The 10 of us that were there. From left to right: Mary Beth (Minnesota), Catherine (New Zealand), Pinja (Finland), Sarah (Portland), Linda (Iceland), Me, Zeke (St. Louis), Danielle (Houston), Caroline (Boston), & Mackenzie (Phoenix).

Saturday, January 22nd, was the 18th birthday of fellow AFSer Linda from Iceland. She, and Sarah from Portland, Oregon, are both in Segovia, a small city 60 miles north of Madrid. Those two frequently take the bus into Madrid for activities that the 17 of us in the Madrid area with AFS are constantly planning. We've done stuff such as go to the Parque de Atracciones, see the premier of the latest Harry Potter movie, and have a white elephant gift exchange, and let me tell you, we still have a long list of things to do together.

We've been talking for a while about how we need to take the trip up to Segovia one day since they're always coming down, plus we wanted to see the city for ourselves, and Linda's birthday ended up being the perfect opportunity.

And she had no idea.

Thanks to Sarah who had the great idea in the first place, we began to plan it out secretly during weeks. We would all meed up in Madrid and catch a bus together Saturday morning, surprise her when we got to Segovia, and spend the whole day together.


We got into Segovia at about 11am, and the plan was to meet in front of the Aqueduct, the most famous landmark of the city that was built the year Jesus was born to move water around the city.


We still didn't know exactly how we were going to surprise her when we arrived. But someone came up with something last minute. We bought a newspaper and split the pages between us. Then, we spread ourselves out around the plaza that's right in front of the Aqueduct, and hid behind the pages. We didn't know which direction she was going to come from (accompanied by Sarah) so the Aqueduct became 12 o clock, and who ever saw her first had to yell out the number she was coming from according to the clock, and we had to yell it between us.

I was sitting on a bench at about 10 o clock, and I while I was sitting there I overheard a man next to me telling someone on the phone that he was scared because the plaza was full of "American spies". Yeah. We're that good.

What ended up happening was the instant she walked into the square with Sarah, she spotted Danielle standing there with a newspaper. We all witnessed it happening, and Danielle played it off like "woah, what are you doing here? I'm here with my host family" type of thing. Meanwhile the rest of us all ran over to where they were. She was SO surprised, and really excited to see us all.

The cathedral

The cathedral from the top of the Alcázar



El Alcázar



Why does so much of the law revolve around age?

You have to be 12 to sit in the front seat of a car.
16 to drive that car.
18 to vote.
21 to buy/drink alcohol.
35 to be President.
62 to retire.

And apparently, in Spain, you have to be 18 to be able to pick up your Student Card, which is what serves as my visa extension.

But really. What does it matter exactly? Age is a number, and to me, it says nothing about your experience, maturity, or capability.

There are 40-year-olds that have stayed in the same town throughout their entire lives. How much have they experienced?
There are 30-year-olds that still live with their parents. They must be really mature. Not to mention capable of getting a job, paying their own rent, and cooking their own food.
And I would like to thank Jeff Foxworthy for proving that most 5th graders are smarter than adults.

I had already applied for this card, paid for it, proved I was who I said I was, completed the proper documentation, and they still wouldn't give it to me. Do I really have to be 18 just so they can hand me what's basically an ID card?

Well like I said. Age doesn't mean anything. So even though I'm only 17, I think I'm mature, capable, and pretty experienced for my age. Oh, and yeah, I get what I want.

I left my house as 8:45 that morning, and caught the Metro. I was about halfway there (out of the hour-ish trip) when I got out because I realized that I had forgotten to go to a bank to pay the fee. I knew I was heading towards the middle of nowhere of Madrid, so I got out there to go to a bank.

It turns out that you can't just go to any bank, however. There is one specific bank where the fee needed to be paid at. The problem was that I didn't know where this bank was. Let alone what it was called. So I called my friend Mary Beth who had already gone through this process. Thank God this bank is only two Metro stations away from where I was headed anyways. I found the bank, paid the fee, and continued on.

It took another call to Mary Beth for me to find the building I needed to pick up this card, which is impressive considering that there's basically nothing in this zone of Madrid. This place was an interesting sight, though. There were people and people everywhere. Everyone was foreign, there were a lot of police officers, and various lines all over the places, all of them really long.

There was a worker standing in the front directing people to the various lines. I told him what I needed and he pointed me to one, and I joined it. Even the music and games that I have on my phone didn't help pass the time. It took more than an hour, standing the entire time, for me to reach the front of this line.

When I finally got there, I showed them my documents and my passport, and they basically just told me that I wasn't in the right place. They told me where I really needed to go, a different line, and of course this one was much longer than the original. It took closer to two hours to get to the front.

When I got close enough to the front of the line that I could see what was going on, I noticed every person went through the same routine.

Check the passport, go through all of the rest of the documents, check the proof of payment, the worker goes away for a few minutes, comes back with the card, hands it to the person, and that person walks away, happy to be finished.

But when it was finally my turn, that was not at all the case. Of course.

The man took my passport from me, looked at it, and pointed me to a nearby chair to sit down and wait.

Woah, woah, woah. Wait just one second. I saw every single person in front of me receive their card, no questions asked. Why do I have to wait?

"Because you're underage" he told me.

So what am I waiting for? To turn 18?

He told me that I was waiting for his supervisor, and that I would only have to wait for about 15 minutes.

"Fine" I said to him, and sat down.

I watched for the next 15 minutes, and the routine continued.

Check the passport, go through all of the rest of the documents, check the proof of payment, the worker goes away for a few minutes, comes back with the card, hands it to the person, and that person walks away, happy to be finished.
I also noticed that he hadn't talked to a single other worker, nor on the phone. So I walked up to him and said "Look, it's been 15 minutes already. No supervisor has arrived. You haven't talked to anyone, nor called anyone. No one is coming. I'm not going to continue to wait for nothing."

What was his response? "He will arrive in about 15 minutes."

Is that not exactly what he had told me 15 minutes prior to that? But I decided I should be civil for a little while longer.

You see, when you have these types of situations, you have to go through phases.
My personal phases are as follows:

1. Try to get the job done normally, nicely, and civilly. Basically, make them want to help you.
2. If that doesn't work, try to get them to think that your situation is not normal, and that they can make an exception in the normal routine for you (lies may be included, or sometimes required).
3. If you still don't get what you want, the last attempt is to simply make them hate you, and make them hate their job. The point? To make them just give you the damn thing so you can get out of their sight.

At this point, I was still trying to maintain phase #1, but I wasn't going to let him think I'm a pushover, so I told him "Fine. 15 minutes, and not a second longer." I started a timer on my phone, showed it to him, and sat down.

Just as I knew would be the case, 15 minutes later (exactly) this "supervisor" still had yet to arrive. Oh, and this idiot still had yet to call someone to come. So I started phase #2.

I walked up to him, and started arguing with him. He told me that by law he couldn't give me the card unless I had someone over 18 with me. So I told him (let the lying begin) that I don't have anyone 18 or older with me, and that I'm here in Spain alone. With that he reminded me that it would be impossible for me to be in Spain in the first place without a guardian that's over 18. So to that I truthfully told him that this year, by law, my guardian is a nonprofit organization, and not an actual person. When he told me that this program should have a representative for these kinds of things, I told him that they don't. And when he told me that I couldn't have even applied for the visa extension if someone over 18 wasn't there, I told him that well, I did that alone too (lie).

I also continued to tell them that a friend of  mine from my program was there the day before, and managed to get her card without someone overage. (Partly true, Mary Beth did do it alone, and she's 17 like me, but she did it a few months before, not the day before). And I told him that the 15 other kids in my program have done the same.

At this point, he ran out of things to tell me. So he started making things up. The first thing he said was "well normally, these cards are for some 15-year-old Russian soccer player that needs to enroll in the school in order to legally be here so they can play soccer. And each one has a representative over 18 to deal with this kind of stuff for them."

"First of all," I told him, "I'm 17. I'm American. And I'm not here to play soccer. I don't have anyone over 18 either. So maybe, my case isn't exactly normal."

And then he just started talking in circles. Well normally this. Normally that. He kept on using the word "normally" and I continued to tell him that my case was obviously not normal.

Then, a lady walked up next to me, and asked him if he knew where something was. He yelled at her saying that he wasn't the information desk. I yelled at him for that. I said "just because you're pissed off with me, doesn't mean you can scream at her when she's being all polite to you. The least you could do is tell her where she needs to go."

So he told her "the information desk is upstairs." Well apparently, she had just come from upstairs, and there they had told her that the information desk was downstairs.

I felt really bad for her, too. She had a little tiny baby that was probably just barely born, and she needed papers for him. She was being really polite to everyone, and this guy was basically screaming at her.

She also advised me that maybe they'd be more helpful if I was nicer to them. So I just told her that yeah, I tried that. I need to continue being stern with them.
At that point, someone else came, and the first guy left. Leaving me, and the lady, problems unsolved. As he was leaving, I made extra effort to thank him dearly for helping me. Sarcastically? Yeah, that too. He stormed off swearing at me under his breath. He's lucky I didn't catch his name, or I would've filed a complaint.

After he left, it turned out that this new guy wasn't the supervisor. So I went with the exact same process with him. And he continued the bullshit of "normally."

At one point, he went and found my card, showed it to me so I could see it's mine, and then returned to put it back.

Bad move. Phase #3 started at that point. (Although, you could argue that the first guy hated me, and maybe his job, by the time he left).

I yelled about how every single thing I could think of. About how I've already done the whole process alone. How I was living in Spain alone. So why would I have to pick up this little card accompanied? I asked him what someone over 18 would even do to the situation. They would watch you put a little ID card in my hand, and make sure you handed it over in the right manner? Like seriously?

I just continued yelling, and he continued to tell me to sit down and wait for his supervisor.

"No," I told him, "I am not leaving, and I am not going to shut up until you give me that card."

Finally the supervisor shows up. He gets the exact same speil. And he tells me the exact same things as the two before him.

Then at one point he stopped arguing with me, and asked the second guy if my card was even there in the first place. The guy showed it to him, and then the supervisor came back over to me, grabbed the documents out of my hands, basically threw my card in my face, and yelled at me to leave.

Phase #3 complete, and Jake wins again.

Even though it was a long day, I sure had fun. I would've been pissed if I had to go home, and return at a later date with one of my host parents, to wait in a long line again, just so they could hand me a flimsy little card. So I left content, and with the sweet taste of success.

Like I said. I may be only 17, and underage in the eyes of the law, but I think I proved that that doesn't mean I'm not capable. And, oh yeah, that I get what I want.

But this story probably isn't the best example in the world of maturity. But I could care less. I got my card.

I hope that all of you will get the chance at some point in your lives to deal with Spanish bureaucracy. It's quite the experience, to say the least.

The Metro (subway) is one of my favorite things about Madrid. It's a really easy way to travel around the city independently (especially since we're not allowed to drive), and it's also cheap, fast, and reliable.

My other favorite thing about the Metro, is it seems to be the place where I meet the weirdest people, or where the weirdest things happen to me. I sometimes also meet some cool people, for example I've met quite a few American's on the Metro because you hear people speaking English, or others hear us speaking English, etc.

The American's...yeah, alright. It's nice to speak with them every once and a while. But it's not like talking to an American is something really interesting since I'm an American. I know plenty of Americans that I can talk to. What I really enjoy are the weird people.

So here are three of some of my favorite Metro incidents that have happened in the last couple of months.

1. Borracha y Fea
One Friday night I got on the Metro to go home with Marta after we saw a movie. We were in the very back of the train, and there was a group of four or five girls my age sitting down on the floor of the train against the back wall. They were drinking alcohol (this is not at all rare) and they were completely wasted. None of them were very pretty either. There was one empty seat so I let Marta sit down, and I stood next to her, holding on the pole, with my back to the girls.

A couple stops later (but in between stations) they all stood up to get ready to leave upon arriving at the next station. And the next thing I know, I feel something hit my butt.

The first thing I thought was "oh, they're drunk, one of them must've brushed against it on accident. It happens all the time here because it can be hard to balance on the trains."

But then it happened again. The second was undeniably a deliberate ass-slap. And so I thought "okay, this is awkward. An ugly drunk chick is slapping my ass in public, right next to my host mom. But I'm just going to ignore it because she's getting off in 30 seconds anyways."

And then it happens for the third time. And this time, it actually hurt a little, she hit me hard. This was when I was really starting to get annoyed. I turn around to stare at her, and she just looks at me, laughs, and walks off the train...

2. Hola Chocolate
My liaison lives one Metro station away from me. And so one day, after meeting up with her downtown, we both got on the same train to go home together. Her station is first, and in that station, the exit is at the very front of the train when you get off, so we were standing in the very front of the train. In my station, the exit is at the very end of the train, so after she got off, I started walking towards the back of the train so I'd be closer to the exit when I got off.

I was about halfway down the train, when I was blocked by a couple who were talking up the entire aisle. So I simply said "excuse me." They both looked at me and stared. Without saying a word.

So I asked "will you let me pass?" And still. Blank stares.

So I asked again "will you let me pass please?" At this point, the woman noticed that I had a cup of hot chocolate in my hands, but it only had a sip or so left. She looked at it and said "hola chocolate!" So what did I say? "Yeah, the chocolate says hi to you to, now will you please move so I can pass you?"

More blank stares.

At this point I was so annoyed that I physically pushed through them to get by, and I continued walking down the train.

Stop the Train!
This last story just happened two days ago, and it scared the hell out of me.

Again, I was on my way home (why do they always happen on the way home?), and there weren't any seats left, so I was standing in the middle of the aisle, in between seats, holding on to a pole.

In the four seats that were on my sides sat four friends, all guys, a little bit older than me.

Somewhere along the way, we stopped at the station, people got off, others got on, and all of a sudden I hear yells of "stop the train! Stop the train!"

The next thing I know is that two burly security guards run into the train right next to me and they're both coming towards me. I was trying to figure out what I did, but I had no idea. The whole time they were yelling, and I was just like "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit..."

They then grabbed the four guys sitting down by their arms, pulled them up out of their seats and off the train, leaving me standing there, most likely, white with shock.

Once they were off the train I notice the security guards had found on them a big bag full of empty cans of spray paint. Busted!

Here's a video I made with a few of my friends from AFS around downtown Madrid one night, checking out all of the Christmas decorations.

I've never been so superstitious in my life until this New Year's.

Apparently there's a whole list of things you have to do in order to ensure that the new year will be a prosperous one.

The most important thing is the grapes. The tradition is that everyone has to eat 12 grapes in the last 12 seconds of the year. It's interesting because we always count down "10, 9, 8, 7..." but here, and with the grapes you count up "1, 2, 3...12." It was pretty funny the whole group of people in front of the TV watching the clock count up and shoving grapes down their throats. It's actually pretty hard. Oh, and also you have to say "Feliz Año Nuevo" (Happy New Year) between every grape, just to make it that much harder.

Thankfully I was able to finish the grapes in time, and that I didn't choke. That was my question about this thing: how many little kids are rushed to the hospital every New Year from choking on grapes??

You also have to make sure to wear something red (I rushed out to town at 7:30 that night, when everything closed at 8,  to buy red boxers because I didn't have anything red. You have to wear something made of gold, too.

Everyone also had to write a letter about what you want the new year to bring, and a second letter of the things in your life that you want to go away, or stop happening, and then you burn the second letter and keep the first one.

I took the letter thing pretty seriously. Actually I took it all pretty seriously, so I hope all this tradition stuff works, and I have an extra good 2011.

I hope you all had a good New Year's Eve, and I wish you all a good 2011. And good luck with that New Year's Resolution of losing 10 pounds!