I have come down to the Costa del Sol to spend my 4-week summer holiday as usual. Normally during this time I would take some classes at the Bonanova Language School in Fuengirola, but this year they had no classes at an appropriate level. Bonanova
Instead I elected to study at Colegio Maravillas in Benamadena. I opted for a 2-week intensive course (20 hours per week), at a cost of 310 Euros. They offer complete packages including accommodation with Spanish families.
This journal will track my progress there.
First impressions
The upfront administration is good. You can register on-line and they will respond in English. Very efficient. I arrived in Malaga on Wed 29th June and went along to the Benalmadena the next day to find out where the school was. From Fuengirola to Benalmadena is a 13 minute train journey on the Cercanias line between Fuengirola and Malaga - the return trip costs 1.5 Euros.
The following day I had arranged to go and pay my money and sit the written test for placement. They were ready for me and everything went smoothly. I had to turn up at 9.00 am on the following Monday for an oral assessment, before being placed in class.
I will let you know how day 1 progressed in my next entry.
Robbieroy

Monday 4th July
Day 1
I travelled through to Benalmadena by train and walked to the school, stopping off to have a coffee in a local bar.

At the school, they were very efficient, I did the oral and then was placed in the Advanced class. We were given a tour of the school - they have very good facitlities - air conditioned classrroms, a well stocked library with 9 computers on the internet (I am using one of them now).


The timtable is:
0930 - 1130 - Grammar class
1200 -1400 - vocabulary and conversation class.
We have 7 students in the advanced class:
1 Swiss, 2 French. 1 Belgian, 1 italian, 1 Swede and and 1 Scottish. Naturally, I am the "abuelo" of the class!

Some of the class with two of the teachers on the right:


The grammar class was quite hard - oraciones condicionales con "Si" and the imperfecto and pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo. The teacher Miguel is quite entertaining.

The vocabuary and discussion class with teacher Julio followed on from this and we did excercises about bank transactions and also practicsed using the Si constructions.
Tuesday 5th July
Day 2
A similar pattern to the classes, more grammar in the first 2 hours and then conversation and more vocabulary. The class is now more confident and the conversations went better today.

As I said, the facilities at the school are good, and the staff very helpful. There is a large outdoor terraza where you can get coffee, drinks and tapas - it is good value too: coffee is only 0.50 euros.

The terrace bar:


Well time to go and catch the train back to Fuengirola.
Robbieroy

Day 3 Wed 6th July
The grammar class this morning was more interactive and communicative than before and we had lots of practice using the imperfect subjunctive and condicional.
The vocabulary and conversation class again focussed on oral activities, reinforcing the use of the condicional. imperfect subjunctive and some use of the present subjunctive.
We took some time out to watch the announcement of the winners of the Olympic bid for the 2012 games. I organised a lottery for this at 1 Euro a ticket. I thought I was on a winner by pulling Paris out of the hat! One of the French students drew London! and London won! Congratulations London!
As well as offering courses to adult learners, the school also offers courses for teenagers and student groups, but in a different facility to the main scholl in the centre of Benalmadena. For this reason, they can offer a comprehensive range of activities.
This weeks´s activities are:
Monday:
1400 - a talk on Granada
1800 - a film: Al sur de Granada
Tuesday:
1500 - Private tutorails are available at no extra cost
1700 - A talk on the Spanish Civil War
Wednesday:
1500 - an excursion to erja and Frigiliana
Thursday:
1500 - free tutorials
1800 - International Film: Las Horas
Friday:
1530 - student and teacher football match
2100 - a party in the school with sangria and music
Saturday:
0800 - a whole day trip to Granada
Personally, I chose to go on the trip to Granda, since I have never been there, but I was informed that no other adults had put their names down and that only the groups of teenagers were going. I was a liitle disappointed by this and I guess I just have to wait and visit Granada some other time.
Yesterday afternoon I played some tennis and took the opertunity to visit some Spanish friends in Fuengirola, managing to sqeeze in some tapas of gambas al pil pil and some tortilla..mmmm!
This afternoon was taken up by some chores such as shopping, followed by an early evening practice session on the tennis court.
For our evening meal, we had one of my favourites - roast chicken bought from an Asador de Pollo - these are common throughout Spain and are shops specialing in roast chicken on the spit. You can also buy baked potatoes. what used to be called French fries and a variety of salads. The whole roast chicken is good value at 7 euros, the best thing is it saves a lot of preparation and cooking time.
Saludos
Robbieroy

Day 4 Thurs 7th July
The classrooms in the school are well maintained and all have air conditioning - a must during the summer months. The average temperature during my recent time here at been around 30 - 36 degrees Celcius.
Grammar Class - more on the condicional and imperfect subjunctive, but this time orally.
Conversation class - this was dominated by a dicussion of this morning´s bomb blast in London.
During the morning break, the winner of yesterday´s in-class lottery, brought in some champagne and congac for us to enjoy.
Enjoying the cognac and champagne on the terrace:



Apart from the news about the events in London, it was a really good day.
I took some photos and will add these to the postings once I am back in the UK.
Robbieroy

Well, this is Friday, the final day of this first week of an intensive Spanish course in Benalmadena. What have I liked and disliked about it?
Likes: the facilities are very good, clean and entirely suited to purpose. They have a good library with intenet access and the teaching and administrative staff are very helpful and accommodating. I particulary like the links between the work done in the mornings in the grammar class and the work done after break in the vocabulary and conversation class. The teachers by and large are good. I also like the idea of the cafe/snack bar area which is good for mixing socially. The range of additional activities is also good.
Dislikes: I have very few dislikes. The only one that springs to mind is that very little homework is given.
Unfortunately, I cannot give you a fuller report on Benalmadena itself, because I am not staying there. From past experience, I know that the has a great marina area and the the town centre is lively.
WOW - in grammar class this morning, a surprise test on Si clauses and on conjunctions line con tal de que. a condicion de que etc!!!!!!!!
In vocab/discussion class we looked at adverts using the subjunctive an also at "false cognates"
Robbieroy

Monday 11th July
This is the start of week 2 of my course.
The weekend went well but much of Saturday was taken up taking a friend to Málaga by train to buy a ticket for him to go to Valencia. We originally went to the Fuengirola train station to buy the ticket for this main line journey BUT BE WARNED - the ticket window for purchasing long distance train travel in Fuengirola is closed until 21st July.
The Cercanías train trip to Málaga RENFE (train station which is one stop BEFORE Málaga Centro), was fine. If you are going to be purchasing train travel tickets in Málaga, please note that the queuing system makes use of numbered tickets - you need to take one from the dispenser and wait for your number to be called and displayed on a screen - this also tells you the ticket window (ventaniila) to go to.
We had a 20 minute wait!
After buying the ticket we went for lunch and enjoyed a selection of food - mixed house salad, paella and cod fish (bacalao) cooked with potatoes and peas. All this with bread and water for only 16 euros total.
The reason I went with my friend was that he suffered a stoke in 1991 and has some difficulty talking, so it is helpful if there is someone there just in case they are needed.
On Saturday evening I played some more tennis, then enjoyed a nice meal at home.
Sunday was very busy with shopping, followed by 2 hours of tennis and then preparing food for our guests who were coming round in the evening.
We had a good meal of mixed fish starters (smoked salmon, boquerones in vinegar and curried herring, with a garlic and tomato salad, followed by spag bolognaise and then lemon mousse and ice cream. Needless to say a few bottles of wine were also consumed.

Grammar class - we were issued with a new book at "Superior" level. Most of the main books used for grammar in the classes have been written by Concha Moreno, so if you are looking for a good author of grammar books to help you with your studies, then she would be a good recommendation as author.
Today, we were focussing on different uses of the present tense, both to make reference to the future and the past. We also listend to a couple of songs but J L Aute and filled in the blanks on the lyrics sheets - a difficult exercise! The focus was on the use of the subjunctive.
Vocabulary/ conversation class - focussed on dictation, stock frases used in everyday speech and discussion about various issues.
5 new students arrived in our class today.
At night, a party was organised for the adults groups, there were about 40 of us there. There was free beer and sangria as well as tapas of ham, cheese, tortilla, nuts, crisps, olives and pork cooked on the grill.



It was an enjoyable evening, mixing with others students and teachers.
Robbieroy

The programme of additional activities for this week is:
Monday:
1400 - a talk and a film on Córdoba
2100 - a party
Tuesday:
1500 - Private tutorails are available at no extra cost
1800 a film - Solas
Wednesday:
1500 - an excursion to Málaga
2000 - tapas in Málaga
Thursday:
1500 practise your Spianish using songs
1600 free tutorials
1800 - International Film: Una casa de locos
Friday:
1530 - student and teacher volleyball match
Saturday:
0800 - a whole day trip to Córdoba
1700 - Seminar on Picasso

I think I might try the Córdoba trip.

Grammar class - the use of the past tenses
Vocabulary/conversation - more use of if.. then

In the grammar classes at this level, there is an expectation that the student knows how to form the verb tenses. The focus is therefore on the use of the tenses.
The rest of the day was taken up by some light revision, tennis and eating.

Wednesday 13th July
I will be going to Málaga this afternoon with the organised trip and will report back tomorrow.
In the morning, the grammer class was mind-bending: we worked on the correspondence of the 9 indicative tenses to the 4 subjunctive tenses AND THEN on probability in the past present and future! My brain still hurts - get me out of here
In the conversation class we discussed various social issues and then went on to look at the lyrics of a song by Los Secretos (a Spanish group, popular in the 80´s) called "Bulevar de los sueños rotos". We then listened to the track a couple of times and then, can you believe it? - we ended up singing it!!

The afternoon trip to Málaga went well - we were picked up at the school in a nice air-conditioned coach and dropped at the cathedral.
There was 1 techer with 5 adults. We did a tour of the cathedral and although I am not religious, I found it interesting.



Next we went to the Alcazaba,



then the roman theatre,



followed by Plaza de la Merced



and then the Plaza de la Constitución.



Here is something interesting. In the this place they have large replicas on the ground (in metal) of the front pages of national newspapers from Decembre 1978, when the Spanish constitution came into effect. AND - if you look at the webcam of the Plaza del la Constitución, toy can just see them by the street light on the left of the image.

We then had some free time so we went for a walk along Calle Larios, one of the main shopping streets that you can see on the webcam at the top of the image. If the web cam is working, you can see it here
We left Málaga at 7.00pm
In the evening I went out for a meal with my lady friend, to a delighful restaurant in the Pueblo Lopez area of Fuengirola.

Robbieroy

Thursday 14th July
Grammar class was a little confusing this morning, jumping beteen probability, the past tenses and the imperative. I am sure that the teacher has a plan....
One thing I did find interesting was how to classify phrases according to Time, Mode and Aspect.
In conversation class wee discussed a variety of social issues.
Four of the class leave tomorrow, so we a planning a small fiesta with tapas. I will let you know what happens.
The rest of the day was taken up with shopping, household chores and later in the evening, a visit to the feria ground. All along the coast, they are celebrating the Fiesta and Feria of Camen, the paton saint of fishermen.
Saturday night is the big night when she is paraded and sent out to sea.
I am going on a trip to Córdoba on saturday and 45 degrees C is forecast!!.
Robbieroy

Wow, this blog has been brilliant. I'm tempted to enrol in this school myself. I hope they are paying you advertising commission Rob Roy! I must say though, I don't envy you walking around Cordoba in 44C heat!!!