Bilbao’s city hall

In order to avoid a completely sugar-coated travel blog, I’ll discuss in this post some things about living and working abroad that are testing me, to the point where last week I almost had a mini mental breakdown (hence the gap in posts on this blog):

• The woman next door, with whom I share a wall, is really old and sick with dementia. She often cries out in the middle of the night, and I wake up completely startled. Also, her caretaker comes bright and early (9 a.m. on Saturdays for the love of God!) and speaks to her at the top of her lungs in order to be heard. Don’t get me wrong, I am empathetic and understand how hard the situation is. But a fan and earplugs are not proving sufficient to drown out the racket, and as a result I’m not sleeping top-notch.
• Bilbao is wet and humid, and I wake up to about 15 new mosquito bites every day. Judging by my red bumps, you’d think I was living and working in the tropics.
• I teach 3 hours a week at an English academy, and last Thursday my director asked me to stay after for “10-15 minutes” to discuss our upcoming Halloween lesson. This actually turned into an hour (unpaid), where she brought me to a store that sells synthetic clay (?! how do these places survive the economic crisis?). A man there then spent said hour giving us a tutorial on HOW TO ROLL AND SHAPE CLAY TO MAKE A SMALL PUMPKIN FACE. I couldn’t believe it. I was cutting into my limited free time, without compensation, to hear in a thick accent, “To make a smooth ball, roll the clay gently between your two palms.” The only saving grace was that he was easy on the eyes ;)
• I gave the same Powerpoint presentation about my U.S. background (where I’m from, where I went to school, etc.) 16 times in one week. After about ten times I wanted to cry. After the 16th I wanted to quit.
• Middle schoolers can test your patience, and most people who know me wouldn’t say I am the MOST patient person alive. I walked into class the other day (to give my 13th presentation!) and one kid was hitting another with the chalk eraser. In retaliation, the other kid picked up a pair of scissors and was no doubt about to stab the offender in the arm. Madre mía why do people voluntarily sign up to teach middle school?
• My nectarines keep molding because of the humidity. (It’s the little things.)

Of course, then there are the saving graces that remind me why entering the real world and living abroad is not only doable, but so rewarding. My students treating my like an absolute celebrity, begging to touch my hair and waving to me when I walk to school, passing me in the halls and always shouting “Hi Jenny!!” (The full extent of their English, let’s be honest.) Or the 13-year-old triplets I tutor, who have an amazing level of English, so driven and well-behaved (of course, since they attend a German-immersion school), and whose mom invited me to stay for coffee and cheesecake after Friday’s lesson, just when I felt like I needed to be coddled the most. Cramming 13 new friends of all different nationalities around a dinner table mid-week, and eating homemade pizza by my friend Valeria, who comes from pizza’s birthplace itself, Naples. Weekend escapes throughout gorgeous Basque Country, like last Saturday’s visit to San Sebastián. The man at my favorite frutería calling me reina (queen)–which is just part of the expression here, “Anything else, queen?” but still makes me feel like my produce purchase is really important and regal.

In short: working and living abroad is not the same as studying abroad. I have to remind myself that I can’t just pick up and take off traveling whenever I want, or miss class if I had too much fiesta the night before. Working anywhere–in the U.S. or abroad–requires adjustment, and these effects are amplified by the cultural differences that come with the territory of being an expat. But I can already feel myself adapting quickly to my new life here, and I can’t wait for what lies ahead.

About The Author

Jenny

Jenny Marshall studied Language, Culture, and Society at the University of California Santa Barbara, and now teaches English in Spain. Here she writes about the intersection of language and culture, and lives a life translated by travel.