Those concerned they might still look a little down-at-heel, have the option of arriving by horse and carriage and parading round the streets:

Just in case anyone might not have noticed what’s going on, a massive, lit-up portada marks the entrance to the site:

Most of the action takes part in casetas - tents fitted out with chairs and tables, and sometimes even chandeliers. It’s in these casetas where you can see the typical flamenco-like folk dance known as sevillanas:

Late on in the game, I decide it would be a good idea to learn sevillanas. I do so from a youtube video, slavishly documenting things like foot-tapping zapateos using such technical flamenco terminology such as ‘bang’:

All that’s left is for me to get on stage and hope no-one nobody’s actually watching – ¡Olé!

My first pair, looking all bashful because of the compliments

“Always buy a good pair of shoes and a good bed, because if you aren’t in one then you’re in the other” (Anonymous according to Websters, Gloria Hunniford according to others)

Travel is about a good a cleanser of the need for material things as there is, but not so long ago I found myself becoming a definite convert to the house of Campers.

We all have different ideas of what the perfect pair of travel shoes. For me they need to be casual enough to be comfortable and smart enough to wear out dancing. They also need to pack away small in case I want to wear trekking shoes instead. Which I never do, because trekking shoes are something that I carry round without ever actually using, like some kind of travel penance.

The only pair that I could find that I really liked were a pair of soft, brown leather Camper Peu. They seemed great, both aesthetically and practically, but I just couldn’t’ justify the price tag of 95GBP (155USD). I wouldn’t pay that for rocket shoes. Actually, that’s not true – I would happily pay that for rocket shoes. I just wouldn’t pay that for regular shoes. Except until I did.

I was going to check them out in the Manchester branch so often I was practically dating them. I was wasting so many hours of my life trying to find cheaper alternatives that in the end I realised that it would actually be cheaper just to buy the damn things and be done with it. Also I think the shop assistants were starting to get weirded-out by my repeat visits, especially when I started bringing flowers.

A year down the road, I now acknowledge them as the best pair of travel shoes I’ve ever owned. And that includes the pair of high-street shoes that were made invincible after being repaired by Nicaraguan street cobbler.

I was going to check them out in the Manchester branch so often I was practically dating them.

So why are they so good? Well, for a start off they’re very comfortable, despite the fact that they virtually consist of nothing. Secondly, they’ve got stretchy laces, so I can slip them on, whilst maintaining the illusion that I can do up my own laces. Finally, they fold almost flat, and hence take up very little in my bag. Oh and finally, finally, they do actually look good too.

But one of the coolest things about them is none of the above. It’s that when, without warning, they developed a split in the side, the shop replaced them just like that *clicks fingers inaudibly* …sorry, I mean like THAT… *clicks fingers successfully*. Always takes me two goes for some reason.

So I’ve become a Campers conscript. Next thing you know I’ll be buying a Mac, getting a custom hairstyle and hanging round media-quarter cafes in lieu of actually working. Well, at least until my next favourite pair of travel shoes comes along.

 I received no recompense from Campers for writing this blog post. Which is not meant to sound like a complaint.

You could walk around Morocco with your eyes closed, and you’d still be party to a sensual experience. Along with numerous cuts and bruises, of course, and some strange looks (though you’d be oblivious to the latter anyway, so that’s kind of alright). Just wandering down a typical market street, you pass through drifting scent-clouds of everything from cumin to fresh bread, from snail soup to resinous incense.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.

From behind I may have looked composed and professional, but had I been facing a mirror rather than a whiteboard, the truth would have been apparent. What on earth was the passive voice used for? My mind had gone blank with the pressure and the whole lesson was rapidly evaporating. This whole TEFL-course lark was a lot harder than I’d imagined.

In similar circumstances, a trainee in a previous year had apparently sat down and got out their lunch, leaving the pupils wondering if it was part of the lesson. Talk about unprepared – I didn’t even have a packed lunch.

One of eighteen trainees of varying ages on an intensive four-week Cambridge CELTA course in England, I was paying for my lack of work the previous evening. I’d only done four hours of preparation and had sloped off to bed at midnight (slacker). We’d been pre-warned that the course would leave no room to work part-time or socialise, but most of us had mentally appended the word ‘much’. I mean, they were exaggerating, right?

That’ll teach you

The average day started in that most terrifying of environments for the untrained – the classroom. For this we were split into smaller peer groups, with half of us teaching on any given day. Those not teaching sat at the back observing or, if they were up next, wondering if anyone would notice if they shrieked and ran out the room.

Later, after the fears of those teaching had proved to be unfounded (or entirely justified), we came together to get feedback from the assessor and to exchange it with our peers.

This could be a strangely deflating experience after the adrenaline of the classroom: Your concept-checking is okay but you’re not eliciting enough; don’t ask if they understand – they might think they do, even if they don’t; and try not to weep so openly.

Afternoons brought with them a role-reversal as we became the students, learning the theory and practice of TEFL plus some key tenets of the English language. We were expected to incorporate these newly learnt classroom skills into our next lessons, like a juggler being thrown another couple more balls every day, and maybe the odd chainsaw.

Teaching English doesn’t require you to speak a single word of the students’ language. In fact, you’re encouraged to ban all talk in any other languages and make the classroom an English enclave. “Just imagine you’re in Torremolinos,” you might tell your class.

The meaning of new words can be conveyed by charades, pictures and using words with which the students are already familiar, the latter being particularly useful if you want to avoid play-acting ‘genetic engineering’.

Easy like Monday evening

By evening the course was over for the day, but the work wasn’t. It was taking me upwards of four hours to prepare an assessed lesson; researching the subject matter, creating the materials and drafting a to-the-minute lesson plan. Even our intended use of blackboard space had to be pre-determined.

Thankfully, in the real world, the ratio of preparation time to teaching time is far more reasonable. And you wouldn’t be required to do the four written assignments that we had to produce in our spare time (ha!).

The hours soon took their toll, and it became the norm for me to have eyes sagging off my face at night and a caffeinated stare in the morning. Meanwhile, my anti-social working hours and trail of unwashed crockery was putting a strain on my relationship with my housemate.

I could have gone to sleep early, of course – the failure rate on such courses is only about 4% globally. And then I’d have felt bright and fresh as I humiliated myself in the classroom due to under-preparation.

Rewarding behaviour

I was aware of the more obvious benefits of the course before I started: the ability to speak English is in demand in many countries, making the ability to teach it a useful skill the world over. It can help fund trips to exotic places, can be a fun job in itself and makes for a much more immersed travel experience than just excitedly pointing at stuff and taking photos.

But it was the unexpected aspects that had the greatest impact on me. Firstly there was the growth in belief and self-confidence that came from having to repeatedly stand up in front of a group and perform. Then there was the sense of satisfaction that came exactly because the course was so demanding without being unrealistic.

Finally, there was the solidarity that came from sharing a difficult situation with others: hearing a colleague say they were thinking about quitting was a daily occurrence, but so was the inevitable chorus of reassurance that came in response.

But as I stood facing the whiteboard, it wasn’t the warm glow of comradeship that I felt but the icy grip of pressure. Come on, you’ve got this far – you can do this.

“Okay,” I said with a cheery smile and a gently perspiring forehead, “this is what I want you to do.”

My tutor looked quizzically down at the lesson plan as I lopped off an exercise, handed out homework as an activity and generally squeezed my way out from the tight spot.

No packed lunch required.

Christmas morning started the same as my relatives around me: with bacon sarnies and Buck’s Fizz, the only difference being that mine had sparkling grape juice in lieu of some slightly more potent.

In the future we’ll all be cyborgs with specially adapted stomachs, capable of compacting food sufficiently to fit in an entire Christmas meal. But for this one, I had to make do with just eating continuously until I felt uncomfortable, and then carrying on for a while more anyway.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.

It’s still important to feel like you’re part of what’s going on, and the tastes and scents of the drinks are a major part of that, so here is a glut traditional Christmas drinks, and some ideas for what to have instead.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine

Spa treatment

For many people, alcohol is a pleasure; an indulgence. Spa treatments provide something similar, except without the bruises. Well, fewer bruises. Well, okay it depends on your masseur. Anyway, it gives people something they sometimes forget to give themselves: permission to relax, forget the worries of the day and generally get prodded with sponges. And if you buy someone a voucher, they can choose their specific treatment or treatments that suit them best.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.

The office christmas bash is important. It can be the one time of year when everyone in the office finally gets to let their hair down and forget about TPS report cover sheets. Bonding, (of all varieties) can occur that just wouldn’t happen in the workplace in normal circumstances.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.

They’re a curious thing, awareness weeks, and Alcohol Awareness Week is one of the most curious, if only for its name. The thing is, we’re all aware of alcohol. In fact, I can just hear the odd joker saying “Oh, I’m aware of it alright!” I wish he’d shut up – I’m trying to write. He’s drunk again, too.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.

The first is that Air Crash Investigations is not a very relaxing programme. The second is that tea is not a very good evening drink, at least not for me. It’s not because it’s not a good drink, nor because of its caffeine content. It’s because it’s not special.

Different drinks have different places in a daily routine. Take my own: Tea is what I drink in my breaks between writing, as a reward for having worked hard, and a spur to work some more; orange juice, is some kind of laughable nod at a healthy diet; and water is that thing I have when I need to put liquid in my body so I don’t die.

Read the full article at Dry Times – the alcohol-free lifestyle magazine.