So that's been it, I'm back home now after 3 months in Mallorca and despite a slight delay cos of a problem on blogger I can now tell you about my last week there.
My last week in Mallorca was largely unexciting. To be honest, I'd kind of been looking forward to going home for the past two weeks or so due to missing home comforts, friends and particularly family after what has been a difficult past few weeks and months for us. I spent much of the week slowly but gradually packing and planning how I was going to avoid paying excess baggage on the way home-I shall reveal all later. In terms of things that actually did happen, on Monday night we had a farewell dinner for Pau and Silvia at theirs and Lourdes' home. Pau and Silvia were to leave for Bilbao on Thursday for Christmas with Silvia's family which meant that it would be the first time Pau would be spending Christmas away from family. No Christmas style dinner unfortunately but we did have some christmasssy treats for dessert.
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| Meal |
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| FOOD OF THE WEEK: some Spanish Christmas sweets. Turrón, duro and Turrón blando plus the Spanish equivalent of Cadburys and everyone's favourite-Ferrero Rocher! |
On Tuesday evening, the new Au pair (Anna) came over to have a bit of a play with the kids and to have a chat with Josep. This very much felt like the passing of a proverbial baton as I got to meet my successor and we were able to share our experiences of both au pairing and living abroad. She seems like a really nice person and I wish her all the best for when she starts in January. Thursday was my final English/Spanish lesson with Silvia before her flight that afternoon. We hadn't had a lesson in a while due to her being in Bilbao looking after her Mum so it was nice to catch up and tell each other about our up and coming plans. She gave me one of her Mafalda comics as a present, an Argentinian comicbook that is fairly amusing and I'm sure I'll read a few of the comicstrips at some point to test out my Spanish reading skills. Friday was my final day in Mallorca before my flight home the next day so it was mainly filled with packing but I did find some time to accompany the family to Marina's nursery for a special christmas party. There were drinks and special festive treats in the yard before going inside to watch a rather bizarre music performance by one of the teachers which included scarfs, feathers and a fair bit of clapping and singing to some catalan christmas songs. Evening wasn't too memorable as the family were also getting ready to go away skiing the next day so there was no real celebration. Instead, I turned into Fraser Christmas and gave the family the Christmas gifts I had bought for them including a Rugby ball for Simó, a Beatles CD for Josep, a Yellow and Green candle for Marta, a puzzle for Marina and a colouring book and pens for Júlia. They were all things that I chose so that they would remember me as a person as well as what I had done with them during my time there. The next morning, we shared some brief goodbyes before Josep took me to the airport.
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| Party treats at the nursery |
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| Musical entertainment at the nursery |
To sum up my time in Mallorca it has been: surprising. What started off as just a comfortable location to do my TEFL course and to speak a bit of Spanish became so much more. I made some great friends, threw myself into new experiences that were often out of my comfort zone, learnt a lot more about myself and established some new hobbies that I probably wouldn't have time to have done if I had gone straight to Uni even though I still sometimes wish I was there now. I have seen a very different side to Mallorca than to the one I originally imagined with there being more than just beaches, sun and nightlife. In terms of the Au Pairing itself, I must say despite the odd difficult spot now and then it has been rather enjoyable. Simó reminds me of a young version of myself except with all the confidence in the world that I never had and his ability to speak and understand English has really come on leaps and bounds. As a guy, I was always going to have problems connecting with Júlia who is very much as girly as one can be however we built up a rapport with each other and I was able to enjoy some of her favourite activities like drawing, doing random gymnastics things around the house and playing role play games like shops. I found Marina the hardest to connect with as I expected seeing as nowadays I live in what is a very grown-up household and I just can't understand the mind of a two year old yet when the other two had gone off to bed she would often be in a better mood and I would be able to teach her some English and she was fascinated with looking at herself in my laptop's webcam. Overall, I don't think I could have asked for a much better family. Marta and Josep are two very reasonable, open-minded people who share many of my common interests and generally the kids responded well to having me. I hope that they will remember me and that perhaps I could return there sometime, maybe in the summer, to see them once more.
Now my flight back was pretty much perfect. As mentioned earlier, I devised a masterplan so that I would avoid paying excess baggage fees which I had to on the previous flight. I decided to take my wetsuit (quite a heavy item of clothing) and put it in my carry-on bag and wearing 8 layers on the top (a vest, 4 t-shirts, a jumper, a hoodie and a rain coat), 6 layers on the bottom (2 pairs of pants, 3 pairs of shorts all under one pair of pyjamas), 3 pairs of socks and then carrying several pairs of socks in my rain coat (making me look like I had a bomb attached to me) all on the flight home in order to make my guitar and suitcase add up to the combined total of 20 KG. Despite being an agonising 2KG over the weight limit, I escaped without incurring any further financial penalty and security were totally cool with me taking my wetsuit in the cabin so my plan was a success(ish)! I then impulse bought a new pare of running shoes for 40 euros in duty-free before boarding the plane. We set off early and once up in the air we were treated to incredible aerial vistas of the Island as we left it. The plain skies continued while we were crossing mainland Spain and it was simply breathtaking to be able to look over the snow-capped peaks of the Pyrenees while cruising at 3000ft..During the flight between games of Fifa on my iPod, I made friends with a Spaniard sitting next to me called Miguel which gave me an opportunity to practice a bit of Spanish and help out a confused non-English speaker who was left bewildered by many of the on-board announcements before I began translating them for him. We talked about many things such as our cultural differences, Mallorca, Football and Miguel's favourite show Top Gear. My journey was capped off in really random/awesome style. Our early departure also meant for an early arrival in Liverpool however during the only delay in the journey when waiting for baggage collection, I noticed members of the British Cycling team who had been on the same flight were waiting for their baggage as well. Most of them were unrecognisable athletes in official GB Tracksuits but I recognised one in particular who was tall and thin with little hair... It was only Chris Froome, Tour De France 2013 champion! Naturally, I went over and had an awkward chat with him to pass the time and he was really friendly and humble. He'd been on a training camp in Mallorca and was heading back home for the BBC Sports Personality Of The Year ceremony in Leeds in which he was one of the contenders for the main prize (didn't even get in the top 3 in the end, darn you AP McCoy). He then asked me about my time in Mallorca and before collecting my baggage I had a quick picture taken with him which is below. We met once more when I was waiting for Mum to arrive outside the terminal where he said goodbye and I wished him luck for SPOTY. A genuinely lovely meeting with one of the world's best athletes.
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| View of Palma while flying somewhere over Magaluf, adios Mallorca |
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| The Pyrenees from the air |
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| Liverpoooooooool John Lennon Aiiiiiirrrrport |
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| Me with Chris Froome |
So that just about raps up my final Mallorca related post. I've been pretty busy since I got back home but I promise I will find some time to do a few more posts before the year is out. You haven't heard the last of me yet for 2013.
FP
#FraserOnTour
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