I've said it before and I'll say it again. I should NEVER EVER go along with one of my 'good ideas'. They never work out the way I think they will but I never learn. Hindsight is a bitch.
I thought it would be a good idea to take a job looking after kids in sunny Spain.
So, here are the major faults in my planning strategy. A) Why did I agree to 10 and 14 year olds, these aren't kids - they're adolescents. B) Why didn't I check the weather forecast before heading off the the flipping mountains of Northern Spain?
Well the answer is pretty simple, I'm an idiot.
It's safe to say this whole endeavour has been a disaster, mostly on account of them being arseholes.
I'm somewhere over west France while I write this on my phone. I know for a fact that some people, mainly those who bet on how long I would last, would like to know what happened and why I headed home so early.
Let me start with this: I have never been as relieved as the moment mid argument that the father of the family I was working for told me he had booked me a flight for tomorrow - that was until I realised I had 24 hours of complete and total awkwardness in which I would have to avoid them at all costs which wasn't easy considering home for them is a flat with 6 rooms.
So here's the juicy bit of how the argument happened. (Background info first).
The agreement was that I'd be with the kids from 9-4 everyday which was fine. An hour each to teach them English, fine. Lunch at 1.30 - fine. But the parents always came home for lunch and didn't go back to work until about 3 which felt a bit weird. It was like they were checking up on me and it also made the day a bit disjointed. While they were present, I wasn't in charge of the kids like I was in the mornings so I had no authority over what they were up to. How do you tell a 10 year old to shut her nasty little mouth and to stop slamming the doors when her mother is there to do it? You can't. It was always so bloody awkward.
Once I had finished their English lessons, it was usually about 11am and they would put the tv on or go to their rooms. It rained everyday bar one that I was there, so there wasn't much else for them to do really. Their phones and iPads were kept by the father in the mornings so they had to entertain themselves the old fashioned way. Cue monopoly.
At about 11.30 one day last week, the kids had done theirs lessons and they got out monopoly. For two difficult kids who didn't want me around, they were perfectly pleasant until they had an arguement about cheating. Anyway, the dad gets in and sees the (abandoned) monopoly board and tells me off saying they shouldn't be playing games, that's not what he's paying me for.
Now, these kids were playing in English, and translating the words for me. I literally couldn't comprehend how it made sense that we shouldn't be playing nicely together? He kept saying 'go for a walk' which would have been dandy if the rain didn't piss down everyday.
So this is still week one, and people who know me well will appreciate that my patience is not something to brag about. It was wearing thin, but I agreed to myself to do 4 weeks and leave before going to summer camp with the kids. 3 more weeks I told myself. Haha.
On one day that it wasn't raining in the morning, we went for a walk to another town and got back at around 1.30 and I got told off for not having lunch ready. I was ready to go crazy at this point so after 4, when my 'duties' were done, I sat in my room and read my book. Which he's now informed me is rude, apparently.
Yesterday, when the drama began, the kids were both watching Disney channel so I was on the sofa with them reading my book and he comes in at about 12 and says what are you doing... The first thing that came to mind was a sarcastic 'I'm riding my bike what the fuck does it look like I'm doing'. He sighed and said I don't think this is working. The kids and I are all just staring at him wondering where this monologue is going. He continued saying "you're supposed to be teaching them" so the 14 year old tells him we've done our lessons and we were going to go for a walk but it's raining. He didn't appreciate her input so he tells then both to leave the room. He comes over to me and says "I'm not paying you to have free time I'm paying you to be with them from 9-4."
I wondered what he thought I'd been doing all morning, climbing a mountain? Knitting a bloody jumper? I was with them all morning, chatting, getting them to practise conversational English. But they got bored and on went the telly. Watching re runs of Disney channel programs in Spanish isn't what I call free time. It's called - 'your kids refuse to do anymore English and they don't want to make a cake either, what else am I supposed to do' - time.
So I explained this with an oscar worthy facade, when inside, my only thought was 'I wonder how hard I could punch him'.
So blah blah there's a disagreeing conversation going back and forth until he says he doesn't think I'm working out so I told him I'm not a teacher, I'm helping them with English like you asked. If you wanted them to have a teacher you should have sent them to summer school. I think to some extent he was agreeing with me and I was about to tell him I think I should just go home before he whips out a boarding pass for a flight home the next day. SWEET FREEDOM..... In 24 hours. It struck me about ten minutes ago that he had already brought the ticket before this argument happened. It makes me wonder at what point he decided he didn't like me. But whatever, I literally couldn't care less about this silly little man.
The awkward 24 hours were appalling. They absolutely insisted I went out with them for dinner, where literally the only words spoken to me were: what do you want? Even worse than not being spoken to, however, was the fact that they actually started speaking about me. Yep. "I wasn't paying her 100 euros a week to play games".
Haha. Ha. Ha. Then this was when I realised these people mean absolutely nothing to me. I have nothing to owe them. I had been nothing but nice and polite (things they ought to learn). I could ignore them, they'd drive me to the airport, and this little escapade will never be repeated ever again.
Or at least until I get another bright idea.
Footnote: signs from the universe telling me that everything was going to be a disaster:
1) getting lost in Bristol because the roads were diverted.
2) nearly missing boarding the outbound flight due to engrossing stories in Cosmo.
3) the whole car ride to Beasain being weird and awkward
4) Beasain in general
5) all the stuff in between
6) duty free in Bordeaux having a) run out of vodka, b) not selling Captain Morgan's spiced rum
7) head butting the over head luggage cabin when sitting down.
Fucking disastrous.
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