More Tour Guiding

Last summer and this spring, I got several mornings work as a tour guide, showing people around either the William Herschel Telescope, or the Isaac Newton Telescope.

Today was my first go at the new-style open days at the observatory (see my blog about the island) where I have to give a general talk about the observatory first, then take them to the MAGIC telescope (and maybe give the explanations if the MAGIC site manager isn't available) and finally take them to one other telescope, which could be the Galileo, the Liverpool or the Mercator. Today was the Galileo, and one of the Italian astronomers was going to give the talk there. That left me learning the general talk, and creating one about the MAGIC.

Last night I dreamed that I arrived at the residencia (the private hotel for the observatory) in good time, had a quick coffee, and suddenly I was half an hour late, and I couldn't find my car to go and meet the visitors. So I ran uphill the whole way, only to find that they were all Japanese, and expecting me to explain telescopes to them in Japanese.

Spot the anxiety dream.

And this morning went fine.

I was on time (as always). Juan Carlos, the observatory site manager, offered to give the general talk, since it's the first time, and I gratefully accepted. As it turned out, most visitors were Spanish, but six were German, so he gave the talk in Spanish, and I did it in English for the Germans. Then Karl, the MAGIC site manager, was available, so he gave a talk in German, while Juan Carlos did it in Spanish, and I listened and learned.

In fact the hardest bit was the Galileo, translating the talk into English when I could only half hear it for the background noise. Fortunately I knew more than half of it anyway, so I managed.

And then I went off to the Mercator and Liverpool telescopes to educate myself. I came home feeling that my brain had been down the gym, but it was fun.

And now you'll have to excuse me. I have to do my homework. I'll never remember all that new stuff unless I write it down in my own words.

Still busy

I feel I'm crawling out from under an avalanche of paperwork.

I've sent off my son's passport application and collected his last Primary school report - and picked up a the official application for him to start High School. Now for the last seventeen years I've had plenty of practice speaking (mostly informal) Spanish, but very little practice writing it. And these forms are formal. My son even has to fill in a legal declaration that he hasn't got a High School place elsewhere. I've got most of the associated bits together, like photos, and proof of bank transfers for insurance and the parents' association, and the form for free textbooks. We've got a doctor's appointment to fill in the form to say he's healthy enough to go to school. I could see the sense in that in the days when TB was rife, but it seems a bit OTT these days. But we have to get one, so we'll go waste the doctor's time on Monday.

We handed in our tax return. I also went along and translated for a friend signing off self-employed teaching work over the summer. And we went to hand the next issue of Ruido at the printers. Only the printer's off sick, so I have to go back on Monday. And I did a pile of updates to the Ruido website.

I've given last year's teacher a copy of all the photos and videos my son took on the school trip.

And in the middle of all that, I had a guiding job. Not take-two-groups-round-a-telescope, but stay-with-the-group-from-11am-to-4pm. The Science Museum in Las Palmas held a competition, and the prize was this trip to the Roque. So I had to stay with the group all day but only do the actual guiding around the Herschel and maybe the MAGIC.

First we went around the MAGIC telescope, then the Herschel. Half way around the Herschel, we were joined by the Vice-Consul for tourism in the Canaries, and her driver. Then we went up to the Roque itself to admire the view (photos on the blog about La Palma).

We had a rather nice lunch. Coffee was rather spoiled by a skinny American woman who kept muttering "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!" like she owned the place, and generally acting like we were illegal immigrants because we were talking Spanish. In Spain. I ignored her, rather than make a scene, but I now wish I'd asked her when she bought the observatory, because I hadn't even heard it was up for sale. And then she started telling her companions that she really hoped Spain would lose the football. (They won. Yippee!) Altogether it was the worst display of bad manners that I've seen for about a year.

Then we forgot the silly woman and went up to the Swedish Solar Tower. To my alarm, the guide there didn't speak Spanish, so I had to translate, but it went OK. And we finished up with GranTeCan, which was spectacular as always.

All great fun, and presumably lucratuive, but very tiring.