National Ski Week (But Not For Me)
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2021
FOURTH WEEK IN SCHOOL
Indeed, this past past week was National Ski Week for Andorran secondary schools (the equivalent of 7th-10th grades). Interestingly, the Andorran government requires that all students in the Andorran school system reach a certain level of ski ability. I’m not sure why exactly, but my theory is that they need to raise the future generation of skiiers to support one of the biggest industries in Andorra: skiing.
Since I’m teaching at Batxillerat (10th & 11th grades), unlike my Fulbright colleagues, I did not spend six whole days on the slopes with secondary students. I did get to witness some of the chaos that is bringing an entire secondary school to ski on Friday, when I took myself & my rental skis to Soldeu by bus. I was pretty proud of myself for my solo excursion. As an old(ish) Spanish man said on the ski lift, “I just love it when young people have the courage to go on these adventures by themselves”.
Amanda terrorizing her students and throwing snow at them
2-12-2021
For me, I had an exciting (yet exhausting) week of presenting on “Do arts even matter?” to all the first year classes at the school. It is interesting to see the diversity of participation, attitude, and English competency between classes. Some classes we engaged in fruitful discussion on art’s impact on society while in other classes students were a little more reticent.
Next week we have off for Carnaval. I will share more on that soon!
“Da Vinci of Debt”
One of the examples I used is this installation at Grand Central Station, the “Da Vinci of Debt”, sponsored by Natural Light, to call attention to the student loan debt crisis in the U.S..
ACTIVITIES
Sunday: skiing at El Tarter! It was a beautiful day and I personally liked this place more than Pal. It’s easier to get to because you can get on the bus with your skis and take the gondola up to the lifts. There are normally a lot of places throughout Andorra where you can take a gondola directly from the villages, but they are all closed due to Covid and the limited opening of ski resorts.
No pictures from Friday’s solo ski adventure because I didn’t have the same luck with the weather :/
This past week the snow was a distinctive brownish color, and that is because last Saturday the wind brought sand from the Sahara that showered down in Andorra and covered cars, streets, and the slopes. The phenomenon is actually quite rare!
