4. 'Skin and Bones' (Part I): The Countdown to Registration

Skin and bones is nearly all I had left… Today, December 2, 2023, marks four months since my arrival in the United States, and I can say out in the open that, so far, I have survived. However, the registration process leading up to it nearly left me skin and bones. What a lesson in patience!

the registration process leading up to it nearly left me skin and bones.

It all began on December 27, 2022, when I decided to go looking for a new adventure, and not just any adventure: to make my departure for the United States official. There were only two days left to register and compete for one of the positions as a Spanish teacher. The countdown had begun and only 48 hours remained. I was in Granada, at my mother’s house, sunk in the Christmas stupor, watching the days go by.

…and only 48 hours remained.

Faced with this pressure, I reacted with such vigor that all the sugar from the Christmas turrón dropped straight down to my heels. I broke out in a cold sweat, with a mix of nerves and confusion, doubts and far too many questions. But I couldn’t take it anymore; I shut off every kind of thought, jumped to my feet and said to myself: “What am I waiting for?” I turned on my laptop and repeated under my breath: “Let’s go, we’re off!” I was so excited about this project—one I had been putting off for so many years—that I couldn’t let it slip away from me once again. I had been dreaming of this change for a long time, but amid life’s daily chores you settle in, letting the days go by until, suddenly, either you wake up, or life is gone in a flash.

Looking back, I had already spent thirteen years as a teacher at IES Pasqual Calbó i Caldés in Menorca. I was happy at that school, a warm, family-like place on a small, magical, peaceful island, with intoxicating nature and coves of blue and turquoise green. And yet I, who have never known how to cling to one place, felt I needed a change, not only in my teaching experience but in life itself. Something like changing the ‘wallpaper‘ and stepping out of that comfort zone which, without our noticing, turns us into mechanical statues. I felt that call to escape as pure purification, as a necessary dispersion. That is how I lived it when I enjoyed an Erasmus scholarship in Tübingen, Germany, twenty-two years ago now. So, if opportunity was knocking at my door once again, why not open it?

Looking back, I had already spent thirteen years as a teacher at IES Pasqual Calbó i Caldés in Menorca. I was happy at this school, a warm, family-like place on a small, magical, peaceful island, with its intoxicating nature and coves of blue and turquoise green. And yet I, who have never known how to cling to a single place, felt I needed a change. Not only professionally, but in life itself. Something like changing the ‘wallpaper’ and stepping out of that comfort zone which, without our noticing, turns us into mechanical statues. I felt a call to escape, a purification, something I had already experienced back in 1999 when I enjoyed an Erasmus scholarship in Tübingen, Germany. If opportunity was knocking at my door once again, how could I not open it?

If opportunity was knocking at my door once again, how could I not open it?

IES Pasqual Calbó i Caldés (Mahón, Menorca)

Cales Coves (Menorca, Illes Balears)

In September of that same year, when the school year in Spain had just begun, I started looking for options to work as a Spanish teacher in the Netherlands and Switzerland. I immediately remembered the nostalgic film Un franco, 14 pesetas, by the playwright Carlos Iglesias, in which two Spanish friends move to Switzerland in search of work. Of course, had I wanted a more exotic adventure, I could have gone to Bali, in Indonesia, where my brother David lives, and built another ‘wallpaper’ there. However, I needed to join a program that would offer me certain health and employment safeguards, which would guarantee me a peaceful stay in the destination country as well as a smooth return to Spain afterward. The only one that met these conditions was the Visiting Teachers Program in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and Germany, offered annually by the Spanish Ministry of Education since 1986. Finally, in November, my principal forwarded us the call for applications for that program for the 2023-2024 school year, and I signed up.

And so, in September of that same year, when the school year in Spain was barely getting started, I began looking for options to go abroad as a Spanish teacher. I focused on a European destination such as the Netherlands or Switzerland, and I immediately remembered the nostalgic film Un franco, 14 pesetas, by Carlos Iglesias, in which two Spanish friends emigrate to Switzerland in the 1960s in search of work. Of course, had I wanted a more exotic adventure, I could have gone to Indonesia, where my brother David lives, and built quite a different ‘wallpaper’ there. However, I needed a program that would give me job stability and good health coverage. I couldn’t find a thing.

But one fine day that same month, the Visiting Teachers Program for the United States, Canada, Ireland, and Germany landed in my inbox. The Spanish Ministry of Education had been offering it since 1986, and although I had never paid it much attention, this time I said to myself: “Why not?”

…I immediately remembered the nostalgic film Un franco, 14 pesetas,

Martín (Carlos Iglesias) and Marcos (Javier Gutiérrez) arrive in Switzerland.

Given the lack of options for Switzerland, the Netherlands, and other destinations I had also looked into, I finally clung to this Ministry call for applications like a lifeline. Of the four countries it offered, the United States had the largest number of positions, with 617; Canada had only 10, and Ireland and Germany 5 each. Although the figures were provisional, this large offering tipped me toward the country of the great states. If I had learned to live in Germany as an Erasmus student, now it was my turn to settle the score as a visiting teacher, and on a completely different continent.

My conversations with my friend Sebastian, a Washington native recently settled in Menorca, also weighed on my decision. He encouraged me to choose Texas as my destination, pointing out how similar its climate is to ours, the generosity of the Latino community, and the cosmopolitan character of the South. He told me about its capital, Austin, city of music, and I could already picture myself roaming the Texas prairies with a blade of grass in my mouth, singing that old tune: “I’m a poor lonesome cowboy, and a long way from home…”

“I’m a poor lonesome cowboy, and a long way from home…”.

Lucky Luke

That was how I applied for the teach-abroad program, aware that holding a permanent position would guarantee me certain advantages: all of us tenured teachers moved into the administrative status of ‘special services’, which allowed us to keep our position at the same school for a maximum of five years. In addition, we were offered free health coverage in the destination country (a privilege almost unthinkable in the United States), as well as continued standing in the Spanish social security system. And that is without counting the improvement in our English and our professional qualifications. We even had the chance to earn a master’s degree abroad or take officially accredited training courses. But most important of all was the opportunity to live an experience as unique as it was transformative—something invaluable that not even the best travel agency could offer.

Well then, as I was telling you at the beginning, on that December 27, immersed in the Christmas whirl of appointments and commitments, I realized I had been putting aside the most essential thing: the registration. A strong gut feeling told me I had to try, even if only two days remained. So I swallowed hard and entrusted myself to the best of luck. I switched into ‘focus mode’ and, watch in hand, took on the challenge. I admit I feel an enormous aversion to these online bureaucratic processes, so cold, as slow as they are tedious, but the occasion was worth it. Nothing was easy: searching, attaching, filling in data and documents… More than once, the site’s server crashed and everything had to be restarted. Time slipped through my fingers like sand in an hourglass. And that is without counting the questions that kept popping up as I advanced through the screens. My wits were shrinking; I fought to stay upbeat, awake, level-headed. If I needed to contact Madrid, the wait was endless, and the answers, late. Fortunately, I was able to get many answers through the ‘PPVV USA’ (Visiting Teachers in the U.S.) group on Telegram, a community of teachers as helpful as they are understanding, who either were already there or were getting ready to go.

Nothing was easy: searching, attaching, filling in data and documents…

And so came December 28, Holy Innocents’ Day—Spain’s April Fools’—and there I was, well into the night, the blinds of my eyelids rolling down out of control, paying for the day’s ‘prank’. I went to bed exhausted, but the next morning it would already be the 29th, and all I would have left to do was print the application and send it. A distant voice kept saying: “Think how relaxed you’d be if you just let it go. They might not even pick you…” But those thoughts, far from holding me back, only pushed me even further in my decision.

“Think how relaxed you’d be if you just let it go. They might not even pick you…”

– Skin and Bones (Part II): superPPVVivors.

Coming next Saturday, December 9, 2023.