Comenius Meeting "Believing in Humanity" in Trieste

Tuesday 15th of November.

The first day of our trip.

That was the date in which we, the teachers from IES Mediterraneo school, Cartagena, Spain - Antonio Parra, Jose Angel Moreno and I, Paloma Perez-Crespo - started our trip to Trieste. It was the first time we were going to meet our European partner colleagues in the Comenius Project, our school coordinates about education in values. A beautiful work, we hope it will go far in achieving our aims.

At 5:30 in the morning, we took the train to Madrid. There, at Chamartin station we went for a walk, because we had enough time before going to Barajas airport. Our flight was at 2:30 in the afternoon, and we changed at Milan to fly to Trieste. Everything went perfect. We had time to look over our notes, and even visit Milan town cente in the time we had to wait for the next flight.

When we arrived in Trieste at 9:30, Barbara, the Italian coordinator teacher, kindly came to meet us. All the other teachers were already at a restaurant having dinner and waiting for us. But first we had to drop off our luggage. Barbara had told us that we could book a very cheap hostel in a beautiful village near Trieste. On arrival we realised there was no receptionist and, after pulling our suitcases up 4 flights of stairs, there was no lift either. Besides, the door of my room was made of glass which made it embarrassing for me. We were very tired and we preferred to look for another hotel, like the Swedish colleagues, in Trieste. But it was too late, and we had to meet the other people. Then, we got in the car again, but it was very small. Only 2 suitcases fitted in the boot, so the third one had to sit on Antonio´s lap, in the back. He called it "his little daughter", referring to the times he had to carry her. In fact it was not so little. It weighed about 23kg. Anyway, jokes apart, I have to mention the totally good disposition of Barabara, the Italian coordinator.

We arrived at the restaurant at about 10:30, very late for a European dinner. All of them had almost finished, but they had kindly waited for us. There were some brief introductions and friendly conversation, but everyone was tired and soon we said goodnight. Then we had to look for a hotel. It was not easy but eventually we found the absolute opposite to the other one. For that night we were able to rest very comfortably.

To be continued...