Auxiliar meeting

6 Oct. 2011

Today we had yet another meeting for auxliares de conversación (conversational assistants). Thankfully, this meeting was in Alicante all the auxiliares from the province of Alicante were required to come. So this was an opportunity for us to meet auxiliares here in Alicante with other programs. There were basically four groups of people here for the meeting. First, there were the auxiliares that are funded by the Ministry of Education. Then, the auxiliares funded by the Community of Valencia. Of course, there were the Fulbrighters--all three of us! Lastly, the teachers.

The meeting lasted most of the day. However, a good portion of the information didn't pertain to me as a Fulbrighter. We broke up into groups and the coordinators talked to each group about topics such as the procedure for insurance, getting paid, and the NIE process. Nonetheless, the Fulbrighters have a different insurance and we receive our stipend from a different source. Later, a Spaniard talked about how she uses her auxiliar in the classroom. This information was mostly directed at the teachers who had accompanied their auxiliar.

During lunch, our topic (i.e. obsession) for the day was the Duchess of Alba. She is one of Spain's wealthiest people as well as one of the world's most titled nobles (she's got at least 40!). In August, I had read an article about her on CNN.com. At the time, there was a little bit of a scandal because she was planning to remarry. She's 85 years old and she was planning to marry a man 24 years her junior. However, this wasn't really the scandalous part of the article. Apparently, her children were "worried" that the man was just with her for her money (and they wouldn't get their inheritance) so they made her sign over her money. Apparently, a lot of the people in her family disagreed with her choice. One of her children didn't even come to the wedding because she disagreed with her mother's decision to marry someone who is untitled.

Well, yesterday, the Duchess of Alba got married to the younger man. She "embarrassed" her children by dancing the flamenco in front of cameras.

You can read an article about it in English here: http://www.elpais.com/articulo/english/Duchess/of/Alba/ties/knot/for/third/time/at/85/elpepueng/20111005elpeng_6/Ten

After lunch and a visit the park (where we saw the most adorable baby turtle), we headed back to my apartment for a few hours to rest before going out for tapas and later a movie. We settled for something not serious--The Three Musketeers dubbed in Spanish. We chose it mostly because it promised to be lighthearted but also because I've seen a ton of posters for it in the city. The movie itself was alright. It was really dramatic, fairly predictable, but it made me laugh so I can forgive its faults. I felt like the movie was so ridiculous (and didn't really try to take itself seriously) which made it awesome!