Killing Time

I like most parts of the English teacher gig, mostly because it is so different from my old lifestyle as a teacher, always in one place, same schedule everyday, no time to ever go out and do anything during the day except for the occasional Friday race to order and eat a Jimmy Johns sub and be back at school in 50 minutes.
Here I have the opposite problem, sometimes I have so much time to kill in between things that I wish I could stay in one place. It's not really worth it to take the metro home in the late afternoon because that would just mean having to take it again at the busiest time of day in order to get to my night class. I usually end up with about 2-3 hours to kill depending on if it's a day that I meet with my private student at 6:30. Sometimes I'm gone for 12+ hours and realize that I've only been teaching for about 4 of them, but it really comes down to what time and how far away your classes are. I think most English teachers must be master time killers, knowing exactly what coffee shop is where, how good the wifi is, and exactly how long it will take to walk or ride from Point A to Point B.

Here are some of the ways I have been killing my time:

1. Starbucks
Pretty much the only place with soy milk, so bring on the wifi, lattes, and comfortable chairs. I'm pretty sure I've spent more money at Starbucks here than I ever did back home.

2. Journaling
I've actually filled up 2 whole notebooks since I've been here, not bad.

3. Itouch surfing
See number 1

4. Lesson Planning
Sometimes...

5. Eating lunch at 4:30
Too early to eat lunch before I leave the house and by the time I get to my next stop it´s around 4:30. I eat the lunch/dinner combo and then have a late night oatmeal with apples snack. Nothing wrong with just moving the foods around to different times of day, and grabbing lunch somewhere is a great way to kill at least an hour and have a place to sit for awhile.

6. Walking an extra couple of metro stops when it's nice out
I love walking, but when I'm weighed down with a lot of books it makes it a little less enjoyable. The best part is the people watching, I can't get enough.

7. Reading the magazines from El Mecurio
Some days I try to listen to my own teacherly advice...to keep improving at a language, spend some time reading to help learn new vocabulary.

8. Yoga
I'm lucky enough that my yoga place is within walking or biking distance from my house. Walk to class, hop on the metro for the day, and off I go, or sometimes the reverse plan is also true.

Regardless of what I'm doing, sometimes it's just better to be out and about rather then hanging out in the casita!

My First Yoga Class

For those of you that know me well, you know that I like to hit up the yoga classes 2-3 times a week.  It's become a necessary part of my life over the last 8 years or so and I was excited to continue with my practice in a new place in a different city.  I'd like to thank Emily for recommending YogaLuka, and the nice part about it is that it's fairly close to where I live, it's really cheap, and there are many classes to choose from since my teaching schedule is different everyday and will continue to change over the months ahead.  Right now I happen to have a few holes in the middle of the day, so it's the perfect opportunity to do something productive.
I didn't think I'd already be signed up for classes this quickly, but in the last week I have carried ridiculously heavy bags around airports and up and down stairs, slept in a hostel, tried to get accustomed to a new bed, walked everywhere, and stopped going to the chiropractor, which is something that I had been doing regularly for about 7 months. I'm just one of those people with a lot of aches and pains and I have to do what I can to take care of myself.
The class was a little different that what I had become accustomed to, but it's always a good thing to switch things up now and again anyways.  I can't say that I understood everything that the instructor said, but it wasn't too hard to sneak a peek around me to see what was going on.  I'm going back for a different intensity class on Saturday, so we'll see what happens then!  I also need to get my hands on my own yoga mat, so I can start my own little routine out on the sunny patio right outside the door of the casita.