When Was The Last Time You Wrote Something?

During a break between my classes the other day, my bilingual coordinator asked me to write a short story about a restaurant. I immediately said sure and got to work, but it didn't take long for me to start thinking about the last time I actually wrote something. When I was younger, during elementary and middle school, I used to love to read and write. My mom often tells people how I used to love to read when I was younger..."and then high school happened."  But, until the other day, I never realized, or even thought about why I stopped writing. 

Well, it's not much, 200 words about a restaurant, but it's the first story, or any type of writing (college essays don't count), that I've written in years, so I decided to share:

     "Last Saturday, the 19th of November, my best friend Sarah and I decided to go to a restaurant called "El Mago". I previously heard the food there was delicious, and the atmosphere was entertaining because "El Mago" is a magic- themed restaurant.

  Located in the middle of the downtown Málaga, "El Mago" is a small restaurant, tucked away on a quiet side street. The quaint dining room was dimly lit, with paintings of famous magicians, such as Houdini, lining the walls. I ordered a steak with rice pilaf, while Sarah ordered a seasonal, Mediterranean chicken dish.

     Everything seemed like a typical dinner when suddenly, a woman dressed in an elaborate costume appeared seemingly out of nowhere, and offered to read our fortunes. She was wearing a long, sunset orange dress, with an emerald green head-wrap, and the largest, most colorful earrings and necklaces I had ever seen. Yahira then settled in at our table ready to read our fortunes.

     Instead of the stereotypical crystal ball, or even tarot cards, Yahira wanted to "read" the lines in our hands to tell us our fortunes. After appearing out of nowhere, and not using the "typical fortune teller tools," I was more than a bit apprehensive to let Yahira read my palms. But, after telling Sarah that she would be a stay-at-home Mom with two adorable kids, I let Yahira tell me my fortune: I will be happily married and very successful in my career.

     In the end, I had a wonderful time at "El Mago." The food was great and the ambiance was even better. I would recommend this restaurant to everyone and advise you not be wary of the fortune teller because telling your dinner guests that you see negative experiences in their fortunes would be bad for business right?"

When was the last time you wrote something? 

Comida de Madrid

Care Package

I now feel like a true expat...this week I received my first care package! When I was packing to move to Malaga, I was weary of bringing two large rolling suitcases because I was going to be in a new city, and I was going to be by myself; so to make things easier, I only brought one bag. For most people, this would have been plenty of room for clothes. But for me, a perpetual "over-packer," I barely made it a month wearing those clothes ;)

After days about an hour of agonizing over what to bring, and what could wait, I packed a suitcase of clothes to bring with me, a suitcase of heavy winter clothes for my family to bring when they come visit me, and a box of clothes for my Mom to mail to me when I got settled into my apartment.

I knew that my Mom was mailing me some clothes, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that she had secretly packed some goodies into my box. 

Please note that hair products definitely count as goodies :)

Thanks Mom!!!

"Real" Food

I haven't talked much about my apartment since I moved in (maybe a photo tour in the future?), but even though it's old, it's in a great location, and it's huge! The only drawback for me is the stove; It's not electric, we use butano, or butane, and it's not automatic so we have to light it every time we want to cook. While I have a gas stove at home, it turns on automatically, but here, I have literally been terrified to light this stove because I'm afraid I'm going to blow up the whole butano tank like a bomb.

The first couple of weeks we lived here I was too scared to even try to light it. While I didn't blow anything up, this also meant that any "cooking" I did involved the microwave. By the way, if you ever want to get looked at like you're completely crazy, cook some pasta in the microwave in front of some native Italians. But, after a trip to one of the largest grocery stores in town, I bought sooo much fresh food that I had to "conquer my fears" and light the stove (is that bad that my worst problem in life is lighting a stove?).

So here we are, my first "real" meal that I cooked in Spain....Chinese noodles with shrimp and broccoli!

Here's what you'll need: spaghetti noodles, water, broccoli, shrimp (I used langostinos, pretty much shrimp with the heads still on them), soy sauce, and olive oil. 

First you boil the water, and place the spaghetti in the boiling water for about 7-10 minutes. 

While you're waiting for the water to boil, cut the broccoli into smaller pieces, and shell the shrimp.

Sautee the shrimp and broccoli in equal parts olive oil and soy sauce (can't begin to describe how happy I was to find soy sauce in Spain). But, be careful with the soy sauce, especially if you're not using the low sodium kind because it can be very salty. 

This picture is from when I made a similar tomato based pasta so just pretend like you don't see the bacon,  thankyouverymuch. 

Lastly, when the noodles are done, drain them and add them to the shrimp and broccoli stir-fry. Add more olive oil and soy sauce to the noodles, but just enough soy sauce to turn the noodles brown.

Sautee the noodles in the stir-fry for about five minutes and then voila! You have Chinese noodles with shrimp and broccoli!

Buen provecho!

Spanish Word Of The Day

"Feria"

Feria (fair-e-ya): Fair

On Saturday, I made my first trip outside of Malaga, and I went all the way about 40 minutes, outside of the city by train to a town called Fuengirola. I have a few Auxiliares friends who live in "Fuengi" and they were all really excited about the Feria in Fuengirola. Even though I knew Feria meant "fair," I guess I was expecting some arts and crafts booths, and some food. But when we got there I was shocked to see an all-out "state fair" type carnival, with actual roller coasters, every type of food you can think of, and straight up bars in the middle of the fair. 

Legit coconut water. 

There were women and girls dressed in these beautiful, traditional  (I'm guessing) gowns. 

When I said there were bars at the feria, there were full service bars with music and everything! 

This girl was definitely enjoying the bar in her beautiful dress :)

Here are some of the rides and lights they had:

I had never seen this before, and I thought it was pretty cool. These were "bubble balls" (like you see at sporting events where people race across the field/court in them), but this time, they were in water!

Best.Orientation.Ever

Last Thursday (three days after we started work) we had our orientation as Auxiliares de Conversacion in Malaga. There was a meeting where we went over the basics like our salary, how to get your NIE (foreign identification number), work expectations, and health insurance. I heard that afterwards there was some type of lunch, so I was thinking that we were going to have sandwiches, maybe some tortilla, and a few bottles of water. 

WRONG! As we headed to the lunch room, we were greeted by this beautifully dressed woman pouring glasses of wine before we even got into the door. 

After entering the room, there was a wide array of tapas spread over the whole room. The event was catered and there were waiters who came around with freshly sliced ham--Spaniards love their ham--, hot tapas, and of course...more drinks!

Just when I thought this orientation couldn't get any better, we found out that they had hired a live band! The band opened with Bob Marley and I instantly was in love. 

Just to recap, we had an open bar, unlimited tapas, paella, and dessert, and a live band....for FREE!

Have I ever told you how much I love Spain??

A Few Things I Like About Spain

 Cathedrals. Every city has one, and whenever you visit a new city in Spain, you have to go see the catedral. When we used to travel around Spain with my study abroad group, I can't tell you how many times I heard that "x" city has the best catedral in Spain.

Cathedral in Malaga

Fruit is genuinely considered a dessert, and is consistently offered as a dessert in many restaurants. One restaurant offered pina natural--pineapple...

There is history everywhere! I'm sure they have these in many other countries also but one restaurant I visited had a cool display of the evolution of the coke bottle. 

Menu del Dia, Tapas, and Kebaps

As if all of these food post's today haven't made you hungry enough already, here's one more just to make sure :)

I had another menu del dia the other day, this time for the first course I had something that I think was called caldo, fried calamari for the second course, and an incredible chocolate cake drizzled in raspberry sauce for dessert. 

"Caldo" or maybe the broth is called Caldo. This was a meat dish that tasted similar to BBQ, spread on a piece of toast. The broth that was with it was kind of like a french dip, and it was very good when you dipped the toast in it. 

Later on, I went and had two of my favorite tapas, Paella, and Tortilla Espanola.

And finally......a kebap!!!!! The kebaps that people eat here in Spain, are not the same type of kebaps that people in the States typically think of (meat or vegetables on a stick). Kebaps are a type of fast food in Spain, and it's kind of like a pita sandwich with either chicken or steak, lettuce, tomato, onion, and some type of white sauce, and red sauce. The meat is rotated on a pit kind of like BBQ, and shaved off when you order your meal.

This is a picture of the meat being shaved off. I'm not really sure how they get chicken/steak to look like that but it tastes too good to ask too many questions ;)

Un Kebap!

Excuse the weird smile, but I was sooo excited to have a kebap again.

Best Pasta Ever???

On my second day at the hostel, I met Pierrick aka el loco. While Pierrick left us all with many fun memories, I don't think any of us will ever forget the pasta he made us. One day while we were at the beach, he casually goes "so I'm going to make yall dinner tonight." We were all like ok...sure (don't forget his nickname was el loco). We went to the grocery store and he wandered around for a bit, not really sure of what he wanted to make, and I'll admit that I was more than a bit skeptical about what he was going to cook. However, when I say he cooked one of the best pasta dishes I've ever had....

Dinner

Shrimp, clams, and chorizo

I had never eaten a clam a day in my life until he made this dish.

The chef, Pierrick

The aftermath...