulate another adult in their life and not have to do any actual work.

That was it. After 4 months of thinking "if somebody only had some balls around here..", I flipped my lid. I started yelling until RED red in the face, slammed the classroom door shut, rattling the class windows ( I actually thought I might break them) and made everyone sit down in their seats. I told them in English and in Spanish that I was super mad and tired of their class. I told them that they were an embarassment, that the kids in my country had much more respect and that from this point on there will be NO questions and that they will do EXACTLY what I tell them to do for the rest of the class. I reminded myself of one of my favorite teachers in High School, Mr. Jackson, whose vein would bulge and his face would get red while he ripped into us. We would laugh later and tease him about his bulging vein but in that moment, we were more than a tad bit uncomfortable. Because that level of pissed offedness (yes, I know) cannot be faked and we knew he meant business. And today with those kids, they knew it as well. The anger was 100% real and boy did they feel the wrath. The fear in their eyes was priceless.

In four months I have seen teacher after teacher try and maintain order in this class and fail pathetically. Its sad to say but obviously this class was long over due for a good put-the-fear-of- God-in-ya, ass chewin. And unfortunately I was the one who had to do it. But let me tell ya, I have NEVER seen this class behave so perfectly as I did today for the rest of the period.

Moral of the story...no matter how nice it is to have patience, there is NO substitute for a good ol' fashioned genuine butt chewin. Accept no substitute.

La Loca Landlady

Well, folks I 've done it again. I've moved for the second time (3rd apartment) since I've been in Spain. As you may remember, I moved in December to an apartment right across the street from one of my elementary schools and quite close to the other. At the time, it seemed like a great decision. Sure, I was once again paying a lot to share a house (300 euros) but I thought to be close, since I dont have a car here, to my 2 schools and to my private classes would make my life much easier. I also liked that the apartment seemed very clean, the kitchen was well stocked with all the utensils a self-proclaimed chef would need and my room had a leather couch in it. I pictured having all the privacy in the world, where me and Jesus could watch movies as we snuggled on the couch in my room and we could cook our fun international dinners that we like to prepare together while drinking beer or wine. But all in a respectful, mature manner of course. That was the fantasy. Now let's move on to how it really unfolded.

When I answered the add for the new apartment on easypiso.com, the add said "shared bedrooms for rent". This struck me as odd considering that she was asking the steep price of 300 euros. She answered back saying that "No, I only rent individual rooms to one person at a time." Okay, so that was settled. Just wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to be bunking with someone else for 300 euros.

When I went to look at the place, I should have known something was odd because she brought it up to me that she doesn't rent to couples and that if someone wanted to rent a room from her and wanted their partner to be staying there on the weekends from out of town that she would charge them more rent. She told me that she had had that situation before and she plans on charging more money for that sort of thing. I said "Oh, thats okay, I dont plan on living with my boyfriend at this point. We are not at that point yet in our relationship. He lives with his parents in a nice house and is still finishing school and is where he needs to be. BUT, I do have to be honest that YES, my boyfriend would come over and watch movies with me and sometimes spend the night. But not all the time because he is busy with kickboxing and school and goes out of town a lot for kickboxing. But I just want you to know that yes, I do have a boyfriend here in town and he will be with me sometimes etc, etc. " She responded with "Or in exchange for letting your boyfriend stay here, you could give me english classes. I used to go to the English academy here and had a really high level of English. But after all these years of not speaking, I have lost a lot of it." I said "Okay, we could do a conversation class once a week, every Friday where we have coffee and we can speak in English." Done deal. In my mind that meant, that I could live normally and every once in awhile Jesus could spend the night and could come over when he pleases to have dinner with me or watch a movie and if he was beginning to stay a lot, then I would have to either pay or give her classes. Although I planned on doing this conversation class once a week just to keep her happy and quiet.

So, for Christmas break all the roomates left town to go spend the holidays with their families in other parts of Spain. So Isabel, the landlady who also happens to live there, comes up to me and says, "If you want Jesus to come over and stay with you, now is the time. Now that everyone is gone, you should take advantage of it and I dont mind if he is here at all." I still didn't want to take advantage exactly of the situation but then again, she said it. Anyhow, we spent my birthday picnicking in the countryside, then Jesus took me to the physical therapists that evening and we ended up back at my place for dinner and a movie. And of course, he stayed the night...it was my birthday and I had the go-ahead. Christmas Eve we spent at his aunt's house until midnight, then slept at my place and he got up in the morning and left. The 26th I went to Barcelona and Jesus went to Granada. We got back on New Year's Eve and spent that night at his parents house. I was sick with what turned out to be a 3 week sinus infection, so Jesus brought me home, tucked me in and went out like he had planned with his friends.

A week or so after the break ended and everyone was back home, Jesus spent the night but Isabel had no way of seeing him. He came late and my room is the first bedroom as you enter the house and Isabel's room, living room and bathroom are at the back of the house. He never left my room and left before anyone was awake to be respectful. That morning Isabel tells me "Has Jesus left? He has spent the night 4 nights now (in a month's period of time mind you). I am thinking about charging you 10 euros a night for every night that he sleeps here. And when are you gonna give me my English lessons? If the others see that you have someone over, they are going to think that they can have someone over and I dont want a house full of people. So I am not going to charge you but I am going to tell the other roomates that you are paying me more money to have Jesus here." I said "But, you told me it was okay for him to come during Christmas break and we can do the English classes whenever. I told you Fridays work good for me but you always have something else going on." She said, "If you want to have your boyfriend over you need to ask permission from the other roomates." Huh? I said "Well, what if he is just coming to eat dinner?" She said "Well, then you need to give us a day's notice." Wow!! Okay. "And what if I am hanging out with my friend Juliana and we are far from her house and we get hungry and decide to come to my place to eat something, then what?" She says "Well, if you do it very descreatly and you guys stay in your room, it would be okay." I started to get the feeling that she may like to just make up the rules as she goes along while contradicting herself and trying to control every move in the household.

Every week I would ask her if she was ready for her English lesson and every week was a different excuse like "I dont feel good or I dont feel like it. Can we do it tomorrow?" We ended up only following through with one lesson the entire time but I tried every week to set it up.

She got mad when I took all the blankets off the furniture that she had put on because she said the furniture cost her lots of money and if I scratched ANYTHING, I would have to pay her. Although when I first looked at the room these florescent, felt blankets were non-existent. I explained that that is what the deposit is for and if I ruin something, she can take it out of that money and that when I first saw the room and decided to take it, those blankets were not there and part of the reason I chose the room was because I liked the furniture.

She would interrupt me when I was cooking, acting all frantic about which burner or lid I was or wasn't using. One night after watching a movie in my room with Jesus, I was hungry and nobody was home but Isabel so I made a hamburger. I looked at the clock at it was exactly 11pm when I FINISHED. You must remember that this is not exactly a late time in Spain to be having dinner. In fact, Jesus' parents usually eat dinner at around 10 or 11pm. And keep in mind that Isabel's room/apartment is on the other side of the house at the farthest point from the kitchen. Well, the next morning, you guessed it, she confronted me with "You started cooking at midnight last night. When the others are here you cannot do that." I said "No, it was 11pm when I finished but yeah, okay, it was a little late." She says, "No it was 12 when you started and you can't be doing that." I can completely understand that, IF it wasn't for the fact that I am in SPAIN for crying out loud and that is when many people, including her, eat their dinner. Basically she was trying to control my every move. Not only that, every 3 or 4 nights I would hear her barfing in her bathroom during the middle of the night. Not sure if she was borracha or bulemic on these frequent occasions..I am thinking bulemic(control issues, right?).

Also, soon after I moved in, although we never signed a lease/contract, which is quite common here, she started bringing up signing a contract for a specified length of time...AFTER I had already moved in and given her my deposit. She then said, "well, you said you would be in Cordoba until July, so if you leave before that, you will lose your deposit (300 euros). Then she would say "so, do you want a contract?" I kept asking "what do you mean a contract? I said I would be in Cordoba until then but I never signed a contract or said I would be staying in this apartment that whole time. In fact my job ends in May, so I will be unemployed here for 2 months and may stay somewhere else for less money." She got mad and said that "How am I supposed to find someone to rent in the middle of summer when all the college kids leave to go back home?" I said "I dont know, but I never said I would be here in this apartment until then. I have a lot of bills to pay and cannot be spending that much on rent in the summer when I have no income." She snapped back "Well, everyone has bills. That's no excuse." Does, her line of reasoning make any sense at all though? Why was she asking me if I wanted a contract but yet telling me that I have no choice but to stay until July or else I lose my deposit. Ahhhh!!! Me vuelve loca esta mujer!!

Then not last Friday but the one before, la loca crossed the line. Not only was she irritating me and acting like the second reign of a female Franco around the apartment but the bitch done screwed up big time. I stepped out for a little while with Jesus and while I was gone, at 10 pm(which is not considered late in Spain), Juliana stopped by. She had tried to call me but my phone had gotten wet and wasn't working. So, she rang the apartment bell like any normal person would do. Isabel saw her from the window above and that she had two friends with her. But for all Isabel knew, she could have just wanted to ask me something. She knew that my phone wasn't working. But instead of answering the door, she yells down from the window "Jessey's not here" with a rude tone. And that next morning when I was making my coffee, Isabel corners me in the kitchen by closing the door and saying she needs to talk to me in private. She says "You can't be having friends come to the house. If the others see that you are having friends over, they will think that they can have friends over and then I will have a house full of people that I dont know." I explained the situation, that Juliana didn't know I was gone and that my cell isn't working and that she only wanted to ask me something, yada yada yada. Well, then she started with "and you haven't followed through on your end of the deal. Jesus spent the entire Christmas break here (really? 3 weeks? or do you mean 3 nights? and because you told me it was okay) and you haven't been giving me my English classes. And I have been trying to be nice because you are far away from your family and you can't just catch a bus and go see them whenever you want. So I have been telling the others that you are paying me more money so that you can have Jesus over (mind you he hardly EVER came over to avoid situations like this). I am making an exception for you because you guys are in love and I am not going to say no to love." OMG. These "tonterias"(or nonsense) may work with the 18 year old boy who lives there or the new girl who just moved in and hasn't gotten to know her yet. But at my age, I am not too keen on manipulators OR hypocrites. And besides, is she really trying to manipulate a psychology major? hehe. Nice try lady.

At that point I done had enough of her shananigans. What I have mentioned so far were the major points, not to mention all the other little lies and inconsistencies. She said no smoking was allowed because it turned all the walls yellow, yet she smoked in the house all the time and besides the smell there were burn marks to prove it all over the shelf in the kitchen and shells for ashtrays everywhere. AND she would have friends and family over ALL THE TIME. Also, she would lie about cleaning things. And I would walk into the bathroom and see a dirty, toothpaste encrusted sink and faucet. She failed to tell me the first day that I went to look at the apartment that the living room and t.v. were ONLY for her. I dont think I would have paid 300 to live in a house where I didn't have a living room. She also said I would have a landline in my room but took the phone after I looked at the place and before I moved in.

So, after the straw that broke the camel's back, I decided it was time to start looking at other options and one opened up just at the right moment. I told Isabel that we both just want different things from a living situation and I can't live in a place where my friends aren't allowed to even ring the doorbell. I tried to be politically correct/diplomatic or whatever and put the blame on myself, saying that I just didn't understand her in the beginning because I was under the impression that she just didn't want a boyfriend always hangin around the house but that I had no idea that I couldn't even have friends over...EVER. I explained that I am social and like to invite friends over to have dinner with me from time to time. Anyhow, she said "its better that you go then. I tried to stay really nice and mature about the whole thing and when I left I said "give me hug, no hard feelings (basically)" and she refused to give me a hug, saying "I just want you to know that what you did was wrong. You have to give notice before moving out." I said " I understand that, but thats why you get to keep the deposit... because I am leaving without a notice." She said "That has nothing to do with the deposit" , although many times before she had always said that if someone leaves without notice, she keeps the deposit. And this common practice in Spain just like in the U.S.

So to make a long story a tiny bit shorter, I have moved across town, far from my schools into an apartment for 1/2 the price (150 euros) that is bigger and where I have a living room, tv,etc. and can do whatever THE HELL I want. Jk. But at least I can breath. Damn!! Only problem is that its in the same apartment as Juliana. Now we have to have the discipline to not hang out with each other all the time, speaking in English and isolating ourselves from the Spanish world. I think we are at a point now to where we are strong enough in our Spanish to stay in character most of the time and not resort to that. So there you have it!! I think I am finally in the right place where I will stay for the rest of my stint in Spain. Hasta Julio!!