I arrived about 9:30 on Thursday morning. Mario picked me up with a rental car and we were off to the hotel so I could shower and change before our noon meeting at the American School and 3:30 meeting with the International school. I was crazy for scheduling appointments so soon after getting off an all night flight but I was anxious to find a school so we could find a neighborhood. We didn't have a GPS but we found the American School with using the maps app on my iPhone that wasn't connected to service but it would at least have a dot showing where we were. That app came in handy all week. We pulled up to the school and it was completely gated off with an armed security guard. We had to put my purse through an airport-type security screener. I asked if the kids have to do that everyday and he said no, just visitors. We walked in to the school and was greeted by a very friendly lady who gave us a tour of the entire middle and upper school. When we first walked in, we saw a boy in line with his class wearing a BYU t-shirt. Mario so desperately wanted to go talk to him and get his info so we could contact his parents. But I restrained him. But seeing that shirt was such comfort to us because we knew there would be other LDS kids in the school.
We loved the school. Our tour guide let us walk in the classrooms and see the interactions between the teachers and the students. One thing I noticed, was everyone looked very happy and friendly. The teachers spoke perfect English, which I later found out was because they only hire teachers from America. That was a relief because I was worried about the teachers using heavy accents and my children not understanding. I received 3 B's in college and 2 of them were from a teacher from India and I didn't understand but a few words he said. So I'm clearly not good with accents. The school was clean, big, and modern looking. It has 1/3 American, 1/3 Spaniard, 1/3 International students. So I love the diversity my children will be exposed to, but still enough Americans to feel at home. The school offers many clubs and sports (unfortunately not crosscountry) and Boy Scouts. The kids are very excited because soccer is HUGE in Spain and two soccer players from the Real Madrid have their children at that school. One of them, Ronaldo, is regarded by some as the world's best soccer player. A father told me that the mothers all dress up now to take their kids to and from school in hopes to see Ronaldo. Fortunately the military will pay for transportation for the kids so hopefully I won't have to drop off and pick up very often.
Our next stop was the International College of Spain. It is k-12, not a college level like we know here in the US. We should have turned around the moment we saw it and not wasted our time. It was also very heavily guarded and once we got inside, we could barely find a parking spot. I'm pretty sure we parked illegally. The admissions lady forgot to write down our appointment so she wasn't aware we were coming. Fortunately, she was kind enough to show us around anyway. The school was so unimpressive. It was in an old mansion (which is kind of cool) but very outdated. We saw many students just lounging around. Mario said it looked like a daycare. I'm not sure it was that bad but it just made our school decision so much easier. It was also located in a very rich neighborhood and we decided that just wasn't a neighborhood we would be comfortable living in. Besides, we could only afford an apartment near that school.
Getting back to the hotel after visiting the school proved to be a huge challenge and would have made that $150 GPS rental so worth it. We got lost for probably two hours. There are two large loops that circle Madrid. So it sounded easy. Holy cow! Their highways are so confusing. We had to stop and ask for help so many times and even got a police escort for part of the route. We were so upset by time we got back to the hotel, that we wanted to return our rental car the next day. We didn't want anything to do with driving in Madrid.
But, at least step one was completed, we found a school! That evening Mario showed me a local grocery store and we went out to a tiny little restaurant that served the most delicious salads and crepes made fresh right in front of us. It turned out to be the cheapest place we could find, but also one of the most delicious. So we went there at least 2 or 3 more times that week. They knew us well by time we left because there are just two young guys that own and work there. Fortunately, it is only a block or two from Mario's work so we can meet there for lunch often.
Incredibly, I was able to stay away until 9 pm that night and then I slept solidly until about 5 in the morning and then I went back to sleep until 9 am, which is really sleeping in for me.
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| Our police escort |
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